This soon to be FIA race car will be wearing an Healey hardtop and side curtains. The Speedwell door handles added to these doors will make getting the doors open during a race a lot quicker and easier.
Tag Archives: Austin Healey
Competition Sebring
Thanks to everyone who stopped by yesterday for our competition Austin Healey Sprite event with the Iowa British Car Club.
After: 1960 Austin Healey 3000
The two seater BN7 is a beautiful car compared to the four seat BT7 and leaving the original bumpers off accentuates the great body lines.
Before: 1966 Austin Healey 3000 MkIII
Sometimes great looking cars don’t have great foundations. Although many might not tear apart a car that looks this good what we have now uncovered hiding under the paint and horrible previous body work shows it was a good decision.
Interior: 1960 Austin Healey 3000
The brown and biscuit interior is looking great with the Race Red exterior color. This BN7 has come a long way from the green it originally arrived in.
Painted: 1960 Austin Healey 3000
Although not an original shade this car looks great in modern Ford Race Red. The engine and transmission are already installed and the fun can begin on all of the many smaller jobs to complete it.
Almost Powered: 1960 Austin Healey 3000
The Healey is about the receive it’s 2,912 cc C-Series engine. A wheel swap to the knock off Minilite style wheels is planned before completion.
The C-Series
A customer had this 2,912 cc engine for his Austin Healey 3000 send over to us in a crate. The engines in the MG Midget and MGB are well known as the A-Series and B-Series but few are aware that these engines are the C-Series. Mostly used in the large sedans the Austin Healey 3000 and MG MGC were the only sports cars to use this large engine.
Adjustable 22
These extremely rare “Adjustable 22” Armstrong period correct externally adjustable lever arm shocks are being test fit to the Austin Healey Sprite which will be receiving the equally rare supercharged engine pictured earlier. Most have only seen examples of these in some of the original special tuning parts manuals.
Shorrock Charger
In the sixties if you wanted more power out of your Mini, Austin Healey Sprite, Austin A40 or Morris Minor the Shorrock and Judson superchargers were about the best as you can get. This very rare Shorrock supercharged A-Series engine is going into one of the FIA race car Austin Healey Sprites we are currently building.
Before: 1960 Austin Healey 3000
The BN7 model is a two seat six cylinder version of the 3000 as apposed to the BT7 which has four seats. This car has been painted at least once before and is currently in a non-original green color.
Paint Progress: 1965 MG Midget
The original Tartan Red color came out beautifully on the Midget. The wire wheels have been media blasted and powder coated the correct color with fresh set of Vredestein tires.
The Italian Austins
The Italian manufacturer Innocenti whom started producing cars in 1920 but is most famous for it’s Lambretta scooters of the 1940s to 70s started making their own versions of Austin’s best cars in the 1960s. Each of the cars on the right is the Innocenti version of the Austin car on the left. The Minis were still called Minis but the Sprites were called Spiders.
Before: 1959 Austin Healey Sprite
This Sprite arrived in typical fashion exactly as you see pictured here. The owner has decided to put on hold the 1958 Sprite we started and move the racing engine and suspension over to this car instead and then restore the other car to a more factory condition. This car has signs of being an old race car with the roll bar cut off near the mounts and when finished will be faster than ever.
1966 Austin-Healey 3000
This non-original Chevrolet color works beautifully on this Big Healey. With a small amount of work on the brakes and carburetors this car is ready for another year cruising the backroads.
Uncommon Dyno
We have had the DynoJet for just shy of a year now and by the end of the year it will have seen a fair share of interesting makes and models. The DynoJet is great for much more than just finding out how much power or torque a car makes. You can analyze the fuel to air mixture, ignition condition, finding leaks, engine break-in, and even aero dynamic effects on gearing.
Usually too Busy
With the fab shop shut down for the holiday it is a good time to share a glimpse of what we are doing in there. Media blasting, powder coating, metal forming, and welding all happen in this room. We stock around fifty colors of powder and will do from a single part for a walk-in customer to supply production parts for machine shops and manufacturers.
Before: 1958 Austin-Healey Sprite
This bugeye Sprite arrived yesterday from Arizona as a rolling shell. It doesn’t look like much yet but this might be one of the most exciting builds we have done. FIA Homologation is guiding the specifications and period construction.
1960 Austin Healey 3000
New kingpins installed and this gorgeous Healey with a great vintage patina can enjoy many more enjoyable miles on the road.
What is a sports car?
53 years later this Laguna Seca Boss 302 is bit bigger, a bit more powerful, and just as purpose built for fun.
