TOPIC: Does Anyone Know About Austin Healey Boats?

Can anyone enlighten me to the approximate price of an austin healey fiberglass speedboat as i havent got a clue

I do not know if any or many that made it over here. I had a guy that was into MG's and Austins that wanted to take my center deck G3 and turn it into a Healey Sprite which is a copy of a center deck G3 anyway.
I guess I am not much help.

Rawsco81 wrote:

Can anyone enlighten me to the approximate price of an austin healey fiberglass speedboat as i havent got a clue

As much as someone would pay. I'm not trying to be smart here, but it depends on what condition it's in. These are rare, desirable and hard to find boats. If I had one, I'd start high.

Frank

WoW, I grew up owning and driving Austin Healeys but I never knew they had anything to do with boats..Got any pics of it?

I see your in Scottland...welcome aboard. I've been looking for a friend in the US...harder to find than chickens teeth. How many glass Healey models were there, does any one have pics of glass Healeys? I've only found a small bow shot of a 707...looks bigger than a G3.

Stop in to the British Car Forum - www.britishcarforum.com - and post this question on the Austin Healey forum. I've read threads there about these boats.

Back in the 50's there were wood Healey Sportboats and I do have some advertising on them. I know that Donald Healey was talking with Bill Tritt in the late 50's and they were actually close to a deal when the Glasspar board of directors pulled the plug. This is one of the things that led to Bill's departure from Glasspar.

Lee Wangstad

Pics here:

woodyboats.blogspot.com/2009/04/like-austin-healeys-have-we-got-boat.html

That's one of the models. The one she has looks similar to a G3. she sent me pics, but I deleted them.

Frank

As was mentioned earlier, the Healey is a copy of the G3. Whether Austin Motors had anything to do with it is open to question...

Just seen this post, so will add my 2c worth..

There are no Austin Healey boats...all are Healey Marine Ltd. they built the Healey Skimaster, Healey 55, Healey 75, Healey Corvette, Healey 707 and the Healey Sprite.

The Sprite is a G3 copy with faired in sponsons. You'd not want to create a Sprite from a G3 because there'd be no advantage other than to have something that looks like a G3. The G3 is just perfect the way it is. Healey built the Sprite between 1960 and 1962. They are poorly built in that the gelcoats are unstable, the deck edges are mostly filled with voids caused by inadequate strength used to push the fibreglass into the deck mould when laying up and the way that Healey faired in the point where the sponson starts to it's end means that their surface can look wavy. The moulds were sold onto Interglass Ltd, who reshaped them and called the Thunderball, which seems to have been announced to the market in Jan of 1964. To the un-initiated a centerdeck Thunderball is identical to a Sprite, but has a number of subtle differences - the last Thunderball I knew of exchanged money for about 400 USD, a usable boat without motor, we know of 2 versions of teh Thunderball, one is with centerdeck and forward facing occasional seats mounted at the transom, the other with moulded GRP back to back seats. Interglass then changed their name and became the Birchwood Boat Company Ltd and made further versions, mostly back to back seats, some with a cutout in the floor for waterskis. That model is the Thunderski and hit the market around January 1968.

Proper Healey Sprites change hands for a few hundred dollars as a restoration job. The deck hardware and windscreen is specific to this boat and will set you back about 1300 USD for a new set. The last complete boat to come on the market was about 70 USD and was bought by a relative of Donald's I believe. We in the CMBA ( www.cmba-uk.com ) know of about 9 genuine Sprites in the UK. There are 6 'Thunderthingys'. The last restored Sprite was badly damaged in a storm and rebuilt then offered on the market for about 10,000 USD. There were no takers and at that price unlikely to be. There are more out there, but most don't know what they are and they can be fairly dire as to condition.

The Corvette and 707 are straight copies of the late 1950s 17ft Cutter / Owens hull, minus it's fins and the two ends that stick out from the transom. The Corvette has a heavy sliding roof that is incredibly noisy to sit under with a big outboard on the back. The 707 is a straight 6 Healey 3000 powered boat with a Hamilton Jet unit. There are two of each still around.

The Skimaster and the 55 were made by Aquacraft in Dorset. The same company made the Aquacraft Avenger, a Triumph TR3 powered shaft driven boat with huge wooden fins. There is one Avenger in the CMBA, most have rotted we think and we think there is still one surviving Skimaster, again they rot dreadfully, personally I think they're a waste of space and given our lack of lakes that are availble to powerboats, is not a boat I'd take to the sea - there are so many prettier wood runabouts in this world. Here is a recent Aquacraft on ebay uk.

cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180587070385&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT

You can see the similarity to the link to the Skimaster.

Price wise, the Sprite market is undeveloped. I'd offer around 5-6k for the nicest one in the country. It's been professionally restored with beefed up transom, repainted and has all new hardware including the proper windshield, a rebuilt short shaft 70s Mercury 850 and T&T. At the bottom end a very sound boat in orginal gelcoat has sold for 70 and the Thunderthingy versions have an all time record price of $3.50 for a bare hull.

The pic below shows a Healey Sprite. If anyone interested I can post pics of the Corvette, 707 and various Thunderball and my own Thunderski

I'd sure like to see them, and the pics and your dissertation there should definitely make it into the library!

bill loveland wrote:

I'd sure like to see them, and the pics and your dissertation there should definitely make it into the library!

I agree...any pics, first hand info and or brochures should definitely be saved for future viewing and reference in the archives.

Please post what you have and we will see that it gets saved.

Been awhile..I had computer problems..This is a pic of a Healey 707 (forground) and a Healey 75

707 dash

707 stern view

Healey Sprite

Another Healey Sprite - gelcoat colours available were those that the Austin Healey Sprites were originally painted. This yellow is called rprimrose yellow.

Another Healey Sprite. This one is a non standard colour, but very pretty. Mercury is a retro-styled 1970s 850

Sorry to hear of your computer problems Chirombo, but glad you got it fixed. Very nice looking examples, thanks for sharing the pics and the info on Healey with us. Looks like somebody has been working hard over there, nice job(s)!

(You can post multiple pics in one post by hitting the edit button after posting the first one, and adding another. You can repeat as many times as you would like, I believe.)

Healey 55, this one sank in 6ft of water, luckily on a falling tide, the day after this pic was taken. Old age got to it...

I'll hunt for a Healey Corvette picture, but if you imagine a Cutter 17 with sliding hardtop, you'll be 98% there..

Thanks MarkS, just seen your post! Sorry about the multiple posts, been a long time since I posted anything here.

If anyone interested here is a long-winded vid I took of the Healey 55 a few years back (and an early 60s Dowty with Hamilton drive and 6 cylinder ford zephyr (uk) engine) We had to stick to the speed limit sadly...

This is my Healey Sprite copy, called a Thunderski. It was produced from the same moulds by Birchwood in 1968, there are a number of differences so would be hard to fake a proper Healey Sprite

Another pic shows the centerdeck now redundant, i.e a full 4 seater.

No problem, we appreciate your sharing with us.

hi do you have any pics of the interior of the sprite as i am about to try and restore one can't seem to find any info anywhere must be rarest of healey boats