Griffith 200/400

The TVR Griffith began as the brainchild of its creator, Jack Griffith in 1962. Griffth ran a car repair workshop in the US who catered to patrons such as Gerry Sagerman and Mark Donohue. Both of these men had incidentally driven the works TVR Grantura at Sebring in 1962. Legend has it that one day at the shop, just for fun, Griffith decided to see if he could drop the Ford V8 from Donohue's AC Cobra into Sagerman's TVR. It didn't quite fit, but the idea had been planted in Griffith's mind. After performing a proper conversion for the car, and showing it's potential worth, Griffith contacted TVR with the details of his plan. Griffith wanted TVR to supply him with slightly modified TVR Grantura chassis without engines or transmissions which were to be fitted at his shop in America. TVR jumped at this idea and quickly began supplying chassis at the rate of 5-10 per week, far above their previous output.

The addition of a V8 to a Grantura turned it into a veritable beast. The Griffith 200 could either be fitted with a 195 hp motor, or a Hi-Po 289 that pumped out 271 hp. Performance of the car was virtually unbelievable; 0-60 times were quoted as 3.9 from the factory, although 5 if closer to the truth. The quarter mile came and went in 14.1 seconds and top speed was in excess of 150mph. The Griffith could embarrass nearly any car on the road.

Despite this massive influx of power, the car remain largely unchanged from its humble Grantura beginnings. Suspension pick up points were beefed up, and spring damper rates were changes, but that was about it. Even the humble diff that originally came from an MGA or MGB was unmodified. While performance was outstanding, fit and finish, as well as reliability suffered. This was to be expected with the hot-rod treatment the car was receiving and the rapid rate at which they were being turned out. TVR's reputation suffered from this, but improvements were on the way.

In 1964, the Griffith 200 was replaced by the 400. The 400 was a much better all around car that received the new-style Manx tail and vastly improved cooling for the big V8. This improved car could not erase the negative press that the 200 had received though. Sales, while good, were not enough to keep the Griffith, and Grantura Engineering as a whole, afloat in the US. In 1965, production of the Griffith ended with around 200 produced. The Griffith was not entirely dead though, Martin Lilley resurrected the nameplate for a run of 10 cars under his new ownership from April 1966 through January of '67. Despite the end of this final run of Griffiths, TVR's link with American V8s was not over, it was to be continued with the soon to debut Tuscan.

Photo thanks to Charley Colbert