Before the Corvette, Thunderbird, and Kaiser-Darrin came the Nash-Healey, and it was quite arguably the real sports car of the lot.
The Nash-Healey was the product of a chance encounter between George Mason, head of Nash-Kelvinator, and British sports car builder Donald Healey aboard the RMS Queen Elizabeth. Healey was headed to Detroit for a meeting at General Motors to arrange a supply of Cadillac V8 engines for his Healey Silverstone. Intrigued by the notion of a British-American sports car, Mason told Healey to get back to him if he couldn’t reach a deal with Cadillac. The GM meeting worked out as you would expect, and so a prototype Nash-Healey roadster debuted at the Paris Motor Show in October of 1950.
The Nash-Healey’s chassis was a modified version of the Silverstone’s, with a steel box-section ladder frame and the distinctive Healey independent front suspension with coil springs, lever-action dampers, and aluminum trailing arms. At the rear was a more conventional setup with a Nash torque tube, coil springs, tubular shocks, and a Panhard bar for lateral location. Nash engines and running gear were shipped from Kenosha to the Healey facility in Warwick, England for assembly. However, the aluminum bodies, styled by Gerry Coker of Healey, were produced by Panelcraft Sheet Metal in nearby Birmingham.
While it was no Cadillac V8, the Ambassador six was a high-quality engine with a seven main-bearing, fully counterweighted crankshaft and overhead valves. Introduced in 1946, Nash’s best engine featured a 3.38-in bore and 4.38-in stroke for 234.8 cubic inches and 115 hp in base form. The Dual Jetfire version used in the Nash-Healey sported twin SU carburetors, an aluminum cylinder head with an 8.2:1 compression ratio, and 125 hp. When the Ambassador six was enlarged to 252.6 CID in 1953, the Healey version was boosted to 140 hp. All were matched to the Nash manual transmission with three speeds plus overdrive.
1952 Nash-Healey with George Mason (seated) and Battista Farina
After some 104 of the first-series cars were produced in 1951, Mason brought Battista Farina and carrozzeria Pinin Farina into the combination. With the Farina restyling, the headlamps were brought down inside the grille, a curved, one-piece windshield replaced the split screen of the original, and the body shell was now mainly steel. Meanwhile, body production and final assembly were shifted from England to Farina’s shops in Turin, Italy. In the following year, a fixed-head body style called the Le Mans Coupe was introduced.
In the pages of Mechanix Illustrated, your Uncle Tom McCahill (above) raved about the Nash-Healey. “I want to go on the record right now and say I have never driven a sports car that handled better,” he gushed. “It’s a swell rig for the guy who wants a fast, practical sporty car.” While the 2,600 lb roadster was never really embraced by the racing community, competition-bodied Nash-Healeys found some success at Le Mans, finishing fourth overall in 1950 and third in 1952.
Mason had always envisioned the Nash-Healey as a halo car, an image builder for Nash Motors. With a list price of almost $4,000 for the 1951 original and $6,000 for the Farina-bodied cars (twice the price of a new Ambassador), volume production was never likely. Just 507 were produced over the four-year run, including 90 Coupes. When Nash and Hudson merged to form American Motors in January of 1954, the Healey’s days were numbered. The final car was completed in August.
Fascinating car, but I’m not overly fond of the Farina front end, I would have preferred an update of the Gerry Coker design.
A Nash-Healey postage stamp was issued in 2005.
It’s too bad about Nash, but this sports car being a halo for the Metropolitan et al, would have been about as successful as the Avanti being a halo for the Lark. The Aspirational Connection just wasn’t there.
I’ve only known of the Farina design. They should have stayed with the original; I think they would have sold more of them. The Farina car looks chunky and dated while the earlier design has hints of the Austin-Healey.
Few Americans have ever bought into the idea of ‘sports cars’. Our roads don’t encourage them. Even the C8 is highlighted more for it’s horsepower than road feel.
Aside from the Alfa Romeo Giulietta Spider, I don’t favor Battista Farina’s designs. They seem very much of their time rather than being timeless.
I’m guessing you’re from the middle of the country. Sports cars were huge on the US coasts in the 60s and 70s, because the coastal roads DID encourage them: MG, Triumph, Jaguar, Austin-Healey, Fiat, and Alfa Romeo all had significant sports car sales in the US, and sports car racing grew and grew. I recall visiting my grandparents in Illinois in that era and being shocked by how few imported cars there were compared to California.
From a Nash brochure after their third place finish in ’52 at Le Mans: “The Power To Win… How the Nash-Healey Outclassed All American-Powered Cars in the World’s Most Gruelling Race… Jetfire Engine Sets the Pace…” then mentions the Mercedes team that beat them had come “loaded for bear” with “5 cars with 2 spares, 2 complete workshops, a staff of engineers and 40 mechanics”.
None of the J2 Allard-Cadillacs finished the ’52 Le Mans but Briggs Cunningham finished 4th driving almost the entire 24 hours by himself in his own Chrysler Hemi powered C-4R with a slipping clutch…
“You’re secret is safe with me Superma,,,oops, I mean, Mr. Kent”. While not an official sponsor of the original Superman TV series, Nash did provide a lot of cars. Clark Kent is seen driving a Nash-Healey in several episodes. It did little for sales, I mean, after all, Superman was a fictional series, that can’t be a real car, I’m sure many viewers thought. V8s were just becoming popular, and this surely could have used one. It didn’t take GM long to offer one in the Corvette, the N-Hs primary competition. Biggest deterrent, the cost. I read, these cost close to $6grand new, mostly in shipping charges, almost TWICE the cost of a Corvette. Another swing and a miss in automotive history.
Perhaps another segment to explain the unusual looking front suspension in the third photo of this article which drew my interest.
Good idea. I have been considering one or more articles on independent front suspensions and their history. This one is similar to GM Dubonnet in function though there’s not much resemblance.