History
I had recently passed my driving test and dad was getting a little fed up of me borrowing his car (kept saying something about a place where petrol went in).
Dad had a small win on the football pools and asked a friend of his who regularly attended vehicle auctions to keep an eye out for a cheap car for me. One night the phone rang and it was dad's friend he said he had his eye on a car at the auction but was not sure if dad would want it for me. Dad was out and when his friend said it was a Healy I said yes buy it (visions of a Healy 3000). I told dad about it as soon as he got home but there were no mobile phones back then so dad had no way of contacting his mate.
Next day dad's mate turned up with the car as pictured it was a special based on the Riley 2.5litre. The body was all hand formed aluminium the cylinder head was alloy the exhaust was huge and very loud. The car had suicide doors and in the boot was a spare gear box which I was informed was close ratio and a complete set of racing slicks.
There were rear seats which were set higher than the fronts so the passengers could see over the heads of the people in front. The dash and door trims were a really nice mahogany but there was a hook and eye set up on each door connecting to the dash which I removed but soon replaced when the doors flew open going over a humpback bridge. The car had no syncromesh so all gear changes were double declutch. The electric fuel pump had an annoying habit of jamming every now and again requiring a tap to get it going again so I made up a bracket to hold the jack handle across the top of the pump which rattled around while driving the fuel pump never stopped again. There was a box full of magazines from the Healy owners club in the car and the original log book which contained the name Donald Healy. There were no visible badges on the car and people would always try to guess what it was most thought it was an early Jaguar.
The fastest I ever drove it read just under 110MPH on the speedo. Unfortunately the insurance companies in England did not think much of the idea of an 18yr old driving such a high performance vehicle and the insurance premium was almost 5 times what dad had paid for the car so it had to go. There is always one car you wish you could have back this is mine. I have no pictures of my car unfortunately and have used the Riley for illustration purposes only. I have only ever seen one reference to this car in a book in a second hand book shop in Adelaide I did not buy it at the time and when I went back it was gone however I keep looking.
