microcarfan
  • Microcar
  • Australia
  • Four wheels
  • No reverse gear

Lightburn Zeta

Also known as Zeta Runabout, Zeta Sedan, Zeta Utility, Zeta Sports

There was no reverse gear. To reverse a Lightburn Zeta Runabout, the driver stopped its two-stroke engine and started it again running backwards, and then all four gears went the other way. The firm that built it made concrete mixers.

A grey-blue saloon with a bonnet scoop in the foreground and a green roadster behind it in a museum hall.
The Zeta Runabout and the green Zeta Sports side by side in the National Motor Museum, Birdwood, in 2008.Photo: Peripitus, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

At a glance

The spec plate

Lightburn Zeta

Runabout · Camden Park

Built
1963–⁠1966Production ceased in 1965 and the last cars were sold in 1966; the Sports from June 1964
Country
AustraliaLightburn & Co., Camden Park, Adelaide, South Australia
Maker
Lightburn & Co. LtdHarold Lightburn’s maker of washing machines and concrete mixers
Engine
324 cc Villiers two-stroke twinDriving the front wheels; the Sports a 494 cc Fichtel & Sachs twin, the FMR Tiger’s
Power
16.5 hp12 kW; the Sports 20.5 hp by the Weiner museum, 15.5 kW (21 hp) by English Wikipedia
Length
3,073 mm1,372 mm wide
Weight
436 kgThe Runabout; 960 lb (435 kg) on the Weiner museum’s card
Seats
4Two in front and a bench; the Sports two
Wheels
4The Runabout’s engine at the front, driving the front wheels
Price new
£5951963, £60 less than a Morris Mini
Production
363All models, 1963–⁠66; about 400 by the National Motor Museum
Top speed
80km/h80 km/h50 mph; the Sports 125 km/h by the same museum

How big is it?

True proportion

3.07 m

It is 103 mm longer than a Fiat 500, about 1.8 adults laid end to end.

  • 1.37 m wide
  • 436 kg: about six adults
  • No tailgate: cargo went in once the front seats were out
Drawn at true proportion. The track is 3.6 metres long; the adult stands at the same scale. The Peel P50 is the smallest production car, on every page for comparison.

The story

History

Lightburn & Co. of Camden Park, Adelaide, was Harold Lightburn’s firm, and it made washing machines and concrete mixers, car jacks, power tools and glass-fibre boats.1234 In the early 1960s it set out to fill what it saw as a gap: a cheap second car, a runabout.14 The Weiner museum, which later owned two, put the background plainly.35

Australia is a land of huge open spaces, and Australians tended to look towards America for their automotive needs.

Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum, tour text for its 1964 Zeta Runabout, about 2002–⁠05.5
Black-and-white photograph of four men in overalls tending a row of new concrete mixers outside corrugated-iron sheds.
Plate I · 1955 Workers with Lightburn concrete mixers at the firm’s Camden Park factory, Adelaide, about 1955, before the Zeta.Photo: State Government Photographer, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

The saloon came from Britain. Lightburn obtained the rights to the British Anzani-built Astra Utility and gave it a new glass-fibre body shaped like a small estate.35 A Villiers 324 cc two-stroke twin of 16.5 hp (12 kW) drove the front wheels, and the chassis was steel tube.125 The side windows were Perspex, and the fuel fed by gravity from a tank behind the dashboard, its level shown in a see-through tube.1 The engine was started by a Dynastart, and that was how the Zeta went backwards: stopped and restarted the other way round, it gave four speeds in reverse.15 There was no tailgate either: cargo went in once the front seats were out. The roof carried tailfins.135

the car was a hideous assemblage of jutting, ill-conceived shapes and angles, with tailfins on the roof. There was no tailgate.

Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum, tour text for its 1964 Zeta Runabout, about 2002–⁠05.5

At 3,073 mm (121 in) the Runabout overshoots the Fiat Nuova 500 that serves here as the measure of what a microcar is, but it earns its place as Australia’s own.5

Saloon, wagon and truck

The Zeta Sedan went on sale in 1963 at £595, just as the Morris Mini arrived for only £60 more.1 Lightburn planned to build 50 a week.2 Its advertising compared the glass fibre on a steel frame with the Chevrolet Corvette’s, and sold the interior: it would carry tools, or sleep two adults with the seats out.5 The maker claimed it was the first vehicle sold in Australia to combine saloon, wagon and light truck, and that the seats could even be bolted to the roof as a grandstand.2 There was a Deluxe, and a coupé Utility, mechanically the same, of which eight were built, some for Sydney City Council’s fleet in Hyde Park.1 The Hyde Park cars were seldom used on the road.6

The Sports

The Zeta Sports had another parent. Gordon Bedson had designed the Frisky Sprint, a 492 cc two-seater shown at Earls Court in 1958 and claimed to do 145 km/h (90 mph), which never went into production (see Frisky).3 He met Harold Lightburn at the Earls Court show of 1959, and the next spring went to Australia with a chassis, some Frisky Sports, the Sprint’s drawings and 50 Fichtel & Sachs twins of 493 cc, the engine of the FMR Tg500 Tiger.3 Lightburn advertising credited the design to Giovanni Michelotti; English Wikipedia says it was Bedson and Keith Peckmore’s Sprint, and the Register of Unusual Microcars finds Michelotti involved in neither car.17

The result, introduced in June 1964, was a doorless glass-fibre two-seater with no bumpers.13 The Weiner museum adds, without knowing why, that most were built in 1961 and held back until mid-1964.3 Lightburn had a network of Alfa Romeo dealers ready to sell it, but orders were few, and some cars failed New South Wales lighting rules and were given extra headlamps standing free on the bonnet.3 That year a Zeta also ran in the Ampol 7,000-mile trial across Australia; its result has not been found (more in racing and rallying).35

Lemon

Production ended in 1965, and the last cars were sold in 1966.1 Unique Cars and Parts blames poor execution, poor build quality and the engines, with the Mini a far better choice.6 Tony Davis made the Zeta a prime exhibit in Lemon!, his 2004 book of Australian automotive failures.1 Lightburn also built an electric two-seater, in two models, of which no details have been found.1

Handling was nervous at best.

Alistair Kennedy, Marque Automotive News, 9 August 2018.2
Grey-blue estate-shaped car seen from the rear left on a white plinth lettered Zeta Runabout.
The Zeta Runabout at Birdwood in 2020, showing the fins at the back of the roof and the tail with no tailgate.Photo: zombieite, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Green doorless roadster with a low curved windscreen and faired headlamps, among other museum cars.
A green 1964 Zeta Sports, Gordon Bedson’s descendant of the Frisky Sprint, at Birdwood in 2007.Photo: Peripitus, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Pictures

More photographs, old and new

The car 3

  • Pale blue small saloon parked on brick paving beside a white car, a man leaning over it and shoppers behind. Opens a larger view

    1 A pale blue Lightburn Zeta Runabout with its information board at a street display in 2011.

  • Side view of a long low green roadster with no doors, a pale blue saloon parked behind it. Opens a larger view

    2 The green 1964 Zeta Sports in profile at the National Motor Museum, Birdwood, in 2008, with the Zeta Runabout behind.

  • Pale blue small car seen from the front: a mesh grille, a scoop on the bonnet and a ZETA number plate. Opens a larger view

    3 A pale blue Lightburn Zeta Runabout head-on in the National Motor Museum, Birdwood, South Australia, in 2007.

Picture credits (3)
  1. 1 GTHO, CC BY-SA 3.0
  2. 2 Peripitus, CC BY-SA 3.0
  3. 3 Peripitus, CC BY-SA 3.0

Variants

Two lineages under one name

The Zeta range, 1963–⁠66
VariantYearsWhat differsHow many
Sedan, or Runabout1963–⁠65Two-door glass-fibre body like a small estate, with no tailgate; the Villiers twinPart of 363
Sedan Deluxe1963–⁠65Better trim, the details not foundPart of 363
Utility1963–⁠65A coupé utility, mechanically the same8
Sports1964–⁠66A doorless two-seat roadster from the Frisky Sprint, with no bumpers and the 494 cc Fichtel & Sachs twinAbout 28 sold; 48 made by the Birdwood sign
Electric runaboutNot knownA two-seat electric vehicle, in two models; no details foundNot found

Specification

The Runabout, from the Weiner museum’s card, unless noted

Engine and drive

EngineVilliers two-stroke twin, 324 cc125
Power16.5 hp (12 kW)15
GearboxFour speeds; no reverse gear: the Dynastart restarted the engine backwards, giving four speeds in reverse15A Villiers dog-clutch box by English Wikipedia; a Burman motorcycle gearbox by Marque Automotive News
DriveFront wheels125
Electrics12 volts; twin-coil ignition5

Body and chassis

ChassisSteel tube5
BodyGlass fibre, with Perspex side windows and a laminated-glass windscreen1
SuspensionStruts at the front, coil springs at the rear5English Wikipedia gives independent trailing arms at the rear
SteeringWorm and peg5
BrakesHydraulic5
FuelGravity feed from a tank behind the dashboard, with a see-through tube for a gauge1

Dimensions

Length3,073 mm (121 in)5The Sports 3,225 mm
Width1,372 mm (54 in)5The Sports 1,498 mm
Wheelbase1,880 mm2
Weight436 kg (961 lb)25The Sports 399 kg, or 400 kg by English Wikipedia

Performance and price

Top speed80 km/h (50 mph)5The Sports 125 km/h by the Weiner museum; a claimed 120 km/h by Marque Automotive News
Price new£595, 19631

How many were built?

Every figure, with its source

363 sold363 is the figure we state: English Wikipedia and Marque Automotive News both give it for all models sold from 1963 to 1966. The National Motor Museum and Unique Cars and Parts give a round 400. No Lightburn record has been found.

  1. about 400all modelsOne source

    The National Motor Museum, Birdwood, and Unique Cars and Parts, not shown to be independent; English Wikipedia’s lead says fewer than 400461

  2. 363all models sold, 1963–⁠66Two sources agree

    English Wikipedia and Marque Automotive News12

  3. 48Sports made, by the sign beside the Birdwood carOne source

    The museum sign, as reported by English Wikipedia and Marque Automotive News12

  4. about 28Sports soldTwo sources agree

    The Weiner museum and English Wikipedia31

  5. 8UtilitiesOne source

    English Wikipedia1

  • Two sources agreetwo good sources give the figure
  • One sourcea good source, alone
  • Unconfirmeda lead only, not yet checked

Famous for

Three points

  1. Four speeds backwards

    No reverse gear in the saloon: the engine was restarted to run the other way, and all four gears worked in reverse.15

  2. Fins and no tailgate

    Tailfins on the roof, no tailgate, and cargo went in once the front seats were out.135

  3. A Frisky in Adelaide

    The Sports was the Frisky Sprint’s designer’s work, built in Australia with FMR engines.13

Survivors and collecting

Today

The National Motor Museum at Birdwood, South Australia, has a Runabout, a Sports and a Utility, and is gathering material on the company.4 English Wikipedia links a 1963 Zeta in the National Museum of Australia in Canberra.1 The Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum in the United States owned a 1964 Runabout and a 1964 Sports, and counted six surviving Sports.35 No auction result has been found.

Pale blue small pickup with a mesh grille, a bonnet scoop and a South Australia number plate, parked on grass.
A pale blue Zeta Utility, one of eight, at a South Australian show in 2012.Photo: GTHO, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Sources

Numbered as in the text

No period source was read: not the Australian Motor Manual of July 1964 that English Wikipedia cites, nor any report of the Ampol trial. The story rests on English Wikipedia, the Weiner museum’s two tour pages and one magazine article. Sources are given as plain text; the links are on the Credits page.

  1. English Wikipedia, Zeta (automobile), read in full. It cites the Australian Motor Manual of July 1964, Drive Life (2011) and Tony Davis, Lemon! (2004).
  2. Alistair Kennedy, “Zeta”, Marque Automotive News, 9 August 2018, read in full.
  3. Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum, “1964 Zeta Sports”, tour page, read in the copy archived about 2015.
  4. National Motor Museum (History Trust of South Australia), “Lightburn & Co”, read in full.
  5. Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum, “1964 Zeta ‘Runabout’ by Lightburn”, tour page, read in the copy archived about 2015.
  6. Unique Cars and Parts, “Lightburn”, read in summary.
  7. Register of Unusual Microcars, “Frisky”, read in full in the copy archived in 2020.