Last BJ8 in the US?

[glemon]

Interesting sale/description. No knowledge or financial interest. Is this one in the registry? https://www.ebay.com/itm/1967-Austi...7b853849:g:TQoAAOSw4CFYqk~F&item=182460954697

 

[BJ8Healeys]

The description is correct (I believe it came from me to an to an agent for an earlier owner) that 43020 was the last left-hand drive car built, but by chassis number, not by build date. It was not the "Last BJ8 in the US" if that means the last one from the factory to the US. There were six more chassis numbers (43021 through 43026) and all were right-hand drive cars for the UK Home market. 43020 was also the highest chassis number built that was BRG.
This car has an interesting, although tragic, history. Its previous owner killed his girlfriend and then committed suicide.

BTW: the BJ8 Registry is only 6 cars short of having documented a full 50% of the total BJ8s built (8,856 of 17,712). I know there are some folks on the forum who are BJ8 owners but who have not checked in with the registry. You should give me a chance to tell you why you should before you decide it isn't worth your while to contribute the details of your car.

 

[Marvin Gruber]

Steve,
Did you have any thing on the one I sent you numbers on yesterday?
Marv

 

[BJ8Healeys]

Steve,
Did you have any thing on the one I sent you numbers on yesterday?
Marv

Marv, 40724 was a new one to the registry. Thank you very much for the information.

 

[Bob McElwee]

Steve, 5 to go! Good Luck.

 

[catfood]

the BJ8 Registry is only 6 cars short of having documented a full 50% of the total BJ8s built (8,856 of 17,712)

Wow thats pretty impressive. Any idea how many of those still exist?

 

[BJ8Healeys]

Wow thats pretty impressive. Any idea how many of those still exist?

I'm glad you asked that question because the answer is more complicated than one might imagine at first thought. I will enter a car into the registry (more properly termed now as a database) if there is ANY information about it that can be identified to a VIN. So, there are thousands of cars recorded from BMIHT data for which no former or current owner is identified. Those may or may not still exist. There are currently 76 chassis numbers known or verified to me that they no longer exist due to donating their parts, being damaged beyond salvage, sent to the junkyard, etc.
Some cars have been entered based on information that is historical, such as (for example) from a list of all Healeys registered in North Carolina in 1975, since those owners are identified by name and address and it is a part of the history of the cars. I have been fortunate to acquire many such records from many different states over the last 20 years. No way to tell which of those still exist or do not unless a more recent owner is recorded.
I could give a more accurate answer than that, but it would require a rather labor- and time-consuming effort to manually sort the cars with owners and those without. I would say there is a surprising number of original production that have survived with current or fairly recent owners noted.