Monthly Archives: December 2012

Cu Ghost – Rolls Royce Brockman 40/50

The Rolls Royce 40/50 launched in 1906, dubbed by Autocar the following year as “The best car in the world”, was only ever supplied as a chassis on to which a body would be individually crafted by an independent coach builders.

It is not known if, upon completion in Derby of today’s, today’s featured 1921 example was sent to a recommended Coachbuilder or straight to Dick Brockman and Company’s coach building works in Reading west of London.

The hand starter was merely a precaution on this chassis as electric lighting and starting was fitted to all 40/50’s from 1919 on.

The Spirit of Ecstacy also known as “Ellie in her Nightie”, was originally sculpted by Charles Sykes and made of chrome alloy was not adopted as an option until 1911, by all accounts Henry Royce was not a fan of the mascot and only agreed to it being offered as an option to dissuade his customers from using less suitable ornamentation.

Up until 1915 shiny brass, and nickle fittings were quite common but after the Great 1914/18 War these items tended to be painted.

Using .065″ copper sheet Dick Brockman and Company appear to have manufactured the body of this vehicle without resorting to either welding or riveting which would have been common practice.

This car, photographed by Geoffrey Horton at Hillsborough Concours d’Elegance earlier this year, is powered by an 80 hp 7428 cc / 453 cui six cylinder motor connected to a 4 speed manual gearbox.

Restoration of the car included replacing the dash board, front and rear screens along with the rear cockpit.

Once the restoration was completed the car won the 1991 Concours d’Elegance at Pebble Beach.

Many of the fitting were supplied by the Restoration Supply Company, Reno who carried out the restoration.

Despite it’s age this vehicle apparently has no problem keeping up with today’s traffic at ‘modern speeds’ with the smooth and silent performance that established the reputation of Rolls Royce as the manufacturers of the finest cars in the world from the beginning.

Friction dampers such as the one seen here were in common usage until the second half of the twentieth century when they were replaced with shock absorbing struts.

Opulent and refined this 40/50 represents the definition of what a hand crafted from nose to tail Rolls Royce should be, this car is regularly to be found in the National Automotive Museum in Reno.

Remarkably this is not the only copper bodied car by Dick Brockman and Company they were also responsible for building the body on a 1930 Rolls Royce Phantom II, Freestone & Wedd also built a copper bodied Rolls Royce on a pre owned 1937 Phantom III, other copper bodied cars include home made hand beaten 1920 Dodge now on view at the Southward Museum in Paraparaumu new Zealand. There are also two copper Cobra bodies one designed by Virgil M Exner in 1965 known as the Mercer Cobra, and the other a Kirkham Replica Cobra. Finally a supercharged rear engined Ford GT was fitted with a retro ’40’s copper hot rod body by Kirkham for the SEMA show in Las Vegas some years ago.

My thanks to Geoffrey Horton for sharing his photo’s of the Copper bodied Rolls Royce Brockman 40/50 copper Ghost.

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

Torrey Canyon – Lotus Ford T86

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On March 18th 1967 Shipmaster Pastrengo Rugiati elected to take his charge the 974 ft Torrey Canyon carrying 120,000 tons of crude oil on a disastrous short cut between the Scilly Isles and the Cornish mainland on his way to Milford Haven and ended up causing the worlds largest ship wreck when the boat grounded on the Seven Stones Reef. As the consequent environmental disaster unfolded the ship was bombed sending it 98ft below and the oil spill was repeatedly bombed in a vain effort to keep the oil off the beached of England, France and surrounding islands.

In 1969 Peter Wright was working on the ground breaking BRM P142 which would have introduced aerodynamically induced ground effects to racing car design when John Surtees joined BRM and insisted on opting for a conservative approach and developing the existing BRM P138 and P139 chassis with which Big John scored a season best 3rd place driving the P 139 at the 1969 US Grand Prix before quitting BRM to start his own team.

Peter left BRM and some years later started work for Technocraft to develop a vacuum assisted resin injection composite process which was to be used for the manufacture of body shells for the Lotus Elite, Eclat and Esprit road cars and Colin Chapman’s boat companies.

After the failure of the Lotus 76 in 1975 Colin Chapman asked another ex BRM employee Tony Rudd, now group engineering director at Lotus, to re-think how a Formula One car might be made to make proper use of the front tyres.

Rudd drafted his former colleague Peter Wright in to run the wind tunnel “in his spare time” after his commitments at Technocraft. The fruit of this collaboration was the successful Lotus 78 and world championship winning Lotus 79.

The team were not so lucky with the Lotus 80, from which they took a step back with the Lotus 81 before regrouping with their next innovation the twin chassis Lotus 86 seen here.

What Peter had found out was that the Lotus 80 and to a lesser extent the Lotus 81 were suffering from aero flutter causing the cars to porpoise as a result of having springs that were too soft for the aerodynamic loads being put through the wheels and suspension.

By having a twin chassis Peter hoped to use a conventional monocoque chassis in which the driver sat and a separate independently sprung ground effect chassis attached to the first at the outboard ends of the lower suspension. The suspension for the outer ground effect chassis was much stiffer than for the inner monocoque chassis and as a result in theory should not be quite so sensitive to flutter or likely to porpoise.

In order for the car to work not only would the science have to be proven but the rule book scrutinised to ensure the car remained legal. By having the outer ground effect chassis suspended from the bottom suspension links using very stiff rubber bump stops the criteria for having all parts of the car with an aerodynamic influence entirely sprung, was met.

To check the science the team took a 1980 Lotus 81 added a spacer between the engine and the fuel tank through which the central cross member of the outer chassis would pass, made provision for the front cross member of the outer chassis to pass under the driver legs and had had the third rear cross member of the outer chassis pass over the gearbox.

The weight of the outer chassis was kept low using the in house developed carbon fibre process that Peter had been developing for the Lotus road cars and Champman’s boats.

Amid much secrecy the Lotus 86 was built and then taken to Jarama for a private test, thanks to the motors heavily revised oil pumps, that were required by the second chassis, a lot of oil was spilled, hence the Torrey Canyon nick name for the car.

Once the leaks had been fixed the Lotus 86 proved that the aerodynamic outer chassis worked providing plenty of down force while the inner monocoque chassis, in which the driver sat, remained free of the porpoising effect that made the car difficult to control.

Upon completion of the test the Lotus 86 which was never subsequently raced was put aside and work started on the Lotus 88 using the same principles.

Thanks for joining me on this “Torry Canyon” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow for a look at an old Rolls Royce. Don’t forget to come back now !

25th Anniversary Aero Airbag – Ford Mustang GT Convertible

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They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder and the few owners of third generation Mustangs, built from ’79 – ’93, that I have spoken too always rave about them, no matter that in some eyes they share the aesthetics with a family pack of lard with no knobs on, you either love these cars or hate them.

Based on the Ford’s mid size Fox platform, around which contemporary classics as the Ford Granada (US), LTD and Thunderbird, Mercury Cougar and Capri, Lincoln Versailles and Continental Mark VII were also built, the third generation Mustang GT is fitted with a 5 litre / 302 cui V8 produced 225 hp. In 1987 third generation Mustangs received an “aero” style face lift which replaced the earlier 4 eyes look.

Handling was improved over the other vehicles built on the Fox platform with Fords Quadra Shock rear suspension though the handling still takes some getting used to and is best not sampled in the snow. For 1990 when today’s featured car was built drivers airbags became standard.

A school friend of mine who used to work in the oil industry out in Houston Texas had one of these 25th Anniversary Mustangs from new and said that the cost of keeping it maintained aside, there was no car he has owned before or since that has given him so much pleasure as his Mustang GT being driven out of Houston on a balmy evening with the hood down and the air conditioning on.

Thanks for joining me on this 25th Anniversary Aero Airbag edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres”, I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Fully Loaded Rare Breed – Zastava Type 102 / Yugo 65AGLX

Last British 2 Seat MG – MG TF

The Welsh Twin Royces – Rolls-Royce Boattail Speedster

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Gary L Wales winner of the 1984 Great American race for ‘antique’ cars is also a prize winning restoration expert who also has penchant for what he calls ‘Retro Design’ with which he aims to put together pleasing and fun vehicles for the road which recombine some of the best ideas stolen from the entire history of motoring.

Today’s featured car started life as a 1937 Rolls Royce 20/25 chassis onto which had been built a Saloon / Sedan body. The car ended up as a termite demolished derelict in Puerto Rico and in the mid 1980’s Gary acquired the chassis which is fitted with a 25/30 4257 cc / 259 cui six cylinder motor. 25/30 motors were introduced to the 20/25 chassis because owners were having bodies fitted to their cars which were too heavy for the 20/25 3699 cc / 225 cui motors. Note Gary has used double hinges for the bonnet / hood which nicely extend the line of the radiator grill.

Gary who by his own admission “flunked ruler reading” like any artisan turns his remarkable designs from his head into sheet metal using traditional techniques and tools, employing the work shop floor for schematic layout and traditional tools like the English Wheel.

For the Boattail Speedster Gary decided to move the motor, transmission and fire wall back a full 18 inches to give this car a longer bonnet line with the added benefit of improving the handling. The design for the wings / fenders was inspired by the French coach builder Henri Labourdette.

The dash board is original note the goggles are hanging from a map reading light to aid navigation by the passenger at night.

Labourdette also made numerous boattailed bodies back in the day, the wood work for Gary’s Rolls was cut by Gary’s neighbour John Maddocks who happens to be President of an Antique Boat Society.

The Philippine mahogany with darker Honduras mahogany edging is backed by aluminium from which the rest of the bodywork was also made.

If one lets ones eye follow the center line of the vehicle from the rear to the front it passes through the centre screen pillars which frame the Spirit of Ecstasy mascot on the radiator grill at the front.

If it is remarkable that Gary should build one such car it is surely all the more remarkable that around the time he acquired this chassis he acquired a second chassis of the same type and similar age which had served as an Ambulance in London during the ’39/’45 war. Gary made an identical twin of today’s featured Speedster and both are usually seen together. As with much else Gary’s Retro Designed pair of Speedsters have also become award winners.

My thanks to Geoffrey Horton who took these photographs at last years Palo Verdes Concours d’Elegance, and to Gary Wales who kindly confirmed which of his Rolls Royce twins Geoffrey took the photos of.

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

Not A Bolt On – Lotus Turbo Esprit Type 82

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In 1979 Monaco based oil traders Essex Petrolium joined Martini as sponsors of the Team Lotus Formula One team, something that Martini were not too thrilled with as they decided not to pursue there sponsorship for a second year. For 1980 Essex became the teams primary sponsor which carried over into Lotus production car operations with the launch, at the Royal Albert Hall, of the Lotus Turbo Esprit as a limited edition Lotus Essex Turbo Esprit of which just 100 were built in 1980 and 1981.

Unlike the single carburetor bolt on turbo that Lotus dealers Bell & Colvill had been offering customers since 1978 the official Lotus Turbo Esprit was a substantial upgrade of the normally aspirated Lotus Esprit Type 79, which included a new chassis with a wider engine bay, new front suspension derived from the latest Lotus Elite, new rear suspension and a new 210 hp type 910 development of the 4 cylinder Type 907 motor with twin carburetors and Garrett T3 Turbocharger.

After the production run of 100 Lotus Essex Turbo Esprit’s had been completed a variation of the originals blue red and silver colour scheme was offered with red leather interior like the one seen above in the Paddock at Silverstone which features rare three piece Compomotive wheels as used by James Bond in the 1981 film “For Your Eyes Only“.

Most Turbo Esprit’s were supplied with one piece BBS wheels. The Turbo Esprit body work is differentiated from earlier Giorgetto Giugiaro designed Esprit body by the addition of a front below the bumper spoiler and side “skirts” with NACA air ducts for the engine bay.

The significance of the wider engine bay of the Turbo Esprit’s new chassis would not become clear until the launch of the V8 Esprit which although initially developed alongside it’s turbo sibling did not come to market until 1996 having been delayed by numerous other projects including Colin Chapman’s involvement with De Lorean.

Although well received by the press the Turbo Esprit failed to gain a substantial foot hold anticipated in the USA and the 846 examples built between 1980 and 1984 marked the beginning of a steady decline in the fortunes of Lotus Cars.

Thanks for joining me on this “Not A Bolt On” 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