The first AC automobile was presented at the Crystal Palace motor show in 1903; it was a 20HP touring car and was displayed under the Weller name. The Weller Brothers in West Norwood, London, planned to produce an advanced 20 hp car. However, Portwine their financial backer thought the car would be too expensive to produce and encouraged Weller to design and produce a little delivery 3 wheeler. Weller did so, called it the Auto-Carrier and a new company was founded and named Autocars and Accessories, production started in 1904. The vehicle caught on quickly and was a financial success. In 1907 a passenger version appeared, it was called the Auto-Carrier Sociable. It had a seat in place of the cargo box.
The company became Auto Carriers Ltd in 1911 and began using the ‘AC’ logo and moved to Ferry Works, Thames Ditton, Surrey in 1911. The first 4-wheeler was produced in 1913; it was a sporty little 2-seater with a gearbox on the back axle. Only a few were produced and production was interrupted by the first World War.
After the war, John Weller started on the design of a new 6 cylinder motor. The first versions were running by 1919. The Weller motor would be produced until 1963; it is probably the second longest running production motor in history after the VW boxer. During the 1914-18 War, the Ferry Works factory produced shells and fuses, although at least one vehicle was designed and built for the War Office. At the end of the First World War, AC Cars started making motor vehicles again, designing and building many successful cars at Ferry Works.
In 1921, Selwyn Francis Edge (S F Edge, who had been with Napier & Son) bought shares of the company and was appointed governing director. He did not get along with Weller and Portwine who resigned less than a year later. In 1922 the name changed again to AC Cars Ltd. Edge bought the company outright for £135,000 in 1927 and re-registered it as AC (Acédès) Ltd but sales, which had been falling, continued to decline. The company was caught by the crash of 1929 and went into voluntary liquidation. In 1930 production ceased and the company was sold to the Hurlock family who ran a successful haulage business. They wanted the factory as a warehouse but allowed the service side of AC to continue.
A single car was made for William Hurlock in 1930. He agreed to a very limited production restarting mainly using components left over from previous models. Agreement was reached with Standard to supply new chassis and in 1932 a new range of cars was launched. Production remained on a small scale until the outbreak of war in 1939.
Post World War II
Production of cars restarted in 1947 with the 2 litre and with a large contract with the government to make glass fibre bodied single seat invalid carriages with BSA engines. These continued to be made until 1976 and were an important source of revenue to the company. They also built an aluminum bodied three wheeled micro car, the Petite.
In 1953 the firm began production of the AC Ace, a lightweight chassis designed by John Tojeiro with the venerable AC Weller 2 litre engine. Soon after, car dealer and racing driver Ken Rudd fitted his competition AC Ace with a pre-war BMW designed, Bristol Cars produced 135 bhp (101 kW) six-cylinder engine. This combination was put into production as the AC-Bristol in 1957. The car raced at Le Mans in 1957 and 1958. In 1961, Bristol stopped production of their engine and once again Ken Rudd came to the rescue an suggested that AC use a 6 cylinder engine from the Ford Zephyr. These engines when fitted with the Raymond Mays 12 ports alloy head and Weber carburetors could be made to produce a safe 170 bhp (127 kW) and a 125 mph (201 km/h) top speed. The AC Ace 2.6 is for many people the prettiest Ace of all and the rarest, only 37 cars were built. To fit the Zephyr engine, AC had to modify the frame, relocate the steering box and completely change the nose of the car. These changes are often mistakenly attributed to Carroll Shelby.
In 1954, a beautiful little alloy bodied coupe was shown at Earls Court, The AC Aceca. It was only slightly heavier than the Ace and because of better aerodynamics was slightly faster. Only 328 Aceca cars were produced, and they were equipped with either of the Ace engines. There was a demand for a larger four-seater car and AC produced the Greyhound, built on a stretched Ace chassis with coil suspension all around and a 2.2 litre Bristol engine.
Carol Shelby and the Cobra
In 1962 AC was approached by Carroll Shelby to use a small block Ford V8 Motor in the Ace chassis, producing the AC Cobra. Shelby needed a car that could compete with the Chevrolet Corvette in US sports car racing. The resulting Cobra was a very powerful roadster, and it is commonly blamed for the introduction of the 70 mph (113 km/h) limit on British motorways. Although a major factor in the decision, after a coupe version was caught doing 196 mph (315 km/h) during a test run.[1] a recent spate of accidents in foggy conditions also helped the introduction of the limit.
At the end of the 1964 racing season, the Cobra was being outclassed in sports car racing by Ferrari, Carroll Shelby decided he needed a bigger engine. A big block 390 Ford FE engine was installed in a Cobra and the result was scary, the car was virtually un-drivable. It was decided that a completely new chassis was needed. With the combined help of Ford’s computers and the experience of the AC engineers, the new MKIII was born with 4 inch (100 mm) main tubes instead of 3 inch (75 mm) for the chassis, huge cross-braced shock towers and coil springs all around and made the new AC Cobra MKIII an absolutely unbeatable 2,200 lb race car. The engine that was installed in the car was the famed Ford 427 engine FE NASCAR Side Oiler Ford V8 motor, a power-house engine developing 385 bhp in its mildest street version. Unfortunately, the car missed homologation for the 1965 season and was not raced by the Shelby team. However, it was raced successfully by many privateers and went on to win races all the way into the 1970s. The AC 427 Cobra, although a commercial failure when in production, is one of the most sought-after and copied automobile ever. It was produced in two versions, a street model with a tamer motor, optional dual carburetors, a glove box and exhaust running under the car and a competition version with a stripped interior, no glove box, different instrument layout and revised suspension. The competition version also had a more powerful motor with only one carburetor, side exhausts, a roll-bar and wider fenders to accommodate racing tires. At the end in 1966, Shelby was left with a 31 unsold competition cars and decided to sell them to the general public under the name of Cobra 427 S/C or Super Competition. (Today these S/C cars are the most sought after models and can sell in excess of a million and a half dollars).
Carroll Shelby sold the Cobra name to Ford in 1965 and went on to develop the famed racing Ford GT40.
Meanwhile AC went on producing a milder version of the 427 MK III Cobra for the European market fitted with the small block Ford motor. The car was called the AC 289 and 27 were produced.
AC 428 or Frua
At the same time, the company realized they needed a Grand-Tourer automobile that could appeal to wealthy customers and they contacted the famed Italian coach builder Pietro Frua to design an appealing GT body that could be fitted on a MKIII Cobra chassis stretched by 6 inches (150 mm). The new car was shown at the 1965 Turin show. A few early models were fitted with the famed 427 Ford FE motors. In 1967 the long stroked 428 motor became available and the car became the AC Frua. Built out of steel, the AC Frua is heavier than a Cobra, at around 3,000 lbs, it is still a light, very fast automobile built on a racing chassis. The car was never fully developed and the cost of sending chassis to Italy and back to England for final assembly made it so expensive that only a few were produced. Production ended in 1973 after only 79 cars.
ME3000
The 1970s were not a good period for luxury cars manufacturers and Derek Hurlock went searching for a totally new smaller car. Mid-engined designs were in fashion at the time and at the 1973 London Motor Show a completely new car was shown, the mid-engined ME3000 with Ford V6, 3 liter engine and AC’s own gearbox. Problems in development meant no cars were delivered until 1979. After 71 cars were sold, production stopped at Thames Ditton. The company was struggling again and the project was sold in 1984 to a new company registered as AC Cars (Scotland) owned by David McDonald who opened a new factory in Hillington, Glasgow, production ended after 30 more cars were built. This is where history stops for the original AC company.
Brian Angliss era
In 1982 Brian Angliss who was running Autocraft, a Cobra restoration shop, parts supplier and replica manufacturer, acquired some of the tooling from Thames Ditton and eventually the right to use the AC name. Brian Angliss was a man of vision and really tried to revive AC Cars. He created the MKIV; the car had US 5 mph bumpers, a federalized motor, and a larger interior with modern switchgear. About 480 cars were produced in his factory at Brooklands. He also produced a lightweight model which was more in tune with the original Cobra spirit but could not be imported to the US due to Federal regulations. Angliss had foresight and was looking for a new car to replace the MKIV. At the 1993 Motor Show, he introduced a new vehicle that he named the AC Ace. It was a nice automobile with a stainless steel chassis and a pretty aluminum body. It was expensive to build and sales never really materialized.
Ownership confusion/Attempt to revive AC
In March of 1996, mainly because of a dispute with Ford management, the company went into receivership, and was eventually sold to Alan Lubinsky’s Pride Automotive in December 1996, who continued car production under the name of AC Car Group Ltd. However, the company soon fell into receivership again, and was saved by Jimmy Price, who owns Superformance in the US and South Africa. After a bitter fight, Jimmy Price walked away and left Lubinsky in control again.
In 2003, Carroll Shelby International Inc. and AC Motor Holdings, Ltd. announced production of authentic Shelby/AC Cobra, with the production vehicle arriving at dealers in July 2004. Initially, available models included Shelby AC 427 S/C Cobra and Shelby AC 289 FIA Cobra, which would be branded as the CSX 1000 and CSX 7500 Series, respectively. In February 2004 the first handcrafted aluminum body shell was built. However, AC Motor Holdings, Ltd. failed to perform under the terms of its license agreement with Carroll Shelby, and a lawsuit was filed by Shelby against AC Motor Holdings, Ltd. and its proprietor, Alan Lubinsky, in May 2006.
In 2005, AC Motor Holding relocated to Malta and is now making fiberglass bodied kit cars (sold as rolling chassis).
There is also a project called Project Kimber to sell the defunct Smart Roadster under the AC name.
Post War Mechanical details
ACs were available initially with two body styles and two engine/transmission combinations (in addition to the micro car). The body styles were the Ace roadster and the Aceca coupé. eventually another body style was added, the AC Greyhound. All bodies were aluminium.
These engines each had about two liters displacement, but different bores, strokes and powers. The best known engine is the Bristol, the design for which was taken from BMW during or after World War II, and which was built by Bristol Cars for its own cars, and sold to AC. This had two sets of push-rods and two sets of rocker-arms opening the exhaust valves to allow a cross flow “hemi” combustion chamber in a compact space. The design, however clever is fragile.
The other engine was AC’s own single overhead camshaft product dating back to 1919 and often referred to as the Weller engine after the name of it’s creator. It’s a long stroke design, producing less power than the Bristol engine but less expensive to produce and lighter, putting the car in direct competition with Porsche.
Road & Track reported on a satisfactory Chevrolet V8 conversion before the Ford “Cobra” V8 version appeared.
Front and rear suspensions were independent leaf spring systems , like the front suspension of a Panhard or the Chevrolet Corvette Sting Ray until the MKIII chassis appeared which had independent coil springs all around.
For historical reference see also Allard.
Source:Wikipedia
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Tags: AC, Automobiles, Sports Cars, Racing, Allworldautomotive
Categories: Auto Makers
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