LWB Aero Engine Special – Peugeot Type 148 Hall Scott Special

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In 1913 Peugeot introduced the Types 145, 146 and 148 passenger cars which all shared the same 4,536 cc / 276 cui 35 hp 4 cylinder motors but had chassis with 3.3m / 10.8 ft, 3.48m / 11.4 ft and 3.61m / 11.8 ft wheelbases respectively.

Peugeot 148 , Clive Press, VSCC Loton Park

Today’s featured car is built on one the longer 1913 Type 148 chassis, one of just 83 built, but somewhere around 2001 appears to have been fitted with a 100hp 10 litre / 610 cui 4 cylinder Hall Scott A7 Aero engine, of the same type as fitted to William Hildyardís 1910 Th Schneider I looked at last week and Stewart Wilkies Fafnir I looked at some years ago.

Peugeot 148 , Clive Press, VSCC Prescott

The bodywork on Clive Press’s Peugeot seen in these photographs at Loton Park and Prescott respectively is styled on the 1913/14 era Peugeot EX3 racers that won the French Grand Prix and 1913 Indy 500.

Thanks for joining me on this “LWB Aero Engine Special” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be visiting Llandow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Escort to Scort – Dutton Sierra

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After serving a tool making apprenticeship in a Jaguar Mk X bodyshell and ADO16 bodyshell manufacturing plant with Pressed Steel Ltd in Swindon, UK Tim Dutton-Wolley built his first MG Midget based kit cars in 1969.

Dutton Sierra, Motorsport At The Palace, Crystal Palace

By 1989 Tim had survived and won a court battle with Ford over the rights to use the Sierra model name which he had been using since 1979, 5 years before Ford wanted to use the name for it’s eponymous 1980’s family car, to become the world’s most successful kit car manufacturer in terms of numbers sold.

Dutton Sierra, Motorsport At The Palace, Crystal Palace

There were three Dutton Sierra variants, three series of Ford Escort based 2 wheel drive off road SUV’s built from 1980 to 1989, and a pickup variant and drophead variants built from 1983 to 1989 when sold his designs off and and took a six year sabbatical from the kit car making business.

Dutton Sierra, Motorsport At The Palace, Crystal Palace

I understand the GPX48H registration plate once belonged to a 1970 Mk 1 Ford Escort that was used as a donor car for a Dutton Sierra Kit.

Dutton Sierra, Motorsport At The Palace, Crystal Palace

In 2007 a Scotty G in Folkstone helped the owner complete a 9 month conversion of the Dutton Sierra kit car into a blue step side pick up as seen in this link.

More recently GPX48H has been transformed into the flat side pick up Ford Zetec powered “Scort” seen in these photographs taken at Crystal Palace a couple of years ago.

Thanks for joining me on this “Escort to Scort” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres”, I hope you will join me again tomorrow when an Edwardian aero engined Peugeot. Don’t forget to come back now !

Indy Tin Lizzie – Ford T Fronty Ford

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After migrating from Switzerland to France and before migrating to North America Louis Chevrolet had a career as a successful racing cyclist and at one stage built and sold his own cycles under the Frontenac brand.

Later he would move into the French motor industry before migrating to the United States in 1902 where he became a successful mechanic and racing driver.

Ford T / Frontenac, Sanoma Historics

While Louis lead driver for the Buick Racing Team General Motors ousted founder William C Durant founded the Chevrolet Motor Car Company with Louis in 1911.

By 1915 Louis and William had fallen out over William’s plan to offer cheaper products with the Chevrolet brand, William bought Louis out and went on to regain control of General Motors in 1916 before being dethroned by shareholders a second time in 1920.

Ford T / Frontenac, Sanoma Historics

Meanwhile in 1915 Louis raced a Cornelian, the first monocoque raced in the Indy 500, before using the name of the 17th century governor of France’s North American colonies for a second time to found the Frontenac Motors Corporation, specialising in competition vehicles with his brothers in 1916.

Frontenac built the cars that won the 1920 and 1921 Indy 500 races for Gaston Chevrolet, who would die at the wheel of a Frontenac on a West Coast board track in November 1920, and Tommy Milton respectively.

Ford T / Frontenac, Sanoma Historics

By 1922 no less than nine Frontenacs started the Indy 500, from a field of 27, with Tom Alley finishing a marque best of 9th from a 12th place start.

Also in the 1922 Indy 500 field were two Fronty Fords which used modified Ford Model T chassis and Frontenac modified Ford motors for Jack Curtner and C Glen Howard which finished 14th and 18th respectively.

Ford T / Frontenac, Sanoma Historics

Barber Warnock Ford entered a single Fronty Ford for LL Corum who finished 5th at Indy in 1923.

In 1924 Barber Warnock Ford entered 3 Fronty Fords for Bill Hunt, future Stirling Moss’s father Alfred E Moss and the #27 Fred Halder who finished the Indy 500 in 14th, 16th and 17th places respectively.

Fronty Fords appeared at Indy in 1925, ’30 and ’31 with MC Jones, Chet Miller and Gene Haustein respectively but none of them finished inside the top ten.

My thanks to Geoffrey Horton for sharing today’s photographs of the #27 Ford T Fronty Ford seen at last years Sonoma Historic meeting.

Thanks for joining me on this “Indy Tin Lizzie” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again for Pick Up Monday tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Not A de Havilland – Comet JAP

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In 1950 Brian Heyward bought the Rudge powered Aikens 500 Formula 3 car from Wing Commander Frank Aikens, Brian only had the opportunity to drive it twice before he was called up to serve His Majesty King George V in the Royal Air Force for two years in Germany.

During his national service Brian’s father Charles bought a Cooper Mark IV which he already found was far too overweight to be competitive.

Comet, Race Retro, Stoneleigh

Upon completion of his National Service Brian and Charles used parts of the Cooper Mk 4 and some, lighter, cast magnesium components off a Cooper Mk VI to build the Cooper Heyward Special more commonly known as the C.H.S..

Brian raced the C.H.S. from 1953 to 1957 and is known to have finished 5th at the wheel of the car in a final at Brands Hatch in December 1954.

Comet, Race Retro, Stoneleigh

Brian found employment at de Havilland alongside future Lotus designer Maurice Philipe, future Lotus driver Alan Stacey, the Costin brothers Frank and future Cosworth partner Mike, and Brian Hart who would also make an enviable name for himself in the field of race engine production.

Soon after in 1953 Brian and Charles began construction of their second car, today’s featured Comet, named after the the jet powered de Havilland airliner.

Comet, Race Retro, Stoneleigh

With machining help from fellow 500 F3 racer Don Parker in it’s original form the Comet featured Kieft castings and wishbone suspension at the front, with swing axles and bungee cord springs on the rear.

The Comet was developed up until 1958; receiving a Norton engine in 1955, glass fiber body in 1956 and at some point a rear transverse spring, as had been employed by Cooper since 1946, replaced the bungee cords at the back.

Comet, Race Retro, Stoneleigh

Construction of a Comet II was started, but never completed, both Comet’s were sold on in 1964 to Brixham Lifeboat Coxwain Arthur Curnow who entered the Comet for Ivor Churchill to race.

Since then the Comet, seen in these photographs at Race Retro, has been restored twice; by Sandy Skinner who fitted the JAP engine along with a new aluminium body in the early 1980’s and by Neil Hodges for Peter Becker in 2003, today the Comet belongs to and is run by James Gray.

Thanks for joining me on this “Not A de Havilland” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at the first of this month’s series of cars that ran in the Indianapolis 500. Don’t forget to come back now !

Operazione San Gennaro – FIAT 1300 Berlina

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The 60hp FIAT 1300 Berlina replaced the FIAT 1200, the chassis of which was used for the 1200TV, in 1961 offered with a price of Lira 1,190,000 (Italian Lira one million one hundred and ninety thousand with and identical version with a larger 73 hp 1500 cc / 91.5 cui motor offered for Lira 1,250,000.

FIAT 1300, Brooklands Double Twelve

The 1300/1500 range, marketed with an elegant modernity strap line, included estate / station wagon along with 2 door Coupé and Cabriolet versions which were fitted with the 73 hp motors only.

FIAT 1300, Brooklands Double Twelve

FIAT 1300’s, like the example seen here at a Brooklands Double Twelve meeting, were fitted with all synchromesh four speed transmissions and were early adopters in this class of disc brakes all round.

FIAT 1300, Brooklands Double Twelve

The 1300/1500 range was also produced by Zastava in Yugoslavia where the Zastava 1300, also known as the Tristać, production continued until December 1979, twelve years after 1300/1500 production had ceased in Italy.

FIAT 1300, Brooklands Double Twelve

Fans of Italian Comedy might remember a FIAT 1300 being abused in the 1966 film Operazione San Gennaro see from 1:25:30, in which Armandino Girasole detto Dudù the character played by Nino Manfredi terrifies his side kick Sciascillo played by Mario Adorf on a trip to Naples airport.

Thanks for joining me on this “Operazione San Gennaro” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at a Comet. Don’t forget to come back now.

Turning You Into Nuvolari – Ford Mustang 2+2

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When Ford announced the Mustang 2+2 in 1965 they claimed, quite rightly that Europe no longer had the monopoly on “four wheeled flair”.