Hi from another newbie

[Stumpjumper]

Hi all. I'm in South Australia where I have an architecture practice. As an architect, I can get away with driving eccentric (even cheap!) cars and other transport. I currently drive a 1984 Mercedes W123 sedan or a 1954 Austin Healey 100/4, ride a Yamaha AG175 motorbike and I ride either a 1973 Raleigh Sprint, a 1999 Shogun Trail Breaker or my latest wheeled acquisition, a stately 1958 Raleigh Sports.

I have yet to scrub her up. I won't be repainting, just cleaning and polishing.

Here she is:

and here, despite the sacrilege here of four wheels, is my Healey. I think they're a good match.

All comments on the Raleigh Sports welcome. I'd like to put together a dossier on the bike. It's all original and complete, I think, except for a missing rubber cap on the battery container.

 

[tintin40]

Hi. That is one hell of a tasty car Just class

 

[Stumpjumper]

Oh yes. She's one of my pride and joys. It's a tasty location too - the Great Ocean Road in Victoria, Australia. Very hard to take a bad photo there. ...some say Heaven is driving a Healey forever on the GOR...

That line at the front of the door is a line of dust. Somehow the airflows through the car (and I mean 'through') resulted in that line of dust always appearing there on unsealed roads.

I've resisted the temptation to put wire wheels on the Healey. Those perforated steel rims are the original ones, and I think they are more in keeping with the vaguely deco look of the car. The windscreen is in the 'low' position, btw; a unique feature of the Austin Healey 100/4.

 

[tintin40]

Don't change any thing. Just perfect as it is. Maybe a bikini totty in the picture to

 

[Stumpjumper]

I had a totty on that trip too - no bikini though, and shy. As I said, I know it's a bike forum, but I can't help myself...

The 100/4 that was sold to the public was pretty much the same car Healey's ran at Le Mans that year (with tragic results - google Macklin Healey Le Mans).

It's a serious machine - the fat (for the era) 15" tyres give it away. Under the bonnet is a thumping three litre four propelling less than 1000kg through an overdrive gearbox. 0-100kmh in around 10 seconds in road trim in 1954. Compare it with MG's best effort that year, the MG TF - 0-100 in 19 seconds.