Tag Archives: Chapman

Indy 500 Winner & Swiss Hillclimber – Lotus Ford 38/1

Apologies again to GALPOT readers who read my posts at rowdy.com who may have seen these photo’s before, but once again I have found some more interesting information about the Lotus 38 model since my original post nearly 3 years ago.

The Lotus 38 was devised by Colin Chapman and designed by Len Terry to win the 1965 Indy 500 on his third attempt with star driver Jim Clark behind the wheel.

With the aid of the legendary Wood Brothers NASCAR pit crew Clark driving 38/1, seen here at Goodwood a couple of years ago, beat Parnelli Jones, driving Clarks 1964 Lotus 34/3, to win the race. In a reversal of fortunes from their first encounter in 1963, Jim Clark became the first foreign driver to win the Indy 500 since 1916 !

It turns out that there were eight Lotus 38 eight chassis built all powered by the 500 hp quad cam version of the Ford Fairlane motor, a potted history of each of the 8 cars can be seen on this Nostalgia Forum link.

News to me since my original post is that after the 1965 Indy 500 Victory a fourth Lotus 38 was built and this car with symmetrical suspension was tested by well known British racer Jack Sears and was then taken on a publicity tour to Switzerland apparently at the behest of Ford’s Swiss agent Mr. Georges Filipinetti, himself a well known racing entrant of a mouthwatering variety of cars.

While in Switzerland Jim Clark demonstrated the Lotus 38 on at least two hillclimb tracks including Ollon – Villars Hillclimb and Ste Ursanne-Les Rangiers. If you speak French, which I like Jim Clark don’t, you may find this interview with Jo Bonnier Jim Clark and Jo Siffert quite amusing.

The Lotus 38/1 seen in these photo’s has recently been completely restored by Classic Team Lotus and was driven for some demonstration laps last year by Dario Franchitti which can be seen here.

My thanks to Doug Nye and Andrew Kitson at the Nostalgia Forum for their help with uncovering more facts about the Lotus 38 cars.

Thanks for joining me on this Indy 500 winner & Swiss Hillclimber edition of ‘Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres’, I hope you will join me again tomorrow, when I’ll be looking at a large Mercedes. Don’t forget to come back now !

Late PS just noticed Paul Chenard has an evocative illustration of the #82 Lotus 38 on his facebook page linked here.

Pushing The Backbone – Lotus 30

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Allegedly Colin Chapman was a little upset about losing the contract to develop the Ford GT40 to Lola and set out to build a sports racing car in 1964 that would show Ford that they had made the wrong choice.

Colin’s idea was to use a back bone chassis similar to the one used in his successful Lotus Elan but stronger to accommodate a 4.7 litre / 286 cui Ford Fairlane motor in the rear. It is said that Colin stubbornly over ruled his designer Len Terry when the latter advised against such an idea and went ahead and built the car with a sleek curvacious body measuring just 26.5″ high.

Photo Courtesy of Tim Murray above, shows Andrew Bradshaw’s Lotus 30 at Dyrham Park.

The original Lotus 30 clothed in a fibre glass body that made regular maintenance exceedingly difficult weighed less than 700 kgs / 1600 lbs and had 350 hp which was transmitted to the ground by 13″ wheels and was stopped by solid disc brakes all round. Unfortunately while the car won a few races, notably in the hands of Jim Clark the chassis, as predicted by Len Terry proved insufficiently strong which resulted in the backbone flexing, and on at least one occasion a chassis is recorded as having snapped in half. It is thought 18 Lotus 30’s were built with an additional 2 replacement chassis being supplied for damaged cars.

Matthew Watts example seen here at last years Goodwood Revival has been fitted with an interpretation of the period body modifications developed by JCB research to over come overheating problems caused by the spare wheel, required by the Group 7 rules, being placed behind the radiator in the nose.

For 1965 the model was updated; with a stronger chassis backbone, spoilers, larger wheels and ventilated disc brakes, was built, though not solving all of the problems 9 examples of the S2 were built and sold. Towards the end of 1965 Colin Chapman uprated this chassis again calling the new model the Lotus 40, dubbed by Richie Ginther as ‘like the Lotus 30 but with ten extra problems’ but the three Lotus 40 chassis were no match for the Group 7 cars produced by either Lola or McLaren.

Despite the lack of success against the Lola’s and McLarens the Lotus 30 was still being raced in British club events until the early 1970’s by John Markey.

My thanks to Lotus30.com for the chassis information Woulter Melisson at Ultimatecarpage.com and Martin Krejci at racingsportscars.com for additional information and results. Thanks also to Graham Gauld, pete53, Roger Lund, Tony Gallagher and Ted Walker at The Nostalgia Forum for additional information regarding today’s featured vehicle.

Thanks for joining me on this ‘Pushing The Backbone’ edition of ‘Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres’, I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

PS I hope you will join me in wishing best wishes to GALPOT Concours d’Elegance Correspondent and Birthday Boy Geoffrey Horton ! 🙂

Fatal Firebird – Lotus Ford 29 #29/3

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In May 1961 a piece of successful Formula One technology percolated into the environs of Indianapolis which started a whole sale revolution in the layout of the cars that would dominate the Indy 500 hence forth in the form of the Kimberly Cooper Special driven by Jack Brabham.

The Kimberly Cooper Special was the smallest car in the field and possibly with the least powerful motor, but what everyone present learned from the car that started 19th and came in 9th was that the li’l funny car with the engine in the back could handle the corners so much better than the hitherto dominant front engine Roadster machines that the lack of 150 hp made little or no difference.

Imagine just putting the engine in the back of your car giving a 150 hp advantage ! It was a no brainer, but in 1962 only the Californian Speed King Micky Thompson and ’55 & ’56 Indy winning owner John Zink had rear engined cars prepared for the Indy 500.

Rookie Dan Gurney who passed his Rookie test in a Roadster was keen to drive either of the rear engined cars in the race in an effort to impress Lotus boss Colin Chapman whom he had invited over from Europe at his own expense in an effort to entice Colin into building Lotus indy cars for 1963. Dan gave up on the turbine powered John Zink Track Burner but did manage to qualify 8th in the under powered Thompson Buick and come home in 20th.

Chapman was sufficiently impressed with the Indy 500 and it’s potential rewards to build the Lotus 29 seen here for the 1963 race. The Lotus 29 featured a monocoque chassis, as campaigned in Chapman’s successful 1962 Lotus 25 Grand Prix car, in place of the usual tube space frame and it had a powerful version of a Ford stock block V8 in place of the almost ubiquitous 4 cylinder Offy that had been winning at Indy since the mid 1930’s and could trace their ancestry back to the Millers of the 1920’s.

Jim Clark and Dan Gurney were to race the Lotus challengers Clark qualified chassis 29/3 5th and Gurney chassis 29/1 12th. Towards the end of the race Clark was challenging Parnelli Jones for the lead when Jones Watson developed an oil leak, but the USAC officials managed to refrain from black flagging Jones before the oil stopped leaking which allowed Parnelli to take his one and only Indy 500 victory ahead of the Rookie Clark. Dan came in 7th also completing the full 200 laps. Dan’s chassis #29/1 today sits in the IMS museum painted in the green and yellow colours of Jim Clark’s #92 chassis 29/3.

The following year Bob Marshman put #29/2 now known as the Pure Firebird Special on the middle of the front row for 1964 Indy 500 right next to pole sitter Jim Clark in his newer Lotus Ford 34, see above. Bob lost an oil plug going low on the apron while in the lead on lap 37 trying to avoid the slower Johnny White, Bob was eventually classified 25th.

Bob crashed #29/2 at Milwaukee and his owner Lindsey Hopkins bought Clark’s #29/3 as a replacement which Bob drove with no more success than he had with #29/2.

Despite the fireball at Indy in 1964 Bob tested chassis 29/3 at the seasons end wearing nothing but the usual, for the period, t-shirt and jeans at Phoenix. During the session Bob’s car was involved in an accident which ruptured the fuel tank, a week later Bob died of the burns he subsequently sustained.

Ed Arnudins photo’s show Lotus Mechanic Colin Riley at the wheel of Jim Clarks of #92 Lotus 29 Ford being towed through the Indianapolis garage area by another Team Lotus mechanic Dave Lazenby who is at the wheel of the dinky li’l towing tractor in the top photograph.

My thanks to Ed and Steve Arnaudin for the photo’s, Tim and B Squared at The Nostalgia Forum informing me of which chassis is featured in today’s post for identifying Colin and Dave in the photo’s.

Thanks for joining me on this ‘Oil Leak ? What Oil Leak ?’ edition of ‘Getting’ a li’l psycho on tyres’ I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

05 02 12 ps Thanks to Brian for pointing out the now corrected Bobby Marshman spelling error and pointing out that Bob did not spin out of the 1964 Indy 500.

12 05 14 Since writing this piece it has come to my attention that Bobby Marshman signed his autographs ‘Bob Marshman’ and it seems fitting and respectful to have removed the references to “Bobby”.

It has also come to my attention that Bob drove #29/2 on the paved surfaces of USAC’s Champ Car Series up until Milwaukee in ’64 and not #29/3 as originally suggested. He also appears to have lost an oil plug rather than damaged an oil line at Indy as originally suggested.

I hope you’ll accept my sincerest apologies for any unintentional confusion caused.

Monocoque Revolution – Lotus 25 #R4 & #R5

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There are some ideas that have to wait until just the right time in order to have an impact, one such case in point is the idea of using a monocoque shell to build a racing car chassis / body rather than the oft used couple of helfty rails or beams welded together or a more intricate space frame built up of small tubes welded together with a body thrown over the top.

The idea of using a monocoque shell made of fabricated sheets of metal to build a racing car can be traced back to 1912 when Howard Blood built a prototype cyclecar called a Cornelian which in 1915 was prepared by the Chevrolet brothers Louis and Albert for an attempt at the Indy 500. The Cornelian reached 12th place before it’s 33hp Sterling motor dropped a valve causing retirement. Around 100 monocoque chassis Cornelian cyclecars are thought to have been built before production came to a halt.

In 1923 aviation pioneer Gabriel Voisin built a team of four extraordinarily underpowered monocoque racing cars to take part in the French Grand Prix at Tours, giving away over 15 mph in top speed just one car survived to finish fifth and last over 1 and a quarter hours behind the winner over the 496 mile race distance.

Despite the success of the D-Type Jaguars at Le Mans in the mid 1950’s which featured a half monocoque design with the engine mounted on a sub frame it was not until 1962 that Colin Chapman revisited the monocoque idea for use in a Grand Prix Car and started to make the advantages of structural rigidity, thanks to the use of innovative steel bulkheads, weight saving and reduced frontal area work in the Lotus 25 design which shares identical suspension and running gear with the 1962 space frame Lotus 24.

The Lotus 25 chassis #R5 was one of seven such vehicles used for Grand Prix Racing from 1962 until models eventual swansong in 1967. The #R5 chassis was completed late in 1962 just in time for Jim Clark to attempt to clinch his first World Drivers title at the South African Grand Prix, unfortunately after starting from pole a tuppenny oil plug came lose and ended Jim’s race twenty laps early allowing Graham Hill to win both the race and the World Championship.

Jim used the car again in 1963 but Trevor Taylor was given #R5 to race at the second event of the season Belgian Grand Prix at Spa Francochamps. During practice for this event #R5’s suspension collapsed and the subsequent damage meant Trevor continued participating in the spare car #R3. Thanks to Roger, Rob of The Nostalgia Forum it has emerged that Trevor retired from the 1963 Belgian GP after 5 laps as the result of a severed thigh muscle.

Chassis #R5 was taken back to the Team Lotus Factory and stripped down to the bear monocoque which was put aside awaiting recycling when Lotus mechanic Cedric Selzer was given permission to take the wrecked monocoque, along with some redundant parts, home.

Over the next twenty years Cedric collected enough parts including a correct Coventry Climax V8 engine to ‘recreate’ the written off #R5 in 1984.

With the full knowledge of the story of #R5 being in the public domain this rare vehicle sold for just short of a million US$ at auction in 2007.

This second Lotus 25, chassis #R4 seen above with Andy Middlehurst at the wheel during the Goodwood Revival meeting has an even more amazing tail to tell, it is the remains of the very car which Jim Clark drove to a, for the period, record setting seven Grand Prix victories on his way to securing the 1963 World Drivers Championship and the World Manufacturers Championship for Lotus.

In 1964 #R4 was driven by Formula Junior sensation Peter Arundell who started his first full season in Grand Prix racing with two third place finishes in the opening two races at Monaco and Zandvoort (Holland) and came home 4th in the French Grand Prix which proved to be his last of the 1964 season thanks to an accident in an open wheel Formula 2 race which effectively ended Peter’s career although he did unsuccessfully return to the wheel in 1965.

#R4 was then sold to Reg Parnell who replaced the Coventry Climax V8 with a BRM V8 and then given first to South African Tony Maggs and then Richard Atwood to drive. Richard crashed the car in the Belgian Grand Prix after which the repaired chassis was given the #R13 chassis number by the Parnnel Team in what might be considered a slight of hand to make the car look like it had a later Lotus 33 type chassis number, the #R13 chasssis number having been passed over by Team Lotus. #R13 also acquired the nickname Percy at this time.

Innes Ireland and Bob Bondurant competed in one further race each with ‘Percy’ towards the end of 1965 and in 1966 Mike Spence took over the driving duties scoring 2 season best 5th place finishes in Percy which was now fitted with a larger BRM P60 V8 motor.

Piers Courage and Chris Irwin both took a championship Grand Prix start each in Percy during 1967 Chris recording a 7th place finish in the cars final Grand Prix in Holland.

Peter Yock became the owner of #R13 in 1968 and he raced the car in the Antipodes passing it on to fellow Kiwi Peter Hughes for 1970, Hughes replaced the by now damaged BRM V8 with a dry sumped V8 sourced from a Daimler and when that proved recalcitrant had a Twin Cam 4 cylinder Ford motor fitted.

#R13 then disappeared until Lotus aficionado John Dawson Damer tracked it down for his Lotus Collection in Australia, when John had the car restored it was discovered that #R13 was not a similar later Lotus 33 spec monocoque at all but that it still had all the identifying monocoque features associated with the Lotus 25 and in particular chassis #R4. Like Cedric John also acquired the correct Coventry Climax V8 type motor to restore #R4 to it’s original splendor and in 1997 #R4 returned to Gooodwood for the first time.

Again with all of the details of this car in the public domain this car sold at an Australian Auction for just short of a million US$ in 2008.

It’s a sobering thought that Jim Clark was entered to drive a Lotus 25 in 30 championship Grand Prix races, he won 14 of them, won one world championship (1963) and but for some cheap engine parts might have won two more (1962 & ’64). One thing was for sure, after the advent of the Lotus 25 the writing on the wall was written large that the days of the space frame racing car particularly in open wheel racing was effectively over.

Finally a well known resource states that Lotus driver Trevor Taylor is credited with ‘inventing’ the yellow stripe that ran the length of some Team Lotus racing cars from May 1963 until the Lotus sponsorship deal with Players Gold Leaf Tobacco came into effect in 1968. There is to the best of my knowledge no evidence to support this myth, it would appear the yellow stripe was first used on Jim Clark’s #92 Lotus 29 Indy Car in May 1963 and next appeared on his, and only his, Lotus 25 at the British Grand Prix in July 1963.

My thanks to Barry, Davids McKinie and Lawson, Vicuna, Roger and Rob at The Nostalgia Forum for their help dispelling the Trevor Taylor myth.

Thanks for joining me on this Monocoque Revolution edition of ‘Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres’, I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

14/01/12 Amendment it has come to light thanks to Roger Clark that Trevor Taylor had his mishap with #R5 during practice for the Belgian GP at Spa not during the race as originally stated in the text above.

Wheels & Studs – Lotus 23B

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The Lotus 23 is a 900 lb / 408 kgs sports racing car, with a nominal passenger seat, built around a wide version of the Lotus 22 chassis frame with identical suspension to the single seater.

Customers had motors installed, from 750 cc / 41 cui to 2 over litres / 122 cui, that were manufactured by Coventry Climax, Lotus, Ford, BMW, Saab and even Ferrari amongst others.

In 1962 over 130 Lotus 23’s were built that are known to have been entered in over 600 national and international events and recorded over 110 outright victories and a more than a further 130 class victories up to the Kyalami 9 hours in 1981.

The Lotus 23 has two important footnotes recorded in the annals of Motor Racing history, both dating to 1962 first Jim Clark qualified a Lotus 23 6th for the 1000 kms race at Nurburgring, a race which included an impressive array of powerful Ferrari’s Porsche’s and Jaguars. The race started in the rain and the nimble Jim and the 100 hp Lotus 23 shot away from the Le Mans type start into the lead and remained there ahead of Dan Gurney in a Porsche until lap 12 of 44 when he was overcome by fumes from a split exhaust manifold and crashed, without injury. Phil Hill and Olivier Gendebien eventually won the race in a Ferrari 246S.

For Le Mans in 1962 Lotus entered two cars one 750 cc / 45 cui and the other 1 litre 61 cui which is said to have upset several French teams causing the organisers to throw the Lotus team out of the race first on the grounds that the front and rear wheel hubs had 4 and 6 studs respectively, when this was rectified the organisers threw the cars out again because the front a rear wheels were different sizes meaning the spare wheel which had to be carried could not be fitted to front & rear axles. This was the final straw for Colin Chapman who vowed “We will never race again at Le Mans!” a promise he kept until his death in 1982.

The Lotus 23B seen here at the Goodwood Revival is driven by Chris Goodwin who finished third in the Madgwick Cup.

T22222 is an Austrian registration number that appeared on chassis 23-S-68 that was driven by Austrian hotelier Alban Scheiber on hillclimb events in 1963.

Chris Goodwin is yet another of my former racing instructors at Brands Hatch, who is better known as a sportscar racer, TV presenter and McLaren Automotive’s Chief Test Driver and Bruno Senna’s Manager.

My thanks to Lutz ‘r.altos’ M for the information regarding Alban Scheiber.

Thanks for joining me on this Wheels and Studs edition of ‘Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres’, I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

PS Don’t forget …

Automobiliart GALPOT Seasonal Quiz

December 26th – January 2nd

Win a set of Paul Chenard Greetings Cards

Set 1 Sports & GT Cars

Set 2 Phil Hill World Drivers Championship 50th Anniversary Edition

Set 3 1934 Season

Set 4 Grand Prix Engines of the 1950’s

Set 5 Mike Hawthorn’s Race Cars

The Automobiliart GALPOT Seasonal Quiz will comprise 8 categories.

Overall winner chooses one set of Paul Chenard Greetings Cards from the five sets shown above.

The cards measure 15.24cm x 11.43cm, come in packs of 12 with 3 copies of 4 designs in each set, plus A6 envelopes.

Which set will you choose ?

The free to enter Automobiliart GALPOT Seasonal Quiz will run from December 26th – January 2nd Entries close January 8th 2012, Winner announced January 16th 2012.

Full details on December 26th at GALPOT.

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The Sure Bet – Lotus 22 #22-J-17

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In 1962 Lotus built one of their more significant models, the Lotus 22, for competition in the 2nd tier open wheel Formula Junior in 1962. The 22 was an upgraded version of the Lotus 20 but now featuring disc brakes all round.

The Lotus 22 dominated Formula Junior in 1962 with Peter Arundell and Alan Rees at the wheel of the works cars which dominated the European Junior scene.

Arundell won 75 % of his races including the Monza Loteria and was crowned British Junior Champion. Moises Solana won FJ races in Mexico.

The design of the 22 was also used as the basis of the two seat the Lotus 23 sports racer, which I’ll be looking at next week, the 22 design was given a second lease of life with the emergence of the third tier open wheel Formula 3 in 1964 which mandated single seat vehicles with space frame chassis like the 22 which was upgraded to Lotus 31 spec in F3 guise though the chassis numbers for Lotus 31 curiously ran 22-F3-xx. The 22 design had yet another lease of life when Jim Russel converted a couple of 22’s and 31’s into Ford Kent powered racing cars and inadvertently invented Formula Ford leading to yet another run of cars being built to the basic Lotus 22 design now upgraded to Lotus 51 spec.

It is thought 77 Lotus 22’s were built in their original Formula Junior spec between 1962 and 1963.

Formula Junior was open to cars weighing a minimum 400 kgs / 880lbs fitted with 1100 cc / 67 cui motors or 350 kgs vehicles weighing a minimum of 350 kgs / 770 lbs with 1000 cc / 61 cui.

Chritoph Burckhardt’s car, thought to be chassis 22-J-17 seen above at Goodwood Revival, like most FJ cars in 1962 is the heavier 400 kgs type with 90 hp Cosworth tuned Ford 4 cylinder engine with a mandated production based block, this one canted over at 30 degrees to lower the centre of gravity and minimise the frontal area of the car.

Other FJ engine options included a BMC and DKW two stroke motor as used successfully by a German Gerhard Mitter in his Lotus 22.

At this point I’d usually wrap up this post in the usual way but I’d be doing the model a grave injustice since the Lotus 22 is the stuff of legend that ultimately brought down hitherto respected Porsche racing driver Richard von Frakenberg who survived flying literally of the Avus track to become an equally respected journalist for Auto Motor und Sport one of Germany’s most successful motoring publications.

On Sept 30th 1962 there was a German Formula Junior Championship race on the short 5 mile Südschleife track at the Nurburgring. There was much rumor and gossip in the paddock that weekend about a simple way to increase the engine capacity of the stock block Ford Formula Junior motors by changing the Ford Anglia crankshaft for a crankshaft sourced from the larger capacity Ford Consul that used the same block with the same diameter cylinders but increased the combined swept volume of the blog by having a longer stroke.

The race was notable because the championship title was to be decided between two drivers, the aforementioned Mitter in his DKW powered Lotus 22 and reigning champion Kurt Ahrens jr driving a Cooper T59 with a Cosworth prepared Ford motor of the type which could be easily oversized.

To secure the title all Ahrens Jr needed to do was finish ahead of Mitter, if he finished just one place behind Mitter the two would share the title. bizzarely the latter is exactly what happened Ahrens trundled around behind Mitter’s DKW powered Lotus until the DKW lost one of it’s three cylinders when Mitter pitted Ahrens Jr drove as far as the Müllenbach corner at the back of circuit and promptly stopped his perfectly good car and waited for Mitter to affect his repairs and come past and then followed Mitter across the line to ensure a tie in the Championship.

Richard von Frankenberg absorbed some of the rumors, which should probably have been taken with a pinch of salt in the first place, from the meeting and the following week published a story full of scandalous accusations under the Title “The Biggest Disgrace in International Motorsport”.

In his exposé Richard pointed out that during the Formula Junior season none of the motors had been checked to measure their capacity during scrutineering either before or after races and alleged that some teams had taken advantage of the situation.

Specifically Frankenberg accused reigning champion Kurt Ahrens jr & Austrian Kurt Bardi-Barry winner of the race of running with an oversize engines on September 30th.

He also accused Alan Rees who was running in a work Lotus 22 with a Cosworth Ford motor of running in practice with an oversize motor during which he crashed and eliminated himself from the race.

Frankenberg then went on to report Alan had openly declared that his team (Lotus) had been running oversize motors through out the season.

Finally Frankenberg challenged Colin Chapman to send two cars to Monza to rerun the Lotteria race distance at the same average speed that the cars had achieved in June and then have the motors legality checked.

In the aftermath of the publication Kurt Ahrens Jr and Kurt Bardi Barry won civil actions against von Frankenberg and Auto Motor & Sport both presented motors which passed inspection well after the event but it was concluded that hear say in the paddock was not sufficient proof that either driver had cheated.

The ONS, governing body of motorsport took Ahrens Jr, Bardi-Brady and Mitter to task about events on the September 30th 1962 and concluded that the hear say evidence of Mitter was not proof positive that Ahrens or Bardi-Brady had cheated but they did find Mitter and Ahrens Jr guilty of conspiring to fix the race results for which they both had their licenses suspended for six months.

Colin Chapman accepted von Frankenbergs suggestion, offering to run one Lotus 22 Formula Junior car at Monza over the 30 lap distance of the Lotteria held in June and made a bet of £1000 that his car would not only achieve the same or better speed at Monza over the 30 race distance and be proved perfectly legal. In the event von Frakenberg and Auto Motor und Sport lost the bet they would pay Chapman £1,000 and publish a retraction of the accusations against the team.

All parties duly deposited their stakes and convened at Monza on December 1st 1962. Peter Arundell did some slow warm up laps and blew his engine, it was agreed this should be repaired for a second attempt the next day.

On December 2nd a new attempt was made after cement had been strewn across patches of ice found under the trees at the first Lesmo Corner. Despite another slow start Peter Arundell soon started lapping ahead of the target time eventually crossing the line for the 30th time 52 seconds faster than he had in June.

On completion of the race distance he did one final blinding flying lap and lowered his lap record of 1’50.9′ in June to 1’49.8′ in December.

It was noted at the time the cooler conditions gave Peter an advantage, as much as 4% extra horse power by my calculations, but his times by my calculations are only 1.5% quicker for the race and and 1% quicker for fastest lap.

Once Peter returned to the pits the car was meticulously weighed, the engine dimensions were measured, as 1092 cc / 66.6 cui, and so the car was declared fully compliant with the Formula Junior regulations to the satisfaction of all concerned.

Immediately after the technical inspection the “Monaza Lion” as the car became known was sold for £2,000 to a Sig. Motta, thereafter Richard von Frankenberg shook Colin Chapman’s hand and formally apologized in front of all those present and an apology with full retraction of the false statements was printed in the following issue Auto Motor und Sport.

Peter Arundell won a second consecutive British Formula Junior Championship in 1963 and looked to have a promising future until an accident in 1964 saw him thrown out of his car. Colin Chapman kept a seat for Peter until his return in 1966, however Peter showed none of his earlier promise during his comeback season and retired from the sport completely in 1969, after selling his Garage Business from which he and his family were lucky to escape from a serious fire he moved to Florida where he founded the notorious adult software gaming company Mystique.

Colin Chapman went from strength to strength his Lotus team wining the first of six World Drivers and seven World Constructors Championships in 1963.

Kurt Ahrens jr regained his German Formula Jr title in 1963 but never quite broke into the big time he did however win the 1969 Austrian and 1970 Nurburgring 1000kms races driving with Jo Siffert and Vic Elford respectively, the 1968 Austrian event was the first ever to be won by a Porsche 917, he also took two consecutive pole positions at Le Mans for the 24 hour races in 1969 and 1970 both in works Porsche 917’s. He retired in 1970 to look after his family’s car dealership and scrap metal business and still takes an interest in the historic racing scene.

Gerhard Mitter drove in seven Grand Prix but like Ahrens Jr never secured a permanent seat on the Grand Prix circuit, he won the 1969 Targa Florio driving a Porsche 908 with Udo Schutz. Gerhard was kiiled during practice for the 1969 German Grand Prix after either suspension or steering failure caused him to crash.

Soon after he lost the Monza bet von Frakenberg left his staff position at Auto Motor und Sport. He was killed in a road accident in 1973 aged 52.

My thanks to every one on The Nostalgia Forum particularly, Doug Nye, Arese, r.atios, Ralf Pickle and Charlieman, on the L’affaire Lotus/von Frankenburg thread, RWB, Macca & Rob on the How many Lotus 22s? thread, finally but not least Cheapracer and saudoso on the Ambient air temperature and car performance thread.

Thanks for joining me on this bumper edition of ‘Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

PS Don’t forget …

Automobiliart GALPOT Seasonal Quiz

December 26th – January 2nd

Win a set of Paul Chenard Greetings Cards

Set 1 Sports & GT Cars

Set 2 Phil Hill World Drivers Championship 50th Anniversary Edition

Set 3 1934 Season

Set 4 Grand Prix Engines of the 1950’s

Set 5 Mike Hawthorn’s Race Cars

The Automobiliart GALPOT Seasonal Quiz will comprise 8 categories.

Overall winner chooses one set of Paul Chenard Greetings Cards from the five sets shown above.

The cards measure 15.24cm x 11.43cm, come in packs of 12 with 3 copies of 4 designs in each set, plus A6 envelopes.

Which set will you choose ?

The free to enter Automobiliart GALPOT Seasonal Quiz will run from December 26th – January 2nd Entries close January 8th 2012, Winner announced January 16th 2012.

Full details on December 26th at GALPOT.

Looking for Automotive Seasonal Gift Idea’s? Visit Automobiliart Now !

Thread Breakers – Lotus 20 # 20-J-892

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In 1958 at the suggestion of engineer, journalist and former racing driver Count Giovanni “Johnny” Lurani Formula Junior was adopted as an entry level form of open wheel racing that mandated the use of engines, gearboxes and brakes from everyday production road cars.

There were two classes up to 1000cc / 61 cui vehicles were allowed to run with a minimum weight of 360 kgs / 792 lbs and up 1100cc / 67 cui were allowed to run with a minimum weight of 400 kgs / 880lbs. The larger engine class was the most popular and initially a large variety of motors were used including FIAT, BMC, Moskvitch with 4 stroke 4 cylinder engines while SAAB and DKW 2 stroke 3 cylinder engines were also popular.

The series initially featured front engine vehicles but followed the trend set in Formula One and went the rear engined route at the turn of the decade. Lotus built a successful variation of the Lotus 18 Formula One car for formula Junior in 1960 and followed that up with Lotus 20 model that is featured today.

This particular Lotus 20, # 20-J-892, belongs to long time Lotus enthusiast Ralf Pickel, who fell in love with Lotus cars thanks in part to Matchbox, from Schwabach in Southern Germany.

# 20-J-892 was supplied new to Honda Racing Team manager and ex motorcycle racer Reg Armstrong fitted with a Cosworth tuned Ford engine number # 61425. Reg is thought to have driven the car at several events in Ireland.

After being sold on, first to Edmund Gill then to Bill Popplewell, who shared the driving with Frank Keane in Ireland, the car was fitted with a larger engine in 1965 by Brian Cullen for entry into Formula Libre events.

At Phoenix Park a drive shaft, which also acts as a critical suspension component, snapped causing an accident while Brian was at the wheel, that damaged the left hand side of the chassis.

Gordon Percy bought the damaged 20-J-892 with the intention of using it to build a grass track racer but over a period of 20 years he never quite got round to it and in 2000 the car left Ireland and ended up being restored by Michael Hibberd who replaced the damaged chassis members. After a couple of further documented changes of ownership Ralf bought the car from Richard Smeeton, who had a fresh £12,000 Richardson built Ford Formula Junior engine installed, earlier this year.

Ever since he bought the car Ralf has been wondering why the mirrors are mounted so high and close together on the screen, the probable answer has recently come to light that in the absence of timing beams on hill climbs a thread was stretched across the finish line of these events that mechanically stopped the timing clock when it was broken as cars crossed the finish line.

One one occasion when Reg Armstrong was driving today’s featured Lotus 20, which was considerably lower than all of the other vehicles in a contest, the thread was broken not by the car but Reg’s chin, reportedly causing copious blood shed.

Subsequently it is thought the mirrors were placed high on the screen to prevent further injury. A similar bloody fate befell the slightly taller Edmund Gill when he drove 20-J-892 following year when again the height of the finish line thread took no account of how low the Lotus 20 was.

To date Ralf has only had the opportunity to do some testing and demonstration events with this neat racer, but has plans to drive the car in anger for the first time next year hopefully at Hockenheim in April and Salzburgring in May.

My thanks to Ralf for sharing the photo’s and information on his Lotus. Thanks to TNFers Alan Cox, David Mckinney, Simon Thomas, Bill P, Richard Hinton, David Beard, Tim Murray, Richard Young, Edward Fitzgerald and larryd who contributed to the Lotus 20 and Reg Armstrong threads on The Nostalgia Forum.

Thanks for joining me on this Formula Junior edition of ‘Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres’ I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Gettin' A Li'l Psycho On Tyres

Art Tidesco blogs on all things motoring