SCM Analysis
Detailing
This 1958 AC Ace Bristol Roadster sold for $195,437, including buyer’s premium, at the H&H Auctions sale in Buxton, England, on June 10, 2009.
This was the star lot, centered in front of the stage at the charming Octagon Theater in the Peak District spa town of Buxton. Aces have been creeping up in recent years, to the point when even the supposedly least desirable AC-engined cars tipped over the psychological £100,000 ($162,000) barrier a couple of years ago. Without the Ace to inspire him, remember, Carroll Shelby might have put his V8s in Healeys-and plenty of folks have done that. But would it have made such an emblematic Cobra?
With a sale room half full of sports cars, intense bidding lifted this car $30k over a fairly conservative prediction. Eventually it was bought on the telephone by a private U.K. collector who outbid two traders-a Brit on the phone and a Dutchman in the room.
This Ace Bristol Roadster was about as nice as they get without being too concours. The body was very straight, the vulnerable corners-unprotected by the tiny over-riders (only U.S. Aces and Cobras seemed to get little nerf bars)-are in good shape. The doors fit well and the body was symmetrical and ripple-free, not always the case on Aces.
A driver, not a car you’re afraid to use
The metallic blue paint was good and even, not over-shiny and with just enough tiny blemishes and imperfections to give it some character, keeping it firmly as a driver rather than a car you’re afraid to take out. The leather was nicely supple and the top was new; the sidescreens were scruffy but perfectly usable.
The chassis looked in good shape, and there were some welded repairs to the low-slung exhaust. The Bristol motor is an expensive unit, but this one was refreshed 6,000 miles ago by one of the U.K.’s leading specialists, so one might assume all is right with it.
The AC Ace retains a lithe delicacy that is absent from its meatier, heavier-tired derivative, offering super-tactile high-geared steering, enough body roll to orient you in its enormously adjustable envelope of poise, and a firm brake pedal, proudly embossed with the AC logo, which gives reassuring bite from the disc/drum setup.
The right rubber is important here. Aces were originally fitted with 5.50-16 crossplies, and for a long while in the 1980s and ’90s, all that would fit were taxi radials, unsuitably heavy and stiff of carcass. Happily, a wider choice of vintage and classic-style rubber has become available in recent years, and this car sits on some period-looking Avon Turbosteel radials that should give it grip (but not too much), along with the feel original Ace owners found such a revelation.
The pedal blocks are included, presumably so the car can be fitted for a shorter driver, and the only absentee from the “desirable” roster is overdrive; with long gearing these are surprisingly good long-distance tourers, making them very accomplished all-rounders. But at least the adaptor is included.
So what we have here isn’t the cheapest AC Ace Roadster to have sold recently, but it is one of the nicest, most usable cars, with no immediate expenses, and the right-hand-drive conversion doesn’t seem to have hurt its value. In my book that makes it a very shrewd long-term purchase, as you can’t buy these on every street corner; owners tend to keep them a long time.
You can bet that those for sale will all now be marked up to $195k; there’s currently an Ace on the U.K. market that started as an Aceca and has an asking price of almost $220k. As we go to press, H&H has a much rarer Ford-engined car slated for its July 22 sale. A comparision will be interesting. As we Brits never tire of saying, this is the thinking man’s Cobra. And this one was thoughtfully bought.