Now in Maximum Mini Newsletter #75

What happened to Alec Poole's Unipower GT 'RBL 25F'?

Is that really the Luna Bug prototype turning up..?

Harold Dermott - where are you?

Luna Bug brochure found (cars still missing)

When I came across a brochure for the ultra-obscure Luna Bug lately I just had to buy it. Made in Fratton, Hampshire, the Luna Bug was a rather shameless copy of Stimson's Mini Bug, with similar framework and a body that looked much alike and even built around the corner. The thing was offered for sale in late 1970 from 145 GBP as a basic kit and two are believed to have been made, one with steel body and one in fibreglass (story here). The steel bodied car supposedly was the one offered for sale exclusively by Self Fit ltd. of Portsmouth in 1970. While the other car (or so it seems) was found a couple of years ago (click here) only to disappear once again soon after. It was registered 'PBK 714H', while the demonstrator used 'PBK 705H'. I would still love to find out more.

A Luna Bug brochure has to be rare. Just two Luna Bugs were made

Picture Jeroen Booij

Prices appear to have been lowered at one stage. Self-Fit Ltd. has forgotten all about it

Picture Jeroen Booij

The car as it could be seen in an advertisement in November 1970

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

And a Luna Bug as found in early 2013. The same car? Or a different one after all?

Picture Jeroen Booij archive via Paul Wylde

It disappeared off the radar as soon as it had appeared. Where is it now?

Picture Jeroen Booij archive via Paul Wylde

The sun seekers (3)

I'm off for a holiday for some time, but not without leaving you with no Maximum Mini stories. So here's a little series on Mini based sunshine cars that I wrote some years ago for Mini Magazine. Enjoy!

Apart from the obvious Volkswagen based Beach Buggy, the Mini proved to be a great base for a fun car too. Jeroen Booij looks at the best-known Mini derivatives for sunbathers; only to find out they all came from the south coast. Evidently not a coincidence.

The majority of the sun seeking Mini derivatives came from the UK's south coast. No coincidence?

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

That same year, however, the Mini fun car was given a new lease of life by Domino Cars Ltd of Southampton, once again in sunny Hampshire. The company was formed the year ahead by aeronautical engineer John Chapman and GRP-expert John Ingram. By 1986 they introduced their Domino Pimlico. A bit of a cross between the Mini Beach Car and a Mini based Beach Buggy! The design of the car came from Richard Oakes who did numerous kit cars before and Fibretech GRP that also did Beetle replicas built the car’s open body. The Pimlico was immediately recognizable as a Mini but came with lots of differences too. The body was completely seamless and came with high sills, no boot lid and no doors and a ‘T-bar’. It had large incorporated wheel arches; distinctive side skirts and ‘frenched’ rear lights. Simple doors that required external door hinges were available at extra cost but most customers ordered their Pimlico without. Standard, the cars were painted in a two-tone paint scheme. After the Pimlico-success the Domino-range was quickly broadened with more models. From a Hard Top version to a Pick-Up and from the Cabrio to a lightweight racer with space frame chassis and carbon composite body shell. Domino Cars and Fibretech went into receivership in the new millennium and the assets were taken over by Domino Composites, which changed its name to Composite Designs before going into liquidation in late 2007.

An early sketch of the Domino Pimlico. It became a best seller

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Thanks to an enthusiastic importer, quite a few Pimlicos sold in The Netherlands

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Although some went further abroad, to sunnier places, as well. This one is in Florida

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Life's a Beach! Some Domino Pimlico's even ended up with gullwing doors

Picture source unknown

There were plenty of others, too. Ranging from a Stimson Min Bug copy called the Luna Bug (this time it came from Portsmouth) and another from Scotland called the Dougal Bug, to the Cirrus – a buggy with a swoopy design of which a prototype was shown only once in public (in an incredible metalflake paint job) before disappearing forever. There were many more unofficial Beach cars built in small numbers from Portugal (Arco Iris Beach car) to the UK (Crayford Carnival; Tigmark Mini Millé), France (Fayard Mini; Jacky Mini Plage; Many Mégo Mini), Germany (L&H Mini Beach Car), Venezuela (Mini Cord Beach Car) and there was the unique Gran Turismoke from Australia and Ed Roth's Surfite from sunny California. Except from the Pimlico perhaps, all Mini based sun seekers mentioned here are all pretty rare though. Even the Stimson Min Bug of which reputedly 180 were built you don’t see on the roads anymore. So if you do know of one that’s been parked in a shed way too long, get it out before the summer is gone and the sun disappears again!

The Luna Bug turned up in 2013 (story here), only to disappear again very soon after!

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

The Cirrus Mini buggy remains another mystery. This is the only photograph I have of it

Picture Jeroen Booij archive / Hot Car magazine

Ed 'Big Daddy' Roth's Surfite was a bit of a film star before it ended up in a museum

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

The 1998 Tigmark Mini Mille - 'the Mini Beach Car for the new millennium'

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Sun seekers come from the south

A couple of years ago I did an article for Mini Magazine on some of the Mini based buggies. Now, when I had a better look at their histories put together it suddenly struck me that all of them were built very close to each other - on the British south coast. Evidently not a coincidence. First there was the Stimson Mini Bug from Chichester and the several version it spawned, including the mad Safari Six. But other companies soon came with ideas similar to Stimson’s. Not too far from Barry's workshop, another two Mini derivatives with bold beach buggy styling were conceived within months. From Poole came Neville Trickett’s more traditional Siva Buggy, soon to be distributed by Skyspeed's motor accessory company. Second was illustrator Mike Jupp's Nimrod, just miles further eastwards along the south coast. Then there was the Luna Bug (a Stimson clone, this time from Portsmouth - still missing); the Cirrus – a swoopy design of which a prototype was shown only once in public (in an incredible metalflake paint job) before disappearing forever (who knows more?) and the later Autocom Mini Buggy, also from the coast but now from Combe Martin in Devon. Do I miss out on any others here?

The south coast (and Devon) was the place where Mini based buggies were born

Picture Google Maps

The one that started the craze: the Stimson Mini Bug - first of the Mini based buggies

Picture Jeroen Booij

Mike Jupp and daughter with the Nimrod he styled - and owned since the day it was conceived

Picture Jeroen Booij

Now off to the beach! Siva's Buggy was a Neville Trickett design, marketed by Skyspeed

Picture Jeroen Booij

The Autocom Mini Buggy came from the north Devon coast, seen here at its birthplace

Picture Jeroen Booij

While the much more obscure Cirrus was marketed by Roland Kerr of London. Who knows more?

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Luna Bug discovered... vanishes again

As promised, here an update on the Luna Bug after yesterday's story about it. To find out more I chased Self Fit limited to no avail. So now it seemed that only luck could lead to more information about the car. And lucky I was. Or actually not me, but Paul Wylde - who has been very helpful before - was. He wrote to me a while ago: "Don't take this as gospel but I had a email a bit back about a guy who stated the Luna Bug never went to the fibreglass stage, claiming the one and only Luna Bug was fabricated out of steel because Barry Stimson threatened them with court actions." However, it lead to nothing.

But then, all of a sudden, Paul was offered a car for sale that definitely looked to be a Luna Bug. The one and only Luna Bug? Perhaps not, as this one was said to wear a different registration number then the car from the advertisement (not 'PBK 705H' but 'PBK 714H'). According to the DVLA database that number belonged to a 'Lunabug' indeed, but is on sorn since 1977. The car also clearly had a fibreglass body, rather then one in steel. The seller told Paul he'd had it for at least 30 years and had lost the number plates as it been moved around a lot in the years. Unfortunately, Paul couldn't pick it up quickly, and when he tried to get in touch later none of his messages were replied to. This all happened some months ago now. Paul doesn't have an idea where the car is now. Could it still be languishing around?

There you go. The Luna Bug as it reappeared recently. One of two made?

Picture through Paul Wylde

Like the advertisement car, the Luna Bug name is painted on its side, in a very 1970s way

Picture through Paul Wylde 

According to DVLA database this is an 850 engine. The single carburettor fits that bill

Picture through Paul Wylde

Steel tubing of framework seems to be least as simple as that of the Stimson

Picture through Paul Wylde

Body is definitely fibreglass. The car's roll bar and wind screen have been removed 

Picture through Paul Wylde

The head lights hidden in pods were definitely copied from Stimson's Mini Bug

Picture through Paul Wylde

Cloning Stimson's Mini Bug: the Luna Bug

When somebody comes up with a good idea, or at least one that seems to be a good one, there are always people trying to copy it. And so, back in 1969, when Barry Stimson built his first Mini based buggy in the UK after he'd seen VW based examples in Canada, it didn't take long for somebody else to clone his Stimson Mini Bug. That, boys and girls, became the Luna Bug. And although it may have seemed a clever idea, the name suggested it was rather foolish. In the first place because the Luna Bug was a rather shameless copy of Stimson's bug, with similar framework and a body that looked much alike, although the upright wind screen didn't do it too good. The thing was offered for sale in late 1970 from 145 GBP as a basic kit (the Stimson went from 170 GBP), but I don't think any were sold. 

With a bit of research and help from Stimson fan Paul Wylde, I found out that two chassis' were made in a place called Fratton by two guys who used to weld the chassis' for Stimson. One of these was built up as a car and became the Luna Bug you see on the pictures below. It was then offered for sale exclusively by Self Fit ltd. of Portsmouth - a company that's still in business today. To see if I could find out more about it, I contacted them, but unfortunately the chap who currently runs it does not remember anything about the Luna Bug. He did speak to the widow of one of the old Self Fit people and she vaguely remembered the car but that appeared to be it. So does the Luna Bug story ends dead there? Nope, it doesn't, as the actual car from the pictures below was found recently. More on that tomorrow.

Rare October 1970 advertisement for the Luna Bug, basic kit was offered for as little as 145 pounds

Picture archive Jeroen Booij / Hot Car magazine

The only other period picture that I found for the Luna Bug. Registration number is unknown now

Picture archive Jeroen Booij / Custom Car magazine