The transverse Ford version sounds really quite interesting. OK not a Microcar, but like many of these small cars that were more miniaturized big cars than a design up from manpower to the minimalist putter power of a small engine, in this case they realized that an underpowered unit was not going to work. Unfortunately we are not told why they did not sel,l save that possibly Ford refused to supply due to the Korean war. This was at a time when much was rationed, so it is possible. Taking this power issue on though, several MIcrocars should have been more successful had they offered a more powerful engine. Powerdrive/Coronet springs to mind. They are not bad to drive in all manners save they are underpowered and therefore unreliable. There are others, Jarc/Astra/Zeta, though here the Zeta gets closer to a result with the 3T unit.
Those smaller cars that did benefit from the extra investment of more engine tended to not be Microcars very long. Lloyds, NSU, even Goggo and BMW all found that small cars sold well if you got it right. The British market is really bereft of offerings other than the dear old Reliant who did devote some time to create a good engine, even if it was someone else's cast off. The larger manufacturers never really looked interested, going from A30/35 to MIni was not really miniaturizing. The Imp might be nearest flirtation, in fact. The bonus for us is it left the way open for the entrepreneur to try and fill the gap and we have some wonderfully eccentric British machines, who's biggest opposition were the great German offerings of the time, as a result.
