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Austin Healey prototype with Le mans kit sold at auction

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emgeetf said:
There is another dealer prepared 100 M Le mans on ebay for sale. listing price $ 104,000. It says dealer prepared Le mans and the delaer who did the work on the car is identified Chrysler ? They have a Heritage certificate for a BN 1 100/4 but a price close to a Le mans car
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We've seen this car for sale before. It's a very nice restoration with a few signs of aging, but badly misrepresented - in my opinion - with the same confusion and, some might say, deliberate mislabeling that is so much in vogue these days.

Trying to explain to people the difference between a 100M and a 100 with the Le Mans Engine Modification Kit so often runs into invincible ignorance that it gets pretty tiresome even trying.

The Chrysler they refer to is not a dealer. He was an individual Healey enthusiast - one of the best and most knowledgeable - who died of cancer in July 2012.

The BMIHT certificate indicates nothing but a standard BN1. Nothing Le Mansy about it.

By the way, both the Car No. plate (the VIN plate) and the engine number plate on this car are re-pops. It doesn't mean fraud, but it does mean you're a fool if you don't dig deeper and check everything very, very carefully. But of course we already know that it is not a 100M, so any premium a buyer elects to pay above the price for a completely standard 100 is only a reflection of the buyer's valuation of some Le Mans Kit parts and when, and by whom, that he convinces himself - with lots of help - were added to the car.

We should designate a new model of Healey 100: the 100CE, CE for Caveat Emptor.
 
Editor_Reid said:
We should designate a new model of Healey 100: the 100CE, CE for Caveat Emptor.
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One of the more brilliant suggestions that I have seen in a long time...
 
Editor_Reid said:
We've seen this car for sale before. It's a very nice restoration with a few signs of aging, but badly misrepresented - in my opinion - with the same confusion and, some might say, deliberate mislabeling that is so much in vogue these days.

Trying to explain to people the difference between a 100M and a 100 with the Le Mans Engine Modification Kit so often runs into invincible ignorance that it gets pretty tiresome even trying.

The Chrysler they refer to is not a dealer. He was an individual Healey enthusiast - one of the best and most knowledgeable - who died of cancer in July 2012.

The BMIHT certificate indicates nothing but a standard BN1. Nothing Le Mansy about it.

By the way, both the Car No. plate (the VIN plate) and the engine number plate on this car are re-pops. It doesn't mean fraud, but it does mean you're a fool if you don't dig deeper and check everything very, very carefully. But of course we already know that it is not a 100M, so any premium a buyer elects to pay above the price for a completely standard 100 is only a reflection of the buyer's valuation of some Le Mans Kit parts and when, and by whom, that he convinces himself - with lots of help - were added to the car.

We should designate a new model of Healey 100: the 100CE, CE for Caveat Emptor.
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That could be applied to all models!
 
HealeyRick said:
In my best "Are You Being Served" voice: "Glass of water for Mr. Trummel."
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Water?!?! Gin and tonic, please. Make it a double.

Yes, that one had already been called to my attention. With the increase in value/price of the 100M, a whole lot of people are trying to ride those coattails with their non-M Hundreds by claiming that (a) a car retrofitted with a few Le Mans kit bits makes it exactly the same spec as a factory 100M, and (b) the kit was installed at the Donald Healey Motor Company. This seems to be the favored formula.

It's shameful and shameless. I'm still predicting that with all of this obfuscation, a crash in real 100M prices is likely. Those who own the real thing should be the most concerned.
 
Certainly faking has been going on for years, such as taking a Mustang and tarting it up to look like a Boss, but the 100M and Le Mans Kit obfuscation seems unique in the automotive world. It strikes me that the existence of the Le Mans kit in period (indeed, predating the 100M) makes for a unique opportunity for scammers. Since they were bolt-ons originally, and developed by DHMC, it is so easy to fake and then write some creative ad copy. Is anyone aware of a similar set of circumstances? Again, it seems unique to me.
 
The muscle car world has been rife with fakes. Tempests being turned into GTOs and all kind of swapped Hemi cars being touted as factory originals.. The lack of VIN #s stamped into the chassis makes fakery a lot easier with the Healeys. Added to that was until the 1980s when John Wheatley and Bill Wood started researching the factory records, there was no way to establish by documents which cars were converted at The Cape. If memory serves, the terms LeMans and 100M at that time were used pretty much interchangeably, even amongst most Healey folks. We now have a firm understanding that an "M" is one of the 640 documented cars and a LeMans is everything else with the LeMans kit, but it wasn't always that clear.
The story goes that shotgun requests were going into British Motor Institute Heritage Trust for BN2s, looking for cars that were factory "M"s so that ghost cars could be created with repro'ed chassis plates. The story also goes there was an "M" in the States and another in Oz, both with the same chassis number. Then again, it's nothing new. In VT, it's illegal to paint a horse. Probably didn't want anyone painting their slow grey one to look like a fast black one.
 
I discussed this "100M" conversion with Craig @ Healey Werks (along with a few others apparently) and he did pulled the listing and re-listed making it very, very clear that this car is not a factory built 100M and is a CONVERSION. Thanks Craig.

Craig does know his Healeys and feels that the Le Mans bits are very authentic and have been on the car a long time. The build date does put in in a period that the DHMC was converting some BN1's to Le Mans spec so it is entirely possible that this may be one of the DHMC built BN1's "with Le Mans Modifications". Unfortunately there is no documentation to prove one way or the other. We agreed to disagree on the use of "100M" in the heading but I feel that Craig is way above board on his listing.

BTW, if anyone is seriously looking at a Florida Green/OEW 100M (@ $249,900!!!) being sold by Classic Cars For Sale in the UK, please do your homework and contact the appropriate Registries.
 
The one offered by Houtkamp in The Netherlands is sold to France
 
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