Solved - MJW #848 - ERA/BMC Maximin Project 378 1957 (1st. prototype)

[wingroad]

Thanks for that.

[barrett]

I was hoping this one would make it up to the pros... I wouldn't have remembered the code name and project number anyway though! Sadly the magazine with the excellent article on this project was amongst the stuff that got thrown out a few years ago. Hopefully Woodinsight can scan a few of the other images of the car??

Incidentally, the 'finished' car has already been featured here before, but it's erroneously listed as a Rootes Swallow prototype (there was a connection between these two projects, but this was definitely the BMC car)
http://www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=1810.0

[wingroad]

If I remember rightly David Hodkin was one of the designers.
I agree that the car shown as the Rootes Swallow is not the Swallow or Maximin,but an rear engined RWD prototype made for BMC by ERA in the late 1950's.

[woodinsight]

I was hoping this one would make it up to the pros... I wouldn't have remembered the code name and project number anyway though! Sadly the magazine with the excellent article on this project was amongst the stuff that got thrown out a few years ago. Hopefully Woodinsight can scan a few of the other images of the car??

Incidentally, the 'finished' car has already been featured here before, but it's erroneously listed as a Rootes Swallow prototype (there was a connection between these two projects, but this was definitely the BMC car)
http://www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=1810.0

Yes, I will scan the article in the next couple of months. My library is in store until the end of March when I should have completed my move to Antibes.
In the meantime I've scanned the three prototypes of the ERA/BMC Maximin Project 378 for comparison.
The first prototype (the puzzle car) was deliberately styled to look like a homebuilt car whilst the second was quite different and badged as an Austin. The third and final prototype (wrongly puzzled here as a Rootes Swallow) was again very different in appearance  - the bodywork was done by Vanden Plas.
Apologies for the large size but I've temporarily lost the means for reducing the picture size.

[barrett]

Thanks so much for that, I've wanted to see these again for years. As I remembered, the Austin-badged example is a very neat looking car that hides its bulk and engine layout incredibly well. The less said about the VdP example the better...

[woodinsight]

The only other photo I have is a three-quarter rear view of the 3rd. prototype -

[wingroad]

Look forward to seeing the article about 378.

[Otto Puzzell]

The only other photo I have is a three-quarter rear view of the 3rd. prototype -

The more colorful it gets, the prettier it ain't