J Type

The J2 was the commonest car in the range and was a road going 2 seater. Early cars had cycle wings but these were replaced in 1933 by the full length type that was typical of all sports MGs up to the 1950’s TF. The top speed of a standard car was 65 mph but a specially prepared one tested by The Autocar magazine reached 82 mph. The car cost £199. A couple of serious failings of a J2, was that it only had a two bearing crank shaft which, due to metal fatigue and stress, was almost certain to break at some stage and which could, if at speed, basically destroy the engine block. Its other problem was that it was not fitted with hydraulic brakes as used in cars of today, but had Bowden cables to each drum. Naturally this is well before luxuries such as power assisted brakes so in an emergency you literally had to stand on the brake pedal which then ran the risk of breaking one or more cables which made driving and stopping something of an adventure. The non syncromesh gearbox takes some getting used to but with its short gear stick it becomes second nature to double de-clutch and rare to grind the gears.

The J4 was a pure racing version with light weight body work and the J3 engine but using more boost from the supercharger to obtain 72 bhp.