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What car is this?


Mr Camouflage

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Nothing MG about that car or midget about those boobies! That is an Austin Healy Sprite Mk II. My guess pre1965 depending on the engine size. The first of the "square bodies" came with the same 997cc engine of the Mk I "frog-eye" and are easily spotted by the way the top fastens to the rear deck. I recall they had side curtains, but I may be wrong about that. There was an 1100cc version of this car before the Mk III was introduced with the popular 1275cc engine in 1967, I believe. The Mk III rear deck had a lip for a perminent fastening of the top along the rear edge. A marked improvement as it made the top weather-proof with the addition of roll-up windows and swing-out vents. The 1275cc engine gave the car the real oomph it needed, although it was cast-iron block and head - pushrod overhead valve. It ran twin SU carburetors - smaller than the Z Hitachis, but the same.

Healy Racing constructed five or so of the MkIII unibody shells in aluminum and campaigned a racing effort at LeMans and Sebring - probably more I'm not aware of. A three-woman team (Donna-Mae Mims?) was entered by the Ring-Free Oil sponsored team in....I don't remember. The "Sebring Sprite" chassis was made in both coupe and roadster form. The coupes raced at Sebring. I have driven a roadster. They were equipped with Lucas fuel-injected 1275cc engines and five speed transmissions derived from the MGB gearbox. Solid rear axle...lever arm shocks...four-wheel disks.

I used to be a sprite freak. Here I am in 1973.

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Chris,

Your telling on yourself now! At least you were driving an RWA (round wheel arch) Midget which is much prettier than the square wheel arched Midgets. Apparently, the body structure was deemed more crash resitant with the square wheel arch and it made its ugly return to finish out the series. I think they really became horrible when the rubber bumpers were affixed to the body shell much the same way that the 280Z ended up.

Funny thing is I now kind of appreciate their ugliness. A friend of mine and I have acompetition going to see who kind find the ugliest Datsun (L-series powered) and we hit a new high (low) point last week when a 610 wagon was for sale on ebay but I digress.

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