Frazer Nash-BMW 319: keeping it in the family

By Andrew Frankel

| 21 Jul 2026

Classic & Sports Car – Frazer Nash-BMW 319: keeping it in the family

So many BMWs of all ages have suffered the dubious fate of becoming entirely overshadowed by more glamorous stablemates.

The most obvious occurrences have come since the advent of BMW’s M department, for what is an E28 535i next to an M5, an E30 325i compared with an M3? Or even a modern M440i parked next to a new M4?

All fine cars that never got the credit they deserved.

Frazer Nash takes precedence on BMW’s famous roundel

You might even argue a 2002tii would have enjoyed a still more stellar reputation had all the oxygen not been sucked out of the air by the party-clothed 2002 turbo.

You know, the one with the reverse lettering on its front spoiler proclaiming its USP and disguising the awkward truth that it was, in fact, a flawed car.

But just one, at least so far as I am aware, has suffered the ignominy of being completely upstaged by a car that didn’t even exist at the time it was in production.

And that car is this car, the BMW 319 – or, in this very particular case, the Frazer Nash-BMW 319.

Tracked down after a long search by the son of a previous owner, this Frazer Nash-BMW 319 reveals the origins of the seminal 328

For those of you still scratching heads trying to place this machine, relief is at hand.

Because if I tell you it’s the father of the 328, I’m betting that no further explanation is required.

I would say also it was a development of the 1933 BMW 303, Munich’s first with not only a six-cylinder engine, but also the now iconic kidney grille.

Even so, and even before you learn how Jeremy Gibson became reunited with his dad’s 319 decades after it had left the family, there are some other things that need clearing up.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319 in dog-eared family photos

The first of these is how the name of a tiny constructor of eccentric British sports cars became appended to that of a highly regarded German sports car manufacturer.

It goes back to the 1934 Alpine Trial.

It was an event at which HJ Aldington, managing director of AFN (Archibald Frazer Nash) Ltd, had expected his chain-drive Frazer Nash entrants to do well in the sub-1500cc category.

And with good reason: the previous year, a TT Replica Frazer Nash was the only car to garner zero penalty points.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s windscreen folds down – but not on a chilly winter’s day

But in 1934 his cars were upstaged by a new BMW model, sporting such refinements as a silky six-cylinder engine, tubular chassis, independent front suspension and rack-and-pinion steering.

This was the 315, of which the 319 was a direct development.

So impressed was ‘Aldy’ that he soon got into talks about AFN not only becoming the UK importer of BMW cars (and, soon, motorcycles), but also assembling them at the Frazer Nash works in Isleworth.

Additionally, a deal was struck that gave AFN the right to call such cars sold in the UK Frazer Nash-BMWs, which was a fairly remarkable concession.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s spatted rear wheels give an Art Deco touch

I’ve tried and failed to think of another example of a foreign firm building cars under licence and being allowed to put their own name on them ahead of that of the licensor.

Apparently the reason given was fear that sales would be limited if they were sold purely as BMWs, not least due to the rise of the Nazi Party in the mid-1930s.

But reinforcing the fact that it was British-built was perhaps the more powerful argument.

By ‘built’, what is really meant is ‘assembled’.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319 has a surprisingly torquey straight-six

BMW would send over the parts, including right-hand-drive bodies, and AFN would turn them into finished cars. A contemporary report in Motor Sport claimed that by the end of six months: ‘Messrs. A.F.N. should be in a position to manufacture every part of the cars in this country.’

Whether that was even ever an intention, or just some PR puff generated to make the project sound more British than it was, it certainly didn’t work out that way.

The Frazer Nash archive states that first imports began in 1934, starting with the 315, which was itself replaced by the upgraded, 1.9-litre 319 and imported until 1937 before it was in turn superseded by the 328.

‘It is how BMW brought together these promising raw materials that explains the magic of the 319’

Of the open two-seater ‘Sports’ model such as this one, just 16 315s and 26 319s were brought in, alongside more than 600 with the saloon and cabriolet bodies.

While 24 of the 42 Sports are believed still to exist, just 40 of the saloons and cabriolets are still around, survival rates of approximately 57% and 7% respectively.

There was little revolutionary about the 319: Morgan had been using independent front suspension since before the First World War, although it was an early adopter of rack-and-pinion steering.

Small-capacity six-cylinder engines were not new either, as anyone working for MG at the time would have been keen to tell you.

Chrome louvres on the Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s bonnet sides

But it is how BMW brought together these promising raw materials to produce something light yet beautifully made, agile yet supremely comfortable, that explains the magic of the 319 – and, indeed, that of the 1940 Mille Miglia-winning (if you can call 10 laps of a pre-set 100-mile course a Mille Miglia), limelight-hogging 328 that came after it.

For 328 aficionados, the archive states that of the 460 328s that were built, 48 came to the UK; all but two of those can be accounted for today, which represents a survival rate of 96%.

The story of the car you see here starts in 1936, when it was sold by the Scott Brown dealership in Glasgow to actor and racer Elliot Playfair.

Its trail doesn’t exactly go cold after that, but the path fades enough for it to become hard to follow.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s jewel-like rear reflectors on its ovoid, side-hinged bootlid

What is known is that some time between then and 1950, when it was bought by Charles Bulmer, then editor of The Motor, it was owned by brothers Paul and Jack Gibson.

The smart money puts the date of acquisition at around 1939, not least because Halls of Balham advertised it for sale in that year for £225, describing it as ‘specially tuned’ and ‘indistinguishable from new’.

Pictures of it wearing wartime black-out headlight covers while in the possession of the brothers appear to put the issue beyond reasonable doubt. Unlike that ‘indistinguishable from new’ claim.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s neat sidelights perch atop the front wings

In fact, ASC 131 had led a busy life in its few short years to date.

As recent research now reveals, it was worked hard between its date of registration and subsequent sale to the Gibson brothers.

There’s a fetching shot of it competing with vigour at the Bo’ness Hillclimb in 1937, along with evidence of it taking part in the two-day Highland Trial in the same year, the Scottish Coronation Rally, the 1938 Land’s End Trial and the International Rally Scotland.

Most of the rest of its history has been lost: new owners were registered in 1962 and 1966, then nothing until almost the present day.

Finding a black-and-white photo of the Frazer Nash-BMW at Bo’ness Hillclimb reignited Jeremy Gibson’s desire to find it

“We wish we’d asked our fathers more about the BMW and what they did with it when we could,” laments Jeremy Gibson today.

He, along with his cousin Tony, eventually tracked the car down: “But we were young, they didn’t talk about it very often and, with petrol rationing, I expect the answer would have been ‘not as much as we would have liked’.”

It wasn’t until 2015 that Jeremy, a dyed-in-the-wool enthusiast but with a penchant for more modern machinery, decided to try to find out what had happened to it.

It was Mike Sythes at the aforementioned archive who revealed where it had most recently been seen.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s exhaust note has a low, sonorous timbre that resonates pleasingly through Cheddar Gorge

“It was last known of in Germany, being restored,” says Jeremy. “I don’t know what state it was in when it arrived, but I think it needed a pretty thorough going-over.”

Pictures of the car in bare aluminium attest to that.

“It had been owned by a chap called Wolfgang Schründer, but beyond that very little was known, and at the time the likely price of the restored car would have been very expensive, so my search stopped there.”

Detective work led owner Jeremy Gibson to this car, his late father’s Frazer Nash-BMW 319

It would be another eight years – until 2023 – before Jeremy thought again about finding the car.

He recalls: “I found online a picture of it competing at Bo’ness, and that sort of set me off again.”

That, combined with the fact that he’d found it listed in Denis Jenkinson’s history of AFN, From chain drive to turbocharger.

What he found was an obituary for Herr Schründer and, crucially, an address for his family.

They passed on details of the car’s new owner, one Wolfgang Klinke, who, once contacted, agreed in principle to sell the car.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s comfortable, low-slung leather seats

Terms settled and inspection done, ASC 131 returned to the UK in April 2024, and in August Jeremy drove it to the Vintage Sports-Car Club meeting at Prescott where it sat on the BMW Historic Motor Club display.

But on the way home, the engine seized.

Simon Blakeney-Edwards rebuilt the motor over the winter of 2024-’25, and since then it has been on trips to Goodwood, Bicester and Boulogne.

We meet in a lay-by in Cheddar Gorge, near where the 319 now lives, Jeremy not in the least averse to getting the car out on a near-freezing winter’s day.

Agility and precision belie the Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s age

It’s gorgeous just to see it motoring up the gorge, more delicate and pretty than the undeniably handsome 328, the only pre-war BMW I had hitherto driven.

The car is standard save two ‘modifications’, both eminently reversible.

The first is the use of a more modern (relatively) gearbox from a Volvo Amazon – a common upgrade on such cars and obviating the need to dust down your double-declutching skills; Jeremy still has the original.

Second, it runs on two, not three, Solex carburettors, the latter I’m told being more trouble than the marginal gain in power is worth.

This Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s gearlever works a substitute gearbox from a Volvo Amazon

The engine is in rude health, bench run-in and probably giving a chunk more than the 55bhp it would have had in period.

Negotiations are brief, to say the least. “Andrew, take it for as long as you like,” Jeremy says, “drive it as you will, change gear when your ear tells you to, and enjoy.”

The 319’s driving position is excellent and accommodates all 6ft 3in of me with ease.

The dashboard layout is surprisingly modern, too, with 5000rpm and 100mph Veigel tachometer and speedometer placed directly ahead, and lesser dials for fuel level, oil pressure and water temperature displaced to the sides.

This Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s engine runs on two rather than three Solex carburettors

There’s no procedure, no theatre in firing it up; you just turn the key, hit a button and the straight-six – which, lest we forget, would go on to serve in Bristols and ACs post-war – spins instantly into life.

Its voice is a little deeper than expected, but it is no less sonorous for that.

It is one of those cars – and this is rare for pre-war machinery – that doesn’t require you to learn how it likes to be driven and to bend your driving style to accommodate.

How you want to drive is how it wants to be driven.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319 explores Cheddar Gorge

There’s really very little process: within a mile you’ve worked out the gear ratios and long-throw shift quality, and clocked that the brakes are far better than their initial feel suggests – they are superb for a quartet of elderly drums.

And then it’s up to you. I drive the outbound leg quite slowly, just immersing myself in the experience and terrific ride quality.

And while the engine is a delight, with far more low-down torque than you would credit for a unit with so little capacity and so many cylinders, it is the steering that is most enchanting.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s smart Veigel instruments

This I remembered from the 328: all by themselves, the precision and feel make these cars seem 20 years ahead of their time.

A very late Derby Bentley, one built in 1938 or ’39 with Marles steering, has a similarly well-oiled sense, just with none of the attendant accuracy of the 319.

On the way back I drive it as I hope Aldy would want it to have been driven.

Jeremy was right about the revs – you just wait until the motor starts to sing – and I’m impressed by how rapidly so few horsepower can bowl the 319 up the road.

The Frazer Nash-BMW 319’s deflectors add welcome extra cabin protection from the wind

But really, and this is the big surprise, the engine is actually cast in a mere supporting role here, where it is used to show off the chassis to best effect.

It handles superbly, with a fine nose for an apex and a ready desire to allow the throttle to neutralise its line.

True, many British sports cars of the era could probably match its agility – such as MGs, Aston Martins and no doubt others from Frazer Nash – but to provide it within such comfortable surroundings is what makes this car so special: all of the gain, none of the strain.

There’s no groundbreaking engineering here, but the Frazer Nash-BMW 319 is more than the sum of its parts

And that’s the iniquity of it all: the 328 is the most famous pre-war BMW of all – you might say the only truly famous pre-war BMW – yet no one ever stops to ask how it got that way.

Well, you’re looking at it and, after driving it, this is a lesson I’ll not forget.

Images: Jack Harrison

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