The late Ron Yates shared some of his information on these cars and had
another photo of them in the pits at Sebring , each car had a different
main colour over the white.In the Official History of America's Great
Sports Car Race in 1957 the cars are entered by Hambro and listed as ;
nos. 23 & 24 Ah 100/6 but no.25AH Special ???????Driven by Geitner /
Cuomo. I believe Healeys built the cars and often the US Distributor
paid the bills and received the publicity from racing
.
It is interesting that the following mix of official names and terms
were used;
Built by and owned by---- Donald Healey Motor Co. [ one of several
Healey companies]
Chassis plates were issued as---DHM.Co with a completely different
Chassis no.sequence.
Listed at races as Austin Healey----promotion purposes.
Entered by D.H.M.Co. or US Distributor
In Geoff Healey's book 'The Story of the Big Healey' the colour pages
between p.112 & 113 shows an Australian built car based on the
'streamliner' bodywork.This car was hand built by a very well known race
car builder who told me he drew the outline on the garage floor and wall
in chalk and then went straight to aluminium.
Also in the same book it states that the Ferrari engine was used at
Nassau and the six eng. refitted after. [p.131.] The claim was that the
car performed better with the Healey eng. [ more a comment on the
condition of the Ferrari eng. condition at that time and the claims of
'Italian' horsepower.
Intriuging and amazing what such a small race team and prototype builder
achieved.
Donald Healey Motor Co. was the fore-runner of the likes of Shelby and
his Cobras. Now did'nt old Carrol work for Donald ?? I have read that
Jonh Cooper sought Donald's opion as how to contract with Austin for the
Mini Cooper.
Your comments please
Joe
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