Tag Archives: John

Pick Up With Pedigree – Reef Engineering Cub

One For The Road – Ford GT 40 Mk III

The story of how Enzo Ferrari enraged Henry Ford II in 1963 by backing out of a deal to sell out to the blue oval has been re told many times, Henry ordered his employees to build a vehicle that would beat Ferrari at Le Mans where until then Ferrari had carved out a ‘Team to Beat’ position that would later be held by Porsche in the 1980’s and is held now by Audi.

Without any expertise in building cars suitable to beat Ferrari at it’s own game, Ford teamed up with Eric Broadley of Lola Cars to get their GT program up and running. The regulations in effect at Le Mans stipulated that cars had to be a minimum of 40 inches high and that was the target that was achieved which gave the Ford GT 40 model it’s name.

The 1964 GT 40 Mk 1 built by Ford Advanced Vehicles in Slough, England was originally powered by a 4.1 litre / 255 cui V8 but this was soon upgraded to a 4.7 litre / 289 cui V8 taken from the Ford Mustang.

Despite a lack of results in 1964 Ford felt the design of the GT40 held the potential for development, a Mk2 version was developed by Kar Kraft in Dearborn, while Carrol Shelby continued to develop the existing Mk 1’s with a development of the 289 Fairlaine motor that had been developed for the Ford Cobra.

The Ford Advanced Vehicles premises at Slough was acquired by John Wyer who managed one of several teams entering GT40’s in international sportscar races. John also ended up developing the Ford GT Mk 3 purely as a road car.

Unfortunately despite it’s road friendly detuned 4.7 litre / 289 cui motor the styling of the Mk 3 with its road legal 4 sealed beam head lights and extra space in the rear for luggage was not so well received.

What customers were really looking for was the out and out racing GT40 for the road as evidenced by the many Ford GT40 replica’s that have been built.

As a concequence only seven Ford GT 40 Mk 3’s were built between 1967 and 1969 making them possibly the rarest of all Ford’s to go into production and now one of the most sort after amongst collectors.

Thanks for joining me on this road going 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 !

The Right One – Chevrolet Corvette

Why Worry No: 6 ? – Scammell Highwayman

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I hope you’ll forgive me taking a break from my usual Thursday Americana blog so that we can to start celebrating regular GALPOT reader and contributor Steve Arnaudin’s Birthday a day early with a look at a 1961 Scammell Highwayman.

This particular vehicle is part of a fleet of vehicles used by John Carter and Sons to transport their steam fair around Britain.

So far as I can discern Carter & Sons operate 7 Scammells in their fleet of 15 vintage trucks.

“Why Not” is regularly tasked with pulling 40 tons of Steam Fair paraphernalia and with that weight can reach 40 mph, too slow to be seen on Britain’s motorway network which normally requires vehicles to be able to maintain a minimum speed of 50 mph.

A big clue as to why Steve might remember this type of vehicle is the number 6.

Highwayman were commonly used to pull Scammell low loading trailers which were built at the Scammell works at Moor Park just outside North London.

Joby Carter reckons that each of his trucks covers around 1000 miles per year some of them only need to be filled with diesel once a year !

One of the problems of running a fleet of vintage trucks is keeping the Gardiner diesel engines maintained this truck is 50 years old and the mechanic who has been looking after them should have retired some time ago.

In case your wondering why this truck might be of interest to our GALPOT birthday boy may I heartily recommend to you 42 mins 10 seconds of this linked surreal youtube clip for all to be revealed.

Happy Birthday and best wishes tomorrow Steve !

Be Seeing You !

Booby Prize from Wide Track Country – Pontiac Firebird

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In 1954 vice president of engineering at General Motors Oliver K Kelly called Packards head of Research and Development John DeLorean to offer him a choice of jobs across the five divisions on General Motors. DeLorean who at the time also had the choice of moving to Studebaker with whom Packard had just merged settled on becoming assistant to chief engineer Elliot ‘Pete’ Estes at Pontiac.

By 1963 John had become chief engineer at Pontiac, and Estes had become general Manager when they together with engine specialist Russell Gee and chassis engineer Bill Collins convinced the GM management to let them offer a $296 performance package on the Pontiac LeMans Coupé and Convertible body stiles that included a 325 hp 6.4 litre / 389 cui V8 motor normally found in the full size Pontiac Catalina and Bonneville models, from whence the ‘Wide Track’ strap line was born and named it GTO a name John picked up from the Ferrari 250 GTO.

The Pontiac GTO with initial production limited to 5,000, by a disbelieving Pontiac Sales Manager Frank Bridge, was an instant hit with Ronnie and the Daytonas, the youth market at which it was aimed and GM Management. The GTO was responsible for transforming the image of the brand from an ‘aunties car’ to a youth orientated performance brand with over 32, 000 units built in 1964.

As the GTO was launched John DeLorean moved on to the development of the Pontiac Banshee a concept car to compete with the Chevrolet Corvette which was killed by GM’s top management. DeLorean seen as Pontiacs golden boy was promoted to head of the entire Pontiac division and given the consolation task of turning the Chevrolet Camaro into a Pontiac Pony Car with the proviso that there could be no alterations to the sheet metal except to the front and rear panels.

By incorporating a signature Pontiac split grill with built in bumper at the front and a version of the rear strip lights seen on the two Banshee concept cars the Pontiac Pony car was easily distinguishable from it’s Chevrolet sibling, Having failed to acquire the Banshee naming rights from rocket scientist Eugene F. Lally, who had successfully raced a Corvette powered special of the same name, for less than ¢50 per car, the name Firebird which had been previously used by GM on three seriously out landish gas turbine concept cars, was eventually adopted for the Pontiac pony car.

The absence of marker lights, Federally mandated in 1968, and the E suffix on the registration plate confirm this as most likely one of the five variations of the 1967 model line up.

The Ram Air bonnet / hood suggests this car had the top of the range 6.6 litre / 400 cui motor installed when it left the factory.

Just over 100,132 1967 Firebirds are thought to have been manufactured of which 9,980 were convertible.

Thanks for joining me on this Wide Track Country edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’, I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Worth Getting Up At Dawn For – Volvo 480ES

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One day in April 1987 I spent the day at Donington Park where Volvo Concessionaires officially introduced the ’87 model range to members of it’s dealer network. This was the first opportunity many of us would have to drive the much anticipated Volvo 480ES.

Unlike Volvo’s previous coupé the P1800 which was based on an existing Amazon platform, the 480 was a completely fresh front wheel drive design by Robert Koch, John de Vries and interior by Corien Pompe. The 480 platform would then later be used for the 440 hatchback and 460 saloon variants.

The car bristled with idea’s new to Volvo including a Porsche tuned transverse 90 hp engine and front wheel drive, engine management by Electronic Control Unit, digital dash instrumentation, and a Lotus tuned suspension that gave the car staggering road holding.

By the time the car was launched the pop up head lights were not strictly necessary as the European Laws that had required them to meet a minimum head light height had been repealed, however this change in the law came so late the design remained unchanged.

During the course of the day I had the opportunity of driving the car around the Donington Park Circuit with a racing instructor at my side and I simply could not drive the car anything like fast enough to explore it’s road holding potential, it went every where I wanted it to go safely regardless of the speed I was doing.

Some weeks later I was given the 480 ES, seen here, for a week in exchange for getting up at some improbably early hour to go and drum up some business at New Covent Garden Fruit Vegetable Market in Central London.

From 1986 to 1995 80,463 Volvo 480 ES, Turbo and 2 litre / 122 cui variants were manufactured at the former DAF works at Born in the Netherlands.

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

Sprinzel Lawrence Racing – Morgan And Triumph SLR

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Towards the end of 1963 former British Rally Champion and Racing Driver John Sprinzel joined forces with noted engineer and Morgan racer Chris Lawrence, under the Sprintzel Lawrence Racing (SLR) banner, to design and build a sports car based on a Triumph TR4 powered ladder frame Morgan +4, with a similar chassis to the one that Chris had co driven with Richard Shepherd – Barron to a class victory at Le Mans in 1962.

(Triumph TR4 SLR, Photo Courtesy David Lawson)

From what I can gather Triumph racer John Hurrell managed to secure some funding for the SLR team and after seeing Chris Spenders drawings for the proposed Williams and Pritchard built bodywork for the Morgan & Triumph SLR car John asked if a similar SLR body could be fitted to his Triumph TR4 that he had been racing since 1960.

As things worked out the Triumph with a slightly shorter chassis was the first to be taken to Williams and Pritchard to have an aluminium SLR body built around it. Neil Dangerfield is known to have been winning races in this car as late as 1967 and the Triumph SLR went down in the record books as being the last to leave the start line at Goodwood as the scratch entry in the last, handicap, race held at the Circuit before it closed in 1966.

Neil drove the Triumph SLR 31 years later at the request of Lord March on a 3 lap demonstration when the Goodwood circuit was reopened in 2006.

Note the registration SAH 137 was originally issued to a Triumph TR3A owned by Jim Hurrell who transferred the number to the Triumph TR4 that was fitted with the SLR body and later sold it to Neil.

(Morgan & Triumph SLR I, Photo Courtesy Bob Bull)

The first of the Morgan SLR’s powered by a Triumph TR4 engine and featuring beefed up hubs along with the benefits of other lessons learned from Chris Lawrence’s Le Mans experience appears to have been built around a 1961 chassis for Gordon Spice a well known figure in British racing circles who eventually built and ran his own Spice Group C cars in the late 1980’s.

After just 3 laps of Goodwood Gordon crashed his new car in 1964, necessitating a complete rebuild making this red car both the first and last of the Morgan chassied SLR’s built. In 1975 then owner Sir Aubery Brocklebank suffered burns after a fuel leak in this car caught fire at Silverstone. The car was subsequently painted fire engine red.

(Morgan & Triumph SLR II)

The second Morgan and Triumph SLR was built for Pip Arnold, legend has it that this car was never painted because soon after delivery it was due to be raced at Spa and so the aluminium bodywork was merely polished. In the early seventies this car was caught in a severe garage fire and rebuilt by well known fabricator of racing cars Maurice Gnomm.

(Morgan & Triumph SLR III, Photo Courtesy Bob Bull)

The third car was built for Chris Lawrence himself and set an all time class lap record at the very last race meeting held at Goodwood in 1966. Chris Lawrences old car also won a race during the Goodwood Revival in 2006.

(L-R John Emberson, SLR II, Bill Wykeham, Billy Bellinger, SLR III, Jack Bellinger, Simon Orebi Gann, SLR I, Rick Bourne, Photo Courtesy Richard Gilbert)

All three of the Morgan And Triumph SLR’s were united possibly for the first time ever at the 2010 Silverstone Classic. As John Sprinzel rhetorically asked after seeing these photo’s “They were good looking cars weren’t they?”

From The Nostalgia Forum I’d like to thank David Lawson and Bob ‘Bauble’ Bull for the use of their photographs, Pete Stowe, Kurt O and Sharman for responding to my TNF Triumph SLR thread garyfrogeye for contacting John Sprinzel and Tim of the Willliams and Pritchard website for their kind replies.
Thanks also to Andy Downes and in particular Neil Dangerfield of the tr- register forum for his post on the order in which the cars were built to Richard ‘redmorgan’ Gilbert for the use of his photo, John “sprinty” and Steve N22MOG L and everyone at Talk Morgan who responded to my post.

Thanks for joining me on this SLR edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’ I hope you will join me again tomorrow for a look at an exotic Italian that needs a cool pagoda airbox to cover a big block V8. Don’t forget to come back now !

11 11 11 Post Script John Sprinzel has kindly in formed me that the three Morgan SLR’s first had a reunion at Goodwood several years ago.

Gettin' A Li'l Psycho On Tyres

Art Tidesco blogs on all things motoring