Marques : MG

Ask anyone with even the most cursory knowledge of classics to name their favourite cars and you can guarantee that the MG name will come up time and time again.

Keith Adams takes a short tour through the history of this great marque…


A potted history

Despite being one of the most recognised marques on the planet, the beginnings of the MG marque are actually steeped in confusion. Not, you understand, because we don’t know the company’s creator or where it all started – but which of the cars was the first to be produced at the famous Morris Garages in Abingdon.

One thing we know for sure is that the first genuine MG was not ‘Old Number One’, the Hotchkiss-engined competition car sporting the magic registration number FC 7900 and currently in residence at the British Motor Museum, at Gaydon in Warwickshire. Despite this beauty not being the first example of the breed, the special first produced in 1924, makes a good focal point for the earliest beginnings of the celebrated sportscar producer.

Cecil Kimber was the General Manager of Morris Garages in Oxford and, in 1922, he commissioned six Raworth-bodied two-seater sportscars to be built on the chassis of the Morris Cowley. The first of these cars was sold to a young man named JOA Arkell in June 1922 for the princely sum of £300 – and this car, which bore both MG and Morris logos, probably has the strongest claim to fame as the world’s first MG.

Whatever the case, the MG phenomenon was quick to take off and, within a few short months, demand for these cars produced by Morris Garages went through the roof. The first example of the breed to be built in significant numbers (around 400) was the 14/28 Super Sport and came in a number of forms, featuring two or four seats and open or closed ‘Salonette’ bodywork. That car developed into the 14/40 and then, in late 1928, Kimber launched the 18/80, a new car powered by the 2468cc overhead camshaft engine for a still-born upscale Morris.

Competition revolution in Abingdon

However, MG’s future direction took a radical leap into the modern era in 1929. The car that set the company on its way was introduced – the MG M-Type Midget, and the company moved to the former Pavlova leather works in Abingdon in order to expand production to meet the ever-growing demand for 847cc Morris Minor-powered sports car.

The factory happily served MG’s needs – and the company remained there until 1980, when it was closed down as part of one of BL’s terminal contractions in later years. Happily, MG saw plenty of good times during the intervening years – spearheaded by the Midget. The car was a clear example of how to launch the right product at the right time and, as a result, people clamoured for it for two simple reasons – it was cheap and it was good to drive.

From the M-Type Midget, the impressive racing C-Type was developed – and, in supercharged form, it could pull all the way to 90mph; an impressive achievement for a sub-1-litre car… even today. In 1932, that car became the J-Type, and featured an innovative crossflow cylinder head and twin carburettors.

In 1933, the legendary K3 Magnette made an appearance – in its first year, the six-cylinder supercharged 1100cc screamer won the team prize in the Mille Miglia race and, in the hands of Tazio Nuvolari (yes, him!), it won the Ulster Tourist Trophy at an average speed that was unbeaten until 1951.

It’s clear that, in terms of competition, these were MG’s halcyon days – not bad going considering just how active in motorsport the marque has been since then. These cars reached their zenith in with the blown Q- and R-Type models – the latter featuring an innovative Y-shaped backbone chassis and all-round independent suspension.

All that came to an end in 1935 when the works ceased racing and turned its attention fully to the burgeoning road car business. That year’s range was looking not only busy, but rather desirable, too – with the TA Midget joined by the 2.0-litre SA, the 2.6-litre WA and the delectable 1½-litre VA.

These successes carried MG rather nicely into the war era…

Post-war growth

Immediately after the war, MG offered a lightly revised line-up of familiar models, starting with the TC (it differed from its Thirties predecessors, by offering a slightly wider cockpit). Despite the ageing underpinnings, the Midget went on to be a massive success, especially in the USA – with a generation of visiting American servicemen insisting on buying their own examples once they returned home.

In an era that the British industry desperately needed to export as much as it could, the Midget’s success was not only good news for MG, but the British economy as a whole.

The 1250cc Y-Type, available as a saloon or Tourer – and a pretty export-only drophead – appeared in 1947 and, with its launch, the process of updating the MG range began. When the 1949 TD appeared, it used much Y-Type hardware, making it an improved drive over its predecessor. MG had already picked up a healthy fan base in the USA, but the arrival of the TD widened that considerably – helped in no small part by MG taking the team prize in the 1952 Sebring 12-hour race.

That coincided with the formation of the British Motor Corporation (BMC) – a merger between the Austin Motor Company and the Nuffield Group, and for many the beginning of a new era of MG component sharing.

With British Motor Corporation


The 1960s heralded front-wheel drive and advanced engineering – and buyers loved it, as the success of
the MG1100 clearly demonstrated

MG within BMC started off slowly – we saw the final flowering of the T-Series Midget concept with the launch of the TF in 1954, while the Y-Type was replaced by the ZA Magnette (an example of Nuffield, not BMC, badge engineering). If it looked like MG was playing safe, it’s fair to say that these cars were the calm before the storm…

In 1955, MG’s second revolution was ushered in by the arrival of the sleek and beautiful MGA at the tail end of the year. It looked about a million miles away from its predecessor, the TF, and was clear evidence that under BMC, MG would enjoy the rudest of health.

The pretty new car came of age (technically, if not in terms of dependability) with the arrival of the twin-cam version in 1958, just on the eve of the Farina-styled Magnette saloon – possibly the least sporting MG ever made. Sales continued to grow, and exports to the USA bolstered Abingdon’s output at a time when BMC was still the fourth largest car manufacturer in the world…

Austin-Healey production joined MG in Abingdon, and the company’s new A35-based Sprite was badge-engineered into the MG Midget in 1961. It seemed apt to name this small sportscar after the original cars – like its predecessors, it was well-priced, fun to drive and turned a basic set of components into something special.

The big news came in 1962, though. For many, the sheer beauty of the MGA would never be topped, but the MGB of 1962 came pretty damned close. Originally introduced to satisfy customer demand for a more modern and comfortable sports car, the MGB was powered by a 1.8-litre version of the BMC B-Series engine and, like the Midget, used a number of components off the shelf – but the end result was pretty special.

Exports continued to grow, as did the MG range – by the mid-1960s, not only were the MGB and Midget sports cars on offer, but badge-engineered versions of the BMC 1100 and Farina saloons were on sale, making this possibly the most comprehensive MG range since the Thirties. With sales ballooning nicely, the MGB roadster was joined by the GT version with its Pininfarina-styled roof in 1965 – a poor man’s Aston Martin if ever there was one. After that, the car received a C-Series engine to become the short-lived MGC – an underwhelming car that never realised its early promise.

Into the Leyland era

The decline of MG began as a direct result of the formation of British Leyland in 1968. The deal saw Leyland (Rover-Triumph) ‘merge’ with BMC to form an unholy alliance of wildly divergent marques – all with their own vested interests. The newly-formed corporation was headed by Donald Stokes – a man who did well by Triumph during Leyland’s best years – and that immediately disadvantaged the Abingdon marque.

The MG and Triumph sports car ranges overlapped drastically – the Midget directly competed with the Spitfire, and it’s probably fair to say that any single young man’s shopping list from 1968 would have contained cars from both sides of the camp.

However, when it came to producing a replacement for the MGB, no resources were forthcoming from BL management, as the company’s sports car needs would be handled by the new ‘corporate’ car that would later emerge as the TR7. One good thing that came from the BL tie-up was the arrival of the MGB GT V8 – a Rover-powered road-burner that arrived just as the 1973/74 fuel crisis was at its height. Sadly, it lasted only three years.

That left the Midget and MGB to soldier on through the Seventies – receiving a few necessary updates, such as rubber bumpers and improved equipment. The Midget received the 1.5-litre Triumph Spitfire engine in 1974 in order to get it through US emissions regulations – and, for many MG enthusiasts, this was something of an insult to the marque. But this was the way that things were within the big, happy BL family.

However, the rationalisation came to nought – Abingdon was closed in 1980, taking the MGB and the Midget with it, and the marque went into abeyance for the first time since the war. The reason the doors were closed on Abingdon was because BL’s management, headed by Sir Michael Edwardes, knew the company needed to contract in order to survive, justifying the action by claiming that currency fluctuations had made selling cars in the USA a loss-making exercise – that was a short-term view…

The impact of Abingdon’s closure was massive – especially on the local economy and, with the best industrial relations within BL, it’s not hard to understand why MG’s loyal staff were aggrieved by the closure. Plans were briefly drawn up to produce an MG-badged version of the TR7, but these were abandoned when it became clear that further retreat would see the closure of the Solihull factory and the death of the Triumph sports car.

From the highs of being the world’s biggest sports car producer at the turn of the Seventies, ten years later, BL had completely abandoned the market that was once its own.

BL was canny enough not to sell the MG name to Aston Martin’s Alan Curtis after he made a generous offer, though, and in 1982, introduced the Octagon-bedecked Metro – complete with appealing pepper-pot alloy wheels, red seatbelts, and a livelier A-Plus engine. Although the Metro and subsequent Maestro and Montego weren’t the sportscars that MG enthusiasts clearly wanted, they kept the marque alive during tough times and sold well.

The final curtain?

In the early 1990s, Rover management finally had the wherewithal to make good its desire to attach the MG marque name to something more sporting than the Metro, Maestro or Montego. The saloons were quietly dropped and, once again, the MG name disappeared from the new car price lists. However, this time, MG would definitely return on something sporting – something guaranteed since the launch of the Mazda MX-5.

In 1992, thanks to the availability of new British Motor Heritage bodyshells, the MGB was re-born as a restyled V8-powered grand tourer – and even at the time of its launch, Rover’s management confirmed an all-new roadster was on its way.

That duly appeared in the form of the MGF in 1995 – and, in true MG spirit, it used a great number of off-the-shelf parts (mainly Metro and Rover 200), and clothed it in a pretty body to produce an accessible and likeable new sports car. The future briefly looked good for MG – BMW had bought the company in 1994, and money was pouring in… However, that arrangement lasted a mere six years and, once the Germans pulled out, MG was left on its own.

The MG name was then passed to warmed over (and surprisingly capable) versions of the Rover 25, 45 and 75 ranges, as well as the roadster – now known as the MG TF. These formed the bedrock of the MG Rover range until its fall into administration in 2005.

However, the name lived on to survive the beginning of another new chapter – bought by the Chinese manufacturer Nanjing Automobile Corporation and then SAIC Motor. What would Cecil Kimber have thought of that?

Keith Adams
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25 Comments

  1. “From the highs of being the world’s biggest sportscar producer at the turn of the Seventies, ten years later, BL had completely abandoned the market that was once its own.”

    ….nuff said.

  2. While it is somewhat understandable why MG were unwilling to allow post-war MG-badged (let alone Riley and Wolseley) versions of the Morris Minor to reach production, it is interesting to note that one MG-badged front-end quarter-scale model proposal in particular resembled the later Jaguar Mk1.

  3. Now shoot me for printing this, but I was part of a sizeable minority who when the MG was temporarily rested, saw this as a good thing, as the cars were outdated, had poor performance( even a 1.6 Cortina could outrun an MGB), were ruined by the American safety bumpers, and offered nothing over a Fiat X 1/9 or the far better perfoming Golf GTi. It was clear British Leyland’s priorities for sports cars lay with the far more modern TR7, which I hoped would be developed with fuel injection and the Rover V8 as a regular option. Sadly, it wasn’t to be as the TR7 joined MG sports cars in the graveyard a year later.
    Indeed, while the fastest MG would struggle to better 100 mph, the TR7 had a very respectable, for a two litre in 1980, top speed of 113 mph and a five speed gearbox to reduce fuel consumption and make cruising quieter. Had the TR7 been developed further with fuel injection, then we’d be looking at a top speed of over 120 mph and with a turbocharged V8, then the TR7, or 8, could have become a real challenger to companies like Lotus for less money.

  4. The MG Metro, Maestro and Montego deserve credit for being affordable (and highly relevant to the contemporary buying public) hot versions of the everyday output of Cowley (okay, I know, not the Metro!). In 2.0 EFi form these were darn good cars and deserved the badge.

    Personally, I’d like to have seen the name retired sometime after the equally relevant “Z” cars finished and before its humiliating, undeserved and drawn out death in the hands of SAIC.

  5. The MG Metro, Maestro and Montego deserve credit for being affordable (on relevant to the contemporary buying public) hot versions of the everyday output of Cowley (okay, I know, not the Metro!). In 2.0 EFi form these were darn good cars and deserved the badge.

    Personally, I’d like to have seen the name retired sometime after the equally relevant and (mostly) desirable “Z” cars finished and before its humiliating, undeserved and drawn out death in the hands of SAIC. In reply to your closing question, Cecil Kimber would have been mortified!

  6. Its no secret that the major reason for the death of MG Abingdon was due to lack of available investment funds, thus losses on product which should have been replaced 10 years previously. That and the huge number of sports car models in production under BMC made no sense in competing with itself. The MG Metro, Maestro & Montego were in my opinion quite decent, the later models in particular, and the Zeds were quite brilliantly executed given the limited funds at the time. But jumping to the present, I regret that MG Motor UK appear to have no autonomy, and the owners no idea about the values of MG. Like Jaguar, the name does need to move on, and SAIC does have the cash (just look at the range of Roewe & MG cars available to Chinese & other eastern markets – it’s very substantial). Understanding MG and the European market is quite a different thing. There is no attempt to make any mileage of the BTTC investment, and zero attempt to properly ‘sportify’ any models we have seen in the UK. As a serial MG owner, I do fear the worst for MG Motor, and the future of the paltry investment in the UK design centre does in my opinion seem insecure. i.e. 300 design engineers in the car industry is a mere speck in the overall resources required. I bet Dyson has a turnover of design staff more than this…. (well almost, I’m just trying to put things in perspective).
    Mr Kimber WOULD indeed be mortified.

    • In 1979, when British Leyland was at its lowest point, they were still producing the MG Midget, MGB, Triumph Spitfire and Triumph TR7, expensive cars to produce that were selling in small numbers and with the rise in value of the pound, weren’t selling well in America. It’s no wonder Michael Edwardes pulled the plug, although the killing of the TR7 was premature, when the car had more to offer than a group of elderly cars that dated back to the sixties.
      That said, the MG revival with the M cars seemed to totally right for the times and the MG Metro was widely praised when it was launched in 1982.

  7. In spite of the sportscars and re-badged saloon models under BMC onwards, MG as a marque deserved a much better fate with a growing upmarket image comparable to Triumph and Alfa Romeo if not snapping at the heels of more prestige marques.

    Other marques notwithstanding, BMC missed a trick in not producing MG equivalents of RWD saloon models such as the Triumph Dolomite and Triumph 2000/2500 as well as the Alfa Romeo Giulia and Alfa Romeo 2600.

      • Of course, merely saying BMC should have built upon Gerald Palmer’s ideas for MG’s sportscars and saloons, so it ends up taking over the position of the ailing Riley marque.

        Instead MG was burdened with the Farina B-based Mk3/Mk4 Magnette (as opposed to more suitable alternatives) amongst other things.

  8. The MG Metro, Maestro, and Montego were very good products in their day. The Maestro was undermined by the reputation of the bodged 1600 model, while the Montego was undercut by the Montego 2.0Si repmobile.
    The MGB received minimal development over 18 years, it should have received a 2-litre B or O series as a minimum.
    The TR7 – oh dear. Fine on the drawing board, extremely unreliable in practice; and with a rather short wheelbase, a bit too easy to spin, even with a four cylinder engine. The very pretty convertible arrived too late in the day to save it. And why was it that Saab could make that engine work when Triumph couldn’t?
    PS nice shot of the 1100, but the not-very-lined-up chrome strip down the side tells you all you need to know about 1960’s build quality!

  9. Mg today has totally lost the plot. Iffy build quality, no desirability for any mg product under the Chinese and a wheezy 1.5 engine in cars that don t stand for any Mg attributes. What about launching a brand new roadster with the equivalent power output of the tf vvc? Maybe an Mg3 with a sharper body suit with a bigger turbo d engine? It would certainly bring back the sportiness that MG was once well known for. Otherwise may I suggest pack the whole thing in and leave the MG moniker to rest in peace with it s reputation intact, and yes Kimber would have had kittens at what MG stands for in 2017 if he did come back!

    • Exactly, the pretend MGs, cars built out of a kit from China and now not even removed from the box in Longbridge, deserved to fail. Who really wants a Mondeo sized car with a thirsty 1.8 litre petrol turbo engine, or a supermini where the smallest engine is a not very economical and expensive to tax 1.5 petrol? I know the GS has developed a following as a cheap crossover, but is this really an MG as people remember them. An photo on here of an overweight pensioner buying a new 6 from a not very well dressed salesman in an ugly car yard surrounded by weeds says it all.

  10. While understanding that WW2 delayed the introduction of the MG Y-Type, was there any way the car could have appeared prior to the war and then sold on for a few years post-war as with other pre-war cars?

    Of the view that MG should have replaced both the pre-war Y-Type and T-Type models with derivatives of Nuffield’s post-war cars (albeit with more tasteful exterior styling particularly at the front), yet still retain the XP engine along with using an OHV version of the 2.2 Morris Six engine prior to being replaced by the Gerald Palmer designed models.

    Know a 1100cc version of the 1.5 Wolseley 4/50 OHC was looked at for both the Minor-based MG 1100 and MG Midget Major proposals, along with the 1.5 Wolseley OHC engine itself for the Midge Major.

    However it is curious nobody investigated the possibly of using the XP engines in the Minor/Oxford-derived MG proposals, since the later Wolseley 4/44 and even the MGA prototype both featured the XP engines and presumably used many common mechanicals among Nuffield cars.

  11. Being one of the most recognised marques on the planet with the MG name even appearing on various pieces of clothing and other forms of merchandise, how far upmarket could the MG marque have been pushed to in the right circumstances?

    MG has been compared to Triumph and a number of people believe the latter could have grown to become a British analogue of BMW had things turned out differently, yet beyond the 6-cylinder Magnette prototype (envisioned as a challenger to the Jaguar Mark 1) or plans to develop a Twin-Cam Magnette (had the MGA Twin-Cam been reliable – not to mention unrealized plans for a Twin-Cam C-Series) what is the consensus on MG having a similar potential to move further upmarket thereby making lower-volume marques within BMC like Wolseley and Riley redundant?

    • I agree; perhaps that’s where SAIC imagine they’ll eventually end up. I’m sure I read an article back in the 80s (probably in Car) that ARCONA dealers in North America would’ve been even more interested in productionised CCV coupe if it had the MG badge on the ‘hood’; in fact, I think MG might have been a better brand for BL rather than wholesale ‘Roverisation’ in the 80s. In a happier counterfactual world, I can imagine MG being an Alfa Romeo like brand. It would fit into a modern day BMC that might resemble the real world FCA, with Austin-Morris occupying the Fiat niche, Cooper the Abarth analogue, MG = Alfa, Riley = Maserati, Wolseley/Sterling/Vanden Plas (?) = Lancia.

        • Healey / Austin-Healey is another matter though perhaps they are part of the Cooper / Vanden Plas sub-marques stable (assuming they haven’t drifted into a more independent direction given their later dissatisfaction at BMC), differing from MG by largely producing mid-engined cars derived from Austin / Morris underpinnings akin to the ADO16-based Healey WAEC as well as the Mini-based GTM Coupe and Metro-based Towns TXC Tracer / MGF.

      • Would otherwise agree and can see an alternate BMC appearing as follows:

        Austin / Morris – Differentiated from each other in late-50s / early-60s with Austin producing FWD hatchbacks, while Morris produces conventional RWD saloons, each with different styling.

        Morris gradually shifts to FWD from the 1970s (Maestro/Montego family, etc), now differing from Austin by featuring different styling, conventional suspension if not by underpinnings (whereas Austin uses Hydragas – inspired by Maestro prototypes with said suspension) and if feasible even possibly different engines (which is another matter entirely being no easy answers).

        Cooper / Vanden Plas – Cooper becomes the Abarth analogue, while Vanden Plas becomes the experimental Radford and Wood & Pickett analogue for sub-Rover models, with the possibility of both sub-marques occasionally venturing into producing more unique models.

        MG / Rover – Becomes an Alfa Romeo like brand that is possibly twinned with Rover (akin to a BMC Rover-Triumph) by producing more sporting models derived from RWD Rover platforms yet with conventional (or specifically non-Hydragas form of all-independent) suspension.

        With Rover being a BMC analogue of Maserati yet retaining the reputation for producing Volvo/Mercedes-like over-engineered cars as well as the sophisticated suspension of the P6 along with the planned Hydragas-like suspension setup for the P8.

        In MG’s case though am debating whether it is worthwhile for MG to retain a presence in the FWD C-segment (albeit possibly with a unique spin in terms of engine – perhaps even in a more Lancia-like direction), shift completely to a RWD C-segment car or have MG completely vacate the C-segment.

        In Rover’s case aside from the mid-engine P9. As a Maserati / Mercedes analogue could it additionally produce a more conventional GT car, positioned above MG and possibly based on the chassis of the Range Rover as envisioned in Gentleman’s Sports Car concept renderings by Steve Harper’s SHADO Car Design Consultancy yet with styling somewhat harking back to the P4-based Marauder sportscar (now with 32-valve, Quad-Cam, Fuel-Injected Rover V8s along with scope for optional AWD given the underpinnings)?

        Land Rover / Range Rover – Would be further differentiated from each other yet with almost all models being based on the Range Rover platform by the 1970s via SD5, an earlier Challenger, earlier Discovery, Range Rover 5-door and smaller 3/5-door Range Rover Sportback (the latter two being akin to SWB and LWB versions of original Mercedes-Benz G-Class – partly inspired by the proposed P6 4-cylinder and 2WD version of original Range Rover).

        Riley would either be canned by BMC in the 50s or acquired by another company in the pre-war period (whether BMW, Triumph or a much luckier Singer Motors that retains its place as one of the UK’s top 3 carmakers. Thus Singer in turn would additionally be in a position to produce and benefit from Issigonis’s work at Alvis, when the latter approached Singer to produce the bodies for the Alvis TA350 prototype after Pressed Steel doubled the tooling costs and increased the minimum production run to 100 cars a week. Perhaps even acquiring the project itself from Alvis.).

        Wolseley would also probably be canned though have read it was actually pretty popular in Australia despite being a low-volume carmaker, in which case it either becomes BMC’s Holden analogue or is basically replaced by a unique Holden-like version of Morris that via post-war Oxford MO / Six MS models with OHVs manages to quickly establish such a reputation (provided William Morris concedes to his view of Morris retaining SVs and follows the example of Austin under Lord by modernizing his factories and acquiring new tooling as envisioned by Miles Thomas).

        • Do you see Rover inevitably merging with BMC then? Interesting. I wonder if, in this marvellous counterfactual world, we might have had four decent sized British owned car makers (one big combine like BMC, a JLR like company that combined Rover/Land Rover, a Leyland organisation where Leyland took the role of Standard and Triumph was booted further upmarket to become that mythical beast – a British BMW, and maybe a smaller Coventry based company that combined Jaguar with bits of Rootes that perhaps had more of a future than others – Sunbeam perhaps, as Lyons did want to take on Sunbeam didn’t he?). Not sure where smaller British brands would fit in, like RR, Bentley, Aston, McClaren, Lotus etc. I guess in such a world, the Germans wouldn’t have the crushing luxury car dominance they have now and the Japanese car industry wouldn’t have made anything like the inroads they eventually did. It would also depend on the Brits getting their act together and not allowing egos/ideology/mediocrity/short termism to destroy the heritage and future prospects of such potentially fine marques as MG.

          • Have read of Rover considering joining BMC instead of Leyland Motors, which had it happened would have given BMC a suitable luxury marque (and makes sense instead of what actually happened) instead of trying in vain to establish Vanden Plas as the main luxury marque within BMC, Land Rover would have also benefited under BMC and would have likely had enough of a role in the Austin Ant project to adopt it as its own rather as a Suzuki Jimny-like sub-Defender model than rejecting it due to NIH syndrome. This alternate BMC would be composed of Austin, Morris, MG, Rover and Land / Range Rover.

            Though have a few ideas of how other British marques or car projects would survive and thrive, it is inevitable there would still be marques that are discontinued regardless.

  12. Trying to think of equivalents of MG elsewhere in the motoring world, as while MGs were sporty, they weren’t exotic, they weren’t over fast or (with the odd exception) especially advanced. Indeed Riley (before BMC) fit the Alfa/Lancia mould better than MG.

    MG was probably too down market to develop into a BMW M/AMG type operation either.

    • Triumph was basically revived after WW2 and eventually developed into an upmarket marque on the verge of becoming a British BMW, the same can be said for Audi under Volkswagen.

      Had Riley been in a better position (whether independent or under the likes of Morris, Triumph, BMW and alternate Singer), they could have definitively developed a 160+ hp 4.9 Riley V8 derived from a pair of 2.5 Riley Big Fours (akin to how the pre-war Riley / Autovia V8s were based on a pair of Riley 9 / 1.1 and 12 / 1.5 4-cylinders respectively) which would have been better received in the US given the post-war popularity of V8s from Oldsmobile and Cadillac.

      However the question then becomes what comes after the 160+ hp 4.9 Riley V8 from the late-1950s as far as replacements are concerned? There was the Gerald Palmer designed Twin-Cam C-Series at BMC yet neither Morris nor Austin ever seriously investigated a V8 (beyond Tadek Marek’s A40-derived V8), while a successful Singer would have been able to capitalize on its resources or from the likes of Alvis, etc.

      Unlike Riley though MG was a higher-volume marque that had a large presence in the US, surely it would have been possible for BMC to build upon the MG marque’s success in the US by following the example of Triumph, Audi, (post-war) Jaguar, BMW (post-BMW 600/700) and others in moving upmarket?

      Think MG’s move upmarket could have worked amongst other things via an earlier move towards OHC updates to the B/C-Series from the early-1960s to compliment a reliable version of the limited-run Twin-Cam B/C-Series projects (plus Magnette ZB-derived Farina B/C, etc), prior to the shifting towards productionized Twin-Cams from the 1970s.

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