HERON MJ1
A FAC TORY- P RODUCE D N E W Z E A L AND S U PE RC A R
Many people think of the Trekka as being New Zealand’s only production car. They are wrong. At best, it is one of four farm-utility vehicles produced as turnkey products, the others being the Terra, the Trailmaker, and the Duzgo. But the crown for New Zealand’s most successful production car should belong to, in my opinion, the Heron — a supercar manufactured in Rotorua.
Some will disagree with my calling the Heron a supercar. However, it is very hard to define what a supercar is, and, in this instance, I have gone with a definition put together by Jeff Glucker, an automotive correspondent: “Supercars are mystic creatures that stalk empty back roads where they can’t be bothered by lesser machines. They inhabit our hearts, our minds … and the posters of the walls belonging to our younger selves.”
Judged by the above definition, the Heron ticks all the boxes. In the first half of the 1980s, if you wanted to look good, go fast, and drive a car that handled well, you had a choice: you could buy European — Lamborghini, Ferrari, Porsche — go British with Lotus; or go Japanese with the ummm … But when the Heron MJ1 came on the scene, New Zealand buyers had an alternative option, and it was New Zealand made!
Having said that, for many who read this story, this will be the first time that they have seen or even heard of the Heron MJ1. It was a car designed by Ross Baker, an A-grade mechanic based in Rotorua, who could not only fix cars but also create them using processes that were outside conventional thinking, and innovative for the day. For a brief time during the early ’80s, this incredible sports car was manufactured in a small factory in Rotorua. Paul Macdiarmid, who was one of the principal people involved in the manufacture of its fibreglass monocoque body, remembers it “as a wild ride.” Sadly, this amazing car is all but forgotten.
Unlike most other fibreglass cars, hardly any steel plates or metal members are moulded into the body, nor is the bodywork mounted onto a steel chassis. Ross believed that the two materials were incompatible, in terms of their different expansion and contraction rates and degree of flexibility. The only concessions to this are a steel roll bar glassed into each door pillar — which also gives a solid mount for the door latches and seat-belt mounts — and, where greater strength is needed for suspension-mounting points, a patented stainless-steel mesh system bonded into the fibreglass. All this at a time when fibreglass monocoque cars were unheard of.
Mechanically, the motor is Fiat, with the suspension and drivetrain componentry provided by Skoda. This includes the transaxle and gearbox. Skoda parts were used as they are simple yet very robust and relatively inexpensive. The instrument cluster comes from the Holden Camira.
Confirmed buyers
It was a sensation at its public debut at the 1983 Motor Expo. Ross had promised his team that if 10 people showed interest in the car, he would shout them dinner. By the end of the show, he had 350 names of people who had expressed an interest. This would eventually turn into 32 confirmed buyers, complete with deposits, and dinner was duly provided!
Ross had intended that the car be sold as a kit or built in his factory for around $16K, using mechanical components provided by the car’s owner. However, before he started gearing up for production, he was convinced by Frank Hart, of Summit Engineering, that a car this good should only be sold brand new, and turnkey. Frank even offered to become the project’s main financial backer and to purchase two-thirds of the Heron company. At the time, the offer seemed too good to be true, and although Ross would later regret it, he agreed to Frank’s terms.
One of the many changes that Summit made was to have the original 1.6-litre motor changed to a brand new 2.0-litre Fiat engine. Ross had designed the car around the 1.6-litre unit, and the 2.0-litre meant that parts would have to be beefed up and possibly changed to take the greater power. Summit was looking for a quick return on its investment, so any development work had to be done while the car was in production. As a consequence of this imperfect design/development process, cars left the factory that Ross knew would return under warranty. He was not happy with this situation, but Summit was now the majority shareholder: Ross had lost control.
Eventually, including the prototypes, a total of 20 production cars were built, but with the in-production design changes, sales tax — once it became a new car, it immediately attracted the 20 per cent ‘luxury items’ tax in place at the time — and the additional burden of the warranty claims, the price of the Heron kept on increasing. By the time production ceased in 1985, the cost for a new Heron was $27,500 (about the same price as a new Commodore), and although at this price it was profitable, it could not compete with other acceptable sports cars, such as the Japanese import Mazda RX-7S, which were now selling for $18K. With the rapid increase in price, many of the people who had paid a deposit for the Heron asked for their money back.
On top of this, Summit decided to back out of the car business, as it was not getting a reasonable return, so Ross opted to buy back the rights to the Heron and the moulds. Production officially stopped in 1985. Although a few more cars were sold as kits, to use up parts that had been accumulated, its day was done. As a testament to the quality of the initial design, most of the cars still exist, although one car caught fire and another was stolen and ended up in the Waikato River.
Something special
Scott Brearley from Auckland has been a fan of the marque ever since he went to the 1983 Motor Expo with his dad, and, despite having limited knowledge of cars, he knew that the Heron was something special. Indeed, in 1992, after seeing a Heron for sale in a car yard, and irrespective of