Background
The MGA is the prettiest mass market sports car of the 20th century. Contentious? Well, owners of early Austin Healeys might argue, but we’d counter that the 100, fine looking machine though it surely is, is a handsome beast, not a pretty one. Then there’s the odd Alfa Spider fan who might protest (Alfa owners need to be odd to withstand the stress of listening to their cars rusting at night). But we’re sticking by our statement.
The lithe looking MGA replaced the positively old fashioned looking MG TF in 1955. The American love affair with the marque had flourished when the UK’s post WW2 export drive had shipped thousands of MG TCs across the Atlantic, and the tax incentives to export remained in place in the mid 1950s, so the Abingdon factory needed a new model in order to survive.
Despite its old fashioned looks the MG TD of 1950 was a fairly advanced sports car. It had an independent front suspension with coil springs, rack and pinion steering, and a 1250cc OHV engine producing 57bhp at 5500 rpm.
This was the basis on which MG’s Chief Designer, Syd Enver, built a streamlined body for the 1951 Le Mans 24 Hours race. This car was given project designation EX176 and is typically referred to by its registration number UMG 400.
The Le Mans car proved to be so inspiring that two new chassis were created for a prototype future production car to replace the rather outdated MG TF, and one of those was developed into a full road-registered test car.
The new chassis lowered the driver’s seating position from the upright TF, something that was necessary for the streamlined Le Mans car, to improve the car’s aerodynamics and lower the centre of gravity.
The new chassis had its side members placed further apart so the driver’s seat could sit between them, and thus sit much lower. This meant that the cockpit floor was attached to the bottom of the chassis members instead of on top of them as in the TF.
The new prototype was at least as gorgeous as the 1952 Austin-Healey 100/4 but with the Morris merger with Austin to form BMC in that year, and the new corporation’s desire to push ahead with the Healey, there was now a very real chance the MG marque would disappear altogether.
However, with MG TF sales rapidly tailing off BMC realised it was losing a vital revenue stream, so sanctioned development of the new car, to be known as the MGA – so called because it was the first of a new modern post-war breed of MG.
The new car did have features that originated from the Austin merger however. The MG T series XPAG engine was done away with and instead the MGA was fitted with an Austin B series inline four cylinder of 1489cc capacity breathing through twin SU H4 carbs and producing 68bhp.
Tweaks bumped this to 72bhp fairly soon after production started. This engine was the same as the one used in the badge engineered Wolseley derived MG Magnette saloon, with which the MGA shared many common parts.
The front suspension was independent with wishbones and coil springs at the front and a traditional semi-elliptic leaf springs with live axle at the rear. The steering was by rack and pinion, much preferred by sports car enthusiasts, just as had been used on the MG T series cars: brakes were Lockheed drums front and rear.
So the end result was an aerodynamic car with head turning modern looks and subtle engineering improvements that was just as much fun to drive as its predecessors – it looked completely new but it drove like an improved real MG.
The car made its debut in 1955 and was priced at £844 with taxes included. The first production cars were made as roadsters with the option of a detachable hard top. However BMC quickly also introduced a fixed head coupé complete with wind-up windows and good weatherproofing.
To make the MGA’s debut an event sports car enthusiasts would sit up and take notice of, BMC built four cars for the 1955 Le Mans 24 Hours. This group of cars were given the company designation EX182, and three competed in the race with one crashing and the other two finishing in 12th and 17th places.
That success was however clouded by the accident at the 1955 Le Mans which led to horrendous casualties when a car crashed at the end of the high speed Mulsanne Straight sending parts of the car including its engine and transmission hurtling through a spectator grandstand.
Prior to this in August and September of 1954 a specially prepared streamlined record breaking car, EX179 was created and taken to Bonneville Salt Flats in the United States for a crack at a number of speed records. This car took no less than seven international records and 24 American National Class F records, including a 12 hour and others between 250km and 200km.
A total of 101,000 MGAs were built, with the vast majority going for export, while us poor old Brits got fewer than 6000 of them, before the car was replaced by the MGB in 1962.
