1953 Austin-Healey 100/4 BN1

Justin Jurgens | July 24, 2013 |

We test drive a 1953 Austin Healey 100/4 BN1. This is a very early production car that wears the ‘Austin of England’ badge on the boot lid instead of ‘Austin Healey’. These early Austin Healey BN1 cars are very quirky as they have a reverse pattern 3-speed with overdrive transmission. The transmission is actually a 4-speed, but the first gear is blanked off as it is a granny low gear.

As we first start out, you can feel that this is a big displacement 4-cylinder (2,600cc or 2.6 Liter) as it is quite slow revving, but once you’re motoring along it pulls surprisingly well. These cars were rated at a top speed of 106mph and a zero-to 60 time of 11.2 seconds. By today’s standards, that is not very impressive, but for early fifties technology, these were very fast, true sports cars.

The reverse pattern transmission took some getting used to, but once we adapted, we found it to be a lot of fun. The 100/4 is definitely a car that you have to drive and think about what you’re doing. It certainly does not drive itself like so many cars these days. We even found that the 3-speed transmission is very well suited for driving, and once at freeway speeds the overdrive works well and brings down the nicely.

Braking does seem to be a bit of a challenge with 4-wheel Girling drum brakes, but once again, it just adds to the fun of the car. You do have to judge your stops with modern traffic all around, but for us, the fun of these old British cars is all the unexpected quirks you find while driving.

For driving around town or jumping on the freeway for a long trip, the Austin Healey 100/4 BN1 is well equipped if you are not in a big hurry. Driving down the freeway at 6 to 70 MPH is not a problem and is does seem quite comfortable. It does get a little warm around the tunnel area and the driver’s floor due to the exhaust system, so we do recommend you insulate the car with Dynamat, Fatmat, or similar products.

On styling, it is easy to see why these Austin Healeys are so popular. We got thumbs up everywhere we went. Once the windshield is down, these cars look amazing and have to be one of the most beautiful British cars ever made. We do suggest wearing goggles with the windshield down, as without them the car is near impossible to drive and very dangerous. This is definitely one of those cars everyone should drive and we would not mind having in our garage. It takes us back to the time when sports cars were real sports cars, not like so many cars produced today.