From 1964-1967 the little Rootes car company in England produced one of the coolest sports cars of the decade. The Sunbeam Tiger combined the sprightly Rootes chassis with a good old American small block V8 and over the span of three years just over 7,000 examples were made. Carroll Shelby and American racing legend Ken Miles both had a hand in developing the fun little car that basically served as a more refined and finished version of the Shelby Cobra. While the Cobra was a hairy chested monster, the Sunbeam Tiger was fast but not the brutish beast the Cobra was.
The little cars were still a handful and the 7,083 recorded production examples have dwindled to a far smaller number across the globe through crashes, neglect, and the unstoppable march of time. This means that the cars that remain are worth a few bucks. Taking that to the next level, the cars that have been restored to factory new or better than factory new are unicorn levels of rare and this means that their asking price is heavy. In this case the asking price is more than $130,000. Yikes. We cannot say whether the market will bear that but we can say that the car looks damned nice.
All but a handful of the latest produced cars were powered by the 260ci small block Ford V8. The little engine was not some sort of fire breather but in a light car, it was magic. The engine barely fit but it did fit and interestingly when Rootes ordered 3,000 260ci engines in 1964 which, at the time, was the largest order of Ford engines by an outside company.
Tigers were not really successful racers. Yes, the competed at LeMans and other races but their accolades were short. Heck, they were more decorated drag race cars than anything with AHRA national records to their credit.
This car is awesome but man, $130,000 a big pill to swallow.
RacingJunk: This 1965 Sunbeam Tiger is a little car brining big dollars
What a nice little car. Though it will never have the value of a Tiger I like my SBC MGB (custom frame and suspension, 500hp sbc) more, I have a couple of friends with modified Tigers that have ridden in my MGB,, it kind ruined their thinking theirs (250hp) were fast. Good luck with that price (actually a maybe at auction, seen $100K before).
Yeah right – take your Chevy-polluted “MG” and drive it off the nearest cliff!
Have a nice day Geordie, I will driving my MGB.
for 130 large,you’d think they would have done a better job on the interior!
Maxwell Smart drove a Tiger until he switched to a Karmann Ghia for some reason.