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Austin-Healey to Austin Healey

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Michael Oritt

Michael Oritt

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Somewhere along the line--I believe it was during 3000 production--the badging changed from "Austin-Healey" to "Austin Healey".

I have heard one explanation that when the supplier mistakenly produced a great number of badges without the hyphen someone in accounting pounced upon the opportunity to get the part at a substantial discount, but I doubt the veracity of that story.

Does anyone know more about what caused our cars to be renamed?
 
No idea why, here are some versions;

1959_austin_healey_3000badge.jpgMkIIBJ7BadgeWithHyphen.jpgMkIIWithHyphen.JPGmkIII-front-badge.JPG

Picture 2 and 3 taken from SimonCars
 
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@healeyblue, now we are getting close !!

Another discussion here
 
BigGreen said:
@healeyblue, now we are getting close !!

Another discussion here
Click to expand...

Looks like there may not be a definitive change point. That thread shows a #208xxx car built in 8/62 without a hyphen and BJ7 22114, built 16-17 January 1963 with a hyphen. So it seems like the change came during BJ7 production. When the new hyphenless badges arrived, they were probably dumped into the bin with the old ones with the hyphen and whatever your car was badged with toward the end of BJ7 production was luck of the draw. It makes Michael's question a little more interesting as it appears that an affirmative decision was made to remove the hyphen sometime during BJ7 production that just wasn't an accident of the badge maker. Otherwise, they would have put the hyphen back for the Mk III cars (maybe the badges were cheaper without the hyphen). I think I'll check to see if AH advertising changed the use of the hyphen during this period. Meanwhile, it's my personal feeling the cars badged with the hyphen are much more valuable than those without. :devilgrin:
 
Well that's interesting. A quick look at brochures for the 100, 100-6, and 3000 on eBay shows the only use of a hyphen in "Austin-Healey" to be on the inside page of one of the 100 brochures. Everywhere else, in all the brochures, there's no hyphen anywhere. Another thought: Didn't all the truck (boot) lid badges including the Mk IIIs contain the "Austin-Healey" script with the hyphen?
 
Just had a quick look at the cover / front page of the Drivers Handbook and it look as if, for all models they use a hyphen
 
The partslists show badges without hyphens, drawings must have been made by "artists"

For the BN7 and BT7;

And for the BJ7 and BJ8;
 

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Like with so many other items, production went on even with temporary outages of inconsequential parts. For example, occasionally the union, Punctuation Fabricators & Parentheses Benders International, would go on strike and BMC reserves would dry up, but they kept sending cars down the line, even without the hyphen.

So far the parts suppliers have neglected to make an acceptable reproduction that will fit without an extraordinary degree of fiddling, and so good used originals remain in demand.
 
The hyphen was used quite variously from the very beginning. The very first brochure for the 100 omits it. Through the years, sometimes it was used in advertising, sometimes not. My BJ8 handbook uses it. Interestingly, Geoff Healey did not bother to use a hyphen anywhere in his first book, so it appears no one got too ruffled over it.
 
The hood badge of my '62 BT7 has the hypen, and I'm pretty sure it's original. Never noticed it before.
 
Patrick67BJ8 said:
What is your vin number?
Click to expand...

It's in the signature ;-)

My car had a chrome badge when I bought it (original car was MGBeige)
Delivered in the US, then back to the UK in 1989 and in the Netherlands since 2001

Back in the UK.jpg
 
Reid--

I knew that you would know.
 
Does anyone know the name of the "Austin-Healey" font ?
 
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