I'm at work so I'm going from memory -
EX 182 was not just a car, it was 4 cars entered in the 1955 LeMans race.
Numbers 40, 41, 42 & 64. Originally intended to be entered as production cars
to promote the new MGA, they were entered in Prototype Class due to delays in
getting MGA production underway. 64 was a spare car which did get an entry
berth due to a scratched entry by another team. They were built on MGA frames
(a frame derived from the EX175 LeMans entry several years before) and had
all aluminum bodies with an undertray. Dick Jacobs badly crashed and burned
his car (42 if I remember correctly) at White House corner at almost exactly
the same time as the horrible accident when LeVegh's Mercedes launched off of
Macklin's Austin Healey into the crowd near the pits. There is a photograph
of the remains of Jacob's car in Bryan Moylan's "Works Rally Mechanic" book.
The remaining cars were refitted after LeMans for the Alpine Rally which
subsequently was canceled after another accident killed spectators in
Ireland. I don't know where any of the 3 surviving cars ended up - there may
be a reference to their current disposition in David Knowle's "MG-the Untold
Story" book.
EX 181 is still the fastest MG ever. "The Roaring Raindrop" achieved 254.91
mph at Bonneville with Phil Hill at the wheel in early October 1959. EX181 is
in the British Motor Industry Heritage at Gaydon today.
EX186 was built on an MGA frame but never did run at LeMans as it was
designed for. The Aspden book is inaccurate on a number of things and this is
one. There are photographs of the car in the Comps Dept. in a number of
recent MGA books. The car still exists and is in the US. Perhaps Greg Perigo
could comment as he published a letter from the owners in MG Magazine last
year. The car made an appearance at a NAMGAR GT a few years back at Indy
(before the '96 one) and I believe Barney Gaylord has some photographs he
took of it somewhere on his website.
The real "bible" on the prototypes, projects and comps cars is David Knowle's
"Untold Story" book. The complete EX project register (at least up to the
point that Rover revived the system by naming EX255 for the speed they needed
to break Hill's record and then retroactively named earlier cars back to
where the original register ended at EX252) is in the book as well as
exhaustive research which turned up numerous photos of cars and projects that
had languished in obscurity. Very interesting stuff.
Kim Tonry
Editor - MGB Driver-Journal of the North American MGB Register
Downers Grove, Illinois, U.S.A.
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