VIDEO: Rebuilding the AC MA 200 Posted 2010/03/26 @ 11:00 AM By Myles Kornblatt
The AC MA 200 won its Sports and GT Cars class at this year’s Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance. But before it was ready for the prestigious car show lawn, this prototype had a long road to travel. The MA 200 had been on the road for almost fifty years, and its age was showing. The Creative Workshop in Dania Beach, Florida needed to strip this forgotten classic back to its chassis before it was ready to be reborn. Watch as the AC MA 200 gets transformed from a shell into a concours winner:
WHAT IS THE AC MA 200?
Picture this...It is a beautiful Saturday morning. The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, and you roll over to find the most intriguing person you’ve ever seen sleeping next to you (women you can play along too.) She’s beautiful, charming, and exotic.
You met her last night at the bar, and everything else is a hazy memory up until this morning. You confide in her that she’s a complete mystery, and she happily tells you about her whole life – everything from her grade school to the name of her cat. But there is one thing she’ll always keep secret…why she left the bar with you.
This is the automotive equivalent.
The AC MA 200 is holding a secret. It is well documented that Zdzislaw Marczewski, an engineer at AC Cars, was developing this British prototype roadster in the early 60s. That pretty much takes care of four of the five W’s (i.e. who, what, when, and where,) but the real mystery that remains is why was this car completed?
AC started this prototype around the same time it began supplying Carroll Shelby with modified Ace bodies to make the now legendary Cobra. Evidence suggests the MA 200’s development was originally started to showcase a flat-six engine that AC was developing on its own. This plan was scrapped during development because the powerplant’s high price tag could not justify the relatively low horsepower yield. The MA 200 was then given the same Ford 289 V8 engine that was going into the Cobras.
Why was AC spending money on building its own home-grown Cobra? Was AC trying to make a new car for Shelby or was AC trying to make a better car to one-up its own half-brother?
Interviews with everyone involved in the project never mention Shelby knowing about the roadster, but no one offers any clear motivation for the MA 200’s survival. We’ll keep digging for more answers, but this is a mystery that may never be fully solved. The three principal people at AC involved with the MA 200, Managing Director Derek Hurlock, engineer and stylist Alan Turner, and Marczewski could never agree on the car’s development story.
Keep an eye out for our full write-up coming soon.
