It was only last year that I discovered that Keith Pettit’s well-prepared “Frogeye” Sprite looked different on Autotests to when it was trialling. I soon discovered the simple reason, Keith has not one, but two, of these British Racing Green machines. He also has another classic “A series” motor, his trials prepared A35.
Very soon I was on the phone, asking Keith if he would be the next subject of my “cars I have owned” feature. He agreed and we got together with my tape recorder and his photo albums during lunch at Falcons July Autotest.
Frog
The Cotswold Clouds in the snow.
Keith bought his first Sprite, 820 NPK, known as Frog, back in 1975 when he was just 17 years old. It soon took to the hills as a Trials Car when Keith took part in PCT’s forming part of the local ACSMC championship. Many of these took place on rough army land, good practice for it’s MCC début on the 1979 Lands End when Keith was very happy to win a 2nd class award, as a Silver was known in those days.
Keith continued to concentrate on PCT’s, his Classic career confined to an annual excursion on the Lands End at this stage. These were not without success though and Keith was the class 4 winner in 1982 (not class 5 – remember the class structure was different in those days). In between PCT’s Keith started autotesting, taking a number of FTD’s, before giving Frog a major re-build in 1983, prior to making a serious assault on the Classic’s in 1985. This was pretty successful, resulting in a class win on the Chase Clouds in 1985 before obtaining a coveted MCC Triple in 1986, along with the ACTC’s Mike Stephens award. This was a very full season for Keith and from an old copy of “Four Wheels Out” I see he competed in the Clee Hills, Chase Clouds, Kyrle and Exmoor Clouds in addition to the three MCC events and a full season of circuit racing!
Although continuing with the MCC events Keith’s trials career now started to take a back seat as the smooth tarmac of the racing circuit beckoned. In the winter of 82/83, Keith had bought another Frogeye Sprite that was so much of a “basket case” that it had to come home on his truck. The registration number of this second car was 3189 AH, but it soon picked up the affectionate name of “Toad”.
- 1976 MSAC Social Climbers – 1st Novice
- 1977 Weavers Down PCT – 1st Class
- 1978 ACSMC PCT – Class 3 Winner
- 1979 Lands End – 2nd Class, ACSMC – Class 4 Winner
- 1980 ACSMC – PCT Class 6 Winner
- 1982 Lands End – Best in Class Four
- 1984 FTD – Singer Owners Autotest
- 1985 Chase Clouds – 1st Class
- 1986 MCC Triple, ACTC – Mike Stephens Award
- 1990 Exeter – Class 5 Winner, Lands End – Best in Class Five
- 1995 Edinburgh – Best in Class Five
TOAD
The previous owner had started restoring it, and done some of the welding, but there was a lot for Keith to do to finish it. He paid a lot of detailed attention to the sills, box sections and prop shaft tunnel as these are the main structure in a Sprite, so important in an open car without a roof to brace things properly! Keith also put on new repair arches, another very important structural part of the car. The suspension turrets were in pretty bad shape and the radiator mountings had gone as well so Keith still had a lot of welding to do to get the car in the condition it is in today.
Keith kept his original Frog in trials trim while his new acquisition, Toad, took to the racetrack in the MG Car Club Midget Series. Keith’s first ever race was at Brands Hatch and in true trials tradition he scorned a trailer and drove the car to and from the meeting, although later in it’s track career it did sneak the occasional ride on the back of the businesses truck!
The new Austin Healey Series followed the MG championship in 1985. There were four classes. Two for “big” Healey’s, modified and un-modified, and two for Sprites where Keith competed in the un-modified class and was overall champion. Pursuing the AH championship involved around 8 races taking in most of the British circuits, of which Brands was Keith’s favourite, with Donnington second. The following year Keith was third in his class before packing up racing because of the ever increasing cost and taking up Historic Rallying in Toad.
When he finished racing Keith changed the suspension for rallying, fitting different springs to raise the suspension and replacing the special Spax’s with standard shocks because of the regulations. Keith’s first rally with Toad was actually during his first year of racing, the 1984 Coronation Rally with Robert Ellis in the passengers seat and the came first overall.
With navigator Richard Dalton, Keith competed in the Historic rally championship for 3 or 4 years. Including the Rally Britannia, which was run at the same time as the RAC over some of the same stages. One of Keith’s favourites was over in Ireland where he competed in the Circuit of Ireland retrospective, which was a really good event, and Keith won a first class award in 1992.
One of the highlights of Keith’s Historic Rallying was the 88 Pirelli Classic Marathon, starting at Tower Bridge the route went down to Cortina in Italy and back. There were stages at Spa and Monza and an exciting trip over the Stelvio pass where the engine got really hot. The evening entertainment was pretty special as well, including a dinner amongst the cars at the Sclumff museum. The event finished at The RAC Club in Pall Mall after a final stage at Crystal Palace. The added excitement was that all this took place on Keith’s honeymoon as he had just got married!
Keith’s last Historic Rally was the 1993 Rally Britannia, after this the rules changed, mandating a steel bonnet. This would have made Toad far to heavy for the power output of the engine. Faced with the necessity to up-rate the power output, with the risk of unreliability, plus family commitments, Keith decided to call it a day, gave Toad a much needed re-spray before semi-retirement, just bringing him out for the occasional autotest.
Throughout it’s racing and rallying career Toad’s specification was very much determined by the championship it was competing in. In the MG series Toad ran on standard width wheels with either the hood up or a hard top. With the move to the AH series it was allowed to run with wider tyres and an Aero screen. When the Austin Healey series started in 1985 the body had to be kept standard so flared arches and so on were definitely out.
Toad had been running a 1275 lump for racing, which in fact is exactly the same engine it has today. Originally the 1275 motor was allowed by later the rules were changed mandating use of the original engines so Keith fitted a 948, which he used for around four years. As you can imagine Keith has become quite knowledgeable about “A series” engines over the years. Toad has a gas flowed head, a 731 cam from the Midget Series and this motor has always ran well. Carburettors are still the twin 1 ¼ SU’s from its racing days.
All the time Toad was racing and rallying the Frog was still being trialled pretty regularly. Frog has had a pretty full life in Keith’s ownership. As mentioned earlier he gave it a pretty major body rebuild about 3 years after he bought it as the wheel arches were starting to go, necessitating quite a bit of welding. Like many trials cars Frog has had quite a bit done to it to keep it going, with several attacks on the sill sections and a major job on reinforcing the rear arches and boot where the weight bouncing about in the back had threatened to start a crease.
Originally Frog had a steel bonnet and was used with that for MCC events and PCT’s before tackling other Classics with a Glass Fibre front end. Like with all Trials cars there have been lots of changes to the springs, involving raising the suspension with supplementary coil springs replacing the bump stops. This gives about another 1 ½ inches of ground clearance and can easily be removed for PCT’s. The front is the normal wishbones but with Imp rear springs to raise it up.
In the early days of trialling Keith spent a lot of time underneath changing diffs before fitting the modified Ford Internals that most Midget people went to about ten years ago. This involves keeping the Leyland CWP, but replacing the sun and planets with Ford components. This has proved to be extremely reliable, even with only two planet wheels. Before this he broke a lot of planet wheels (which he used to re-build) the record was the year when he broke ten and won the ACTC Tractor Tug Trophy!
The A35 came more recently. It’s competition début was in 1997. Keith had owned the car for about 4 years previously, but it lay fallow while he enlarged the garage to accommodate the additional member of the family. It was built it in a year and competed on the Lands End with the family before tackling The March Hare and The Edinburgh where the prop shaft broke because the bodies of the coil-overs were bending and twisting. This caused the axle to rotate, straining the UJ, which of course protested and broke. This sent Keith back to the drawing board. He has now changed things to prevent re-occurrence but the car has not yet re-emerged in competition although it gets used on the road occasionally.
Keith is still enjoying his motoring and has lots of ideas for his cars for the future. I didn’t ask him, but I doubt very much if any of them are for sale!
- 1984 Started Racing in MG Series, 1st Overall – Coronation Rally
- 1985 1st Overall – Austin Healey Racing Championship
- 1986 3rd in Class – Austin Healey Racing Series
- 1988 Pirelli Classic Marathon
- 1989 Circuit of Ireland Retrospective
- 1991 Rally Britannia – 2nd Class
- 1992 Rally Britannia, Circuit of Ireland Retrospective – 1st Class
- 1993 Rally Britannia
We have been publishing stuff about Classic Trials on the Web since 1995 and always appreciate feedback. Comments, Corrections, Criticism & Concerns are all welcome. You can leave a comment to have your say here on this web site or our Social Media
Classical Gas 