£ 28,000

1960 MGA Deluxe Coupe Sebring Replica - SOLD

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Description:

This car is in auction on THE MARKET by Bonhams website. The auction is LIVE now. The price shown is the lower estimate.

All bidding takes place on The Market (see photos for web address), plus you will find further text, over 90 photos/video fully illustrating the car and its service history, and the ability to ask questions directly to the seller. The text below is just a brief summary of our full description:

First registered in 1960 on foreign shores, this MG A ‘Deluxe’ coupé was repatriated from South Africa during 1990, and an extensive, no-expense-spared restoration, rebuild and customisation was commissioned by the then-owner, with a well-known marque specialist carrying out the work, with a view to emulating the Sebring ‘deluxe’ cars of 1960.

Those in the know will immediately stop whatever they’re doing and pay attention at this point, because the ‘deluxe’ model - displayed in inverted commas due to the fact it was never an official factory designation - was arguably the most desirable of all the OHV MG A specification.

Officially noted as the ‘Competition Suspension’ option, the main focus of the ‘Deluxe’ cars was far more than a mere tickle of the car’s suspension components. Technically speaking, these cars featured a near-complete Twin-Cam chassis, including the knock-off wheels, Dunlop disk brakes on all four wheels, separate brake master cylinders, a modified frame, and a slightly forward-set steering rack, all of which required a mildly altered ‘hybrid’ shell, and therefore was an option box that was ticked at considerable expense, making these cars very rare indeed.

Other ‘Deluxe’ options included the Competition Deluxe seats - which were correctly named in the options list - and often cars specified with the Competition Suspension were also fitted with a close-ratio gearbox, and sometimes a hardtop also.

In essence - when specified correctly - these ‘Deluxe’ cars took all the best bits from the Twin-Cam chassis, but mated it to the tried and tested OHV engine, which had proven itself time and again in competition and everyday use.

Back to the car in front of us, following its extensive strip-down and rebuild at the hands of Hampshire Sevens, the car has been near-continuously campaigned since the early 1990s, in the hands of just two ‘gentleman drivers’ and with an impressive degree of success.

Evocative names such as Spa Francorchamps, Castle Combe and championships such as the FISCAR, GTS Equipe and AMOC all feature in this wonderful coupés history folder, with numerous class wins and scoring a very impressive 2nd in class at Spa.

In more recent years, the car has benefitted from not only one but two extensive and exhaustive rebuilds (with the supporting documentation available to view below) and has been set up on a rolling road up to 8,400rpm, but is electronically limited to 6,800 with peak power setting in around 5,800rpm. Recorded as producing 129bhp at the rear wheels and 160bhp at the flywheel, the current engine setup has seen very little use, with only one light testing session and two race hours ‘on the clock’ following the most recent rebuild in 2019 by MG Motorsport.

Notably, the vendor states that the car handles “beautifully” and always has done, apparently, meaning there has never been any inclination to update or change the factory suspension setup.

Always admired within the paddock and out on the track, this wonderfully evocative Sebring recreation and proven itself time and again in competition, and is only being moved on due to the vendor wanting to switch to an Austin-Healey 100 for the 2022 season, as their ‘final hoorah’ before handing up their racing shoes.

For much more description and photos see THE MARKET by Bonhams website.

The vehicle can be viewed with as at The Market HQ, Abingdon.

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