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Austin Healey 3000

The Austin Atlantic was the car designed to wow America, but with 90% of this model, the MK3, going to the States, I’d wager this was a big hit with Americans in a way that Austin could’ve only dreamed of for the lovely little Atlantic.

With 17,000 of these made and less than 10% staying in the UK, you might be forgiven for not having seen one recently. In fact, I’ve been led to believe this particular example is an American car which has had the steering switched to opposite side.

With this being an American car, I hunted down an American brochure for the MK3 to see what we got as standard, because sometimes countries vary in what they offer as standard or as a usual extra. Minis getting air con in Japan is a great example!

Anyway, advertised in the brochure for this model was:
- Vacuum servo assisted brakes
- Overdrive
- Heater and demister
- Wire wheels with knock on hubs
- Adjustable steering column
- Master switch on the battery
- Dunlop road speed tyres
- And bizarrely, wind screen washers

It doesn’t mention the twin carbs, but if you spot those as we go poking around under the bonnet, they’re standard. I believe these were updated for the MK2, which is partially why it has a bit more poke than the earlier cars, amongst other improvements.

It also boasts of a wraparound screen for max visibility - which is quite useful when you’ve got the hood up!

One of the many brochures for these says across the front ‘for going places, the best people choose Austin Healey’ and these are people who clearly expecting the wind beneath their wings because the car is advertised in some UK brochures as doing ‘over 100mph’ or in excess of and in American brochures capable of hitting 125mph.

Even your MK1 launched in 1959 was boasting of doing 0 to 60 in 11 seconds, so by this point in production it was under 10 seconds. A little like top speed, I’ve got 2 or 3 different figures, so to err on side of caution, we’ll say under 10 seconds!

The engine by the way is the six cylinder OHV 2912cc engine - which I’ll talk to you a little more about once we’re in the driving seat.

I should probably mention you’ll sometimes hear this referred to as the Big Healey and the reason for that is, is you also had your Austin Healey Sprite. I did a test of a later one of those earlier this year which you can find in my video listings if you fancy watching that afterwards.

The British Motor Corporation, in my opinion, slightly knocked the good fortune out the window from this car because it replaced it with the MGC rather than keeping the Austin name on a quality, sporting vehicle.

With competition wins and major races like Le Mans, great feedback from journalists and buyers alike; it seems slightly short sighted to replace a well regarded car with another sports car badged as something totally different.

But hey, who am I to knock it? The MGC is still a dream garage car, but for me, the 3000 is something special.