Austin Healey Bugeye Sprites
The Austin Healey Bugeye Sprites were the first small sports cars that were truly made for the masses. While other manufacturers tried to make this claim, the low price of under $1500 proved the Sprite was the Sunday car for the working man.
When the Sprite was first conceived, its startling appearance was not planned. When the car was in the early stages of development back in 1956, it was going to appear as a normal car. The headlights were supposed to be retractable and it would have had a trunk lid.
This was marketed as the car a chap could keep in his bike shed. For this reason, many items and common features were omitted to reduce the cost of producing this car. The original excuse for not making the headlights pop down was it added too much weight to the car. At the extreme, an entire assemble might have weighed only 15 pounds for both lights, so cost was actually the real factor.
Other items that were omitted pointed to the cost cutting measures taken, like having no trunk lid. The excuse here was to give the car a more rigid frame. This is factual, but still just another excuse. Another omission is the doors without any exterior door handles. They did not know about aerodynamics back in 1957, so once again low cost. Since the car had no top that came with it from the factory, there was no need for exterior handles, but the top and side screens were optional.
All of these measures saved money on the production of the Bugeye which was passed down to the consumer. What was not realized back then was this car even saved the driver on their fuel bills. Unlike the other sports cars that had outstanding performance with fuel consumption of 6 to 10 mpg, the Sprite achieved 36 mpg and was still a blast to drive. In todays economy, a car that had mileage like this would be considered an economy car or suspect of being a hybrid.
The combination of low cost and light weight made this the ideal race car for the working man in the late 1950s and early 60s. This became evident when the British Motor Companys Competition Department started entering the Sprite in competitions around Europe and in America.
To help matters, several sports car magazines that tested this little car referred to it as a raceabout car. In its first year of competition, both Willy Cave and John Sprinzel won their respective classes in their Sprites at the Alpine rally.
This led to the development of the much improved Sebring Sprite. To handle the rigors of racing, this car was fitted with 4 wheel disc brakes and a larger 57 hp engine. Many of the special racing parts that were used in this car were made available to the public. This allowed many to have better performance on and off the track. There were even aftermarket manufacturers that offered superchargers.
In California, some racers went as far to dropping small block Chevy 350s in the car, and one even placed a Buick 6.6 L engine in one in 1960.
At the end of 1960, the sales of the car slowed down which was interpreted by the management at BMC that the car was losing favor with the public. This was the reason for the major overhaul of the car. The last Austin Healey Bugeye Sprites were produced in November of 1960, with Chassis number 50116 being the last car to roll of the production line.
When the Sprite was first conceived, its startling appearance was not planned. When the car was in the early stages of development back in 1956, it was going to appear as a normal car. The headlights were supposed to be retractable and it would have had a trunk lid.
This was marketed as the car a chap could keep in his bike shed. For this reason, many items and common features were omitted to reduce the cost of producing this car. The original excuse for not making the headlights pop down was it added too much weight to the car. At the extreme, an entire assemble might have weighed only 15 pounds for both lights, so cost was actually the real factor.
Other items that were omitted pointed to the cost cutting measures taken, like having no trunk lid. The excuse here was to give the car a more rigid frame. This is factual, but still just another excuse. Another omission is the doors without any exterior door handles. They did not know about aerodynamics back in 1957, so once again low cost. Since the car had no top that came with it from the factory, there was no need for exterior handles, but the top and side screens were optional.
All of these measures saved money on the production of the Bugeye which was passed down to the consumer. What was not realized back then was this car even saved the driver on their fuel bills. Unlike the other sports cars that had outstanding performance with fuel consumption of 6 to 10 mpg, the Sprite achieved 36 mpg and was still a blast to drive. In todays economy, a car that had mileage like this would be considered an economy car or suspect of being a hybrid.
The combination of low cost and light weight made this the ideal race car for the working man in the late 1950s and early 60s. This became evident when the British Motor Companys Competition Department started entering the Sprite in competitions around Europe and in America.
To help matters, several sports car magazines that tested this little car referred to it as a raceabout car. In its first year of competition, both Willy Cave and John Sprinzel won their respective classes in their Sprites at the Alpine rally.
This led to the development of the much improved Sebring Sprite. To handle the rigors of racing, this car was fitted with 4 wheel disc brakes and a larger 57 hp engine. Many of the special racing parts that were used in this car were made available to the public. This allowed many to have better performance on and off the track. There were even aftermarket manufacturers that offered superchargers.
In California, some racers went as far to dropping small block Chevy 350s in the car, and one even placed a Buick 6.6 L engine in one in 1960.
At the end of 1960, the sales of the car slowed down which was interpreted by the management at BMC that the car was losing favor with the public. This was the reason for the major overhaul of the car. The last Austin Healey Bugeye Sprites were produced in November of 1960, with Chassis number 50116 being the last car to roll of the production line.
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