Quote:
In regards to completed cars being in Australia, Pedr Davis in his book Spotlight on Mini Minor Downunder states "Australian protypes were running by June 1960 and this writer, Pedr Davis was commissioned by BMC Australia to drive one and make a confidential report on its sales prospects" - Page 7 and "June 1960: Australian - assembled protypes were running in Australia" - Page 13.
I would be fairly confident in the car that Davis drove being one of the three (or six?) complete cars that came from England for pre-approval, testing and evaluation. One of these went to WA, where it was taken around to dealerships to gain feedback, etc, and was later sold to the BMC rep who drove it around for this purpose (sold in December 1960, before the cars were even available new). We had a full history of this car (now owned by a Qld collector) in Issue 1 of TME.
Of the other two cars, which apparently were used for the same purpose in NSW, Vic and Qld (what about SA and Tas?) one was sold to Peter Manton for racing - see Issue 8 - but no trace of the other has turned up - yet.
3 or 6? According to BMIHT when I contacted them (in the days when they were helpful without always wanting money for answering questions) the car we featured in Issue 1 was one of six cars built in February 1960 and sold to Nuffield Exports. It is known that at least three of these came to Australia - the numerous ex-factory people I have spoken to can only recall there being three cars - but it is not clear if the other three cam to Australia or, more likely, went to other RHD markets, such as South Africa and New Zealand, where they were to be assembled.
However, in Ryno Verster's very detailed book on South African Mini production, he says the first pre-production prototype Mini arrived in South Africa in August 1959. "This was a prototype to assist with tooling for the first Mini to be built later that year...This prototype was registered in the Cape Town municipality as CA71..."
So, it is not likely that one of the six cars from Nuffiled Exports in February 1960 went to South Africa. It is also not likely that the other three cars were just for normal export sales - why such a small batch. You would expect a much large consignment than 6 cars, but then, not being privy to the goings on of Nuffield Exports, we have to accept that anything is possible.
The best I have been able to make out is that these three cars that came to Australia were the only complete cars imported from the UK by BMC Australia prior to assembly commencing here from CKD packs. Local content in the cars increased for a number of reasons - partly because of tarrif reductions on components imported if assembled locally with locally-sourced components, partly to meet changes deemed necessary for the cars to be more suitable for Australian conditions, and partly due to cost.
The Australian Government introduced its Motor Vehicle Plan for local content (often referred to as Plan A) in 1963, and as a result of this the decision was taken to press panels for Mini locally. It was a choice between manufacturing the body shells completely or the engines locally, and, although the factory was already doing both functions for a variety of cars, it was found that the body panels required less captial investment than doing the engines.
Some Mini/Morris 1100 engines were later assembled here from imported and local parts, but that would not be for some years.
So, getting back to these early cars, and the Pedr Davis connection - I think you can discount the idea that the car he tested for BMC was an Australian-built prototype. If they had Australian-built cars, even at prototype level, then the decision would already have been made to make them here. If he was requested to do a feasabilitly study for manufacture, then that decision had not been made - so it stands to reason it was one of the imported UK cars.
Just because he was involved at that level does not mean he was privy to everything going on in the factory, and I think his statement that pre-production prototypes were running around in June 1960 refers to the three UK cars.
These UK cars were also clearly production models, not UK pre-production prototypes as is often wrongly suggested, being manufactured in February 1960.
Cheers,
Watto.
a lot can happen in 40 years...
