First Right Hand Drive Austin Healey
The first right hand drive Austin Healey, ever produced, NUE 854, made its first visit to Bill Rawles Classic Cars workshop in August 2013. We spent time with the then owner and provided a vehicle valuation.
First Right Hand Drive Austin Healey – NUE 854
First Right Hand Drive Road Austin Healey ever produced visits the workshop
In November 2013 Coys of Kensington produced a sales spec and it is reported that Chris Routledge, Managing Partner of Coys, said: “This car is arguably the most significant Austin Healey to be offered on the open market this decade. It is a unique opportunity to inherit a competition car rallied by a true legend like Betty Haig.”
The car went to auction in December 2013 and only a few weeks ago we were pleased to have another visit from this vehicle and meet its new owner.
NUE 854 the First RHD Austin Healey has a brass plaque on the dashboard
This Austin Healey is a unique car as it is one of the twenty pre-production cars, which were made at “The Works”, in Warwick and the car’s body number identifies that it was the sixteenth built by Healey’s subcontractors, Jensen Motors. Unfortunately around half of them have disappeared. One explanation that has been offered is that some of these cars were unregistered to avoid purchase tax, on the understanding that they would be scrapped once they were finished with. Apparently the ninth car was scrapped in 1955 having been used as a test car at MIRA.
Carrying out an inspection on our ramps on the first right hand drive road Austin Healey
At first glance a pre-production car looks like an early BN1 but closer examination shows over 40 variations between these models from Warwick and the production BN1s completed at Longbridge. In Bill Emerson’s book A Complete History of The Healey Marque it is noted that one easily recognisable difference on the pre-production versions was an adjustable steering wheel with a large boss and well-defined finger grooves. Not as obvious was the pre-production radiator with a hole at the bottom to allow the insertion of a starting crank. These features were apparent on NUE 854 and were quite exciting to see. Putting the car on one of our hydraulic ramps enabled a full and thorough inspection to be carried out for these differences to be seen.
in 1954 Betty Haig & Enid Riddell competed in the 25th Jubilee Paris-St Raphael Rally
In 1953, the Austin Healey 100 was one of the few production cars with a top speed similar to the other supercars of the day. The first owner of this car was Betty Haig. Betty Haig was born in 1906 and learnt to drive at an early age, owning her own car at just 16 years old. Throughout her life she obviously had a love of cars and motorsport, competing in many events. In 1953, three weeks after buying NUE 854 Betty Haig drove the car at the Great Auclum speed trials, in March 1954 she raced the car with Enid Ridell on the 25th Paris to St Raphael Rally, achieving first in the over 2 litre class and finished seventh overall.
Although Bill Rawles has been personally involved with classic cars, especially Austin Healeys for over 30 years having set up and sold Rawles Motorsport in 2007 and then re-establishing himself as Bill Rawles Classic Cars, it is always a great pleasure and exciting to meet new people, new cars and to be continuously learning and finding out about the history of these vehicles. A previous owner of NUE 854 created a website www.firsthealey.co.uk, which is very informative and a good source of further facts, figures and history about this unique first right hand drive Austin Healey – NUE 854
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnvOsuoSi4o