I REALLY WISH I HAD KEPT THIS CAR!

[Mike Thies]

It seems to me I wrote about this car before, but I cannot locate the story, so here goes:  MGBs were notoriously unreliable and the used roadsters I owned were no real exceptions.  I had several and some were actually just parts cars. The one that was the exception was a 1967 green MGB GT Special.  This car was given one of the 1000 dealer promotional packages. I drove it in the late 70's and early '80s as a daily driver, for four or five years without breaking down once. I had two preschool daughters and I rigged up seat belts and harnesses for them and we went all over the place. I even went to several SCCA (Sport Car Club of America-racing club) events until they outlawed wire wheels.

The 1967 MGB GT Special was, essentially, a marketing effort to generate interest in the GT here in North America. A strong advertising campaign was begun promoting the "First Anniversary MGB GT Special" which promoted the advantages of the GT plus special equipment added at no extra cost. 
This equipment came to the MG dealers in a kit form and could be added to any GT in stock, thus the cars are not in a series in any particular group of serial numbers, nor were they an 'official' factory model, from what I can tell. The kits included a special fender plaques, a wood rimmed Moto-Lita style steering wheel, and a wooden shift knob.  Some were to have had a racing type 'bullet' mirror for the left front fender, but mine was either removed or was never there.  I added bullet mirrors to both fenders after I bought it used.  Mine had beautiul wire wheels with spinner knock off hubs and I put on white wall radial tires.  One thing that was quite different in mine was the factory installed air!

After I remarried, we had "her car", "my car", and the MGB GT.  I had done a lot of work on it and it looked great and ran like a top. I could really tune the twin SUs carbs by then!  But with a family, work and side jobs, it was mostly sitting in the drive way. I wanted one of those new IBM PCs for work and a friend offered to trade me for one. It was twice as valuable as the car, but he said, "PCs depreciate and collector cars mostly appreciate, so some day we will be equal"!  It made sense somehow so I did the trade. The PC has long ago been trashed and I really wish I had kept that car! :-)

Mine was "BRG" - British Racing Green!  I added stone guards on the headlamps, cruising lights, and a chrome grill.  It really was a real good looking car.  I had it painted every two years or so and no one knew how much bondo I had in the rear rocker panels.  

[Mike Thies]

I never owned one myself, but did a ton of work on my neighbors '67 MGC GT. It was quite a rare car, event then.  I recall that it was billed as a replacement for the Austin Healey 3000 by BMC brass who wanted to continue offering a 6-cylinder sports car in their lineup. The "C" was fitted with an engine originally developed for the 3-liter Austin.

They looked pretty much alike, except for bigger wheels, a small rear badge, and a hood bulge on the aluminum hood (bonnet).  Only about 4,500 "GT" hatchbacks were made, and of those, just 1,770 were sent to the U.S.  It was much faster than mine, but mine handled much better.  I thought the "C" had very poor balance.