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Morris Motor Company was started in the 1920s and established a reputation for reliable family cars. In the 1950s, Morris merged with its old rival Austin to form British Motor Corp. Economic factors in the UK in the mid-1950s made the creation of “a proper miniature car” a priority, and BMC assigned a small team […]

Sir Alec Issigonis designed the Mini, which became one of the best selling cars in Europe and one of the most recognized cars ever produced. This car defined Issigonis’ philosophy “less is more.” Mini production started in August 1959 and was an instant success. This small British car originally came with an 850cc engine but

This 1969 Austin Mini has been updated to mid-1980 specification. Although Austin never produced an in-house cabriolet, several independent companies in England performed the conversions. The steel reinforcements welded to the bottom of the sills were intended to help increase the body strength, but the reality is there is still a lot of chassis flex.

This “car” was built from body parts taken from a 1975 Mini, skillfully “shrunken” to approximately 2/3 the size of a “real” Mini. The body is all steel, and the time to fabricate it was over 400 hours, or about 10 weeks of full-time labor! It is not fully complete, as one can see by

Introduced in 1972 and named after the Tipo 158 racing cars of 1939-1950, the Alfetta Saloon utilized a completely new drivetrain for production Alfa models. The front was fairly conventional with double wishbones and torsion bars, but the rear used a de Dion setup with a clutch, transaxle, and inboard disc brakes, providing excellent weight

The M422 “Mighty Mite” was built by AMC as a light weight truck for “vertical envelopment operations,” i.e. parachuting, for the U.S. marines. An aluminum body helps keep the weight down to 1,700 pounds. The truck came in three models: the M422, M422a1, and M422a2. The M422ai has a 71″ wheelbase. It is 80 pounds

This juvenile car is believed to be one of the nine L’Aiglon sport autos constructed for Chocolat Aiglon of Verviers, Belgium in 1939. The cars were given away by the chocolate factory as part of a promotional program to attract more customers to the company. Chocolat Aiglon was best known by Belgian youth for giving

In 1957, BMW brought out a 4-seater development of the Isetta. The 600 (named for its engine size), has two doors: the swing-up front door as on the Isetta, and a door on the right side for passengers. While it may be laughingly referred to as an “Isetta limousine,” the 600 took several steps to

Lawrie Bond designed his first three-wheeler in 1948. His most famous, the Bond Minicar, was the longest-lived and most successful of Britain’s minimal motoring cars. The replacement for the minicar was the Bond 875. It was first publicly announced in August 1965 and production began a year later. The 875 was a complete change for