Bryce has been one of the most prolific CC commenters and Cohort posters from almost the beginning. We’ve heard about his Hillman Minx here and there in snippets, and how it hauls. By that I assumed he meant it goes fast. But here it is, in the full light of day, hauling a utility trailer. I bet it hauls, too, given Bryce’s mechanical abilities. Hi, Bryce!
That’s a pretty cool looking car. Can’t say I’ve ever seen one.
From seeing an occasional picture and learning a bit about these on CC, I can honestly say that I kind of like these little things. And nobody is more surprised at this than me. 🙂 The mini-Studebaker styling is just a plus.
A friend of my Dad’s had a turquoise and white one from new til the early 80s.Well cool car Bryce.I love the 50’s Yank fins and 2 tone paint
Enough of these HIllman Minxes were sold in the Pacific northwest that I remember seeing them now and then back in the day.
A friend from college had a couple in their family a 4dr sedan that he brought to school for a while and a convertible. They were the “kid’s car” that they he and his siblings got to drive in high school.
What a cute little guy!
MONGO TIE WOOD DOWN FOR SHERIFF
Sorry, first thing I thought of.
totally!
I was referring to the car, Mike!
I love the styling JP yep like a mini Stude, When I was a small child there was a Minx this model across the street where the local Rootes group dealer lived, I liked it. The loca;l apple industry dumps old fruit bins outside the 4foot bin boards stack neatly across my little trailer so 49.5 hp of Hillman can pull 24cuft of bin boards for firewood, Heavy Trucks and towed trailers are limited to 90kmh here and this car does that easily which it shouldnt given Ive raised the gearing by fitting a 3.89;1 diff ratio in place of the original 4.55;1 and it still runs a 1494cc engine. Rootes groups ability to design a very durable car is the reson it goes ok, I’m gradually upgrading the powertrain I fitted another diff head and axles it has a full-syncro gearbox from a SuperMinx, Disc front brakes are the next to go in I will install a complete front axle assembly from a 65 SuperMinx a friend is wrecking. The body work on this car is rust free as Ive also put approx a 6×4 sheet of 1mm panel steel into it, new front floors lower rear quarters inner and outer it was well made when new but these had poor windscreen seals and leak like a sieve. Two tiny pin holes in the drip channel around the boot/trunk rusted the lower quarters out, Ive met the son of the last registered owner who learnt to drive in this he said the rear guards were always rusty. Thanx Paul not many of these cars left now they all literally wore out they didnt break down or give much trouble the old Hillmans they were bloody good cars and very popular here once upon a time but they got driven into the ground or rusted away
Bryce, we need to see some more pictures of this car! Let’s see the front and the interior, please. It’s a cool little car, and obviously a labor (labour?) of love.
I can put some shots on the cohort of it but the interior is non existant no headlining or carpet just a pair of SuperMinx Buckets and a tattered bench in back no creature features except the GPS and stereo I fitted. In fact the only automatic feature in my little bomb are selfcancelling indicators everything else is manual
My parents’ first car was a 1954 Minx (previous, more rounded body style). They replaced it with a Volvo 544 in 1960. I THINK I remember it but it’s hard to separate real memories from memories created by seeing the pictures in our family albums. It can be seen in the background of a snapshot of the newborn me back from the hospital, complete with an “Adlai Stevenson for President” bumper sticker (the historians out there can figure out how old I am). These cars were briefly quite popular in the States, judging by an owners survey from Popular Mechanics that I found online. However, over here I don’t remember any of the mini-tailfin version that succeeded Bryce’s version and preceded the Hillman Hunter, sold here as the Sunbeam Arrow.
Last summer, there was an early 60’s convertible in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette advertised for around $ 3K. It was a project car, but had low miles and stored indoors. Can’t say I would have wanted to tackle such a rare project. Saw some nice ones advertised on the UK websites. Would be a neat car when done.
My grandfather had one of these in the 60s in Rhode Island. As an immigrant from Scotland, british cars, marmalade, shortbread, and a once-yearly glass of Ballantine’s were his only nods to his homeland. In the early 70s the Hillman was replaced with a Mk II Cortina.
Usually I’m not a fan of 3/4ths scale British designs, but I like this one a lot. And I love the little wings above the tail lights. It manages to look like both a Volvo and an Impala!
Good to see your car featured Bryce! The only Audax Minx I’ve driven is my mate’s series 1 – not bad to drive but quite a change from what I’m used to and even from Hunters. We took that on an historic rally a couple of years ago in the road car class – the scrutineers had not seen a car on crossplies in a very long time!
I have a set of crossply razor blades on my spares heap those are Peugeot 406 rims an tyres improves cornering immensely.
Not a priority for him – he also has an Imp that he has kept the original comedy front camber setting on (approx 2-3 deg positive camber)
My parents had a ’56 Husky very similar to the one shown below when I was growing up. I can attest to the durability of these cars. We had it for our only car for around 5 years, and then it was a second car for about another 4 years. We then sold (gave?) it to an uncle who used it for another 2 or 3 years. Last I heard (back in the sixties) it went to a mine to use as a utility vehicle. All this was in Alaska. I guess it did fine in the snow and ice, I don’t recall any real problems. Other than seeing some later MInx’s on the road (similar to Bryce’s), I never had anymore experience with one. Except for the ill fated Plymouth Cricket. I ran across a few of them when I was in the used car business in the early seventies. They did not do well in Alaska. Even the Vega looked good compared to a Cricket.
OMG, a Hillman Minx. I had one in college; a 4dr 1958, I think. It was cheap because it had been rolled, leaving the roof lumpy. An all night repainting with bright metallic blue paint helped things if you stood 30 feet away. The shifter was on the column and the pattern was reversed from standard American practice. One day the exhaust manifold broke off the engine. Necessity being the mother of invention, I glued it back. It actually held for a few hundred miles.
As Bryce observed, the styling has Studebaker touches. That’s logical–the Raymond Loewy organization, which did Studebaker styling, assisted with the design of Minx.
He’s wearing a singlet! Must be a kiwi.
Out of frame we can’t see the wellies and the black rugby shorts.
I’m a Kiwi and I don’t own a singlet or rugby shorts 🙁 Yes, I’m ashamed of me too.
Haven’t seen one of these in years. Proves my contention that you can get big results and efficiency with a small car and a trailer.
This was the first car I owned – exactly the same color! I was 4 or 5 years old and the car was a couple inches long. I don’t have mine any more but Google helped me find a photo at toy-auction.com.
Looks like a nice job Bryce. As with many Kiwis, we had a Minx in the family while I was growing up. Mum’s cousin had one until the early 90s. It was the same shape as yours, but in the custard yellow colour – I like your colours a lot more! It was affectionately known as ‘Mini’ to the cousins (wrong brand!).
I’m in awe of anyone who can work on cars like you, hats off to you!
Those arent the original colours for my car it was a sort of 2tone grey this one I copied from a 63 Humber80 that lives locally. These things had quite a following years ago the inaugural NZ Saloon car championship was won by Harold Heasley in a well worked Humber80 yep the faster Zephyrs and Jags couldnt catch a well tuned rebadged Minx. Later a Waikato driver Dennis Marwood flew the Humber80 Flag for several years with much success. Dennis is probably best remembered as the guy who ported and polished Datsun1200 engines for assembly into the NZ only 1200 SSS.
My Mother would say to this day her favorite car was a black Minx with red leather upholstery. Great economy and easy driver. I didn’t recall the column shift, but I do remember it was four speeds.