Tag Archives: Walter

Clever Canadian – Sadler BMC Formula Junior

When Clever Canadian Bill Sadlers Dad was ready to junk the family business Sadler Auto Electric 1939 Austin panel van Bill asked to take on the vehicle he had been delivering parts with and turned it into a convertible.

Later he converted his Hillman Minx to take a 150hp flathead Ford V8, the cars original brakes proved too small on his competitive debut at Watkins Glen.

Sadler BMC Formula Junior, Stephen Bulling, Autimn Classic, Castle Combe,

This led Bill to building a number of sports cars to race, he was an early adopter of both the small block Chevy V8 and the engine behind the driver layout which would become part of the formula for any half way decent Can Am car many years later.

By 1959 MENSA International member Bill was producing sports cars in small numbers when he decided to build a batch of 12 open wheel cars to the international Formula Junior specifications that were announced in 1958.

Sadler BMC Formula Junior, Stephen Bulling, Autimn Classic, Castle Combe,

The Sadler Formula Junior’s were built to a tuned version of the 1098 cc / 67 cui 46hp BMC A series engine more commonly found in Austin A35 van’s, Austin A40 Pininfarina Countryman’s, Morris Minors, Austin Healey Sprite’s, BMC’s various badge engineered 1100’s, later Mini Clubmans, Australian built Mini Mokes and Austin Allegro’s.

The engine and similarly sourced 4 speed gearbox sits in a tubular frame and is covered by an aluminium body.

Sadler BMC Formula Junior, Stephen Bulling, Autimn Classic, Castle Combe,

Details of 1959 Formula Junior races in which Sadlers took part are extremely hard to find, but by 1960 G Hag, Vic Yachuk, Ernest Donnan, James Walter and George Roberts, had all recorded starts in Sadler Formula Juniors in North America.

According to Dutchy and Steven W at The Nostalgia Forum, today’s Sadler seen in these photographs with Stephen Bulling driving at Castle Combe, was at one time driven by Canadian Dave Rodgman.

Thanks for joining me on this “Clever Canadian” 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 in a new Sunday Healey series. Don’t forget to come back now !

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“55 hp at 1,650 rpm” – Mercer Type 35 Series J Raceabout #996

Today’s story begins with John A. Roebling who designed the Brooklyn Bridge amongst many others. John had a son Ferdinand Roebling who together with his cousin John’s nephew Washington A. Roebling II and Kuser Borthers John L, Frederick and Antony, tycoons from the world of banking, bottling and brewing bought out a vehicle manufacturing business from Washington’s friend William Walter in a foreclosure sale in 1909.

Mercer Type 35 J, Palo Verdes, Concours d'Elegance

The new investors renamed the company Mercer after Mercer County, New Jersey where the factory had been located since 1906 in a former brewery owned by the Kusers. They set about building a vehicle which would establish the brand in competition and the result was the 1910 Type 35 J Raceabout.

Mercer Type 35 J, Palo Verdes, Concours d'Elegance

Powered by a 4 cylinder 4.8 litre / 293 cui motor producing 55 hp at 1,650 rpm the Type 35 Series J was designed to safely and consistently be driven at over 70 mph. With a top speed of over 90 mph a Type 53 Series J won five out of the six events into which it was entered in 1911, only missing out to the Marmon Wasp in the inaugural Indy 500.

Mercer Type 35 J, Palo Verdes, Concours d'Elegance

The history of today’s featured 1913 Type 35 Series J chassis #996 goes back to 1935 when founder of the VMCCA and founder director of the Wolfden Antique Auto Museum of Southborough, MA, Mr. Cameron Bradley, bought the car from a used car dealer for $100.

Mercer Type 35J, Palo Verdes, Concours d'Elegance

In 1977 Mr Bradley sold 996 on to present owners Ken and Sharon Gooding, parents of the Gooding and Co Auction House President David Gooding.

My thanks to Geoffrey Horton who took these photographs a couple of years ago at the Palo Verdes Concours d’Elegance.

Thanks for joining me on this “55 hp at 1,650 rpm” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow for Ferrari Friday. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Long Lost – Wolf 1979 Series

Wolf Racing was founded by Canadian Oil Magnet Walter Wolf in 1977 after an ill feted start made in partnership with Frank Williams in 1976.

Wolf / Fittipaldi, Cotwold MM

The Wolf team with Dr Harvey Postlethwaite designing the cars came flying right out of the box in Argentina 1977 scoring a debut win with Jody Scheckter at the wheel of the Wolf WR1. Scheckter impressed further by driving to two more wins in 1977. The 1977 series Wolf design ran WR1 – WR3 same as the chassis numbers.

During the following season the second series Wolf WR4 – WR6, with ground effects side pods that were all the rage in 1978, was less impressive and Jody, who had been courted by Ferrari well before his Wolf contract was up, left to join the red team from Maranello.

Wolf/Fittipaldi, Cotswold MM

The third series Wolf, which ran WR7 to WR9, apparently seen here at The Cotswold Motoring Museum, was designed by Dr Harvey Postlethwaite who had been reunited with former Hesketh driver James Hunt for the 1979 season.

As ironic luck would have it former Wolf driver Jody Scheckter would go on to win the 1979 World Drivers Championship in his first season with Ferrari while ex World Champion James Hunt quit the Wolf Team after the Monaco Grand Prix having struggled to qualify better than 10th in seven races and scored one 8th place finish and six retirements.

Wolf / Fittipaldi, Cotwold MM

Keke Rosberg took over the driving duties for the rest of the year but with no improvement in the teams performance Walter Wolf sold his team onto the equally struggling Fittipaldi brothers at the end of 1979.

Walter Wolf kept one of the third series cars while Fittipaldi upgraded the remaining two cars into Fittipaldi F7 spec with a centre post rear wing and heavily revised side pods with out the rear flick ups and built a third F7 from scratch.

Wolf / Fittipaldi, Cotwold MM

The Fittipaldi F7 cars all but disappeared from public view in the early 80’s. According to the museum description provided by the cars owner Andrew Smith by 1982 the Fittipaldi Team was in administration and all of the teams assets were acquired by ADA Engineering.

Andrew a James Hunt fan, and former Mini racer, saw WR7 race, with Keke Rosberg driving, at Silverstone in 1979 and bought the car from ADA Engineering with a Cosworth DFV engine. Some of the third series Wolf style body work, and unique ’79 Monaco spec twin element front wings have been refitted to this chassis which still has F7 running gear, a Fittipaldi in Wolf clothing.

At this moment there are inconsistencies in the accounts as to which third series Wolf chassis became which Fittipaldi F7 chassis. Not having seen which, if any, chassis plate this particular vehicle, seen at the Cotswold Motoring Museum, is carrying I cannot be sure exactly which, of the two Wolf chassis or three Fittipaldi chassis this is.

If you have evidence as to which of the Wolf third series chassis were transformed into the Fittipaldi F7 series chassis please chime in below or send me an e-mail to the address which appears at the very bottom of the blog page.

My thanks to Steve Holter, and Norman Jones from The Nostalgia Forum for their contributions to today’s blog.

Hope you have enjoyed todays Wolf edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’ and that you will join me again tomorrow for a look at a world champions daily driver that is coming up for auction on Saturday. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Myth & Skullduggery- 16b Marquette Buick

Today ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’ will be starting a month long celebration of the 100th Anniversary of the first running of the Indianapolis 500.

Apart from tomorrow’s post, and the four Ferrari Friday posts, all blogs up until and including May the 29th will be about the Indy 500.

Combining Ed Arnaudin‘s and my own collection of photographs I hope to take you through a marginally less than random history of this extraordinary event.

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When I started reading up on this car a few hours ago all I knew about it was that according to the 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed Guide was that it was a 4.8 litre 4 cylinder 293 cui Buick “thought to be the actual Buick that won the first race at Indy, driven by Louis Chevrolet on the four lap, 10 mile race”.

However I only had to check with the Wheels, Winter / Spring 1998 Journal of the National Automotive History Collection published by the Detroit Public Library to find that the winner of the first race at Indianapolis on Aug 19th was now well known automotive engineer Louis Schwitzer driving a four cylinder 212 cui Stoddard Dayton in a two lap 5 mile race.

Louis Schwitzer would become famous for designing the 1911 inaugural Indy 500 race winning engine for Marmon and later still for designing a variety of automotive pumps used in a wide variety of civil and military applications along with superchargers and latterly turbochargers as used by the, subject of a future blog in this series, 1952 Cummins Diesel.

Thanks to Gerry Godin’s ‘Buick City‘ blog I found the 16b Marquette Buick model name for today’s featured vehicle a wonderful photo of this vehicle on the Indy start line dated 1910 can also be seen on the blog.

Once armed with the model name I found out something about the myth of Buick winning the first automobile race at Indy dating back to at least the September – October 2002 Vol. 66, NO. 5 edition of Antique Automobile (Official Publication of the Antique Automobile Club of America, INC.) and the truth about some of the history of the #34 16b. Marquette Buick in an article by Terry B. Dunham which starts on page 29.

Terry asserts in paragraph 2 on page 43 of his article entitled ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’ “The first races run at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway were held August 19th, 20th and 21st 1909, some two years before the first 500. Buick entered and won two of the three events, including the first race ever held at the track.”

Why Terry’s account in his otherwise excellent article should be at variance with the Journal of the National Automotive History Collection I cannot imagine but I believe the Journal of the National Automotive History Collection has got the story correct about Schweitzer winning the first automobile race at Indianapolis in 1909. May be someday Mr Dunham will chime in below. [EDIT See Post Script below]

So having cleared up a few myths here is what I do know about the 16b Marquette Buick seen here driven by 4 time Indianapolis 500 winner Al Unser Snr.

The origins of the 16b Marquette Buick can be traced to an accident in the 1908 Savannah Grand Prix which befell Fritz Erle after a tire on his, otherwise superior, overhead valve 11.7 litre 716 cui Benz threw a thread which knocked the unfortunate Erle unconscious causing him to loose control of the car which ended upside down on the side of the track.

This misfortune was all the opportunity Buick designer Walter Marr, who’s Buick stood no chance against the superior handling and power of the FIAT’s and Benz vehicles in Savanah that day, needed to inspect the superior suspension design of the Benz while it was upturned and commit the detail to memory.

Later Marr directed a Buick photographer to take photographs of the dismantled overhead valve Benz engine that was stripped down inside the Benz camp while it was left unattended. You can see photographs of this skullduggery on page 37 of Mr Dunham’s article.

Marr used this information to build three hot rods one of them, the one in the photograph, with a 5.2 litre / 318 cui 4 cylinder overhead valve racing engine and all three with chassis built by the Marquette Motor Company, part of the General Motors conglomerate.

These three hot rods were variously called regular model Buick 30 and then regular Buick 16 Roadster while they were actually ‘illegal’ racing specials with non production engines and chassis taking part in races designed for ‘stock’ vehicles.

The vehicle in the photograph above, entered as a Buick 30, is credited as the one driven by Louis Chevrolet to the most important of Buicks 166 (one hundred and sixty six) race victories during the 1909 season in The Cobe Trophy.

The race of attrition, held at Crown Point over 395 miles was won when Chevrolet running on only three cylinders thanks to a broken valve snatched a 65 second victory from a Locomobile which had been delayed by half an hour by magneto problems and beat an otherwise apparently healthy Knox.

By May 1910 the AAA got wise to the loose ways of Buick model naming policy and excluded the three Buick specials for not being ‘stock’ production vehicles.

An interesting foot note to the question of who won the first auto race at Indianapolis in 1909 is that in 1911 Louis Chevrolet turned up with a Marquette Buick for the first Indy 500 without a proper entry, despite being told to ‘sandbag’ go only as fast as necessary to qualify (around 75 mph) Louis foolishly went round at 93 mph.

The organisers of the race agreed to let Louis start on condition the owners of the other teams unanimously agreed to sign a waiver. Having blown every one into the weeds in qualifying three teams declined to sign one of them was Marmon who’s engine designer was Louis Schwitzer and who’s car went on to win the very first Indy 500, I wonder if there is some inter state rivalry between Indiana and Michigan afoot to explain the discrepancy in the answer as to who won the very first auto race at Indianapolis? [EDIT Turns out there is not see postscript]

My thanks to everyone mentioned in this blog for their contributions.

Hope you have enjoyed today’s extended history lesson edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’ and that you’ll join me and a very smart young lady tomorrow for a Birthday celebration. Don’t for get to come back now !

01 05 11 PS the mystery over who won the first race on the opening day at Indianapolis has been resolved thanks to Tim Murray at The Nostalgia Forum :-

Louis Schwitzer won the very first five mile race at Indianapolis aboard his Stoddart-Dayton.
A Buick was driven to victory in the 3rd 5 mile race.
Bob Burnham won the very first 250 mile ‘FEATURE’ race aboard his Buick !

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