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LeMans Conversion

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My 100 was converted to Lemans specs by the first owner in 1956-57 and he or someone apparently saw fit to attach an "M" to the 100 grill badge. I have seen fit not to remove it out of respect for historical misrepresentation.
 
If Micheal Oritt's correct that the "M" was installed on his car in ca1956 then this is the first piece of solid evidence that it might have been a (unlisted) part of the conversion kit.
 
To my knowledge the "M" was not supplied with the LeMans conversion kit. There have been several very original 100M's that did have the "M" attached to the 100 grill badge as you still read that the "M" was given out to special customers of DMH. That is apparently not completely correct per the above original cars. Did DMH give some special customers an "M" to go on their cars, I sure don't know but would guess certainly possible. Would assume that it became available as an after market type item shortly after the factory cars production run was over and conversion kits continued to be sold. I agree with Reid and would imagine Bill Meade of 100M Registry that only the factory cars should have the "M" attached.
Regards,
Mike Lewis
 
mk31755 said:
Reid;

was the "M" a part of the conversion kit?
Click to expand...

No. The "Le Mans Engine Modification Kit" was a collection of engine mods. It did not include the louvered bonnet or bonnet strap either.

In fact, the "M" attachment for the grille badge does not have a part number and was not sold. Many, but apparently not all, of the 640 100M models had it, and that is all. It's just something that the Donald Healey Motor Company had made and attached - most of the time - to the cars that were converted to 100M models.

It was not something that they gave only to special customers (my 100M had the "M" and it was just a car that was shipped to a USA distributor).

Fortunately or unfortunately someone made a reproduction of it many years ago, and so of course many people put them on cars that would never have had one originally. The quality of the reproductions varies; most are easy to spot if you know what an original looks like.

For more on this general subject I can also recommend https://www.britishcarforum.com/bcf/showthread.php?79916-What-is-(and-isn-t)-an-Austin-Healey-100M
 
AH100M said:
If Micheal Oritt's correct that the "M" was installed on his car in ca1956 then this is the first piece of solid evidence that it might have been a (unlisted) part of the conversion kit.
Click to expand...

Bill--

I have no way of knowing when the "M" was affixed to the grill and I am not saying it was put on the car when the car was converted to M specs in 1956 by the first owner who drove the car for a couple of years before garaging it in about 1960. For all I know it might have been affixed by the second owner (my seller) who purchased the car from the 1st fellow's estate in 1988 and ultimately had it restored in 1995 before selling it to me a few years later.

Whatever, since the car is clearly a BN1 it could not be passed off as an M to anyone with the slightest bit of Healey knowledge so I feel there is "no harm, no foul". Seeing as how it was there when I got the car there is where I feel it should stay.
 
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