In reply to my original Bugeyes! posting, steve@europa.esd.sgi.com
(Loopy - the spineless boy) writes:
>>Now, for extra points, have you ever seen an Innocenti 950?
>Is this the Italian Mini? Or is this the Italian bodied Midget?
>Innocenti made both. Classic and Sports car had an article on the
>Innocenti Midget clone a couple of months back. In Hemmings of about
>the same time, there was an actual car for sale (around $4K). Sounds
>like a fun car.
Yep, it's the Italian Midget clone, though it wasn't that close a
clone, really. The banjo player in my highschool bluegrass band had
one for a short while, but the Marelli electrics drove him nutz, and he
sold it in favor of a Mercedes 190SL ....
...
and dstone@sc9.intel.com writes:
>>Now, for extra points, have you ever seen an Innocenti 950?
>Yup, sure have. There was one for sale here not too long ago, butt-ugly
>at $2400, I believe.
I have to admit amazement that there are any left; the combination of
Italian steel and low production numbers made these prime candidates
for the "nevermore" category.
But I guess there is one of everything, somewhere.
>The 4.55 rear also came in TD's & TC's didn't they ?
I don't know, and my meagre reference on MGs doesn't say. With the
TC's large diameter wheels, it might be a good choice, though.
>Where are you located ?
Atlanta, Georgia.
...
...and my posting must have provoked sfisher@Pa.dec.com no end, because
he was moved to drag out his reference books (and his are a lot better
than mine) and post a very informative run-down on some of the more
obscure Sprite variations. I'll only re-quote the questions he asked:
>>Bugeyes were raced at Le Mans in 1960 (says the text) or 1961 (says
>>the picture caption), though you would be hard-pressed to recognise them
>>as Bugeyes from their external appearance; they had special bodywork.
>>One of them was special from nose to tail and looks remarkably like
>>something Lotus might have built, albeit with covered headlights in the
>>wings.
>That's probably the Falcon-bodied Sprite. Is the windscreen abysmally
>large for such a small car? (Yet another reason to hate the French.)
No the windscreen is very much in proportion; it even looks smaller that
what looks like the stock one on the car behind it. Both cars in the
picture were prepared by Donald Healey Motor Company, according to the
book. The first car looks like a semi-fastback coupe from the 3/4 front
angle of the picture, the second car is harder to tell, but it looks
like a custom nose on an otherwise standard Bugeye body with a normal
hardtop.
>Okay, guys, I have actually *seen* a verified-by-Clausager factory
>Sebring Sprite, in original condition (terrible, actually, but it was
>thirty years gone). Here are the differences:
There's a "Sebring Sprite" that used to make the vintage races here at
Road Atlanta, and it's accepted as a real one. The owner seems to be a
class guy and I can't see him pulling a "fast one" .... It was wrecked
a couple of years ago, so I don't know what shape it is in now. I'll
look for it next weekend at the Walter Mitty.
...
By the way, when I posted the original message to
british-cars@hoosier.utah.edu
I got back quite a few postmaster/mailer-daemon "undeliverable"
messages of one kind or another, some of them with really strange "to:"
addresses. _After_ I deleted them all, it occurred to me that I ought
to report this so we can keep the address list clean ... I mistyped an
address some time back (maybe 3 weeks) and just got a message from some
mailer-daemon today that it had "cancelled my mail job" after making
some number of hundreds of tries to send my mail to "jimmy!whutt" ...
which is not even an anagram of any address I sent anything to. I hate
loading up the net (or someone's site) with a bunch of sludge.
-Shel
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