Monthly Archives: September 2012

Goodwood Revival – #7 Silberpfile

At the Berlin Motor Show in 1933 Adolf Hitler announced two new projects the (Kraft durch Freude – strength through joy) KdF- Wagen that would eventually become the Volkswagen Beetle and a state sponsored racing programme for Mercedes Benz. Below is a recreation of a 1936 Mercedes Benz racing department transporter based on a 70 hp petrol engine Mercedes Benz Lo 2570 truck complete with a Mercedes Benz W125 racing car on the back.

Once it became clear that Hans Stuck would not be joining Mercedes Benz he got together with Chairman of the newly amalgamated Auto Union Baron Klaus von Oertzen and free lance designer Ferdinand Porsche to make a bid to fund a rival for the Mercedes Benz team. Hitler agreed that two rivals would be better than one and so split the funding he had announced in Berlin for Mercedes Benz with Auto Union much to the disgust of the former. Below is a Büssing Typ 300 of the type used by Auto Union to carry their team.

There are numerous stories about how the Mercedes Benz and Auto Union team cars came to be called collectively the Silver Arrows. Apparently the earliest use to the term was in a 1932 radio broadcast in connection with a streamlined Mercedes Benz SSKL driven by Manfred von Brauchitsch was called a Silver Arrow. When the Auto Unions were prepared in 1934 they were all painted silver and bitter rivals Mercedes Benz, who would probably be loath to admit it, appear to have followed suit.

For 1934 Auto Union built the A-Type with, for the period, a wholly unconventional mid engine layout which featured a 291 hp super charged V16 motor there was no championship that year, Alfa Romeo won the first two of the seven major races before Hans Stuck won the German Grand Prix for Auto Union, René Dreyfus managed an unlikely win at the Belgian Grand Prix aboard his Bugatti and Mercedes swept the last two races of the season in Italy and Spain. Above is an A-Type of the type Stuck used to win the 1934 German Grand Prix.

From 1934 to 1937 Mercedes Benz used the W25 powered by a supercharged straight 8 motor that rose from 300 hp in 1934 to 490 hp by the time the W25 was replaced by the W125. In 1935 Rudolf Caracciola won the European Grand Prix Championship with three wins, Stuck one once for Auto Union and Tazio Nuvolari famously upset the Fuhrer by winning for ALFA Romeo in the 1935 German Grand Prix.

Karl Wendlinger had some problems selecting gears with the W25 seen on the left above and when he got a gear on this occasion the car snaked wildly as the narrow power band of his screaming engine kicked in forcing the 1938 W154 onto the grass.

For 1936 Auto Union introduced the C-Type which produced over 500 hp from it’s supercharged V16. This tipped the scales in favour of Bernd Rosemeyer who won three of the four European Championship rounds to become European Champion in 1936. This left the previous years champion Caracciola with a consolation victory at the start of the 1936 season before the Mercedes Benz team withdrew mid season, after the Auto Unions superiority became obvious, to regroup for 1937.

Five time Le Mans winner Frank Biela is seen at the wheel of the C-type above.

For 1937 Mercedes Benz came back with a vengeance upgrading their supercharged straight eight motor with a swept volume 5,662.85 cc / 345.56 CUI which produced 595 hp and a new W125 chassis as seen being handled by Grand Prix and Le Mans winner Jochen Mass above. After a consolation win at the start of the 1937 season for Rudolf Hasse, Caracciola took three wins from the remaining four rounds of the championship to win the 1937 European Championship title for the second time. Only Manfred von Brauchitsch also aboard a W125 interrupted Caracciola’s progress at Monaco. It was not until the late sixties that circuit racers so powerful would hit the tracks again with the emergence of the unlimited Can Am Series in North America.

For 1938 the organisers changed the rules to bring the speeds down by announcing a maximum swept volume of three litres / 183 cui. Auto Union developed the new D-type with “only” 12 cylinders in a Vee configuartaion that with 24 psi boost from the supercharger developed 478 hp and was still capable of over 200 mph ! The Nuvolari drove the D-Type, like the one seen here, to a single championship victory at the season finale at Monza.

Mercedes Benz built the W154 for the smaller capacity formula using an essentially unchanged chassis from the W125 but with a supercharged V12 giving up to 475 hp. von Brauchitsch and Great Britain’s Richard Seaman won the opening 2 races of the four race series. Caracciola won the third round which was enough to secure him a third European Championship title.

For 1939 there were only four rounds of the European Championship Mercedes again winning three of them Hermann Lang winning the first and last and Caracciola winning the 1939 German Grand Prix all for Mercedes. Herman Paul Müller interrupted the Mercedes domination with a win at the French Grand Prix. Two weeks after the final championship round in Switzerland von Brauchitsch drove the #6 seen here driven by Rob Hall to second place in the non championship Belgrade Grand Prix. That same day the Second World War got underway and the European Championship organisers who apparently had never agreed on the points system to be used for the 1939 championship failed to announce a championship winner. Lang or Mülller would have won depending on the scoring system to be used.

Finally Mercedes Benz built the 1.5 litre 91.5 cui supercharged V8 powered W165, as driven by Paul Stewart above, to compete in the more competitive, or at least varied since nearly everyone had abandoned hope of competing against Mercedes Benz and Auto Union, voiturette (small) class. Two cars were entered for Lang and Caracciola in the Tripoli Grand Prix and they finished first and second in that order. The cars were never to be raced again despite Caracciola being invited to compete at Indianapolis in 1946, he could not get the car out of Europe through Swiss customs.

Without doubt these are some of the most fascinating cars ever seen in motor racing, they dominated races that were often 10 hours long, but in the early years they were not invincible. However great the achievements of the teams and drivers these cars were built in an industrial context with the conscripted help of men and women who were not free to do as they liked, and I would venture to suggest these vehicles should be remembered as a testimony to those who endured unimaginable hardships and in the greater scheme of things some of the greatest inhumanities known to man.

Thanks for joining me on this “#7 Siberpfile” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres”, I hope you will join me again for some California Sunshine tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Goodwood Revival 2012 – #6 Lotus

Goodwood 2012 – #5 Ferrari Friday

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If I heard the commentary on Goodwood Radio correctly then there were over $300 million dollars worth of cars at Goodwood last Friday with 11 Ferrari 250 GTO’s present that would make up the first $120 million very quickly !

Among the 250 GTO’s I had not seen before was chassis #4219GT a car which Pedro Rodriguez drove to victory in the second Daytona 3 Hour race held in 1963. This car is reputed to have changed hands for just over $12,000 in 1964 and between $3 and 3.5 million in 1993 !

The role call of drivers of this Ferrari 250 TR #0774TR includes Jean Behra and Dan Gurney who did not finish the 1959 Le Mans 24 hours in it, Phil Hill and Cliff Allison who won the 1960 1000kms at Buenos Aires before it returned to Le Mans where it won the 1960 24 hours with Olivier Gendebien and Paul Frere at the wheel.

I am not sure of the chassis number of this 250 GT SWB Berlinetta so I’m not sure wether or not it’s a Competizione model or not, if you know your 250 GT SWB’s and no the identity of this one please chip in with a reference or two below.

A class win at Le Mans in 1967 for drivers Dietter Sporey and Rico Steinemann followed by another in the 1000 kms at Spa in 1969 with Jaques Rey and Edgar Berney at the wheel did not do much to help the value of this car in 1969 when it changed ownership for just $6,000. By 1983 the value had leapt to $150,000 two years later it was fire damaged and the wreck changed hands for $46,000.
The restored car then went to Japan for a reputed $800,000 in 1988, since then it has come to reside in the UK via the USA for undisclosed sums.

My personal pick for Ferrari of the day is this 250 MM Pinifarina Berlinetta with a longer than standard nose. The car has little racing history from it’s heyday and lost 1 million Italian Lira in value, just under 1/3rd, between 1953 and 1955. By all accounts it was used for to chauffeur movie stars in 1954.

If you can’t have the Ferrari 250 of your choice there are plenty of less valuable 250 GTE’s like the 1963 example above that can be acquired and transformed into the Ferrari of your dreams at a fraction of the price of the real thing.

For one reason or another this Ferrari 250 GTO #3757 has come up for discussion on GALPOT numerous times, I make no apology for showing yet another photo of it again because this time former Ferrari Grand Prix driver and would be Indy rookie Jean Alesi can be seen at the wheel.

Christian Horner is best known as team principle of the multiple championship winning Red Bull racing, he was also a dab hand behind the wheel making it all the way to the second tier Formula 3000 open wheel series before the money ran out and he opted for team management in 1998. Christian is seen here in the Ferrari 250 GT SWB Berlinetta chassis 1953GT another car that has been mentioned before in connection with the motor from 250 GT SWB Berlinetta #2025 that has been fitted to the #60 seen here.

The car above driven by Mike Malone looks like a 1958 Ferrari 250 TR however it actually started life as 1956 290 MM Scaglietti Spyder #0606 with Right Hand Drive. After Maurice Trintignant and Phil Hill won first time out in Sweden car was upgraded to 1959 250 TR specs at the factory and ended up in Brazil where Rio Negri was killed after probably mistaking the central pedal for the brakes when it was actually the accelerator. The remains of the fire damaged car were eventually fitted with a Ford V8. Much later it was discovered and mistaken and built up again as the Left Hand Drive ’59 250 TR 0726. Many years later it came to light that the car was actually #0606. Finding Ferrari’s can be difficult identifying them correctly even more so !

Last year I saw 1985 Indy winner Danny Sullivan at my local track Castle Combe, this year I have now seen him race a Ferrari at Goodwood, above he is driving a 1956 Ferrari 850 Monza chassis 0604M, as we saw in a previous post Danny is following in the footsteps of one five time Juan Manuel Fangio and America’s first world champion Phil Hill ! Danny qualified 15th but did not finish the Sussex Trophy Race.

Finally the Freddie March Memorial Trophy race included this 1955 Ferrari 750 Monza Scaglietti Spider S1 chassis #0504M which appears to have been raced by Frenchman Michael Poberejsky under the pseudonym Mike Sparken. Michael won a race in Morocco before sharing the car with Marsten Gregory at Le Mans in 1955 where they failed to finish. R and A Frankel retired with less than half an hour to go in the Freddie March Memorial Trophy too !

Thanks for joining me on this ‘#5 Ferrari Friday’ edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at some of the Lotus racing cars that were present at Goodwood. Don’t forget to come back now !

PS 12 09 21 Condolences to family and friends of Michael Poberejsky who died this morning at his home in Beaulieu sur Mer.

Goodwood Revival 2012 – #4 Vote Gurney !

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The Dan Gurney Presidential Campaign, which was started by Car & Driver Editor David E. Davis in May 1964 when Dan was still to young to run, was in full swing at the Goodwood revival last weekend.

Among many of the cars drove during his career was the Balchowsky Buick ‘Ol’ Yeller II which Dan Gurney drove twice against far more sophisticated machinery in 1960 setting a lap record and leading the race when he retired at Riverside.

B.S. Cunningham employed Dan to share the experimental Jaguar E2A at Le Mans in 1960 with Walt Hangsen. The, one of two, prototype E-Type retired with head gasket failure, Stefan Zeigler is seen at the wheel here during practice for the Sussex Trophy.

Dan drove three very different cars at Indy during the month of May in 1962, having invited Colin Chapman of Lotus over in the hope of convincing Colin to build cars and enter a Lotus team for the 500 in 1963. Dan took passed his Indy Rookie test in a Roadster, then has a go at qualifying for the 1962 500 driving the gas turbine powered John Zink Trackburner, before deciding the more conservative Thompson Buick, above, was the way to go. Dan finished 20th on his Indy debut.

A couple of months later Dan won his first Grand Prix in France driving the aircooled 1962 Porsche 804 seen being warmed up above.

By 1964 Dan was being employed to drive the Shelby American Cobra’s, Dan shared the Daytona Coupé version chassis CSX 2299 with Bob Bondurant to win the GT Class at Le Mans that year. Chassis CSX 2300 is seen above being driven by 1999 Indy 500 winner Kenny Brack on it’s way to pole for the Shelby Cup.

During 1966 Dan campaigned the Lola Ford T70 Spyder, above, during the opening unlimited Can Am season. At Bridgehampton in September 1966 Dan not only qualified on pole but also won, the only Can Am victory for a Ford powered vehicle.

Kenny Brack drove for AJ Foyt when he won Indy in 1999, above is the Ford Mk IV chassis #J5, AJ shared with Dan at Le Mans in 1967. Gurney and Le Mans rookie Foyt comfortably won the race to secure Ford’s second consecutive Le Mans win.

With Foyt having won the 1967 Indy 500 in the last week of May, Gurney and Foyt winning Le Mans in the first week of June, Dan went on to win the 1967 Belgian Grand Prix at Spa in one week later in a car from his own fledgling Eagle team. The Len Terry designed Eagle T1G is powered by a 3 litre / 183 cui Gurney Westlake V12.

In 1968 Dan’s All American Racers team ran Shelby Ford Mustangs Boss 302’s in the Trans Am series.

Dan’s last Grand Prix three drives came when he substituted for Bruce McLaren, after the latters death at Goodwood driving a McLaren M8 Cam Am car. Dan drove the McLaren Ford M14A car to a sixth place finish in the 1970 French Grand Prix his last but one Grand Prix.

Earlier in the 1970 season Dan drove to a 3rd place finish in the Indy 500 on his last appearance in the cockpit at the Brickyard. Though he never won the 500 as a driver his Eagle Offenhauser cars won three Indy 500’s in 1968 with Bobby Unser, Gordon Johncock in ’73 and Bobby Unser again in 1975.

Sea Cadets at the Revival were handing out Gurney campaign stickers and badges in return for donations to the Royal Navy Heritage Trust, a charity which is dedicated to keeping historic Navy planes, like the Hawker Sea Fury above, in the air. In August 1952 Lieutenant Peter “Hoagy” Carmichael, of 802 Squadron based aboard HMS Ocean was credited with shooting down a Mig 15 jet in the Korean War. This was one of the few times a jet has been recorded as being shot down by a piston powered plane. Over the Radio Dan told Goodwood spectators that he applied to become a pilot with US forces, however when he was told that this would not be possible because he was married he told us that he moved on “and did some other stuff”.

Thanks for joining me on this “#4 Vote Gurney” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow. For Ferrari Friday at Goodwood. Don’t forget to come back now !

Goodwood Revival 2012 – #3 Continental Curiosities

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Today’s post features some of the Continental Curiosities that appeared at last weekends Goodwood Revival.

In the pits this 1959 GAZ Volga 21M was being readied for Roger Wills and Brendan Hartley to take part in the St Marys trophy races, the car ended the day with the bonnet hood wrapped round the windscreen after something came loose approaching Fordwater. Brendon finished 10th in race 1 and Roger 11th in race 2. The proogramme notes this 21M is powered by a 3 litre / 183 cui motor which is not a standard size for the model when it was built.

The Nash Metropolitan was a sub compact designed in the US but built in the UK by the Austin Motor Company in Birmingham, England with an Austin motor from 1953 to 1961, this left hand drive Series III car was driven in the St Mary’s Trophy races by Shaun Rainford and 1989/1995 British Touring Car Champion John Cleland. John was not classified in race 1 while Shaun finished 21st in race 2.

Back in the mid 1970’s Stuart Graham was a regular contender for saloon car race wins with first a Chevrolet Camaro and the Ford Capri III S. He is also a two time motorcycle Grand Prix winner. The now 70 year old Stuart can be seen preparing to climb aboard the 1951 Renault 4CV he was sharing with John Arnold. Stuart recorded a non finish in race 1 and John 25th in race 2 of the St Mary’s trophy.

Simply hanging in the paddock was this Goggomobil TS250 that has had the roof chopped off and a 1955 Mercedes Benz 300 SLR Mille Miglia tribute paint job. #722 was the number of the Mercedes Benz 300 SLR driven to victory by Stirling Moss with Dennis Jenkinson reading the map in the 1955 Mille Miglia.

So far as I can tell the vehicle above is a 1926 Peugeot 172R also known as a 5CV named after the French Tax Bracket into which it fell. It is powered by an 11 horsepower 4 cylinder motor.

The first of two Frazer Nash’s I learnt about at the weekend was this 1950 “Foursome” Cabriolet described in the notes on a Frazer Nash website as Fritz Fiedler’s dream car, Fritz was employed by Fraser Nash and Bristol to help set up production of various vehicles based on prewar BMW designs on which he had worked. Fieidler later returned to BMW where he eventually served as chairman. This Cabriolet appears to have been the only one of it’s kind ever built and features a larger chassis than it’s contemporary Frazer Nash vehicles.

This Mercedes Benz 190 will have left the factory as a saloon / sedan and had a post production conversion into an estate / station wagon, given the paint scheme this one may have served as an ambulance / retungswagen. The wide radiator grill dates the car post 1960 confusingly the swish indicators on the wing / fender appear to have come from a more powerful Mercedes Benz 220.

Georg Gebhard gave his Jankowits Special it’s world competition debut in the Brooklands Trophy, and I have to admire him for his bravery, given that the steering wheel is in the middle of a three wide bench seat ! The beautiful but heavy steel body sapped the cars acceleration on the straights and the seating arrangements made cornering a precarious experience even at walking pace. Unsurprisingly the Jankowits qualified last for the Brooklands Trophy over 30 seconds slower than the last but one slowest competitor. The owner is still convinced that the Jankowits is an ALFA Romeo in the absence of a single shred of evidence.

The second Frazer Nash I learnt of for the first time over the weekend is this 1928 Saloon known as “The Owlet” driven by Patrick Blakeney-Edwards. Other than the car appears to be a recreation I know little else at the moment except that it is very fast qualifying over a minuet faster than the Jankowits for the Brooklands trophy race for 5th place on the grid and finishing 3rd behind a more powerful ALFA Romeo and Talbot.

Winner of the unofficial biggest exhaust pipes in the paddock award the Tatra T603 driven by John Haugland and Arne Berg proved to be more than “all show and no go” with 5th and 8th place finishes in their respective St Mary’s Trophy races.

BMW was in danger of a merger with Daimler Benz such was the poor state of it’s finances when the BMW 700 Coupé was launched in 1959, fortunately a substantial number of orders along with a substantial investment saved the day for the company to remain independent. Jackie Oliver driving the #2 qualified and finished 3rd in the 1st Mary’s Race while team mate Richard Shaw qualified 5th and finished 6th in the 2nd race.

Thanks for joining me on this “#3 Continental Curiosities” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres”, I hope you will join me again for a Presidential Americana edition tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Goodwood Revival 2012 – #2 MGs

Goodwood Revival 2012 – #1 Track Action

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I planned to get up at 4am on Friday and head to Goodwood at 5 prompt, the first part of the plan worked well but by the time I’d corrected a false start and gone back home to collect my ticket it was 5:30 am before I hit the road in earnest.

As I arrived at Goodwood the 8 O’clock news headline on the radio was about a controversy surrounding pictures of naked Royalty that had been published in France. I switched the radio off before the whole story had been told and headed off into a car park full of classic and cars where I found this mascot on a Daimler LQ20.

As I approached the bridge that acted as an entrance into the circuit I observed a tent full of people being transformed from 21st Century to mid 20th Century citizens for what is one of the worlds biggest, if not the biggest, three day Fancy Dress Nostalgia events.

Once inside evidence of the Dan Gurney for President campaign was hard to ignore, I bet the guy I would vote for is faster than any other presidential candidate that ever lived.

On my way to the pits I popped by to say hi to Paul Chenard from Nova Scotia in Canada, Paul is seen above with one of the ten limited edition laser cut in steel Ferrari GTO’s he has recently been working on. Given that there were 15 250 GTO’s present to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the model which these day’s are conservatively valued at $20 million dependent on provenance I imagine Paul did not have to take too many of these cool pieces home with him.

Thanks to an armband kindly lent to me by the owner of the Porsche in this linked photo, I was able to get into the pits to see and hear some of the cars as they were being fettled ready for qualifying for the Goodwood Revival invitation races. Above the Walker Climax Tec Mec Tipo 10 apparently was commissioned by Rob Walker for Stirling Moss in 1960 but was never raced in period.

The Tartra T603 from the former Czechoslovakia easily won the unofficial biggest exhaust pipes in the pits competition, they are attached to an air cooled V8. The car qualified a respectable 8th for both rounds of the St Mary’s Trophy with John Haugland and Arne Berg driving in the first and second races respectively.

After a short break for lunch, during which I caught up with acquaintances from The Nostalgia Forum, I started an anticlockwise walk of the circuit as Kenny Brack was securing pole for the Shelby Cup in a Shelby Daytona Coupé. I got to the Lavant Corners in time to see a demonstration of pre 1939 Grand Prix Cars which included V12 and V16 Auto Unions, Mercedes Benz silver arrows models running together for what is thought to be the first time since 1939. Unfortunately the poor commentators had no idea who was driving what and the programme notes are no help either. Above two V16 Auto Unions lead a Mercedes Benz, the V12 Auto Union an ERA and a pair of 8 cylinder Maserati’s.

As the autumnal afternoon unfolded a seemingly endless stream of storied automobiles passed by including this recreation of a 39 inch tall prototype Maserati 151/3 driven by Jochen Mass and owner Barrie Baxter, which was invited to join the GT cars in the TT Celebration race.

After the many trials and all to few tribulations of BRM with it’s V16 P15 built in 1950 the team eventually evolved into Grand Prix and World Championship contenders winning the 1962 World Manufacturers and Drivers Championships with Graham Hill at the wheel of a V8 powered BRM P57, with 8 neat exhaust stacks, similar to the one above driven by David Clark in the Glover Trophy.

The last time I remember seeing Brian Redman at the wheel of an Aston Martin was at Donington Park in 1989 when he was driving the brutal Aston Martin AMR 1 Group C car. Here Brian is driving a 1957 DBR 1 of the type which, unlike the AMR 1, won at Le Mans in 1959 with Carol Shelby and Roy Salvadori at the wheel. Brian is seen above on his way to 18th on the grid for the Sussex Trophy race.

Having started the morning in the fog bound Channel Islands one of only two remaining Avro Lancaster PA474 bombers, powered by four Rolls Royce Merlin V12’s made a flyover of the track just before the day’s only scheduled race started.

Anthony Reid stormed off into what looked like an invincible lead for the 90 minuet Freddie March Memorial Trophy race as the evening drew to dusk. However a gear box fault meant that when owner Nigel Webb took over there was only one gear available, 4th and so the #24 C-type fell back to an eventual twelfth place. This meant that all Alex Buncombe had to do was keep his #12 Jaguar Heritage Racing C-Type,which had started with John Young at the wheel, on the road to keep the lead. Alex did take the win but only after a lawn mowing incident at St Mary’s corner which resulted in Alex loosing his head lights for a good half an our before remembering where the switch was.

Thanks for joining me on this Goodwood Revival 2012 – #1 Track Action edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be taking a look at some of the MG’s at Goodwood. Don’t forget to come back now !

Gettin' A Li'l Psycho On Tyres

Art Tidesco blogs on all things motoring