For the un-initiated, the Newbury Sort-Out is a large auto-jumble, predominantly Land Rover based, held at the Newbury showground in Berkshire in April and October of each year.

It was originally held at Old Sodbury in Somerset, with two events dedicated to Land Rovers and two for vintage agricultural equipment. Known as ‘The Sodbury Sort-Out’, it became somewhat of a Mecca for the enthusiast and restorer searching for rare parts, or just spares at a fraction of the retail price.

As popularity grew, the event outgrew the Sodbury site, and events moved to Newbury about ten years ago. Everything carried on in the same format, growing slowly each year and, shortly after, a Northern Sort-Out was started in Newark, by the same organisers.

This continued until a couple of years ago, when organiser ‘The Old Sod’ cancelled the last Newbury event and began running the Sort-Out as part of the long established Beaulieu vintage auto-jumble. New organisers have amalgamated vintage and Land Rover sort-outs at Newbury, but otherwise the format is the same as ever.

I have attended most of the Land Rover sort-outs since the last held at Old Sodbury, usually as a trader, to get rid of unwanted bits, not have to carry purchases as far and get in before the buyers’ Land Rover traffic jam.

This year, as always, I managed to get rid of most of the things I took to sell, although there was more interest in the mounting pile of bits I had just bought! This was the first event I had attended under the new organisers, choosing this over the Beauliau sort-out as it is slightly nearer and seems become the larger of the two.

I set off fairly early in my Series 2A with equipped with some things to sell, roof bars (in case of large purchases) and Ivan Brown (to deal with the awkward customers!). We had soon arrived and set up, made bacon sandwiches (forgot the tea bags!) and started filling the back of the Land Rover with ‘useful’ purchases.

Looking around, the event seemed to be almost as big as it had become under the previous organisers, with a prevalence of Land Rover stalls, but slightly disappointing vintage turnout. By the end of the day the 88” was full to the roof and nearly sat on the bump stops, with very few parts not crossed off the list.

All in all a successful and interesting day, and I would recommend it to anyone looking to buy  or sell parts, or  just to see some interesting vehicles and chat with like-minded enthusiasts.