anybody ever owned an austin healy sprite?

[rustrocket]

Like the title says.

 

Was it a good car? Any major issues? Parts/performance upgrade availability?

[veritech-z]

I suspect any ancient british car is going to be fun to work on (and by fun I mean frustrating, time consuming, and expensive). Do you know if those had that same crazy hydraulic suspension like the MG's had? My buddy's uncle is restoring an MGB GT, and it makes me glad that I'm not every time I see it.

[rustrocket]

I've already got a 68 triumph spitfire with a ka24de turbo going in there.

 

I think the hydraulic suspension you're talking about looks like this : They're called lever shocks, very interesting! And yes, it has them.

 

And also, i love the BGT!

[veritech-z]

Yeah that looks about right. The way this guy was describing it to me, it made it sound like the front left shared fluid with the back right, and vice versa, and there was some sort of valve in the center of the car that controlled the damping. He was going into detail about how he changed some o-ring that was not supposed to be serviceable on it, and it solved his crappy handling problem. Looking at that picture, it doesn't really look like that's at all how it works, but I've never messed with one in person...

[Mike kZ]

Here's a cool one!

http://kenvoss.com/

[Sparky]

my dad had one, and I used to work on them all the time. the electrics suck, gauges suck, rust is everywhere on those things. that said I like them alot and would love to have a bug eye sprite.

[Phantom]

Had a grilfriend in college that had a 1958 Morris Minor - basically a sprite with a sedan body. Had the same lever action hydraulic shocks, a 4-spd with a non-synchro first, a hand crank that inserted through the front bumper if you were brave - or stupid - enough to use it, and a 987cc 4-banger that had 37 HP. It had been fully restored - black naugahyde interior and candy-apple red paint. Sweet little car.

[OlderThanMe]

there is a guy down the street with one...he won't let it go. It has been sitting in his yard with the top down for over a decade. I wanted to buy it from him before I got my Z and he would not take $1500 for it...

[grumpyvette]

threres a thread somewhere showing a 426 HEMI powered sprite

 

http://www.ntahc.org/modifiedhealeys/Photos/126Marian/Marian.htm

[The Rototiller]

i have a 1966 austin healy sprite. its a great car. fun to drive and easy to work on (it really is) i have found that parts for the later models (non bugeye) are still easy to find. lots of aftermarket parts too. i plan on replacing the stock 50hp motor with a 200hp rotary monster. i have seen a few of these rotary sprite hybrids and they are becoming more and more common. oh and did i mention, they haul a$$

[alsil]

WOW that car is insane......

Talk about power to weight ratio!!!!!

[A. G. Olphart]

Later Sprites were basically the same as the MG Midget. I think they came from different doors of the same factory.

 

Anybody interested in one with a dead 13B rotary?

 

 

.

[mason4300]

Funny that you mention it, I actually sold mine a few months ago. It was in pretty rough condition, and I decided I wanted a Z. It would've been a cool car. Sold it for 100 bucks to some guy on Ebay, full of a ton of parts; deal of a lifetime for him. I got the thing for free, and I wanted it out of our driveway, and he had to pick it up, so it was a pretty sweet deal for me, too.

 

Oh, and that Hemi Sprite is frickin insane! I'd drive it.

[The Rototiller]

Funny that you mention it' date=' I actually sold mine a few months ago. It was in pretty rough condition, and I decided I wanted a Z. It [i']would've[/i] been a cool car. Sold it for 100 bucks to some guy on Ebay, full of a ton of parts; deal of a lifetime for him. I got the thing for free, and I wanted it out of our driveway, and he had to pick it up, so it was a pretty sweet deal for me, too.

 

Oh, and that Hemi Sprite is frickin insane! I'd drive it.

 

i saw that car on ebay....had wire wheels on it right?

[strotter]

I had one when I was in my late teens, a '69 (?), one of the midget-like ones. It was absolutely the worst piece of machinery I have every owned, but also probably the most fun. Had no hood, no top, everything was a mess.

 

True story: there were electrical problems from one end of the thing to the other. In particular, some of the lights would go on and off at random moments. I discovered that a sharp whack to the firewall would bring them back on when they quit. One night I found myself driving through San Andreas , on my way up the hill, when red lights came on behind me. I pulled over, and the officer told me one of my tail-lights was doing the "on again off again" thing. I told him "Oh, I now how to fix that!" at which point I pulled out my baseball bat, stood up in the seat, and smacked the firewall firmly. Light came on solid. He just looked at me for a moment, said "Have a nice night", and left. Sounds like it sucked, and it did such in any mechanical measure you can name: but I also recall, that same night, 7,000 feet on the Sonora pass, not another car within 30 miles, moonless night and there were so many stars the sky really *did* look like a Milky Way, the smell of the pine pitch and dew, the cool air blowing through my hair, hairpin after hairpin after hairpin the whole time Polaris swinging left, then right, then left, then right... There's nothing like a convertible, and there's especially nothing like an English convertible.

[Trevor]

Get on the mailing list for another Victoria British catalog from Lanexa, KS.

 

and MOSS,

 

and Motorheads.

[mason4300]

i saw that car on ebay....had wire wheels on it right?

 

mmm, nope. Mine had steel wheels.

[Pop N Wood]

I used to autoX against a bugeyed sprite with a turbo rotary motor. Absolutely phenomenal car. I once watched him do a complete 360 on an autoX track without hitting a cone. He still beat my time.

[Boobala]

I wonder if you need to stock up on Whitworth and/or British Standard (BS) wrenches, sockets, etc... to work on an old Austin?