Barrett's #66 - Solved - bits & bobs of a Fairthorpe E-M

[barrett]

What car could you build with all these bits? The body isn't shown or it'd be too obvious!
2 points at stake here as I think this is quite difficult!

[barrett]

Can the experts put it together?

[Tom_I]

It's a pity there's no engine. That would have made things easier. But looking round the parts, there's a Lucas voltage regulator, Smiths speedometer and a couple of Girling master cylinders, which would suggest that this is a British kit, probably from the late 1950s or early 60s, judging by these items and the skinny crossply tyres and drum brakes.

It's fairly small, and low-slung, judging by having a chassis cross-member running underneath the propshaft, and considering where the battery is mounted, it's probably a two-seater sports car.

The unequal-length double-wishbone front suspension looks like it's from a Triumph Herald, but looking more closely, the cross-bracing on the lower wishbone is different from the Herald-type cars. And as it has a live rear axle with identical brake drums, and doesn't have rack-and-pinion steering, I'd guess that all these items come from a Standard 8 or 10. The rear axle has brackets welded to it for mounting on leaf springs, but this car is clearly going to have a coil spring set-up.

There were several firms making cars like this in the 50s and 60s, like Elva, Fairthorpe, Ginetta and Turner, but there's really only one that ticks all the boxes for this one, in that the chassis is a ladder type (rather than a space frame), and it's made entirely out of rectangular box sections, with no cylindrical tubular elements. This, coupled with the Standard-Triumph running gear, points strongly to it being a Fairthorpe. And of course, armed with  a name and a search engine, these photos are then relatively straightforward to find online.

So in answer to the original question, as to what you could build from this kit, it would be a Fairthorpe Electron Minor, circa 1958, and when you finished it, assuming you didn't make a complete mess of it, it would look something like this.

[Allemano]

Again it's pure enjoyment to read Tom_I's detailed post. (Who is Hercule Poirot?)

[barrett]

I agree, a very detailed answer from a very smart man!

[grobmotorix]

Simply - wow!

[Tom_I]

It seems that the original photos have been lost from this thread, but I'm pretty sure these are the right ones.