question about a 1962 Triumph Spitfire...

I do not know where to ask about this type of car and figured someone here has to know something about them.

I can pick up a decent 1962 Triumph Spitfire for 300 bucks. It runs, is straight, but needs some loving.

The wife has wanted a small sporty convertable for quite a while and I showed her a pic of one that is fixed up. she said...that is nice too bad we can not afford something like that. hehe...so...the wife is on board and likes it.

I am just curious what any of you know about these cars...how hard are parts to get?

 

Sounds cheap enough, parts are readily available.

Check out Victoria British Ltd

and Triumph Moto is a pretty cool place to ask questions too...

 

first thought that went through my head was I could put a 327 sbc in it! but I am not a fab person...

 

Pretty decent cars. Trying to think where to get parts. You might post over here, http://www.minimania.com/msgthreads.cfm. And try this, http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=triumph+spitfire+parts&ei=utf-8&fr=b1ie7 I like British cars, can't go wrong for $300.00

 

I had a 78. Fun car, but they are useless on the Hwy without overdrive. If I had kept mine I wanted to swap a Buick 215 and make a poor mans Cobra! There's some good forums-www.totallytriumph.net is one I used to frequent.
Todd

 

I had a '63 a long, long time ago. The tilt front end always made me want to put something else in the engine compartment, but the puke drivetrain won't take anything much bigger than the 4-banger. The rear axle setup is particularly bogus, makes a Corvair suspension look sophisticated. If you were a fab guy, you could make a smokin' fun set of wheels, but if your stuck leaving it stock, it's a commuter car at best (and not a very reliable one).

 

My first car was a 62 Triumph Saloon Coupe. Butt ugly but fun to drive as long as you didn't want to go too fast. The guy down the street had a later Spitfire. He told me that the main weak point in Triumphs of that era was the rather flimsy front suspension. Other than that, maybe a quad 4 or a warmed up Ford 2.5 would probably make it come to life without butchering it too badly. Or maybe one of the Brit's could come up with something better for an upgrade.

 

basically I am looking for a fun car for the wife to have to goof off in. Being small, convertable, stick shift it fits what she needs. For me what I get out of it is when her current lease is up we do not have to get another car. At that point we will be car payment free!

 

get familiar with the car or find someone who is.....they aren't to reliable and you'll want to punch yourself in the balls when you have an electrical problem. i hate to admit it but i've worked on a few mg's over the years (and jags) and they can be no fun sometimes........

 

Go to: http://www.british-cars.co.uk/

I belong to the MG forum...I imagine the Triumph one will be just as good/informative.

 

Get a roached out Triumph GT6 and put the 6 cylinder engine,trans and rear end in the Spitfire and you'll have a car that Triumph should have built in the first place!

 

OK, so I'm a Triumph nut!

I drive a 1978 sedan every day of the week, and it's as reliable as any 30 year old car can be. IT also turns heads and is a lot of fun to drive.

The Spitfire should be a lot of fun for your missus too, and for $300 you probably can't go wrong! They do take an engine swap, I've seen them with 2L Fords (Pinto) Fiat, and other 4 bangers, even racing ones with the 2500cc six that's in my car, and yes, the 215 alloy V8, but I'm sure they've had diff swaps for these big engines.

For information and parts try...

http://www.canleyclassics.com/

Or for a club website that caters worldwide, try...

http://www.triumphowners.com/index.cgi

Good luck, Glen.

 

I drove british for years, and they are great if you can work on them.
Lots of idiosyncrasies!
I wouldn't turn my wife loose in one, unless it was 100%.
My wife has a fun little convertable, A Miata.
As fun as a MGB and as reliable as a Honda.

I still wouldn't mind a spit with a 3.8 Buick, T5 and a Miata Torsen diff.

 

I've seen that done, but the Chassis is pretty useless for a SBC Swap, IMO.

It curves in, close to the tranny & driveshaft, and those are a lot smaller than the Chevy parts.

On the one I saw the Chassis had been cut and shut so much it was basicly a piece of angle iron in places.

The Stock rear Suspension is Swingarm ( kinda like early Bug ), which they beefed up with Mazda(?) parts because they read about that in Grassroots Motorsports Magazine.
( but the changes looked like they would increase the Camber changes which are already a lot with these cars...)

I hope they never finished the thing, or if they did, started over with a stronger Frame and better Suspension....

 

Here's a couple of sites you may be interested in: The Grassroots forum has a bunch of Brit car guys that can answer any of your questions. http://www.grassrootsmotorsports.com/ And this site will wet your appetite for a motor swap: http://www.britishv8.org/

 

I remember a friend having one and having constant problems with those goofy swing axles out back. He finally sold it when the Southeast Texas supply of junkyards axles dried up.

 

A puny little 327?

 

Be nice to the stock engine and it will hold up ok.

I have a 1969 MG Midget and a 1952 Morris Oxford.

My buddy has a Spitfire and the built 1380 in my midget walks all over his built 1500. He's told me the crank in the Spitfire might as well be made of spun sugar.

I've always loved the look of the Sptifire, I think a 302 would be the trick in one of them. There are a few rotary powered spits around as well.

As for people bitching about electrics. Show me a 40 year-old car that DOESN'T have a gremlin or two.

If you want electrical trouble, buy an Italian car. I had a Fiat 850 Spider for a while, Lucas is a cakewalk compared to Marelli.

Shawn

 

I had a 62 Sprite. There were differences, but one thing about both cars was the same. If you add horsepower, things will start to break. I had mine putting out enough horsepower to bury TRs, but I was always breaking rear ends, axles, and transmissions. That was in 1963 when parts were dirt cheap.
They are a lot of fun and very reliable when left stock. An above poster mentioned the achilles heal, the electrical system. There is a good reason why they call Lucas the prince of darkness. There are many times that I had to pull the distributor cap and throw it in the oven to dry it out ( during monsoon season). I don't know if WD-40 would have worked to dry the system. Does it have the twin SU carbs? If so, buy a Unisyn, it is used to help synchronize the carbs. After a while, you'll get so good at it that you will be able to do it by ear.
You can't go wrong at $300.
Bob

 

Certainley can......best upgrade I can think of would involve a junkyard crusher....

Truely horrid vehicle in pre-MkIV guise.

I have to agree with the comment about that once the MKIV came out in 1970 with the changed rear axle layout similar to the GT6 they should have fitted the GT6 six cyl and mechanicals into the Spitfire, but by then the car was already outdated, even though it stayed in production for another 10 years......!!

The car does have a claim to fame in that it was pretty much responsible for the introduction of the phrase back in the 1970's of 'Hairdressers car'......

 

A '62 Spitfire (properly called a Spitfire 4 just to confuse matters) is gonna be quite a rare car these days, they were only made for two years and they only made 45,000 of them and most are long since dead and buried. I've only seen a few over the years.. Theyre becoming quite collectable so I'd be tempted to say if its a good one don't chop it up.

I had a 1969 MKIII spit as a first car, and later on a '75 1500, dead easy to work on, parts supply is great with virtually everything still available apart from some of the early trim.

If you want to improve it then the 1300cc engine is a better engine to tune than the later 1500 which was basically a stroked out 1300 and doesn't like to rev. My advice is to just build a nice balanced 1300 engine with a cam/head/ignition/headers/Exhaust upgrade and enjoy it as triumph meant it to be enjoyed.

The Triumph Sports Six club is the main owners club in the UK and it has some good info, here's their website. http://www.tssc.org.uk/spitfire.asp-article=modelrange.xml.htm

 

The early Spitfires are great little cars.. easy to work on, parts are cheap, and they're fun to drive.

I had a '65 while I was in high school. It was my first old car. Purchase price was $400, and then I put that much again into it for tires, brakes, tune-up parts, and a few repairs.

I found mine to be plenty reliable. As my only car, I drove it rain or shine (with a leaky top!). I did need to rewire the tail lights and blinkers and repair the parts in the steering column, but isn't that typical for a 40 year old car?

Anyway, for $300, you'd be silly to pass it up. If it were in my neighborhood, I'd be trying to talk you out of the seller's number!


Ed

PS- Victoria British pretty much sells every Spitfire part and the exploded views in thier catalog double as assembly drawings.

 

For $300 if she decides she doesn't like it, your not going to have any problem getting your money back. Just be prepared to go pick her up once in awhile. If you haven't yet make sure to check it over big time for rot.

It's hard to find a car that's easier to work on.

 

i am going to look at it tonight but it is solid for sure. it is a dry heat desert car.

the car is so small and a block away. i could probably push the thing home by myself. would be the easiest move of a vehicle that I have ever done.

 

Taken for what it is, the car really doesn't need a lot of power. It's not a long legged freeway cruiser or drag strip warrior. It's a fun little town & country backroad driver. If your wife is used to power accessories and air conditioning, this one may be disappointing, but if you simply like nimble little cars that handle well, it will be a lot of fun.

The X-frame layout does not lend itself well to easy engine swaps but the original 1300 and SU's are a nice combination already.

One tip - Corvette rear air shocks will help fix a saggy rear end on these cars.

 

If I had that lead I would be driving it already!

 

Back in the day English Custom Car magazine wouldn't even print the name Spitfire, so low was the respect given them, they would spell it Sp****e, and according to them only puffs would drive them.

I think they're quite attractive, I personally would love to have a GT6, our scoutmaster had one, maybe Custom Car was right about their assertion.

 

I think the GRM car had a 13b rotary in it. I've seen a few rotary powered MGs and Triumphs over the years and they go like snot! That swap would keep the car light and nimble. Not sure about Lucas electrics but on Fiats all you have to do is clean the rust off the ground connections and it cures the electrical problems, real easy to deal with.

 

I have an extra GT6 engine (no intake or carbs) Ran when pulled in 1996, but I think it's stuck now. has always been stored inside. Also have an extra MGA engine.

 

Yeah, I believe so...

I've seen a Rotary powered Sprite out accelerate a race prepped Vette on the downhill straight on Road Atlanta.


I havent had more troubles with Lucas Starters etc than Marelli ones, and I've has less trouble with both of those than Checker replacement Ford Starters.

The wiring itself was real funky on a Austin I used to own, though...