KITS AND PIECES
PETER ANDREWS DOES NOT SEE HIMSELF AS A CAR BUILDER; INSTEAD, HE IS MORE OF AN ARTIST WHO USES A CAR AS HIS CANVAS
In 2007, about 5km north of Katikati, down a long gravel road, I found myself at the launch of one man’s interpretation of how the MX-5 should have looked. Admittedly, it was a very small launch, with no media on site. As a matter of fact, the only people present were Peter Andrews, his partner Trish, and myself. Just over 10 years later, I decided to make the journey back to Katikati to get the story on what happened to the car during the intervening years.
Back then, the car alone had been worth a trip from Wellington. At the time of my interview, the MX-A was a one-off, but Peter intended to put it into production as a bodykit for the MX-5. Peter is no stranger to the car-building world, having built multiple cars already, many of which were scratchbuilt. Peter, however, does not see himself as a car builder; instead, he is more of an artist who uses a car as his canvas. Mechanically, his cars are fairly standard, with parts being fitted in what Peter believes to be the most appropriate place. A classic example of this is the Patero, which featured in the May 2017 edition (Issue No. 317) of this magazine. The Patero was cobbled together using parts from a range of Nissan and Toyota cars. The body, however, was all Peter’s design. The MX-A was a little different, with the Mazda MX-5 being the primary donor. The main difference, besides the body panels, was the addition of Mazda 6 headlights and Mazda 3 tail lights.
The MX-A was Peter’s second attempt at putting a car into production. His first had been back in the mid ’80s, when he was working in his boat-building trade, in Taupo. It was in his Taupo factory that he created the Asco Aura, a car whose design was inspired by the roadsters of the ’30s and ’40s. The donor car of choice in this instance was the Triumph Herald, which, with its separate chassis, was an often-used car in the kit-car industry.
The Asco Aura was launched at the Auckland New Zealand Motor Expo early in 1985. Early indications were that the car would be a success, with 600 people walking away with brochures. Four cars had already been sold prior to the show. The kitset came with all the body panels and a fold-flat windscreen. At the time, Peter had dreams of producing three cars a week, but it was not to be. By the time production had finished in 1988, 11 cars had been sold. The moulds were put into storage, and Peter moved to Australia with his family and got a job restoring old cars.
Own design
When Peter came back from Australia in 2002, he got involved in restoring houses rather than cars or boats. That was possibly the way it would have remained if Peter’s father Phil had not tasked him with restoring a Trekka that had come into his possession. Phil Andrews and the Trekka go back to the day of its conception, as he is one of its instigators. The Trekka was a fun and challenging project, and, although not as glamorous as some of the cars Peter had restored, the simplicity of its construction set him to wondering again about designing and building his own cars here. As with his Asco Aura, they would not be replicas, but his own design. It was at this stage that his new company, Concept Cars NZ, was formed.
Potential market
In Peter’s opinion, if you are going to build a car, it must be unique, otherwise you are only copying somebody else’s ideas, and it would be wrong to put your name on the bonnet. The first of these was the aforementioned Patero. That car was only ever intended to be a one-off. In the meantime, his
partner Trish had purchased an NB MX-5, and Peter was impressed with what a neat little car it was. It was well put together and extremely reliable, but its style had failed to impress car aficionados. Peter thought that he could do better.
These days, a MX-5 can be purchased for as little as $2K, and, mechanically, there is very little difference between a 1990 car and a 2004 model. On top of that, there are plenty of spare parts for them, as roughly 800,000 NA and NB cars were produced, never mind the aftermarket add-ons that can make this car spectacular to drive. Peter saw a potential market to generate more interest in the car by creating a new body shape.
Boat-building skills
His initial idea had been to use Trish’s NB, but he quickly learned from her that that was not going to happen unless he wanted something other than sugar in his tea. Considering discretion to be the better part of valour, Peter purchased an old NA MX-5. Then, using his boat-building skills, along with a reasonable amount of urethane foam, he sculpted the car that you see in the pictures.
Every single exterior panel of the car has been changed — in my opinion, for the better. What makes the car stand out from others of its ilk are the first-generation Mazda 6 headlights and Mazda 3 tail lights, especially the way they have been flared into existing panels. Shaping was done by gluing urethane to the front and rear wings, followed by a lot of hand sanding until he got the shape that he wanted. As all the front panels of the MX-5 can be unbolted, he was able to create a totally new front end and bonnet. The rear of the car was extended slightly to fit the tail lights and to avoid cutting into any of the existing steel panels.
The plan was that the bodykit would consist of the bonnet, front wings, and bumpers — all made from fibreglass. These could have been easily bolted on to an existing MX-5. The rear wings would have been bonded over the top of the existing ones and fared into place. The boot lid and rear bumper were intended to be separate items and, like the front, simply bolt into place. It would have then been a simple job to bog and fill the exterior door panels to remove the existing swage lines. The new panels would have weighed about the same as those that had been removed so the performance would not change.
Almost any part of an MX-5 interior can be changed or restyled with the large range of aftermarket accessories available in Japan and the US. The Japanese market now boasts several different types of interior that can be fitted to these cars. That is, if the builder wanted to move even further away from the MX-5 look. When Peter built his MX-A, he did consider this but, in the end, decided to retain the original interior, albeit the top-of-the-range tan-leather version from another car.
The problem with most home-built cars is getting the soft-top not to leak. Mazda had already spent a fortune solving this problem,
His initial idea had been to use Trish’s NB, but he quickly learned from her that that was not going to happen unless he wanted something other than sugar in his tea
and the MX-A has the benefits of that superbly engineered MX-5 soft-top. Owners could have chosen from the NA with the plastic rear screen or gone one better with the heated glass of the NB, as the tops are interchangeable. Further, there is also the possibility of having the readymade hardtop that is available for these cars, making it quite practical as an everyday runner.
Being a bodykit, the MX-A would have not have been required to go through the full Low Volume Vehicle Technical Association (LVVTA) certification process as, unless a car is mechanically modified or structurally altered, it does not need certification or a new VIN. All the changes to the MX-A were cosmetic. Peter believes that he could have sold the kit for between $8K and $10K, with the main expense being the Mazda headlights and tail lights. The kit could have been assembled over two or three weekends, followed by more a liberal dose of elbow grease to get it ready for painting. The resultant car still looks modern to this day, and, along with MX-5 reliability and performance, it should have been a marketable proposition.
So, what happened?
Enthusiasts, not millionaires
When I visited in 2007, a definite decision had been made to go into production. However, before Peter was prepared to pull the car apart again to create the moulds, he wanted 10 orders to make it economically viable. At the time he had six.
I believe that it failed for two reasons. The first is that New Zealand is too small a country to generate the volume of kits to make it economically viable. All the New Zealand car manufacturers that I have met have either made money selling their cars overseas or kept car production as a sideline to their main bread-and-butter business. In New Zealand, it is enthusiasts who build cars, not millionaires.
The second is that Peter is an artist first and a salesman second. Having finished the car, he was already thinking of his next project, and did not put the energy into the marketing that the car deserved. The media took no interest in it, and Katikati is a long way for an automotive reporter to go without the promise of a free lunch, accommodation, and entertainment.
I still believe that the car looks a lot better than the MX-5S of the era, and it can also compete with the stunning looks of the most recent rendition of it, the ND. The very first story I wrote for this magazine was about an MX-5 that had been, with the aid of a bodykit, made to look like an Aston Martin. That was a copy; the MX-A is a unique New Zealand design.
With 10 orders, a production version of this car may still be viable. I live in hope.