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Austin A-35 historic race-car project - - N. McCabe

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Recent progress and photos (2020-2021) on my Austin A35. Older photos of the car are lower on this page. All captions for each photo are BELOW that photo.

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~CLICK HERE for In-car video from race at Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix - 2021~.

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These above are before/after photos. I found the car semi-abandoned in a field in Ontario. After I figured out who the owner was, I drove almost 1000 miles in one day to pick it up.

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Some of my typical racing friends.

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Working on swapping carbs in Summit Point paddock.

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Human powered starting system (since resolved).

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This is at Lime Rock. The silver car on my left is a Ferrari 250 GT SWB Berlinetta. Worth high seven figures or low eight figures (in USD).

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On Pitt-Race grid.

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At Pitt-Race near Pittsburgh.

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In Pitt-Race paddock. The Datsun Z-car next to me belongs to my friend John. It used to be one of Paul Newman's team cars.

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At Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix (they close off public roads in a city park for this race).

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At Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix...held in the middle of the city of Pittsburgh.

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HS2 SU carbs. I have several sets. This set was plugged with muck and slides were frozen solid. It took several hours of hard work to clean them up and get everything working. This set is stock (not flowed) and will be used initially.

This is the "orange engine". A 1275 Midget engine with will be the normal engine for this car. It's recently refreshed with new bearings, a mild cam, light flywheel and 9.7 pistons.

This is the "red engine" which was recently refereshed. It is a stock and will serve as a spare engine to be used as needed.

A35 - front view.

This is my front tube shock setup, similar to the arrangment I have used on my race-Midget for over 20 years. Lever shocks remain in place since they serve as upper suspension arm, but they are diabled in terms of dampening.

This is trunk cut for fuel cell. I recently rebuilt rear axle and this gave me a bit more room to work.

Fuel cell in place.

Self-built panhard rod (left side). This is similar to the unit I built for my race-Midget over 20 years ago. No rear sway bar will be used. I have added some rear leaf springs to increase rear spring rate. I may add or remove some leafs after initial testing.

View of panhard rod on right side, where it is fixed to rear axle.

A35 front

Wilwood pedal setup with brake bias bar and hydraulic clutch cylinder.

Steering wheel and setup. This car was a LHD Canadian car. I converted it to RHD and deleted the orignal worm and roller.pitman-arm steering. I have converted it to a Sprite Mk 1 (Bugeye) rack and pinion unit.

This is the RHD Sprite rack and pinion coversion with weld in cross bar and flex joint. Engine seen in this photo is "junk" engine used to help with fitting of parts and determine clearances.

A high mount exhaust will tuck the exhaust pipe up into the chassis for better ground clearance.

A 3/4" front sway bar and mounts added.

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Comments and photos below are older, when I first got car and did some initial work.

I purchased my Austin A-35 in late 2008. I've been slowly working on since that time It's a '58 came with a 948 and smooth-case gearbox (just like a Bugeye/Frogeye). I gave away the gearbox to a friend restoring a Mk 1 Sprite. The 948 has been put in a street Midget that I saved from the junkyard so the "heart" of this A35 lives on! (I painted the Midget with a brush and it's slow as molasses but is great fun) I drove almost 1000 miles in one day to a place near Mosport, Ont. to collect the A35 (in a Ford Freestar front-wheel drive mini van pulling an 18' trailer). Much of the drive was through a lake-effect snow storm in the Syracuse, NY area. I followed a snow plow on Rt. 81 for over an hour. Special Thanks to JP Smit (from British Car Forum) for finding this on a Canadian Kijiji site (and offering to help me, if needed). I found others but they were too perfect and too dear to hack into a race car. This car is ideal for my purposes. I washed the car off at a coin-operated car wash in Ontario before crossing the US border (it's required by US law....I guess to keep out "Canadian germs"). The car-wash guy came over and shook my hand.....he loved the car and said that his Dad had one. Four French Canadian guys in a Beemer pulled up to me at a gas station and asked if it was for sale. The return to the US was a little worrisome because I wasn't quite sure what to expect. I had all my paperwork done properly (EPA form, DOT form, provincial ownership title filled out properly) and of course, my current passport. The US officer at the border gate was gruff and unfriendly, but I think that was just part of his act. He sat there silently staring at the car for over a minute before he barked that I should "proceed forward and then turn into the first bay on the right". Which I did. And the officer in the bay was great fun, talking about my "Mr Magoo" car, etc. The border stuff took about 30 minutes in all....it was no big deal (as long as your car is 25+ years old). And they didn't charge me import tax either (not that they forgot....the guard said it wasn't worth the effort). I've trial fitted a roll cage and done a fair amount of suspension work (tube shocks, panhard rod, new bushings, etc). It now has Sprite disks on front and has been converted to RHD with rack & pinion. There was some surface rust and a little "hanger rash" but it was very solid. Final color will be roughly similar to Speedwell Blue.

As it looked when it got home: