Monthly Archives: December 2012

Hill, Shelby & Hall – Ferrari 750 Monza #5010M

Today’s featured Saglietti bodied 1955 Ferrari 750 Monza #5010, seen here in photographs taken by Geoffrey Horton at the Petersen Automotive Museum last year, appears to have had just two owners, Allen Guiberson and the Hall family both from Texas.

When Allen Guiberson bought the car in 1955 he entered it into the Sebring 12 Hours for Phil Hill and Carroll Shelby and they repaid Allen with a 2nd place finish overall, behind the D-Type Jaguar driven by Mike Hawthorn and Phil Walters, and first in the 3 litre / 183 cui class.

Phil Hill drove #5010M in between his commitments for the Ferrari works team, taking victories at Pebble Beach and two at Beverly on July 4th.

Mid way through 1955 Guiberson withdrew from the sport and sold #5010 M to Condor Petroleum heir Dick Hall appears to have bought the car for his brother Jim Hall an engineering student at Caltech. Jim who was not yet 21 and so too young to race managed to race the car under age at Fort Sumner, New Mexico, in October of 1955 where despite a few spins pulled off a win.

During 1956 #5010M was entered for Carroll Shelby to race in at least 5 races. Shelby won 4 of those races and finished 2nd in the other, a preliminary at Ft Worth before winning the feature.

Jim Hall, who can be seen on this link showing the car to some of his Caltech friends in 1957 returned to driving the car legally recording a 7th place finish at Santa Barbra in May 1957 and 2nd place finish at Mountain Eagle the following month.

Once Jim Hall had got Chaparral cars up and running with Hap Sharp Phil Hill joined Jim’s team taking wins in both the Can Am and World Sports Car series in Chaparral designed and run cars.

So far as I am aware the restored car still belongs to Jim Hall today.

My thanks to Geoffrey Horton for sharing his photographs.

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

Supercharged Striped Snake – Ford Mustang Shelby GT500

Stojadin – Zastava Type 101 / Yugo 511

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Zastava, Serbian for flag according to Google Translator, was a Yugoslavian, now Serbian manufacturer that was born out of a Army Technical Institute founded in 1851 that in turn became a firearms manufacturer in the 1880’s. From 1939 to 1941 the vehicle arm of Vojno-Tehnicki Zavod assembled 400, Chevrolet according to some sources and Ford according to others, trucks before the ’39/’45 war closed operations down. In 1953 the renamed Zavodi Crvena Zastava, Red Flag Institutes 96% of the employees voted to resume vehicle manufacture and 162 Willy’s Jeeps were built. If you know have information pertaining to the first Zastava trucks being Ford or Chevrolet please chime in below.

In 1954 Zavodi Crvena Zastava entered an agreement to assemble FIAT’s under license which led to the production of FIAT 128’s called Zastava 128’s in 1971. In 1972 a hatchback version of the 128 was introduced and it is a 1986 version of the hatch back known as the Type 101 that is featured today.

The front end is indistinguishable from the revamped 1976 FIAT 128, voted 1970 European Car of the Year, minor differences to the bumper and manufacturers badges not withstanding.

Power for todays featured car comes from a 1116 cc / 68 cui with an aluminium cylinder head and overhead cam, originally designed by the legendary Aurelio Lampredi, which produces 55 hp.

The Zastava 101, known colloquially in Serbia as the “Stojadin”, was sold under a variety of names in different markets, these include Yugo 311/313/511/513 and Skala 55 in its most recent 2008 incarnation when production ceased after 1,045,258 of the hatchbacks had been built. Production of the hatch backs was also licensed by the Polish FSO company and sold as the Zastava 1100p.

Like just about every other passenger vehicle built under the communist regieme in the 1970’s and 1980’s some Zastava 101’s were used for competition with a class win on the 1973 Tour d’Europe probably counting as it’s most significant achievement.

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

Hot Rover #3 – MG ZT-T

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Like the MG ZR and MG ZS models the MG ZT was based on a Rover model in this case the Rover 75 and like the smaller ZR and ZS it was launched in 2001 and face lifted in 2004.

The ZT-T is the estate / station wagon version of the ZT and today’s face lifted car is said to have been completed on the 20th of January at 13:19 making it the 11th ZT to be built in 2004.

The cars chassis plate shows this car to have been intended to be biomorphic green however it was finished in shot silk chromescent, like only two other ZT-T models, one of which also has a chassis plate showing the intended colour was biomorphic green.

On 5th April 2004 the car was registered to MG Rovers Press Fleet and was subsequently used by MG Director Dr Chris Millard who had many updates and extras retro fitted to keep the car up to date with all the latest developments barring an electric sunroof.

Shot Silk Chromescent paintwork was part of MG Rovers Monogram Personalisation Programme which offered customers an exclusive opportunity for MG and Rover customers to realise their personality through automotive style.

Power for this car comes from a 129hp Turbo Diesel motor which is connected to a 5 speed automatic transmission which gives a rest to 60 mph time of 11.4 seconds and a maximum speed of 117 mph.

Just over a month after MG Rover called in the receivers in April 2005 ownership of this ZT-T transferred to the Royal Bank of Scotland before being sold on to a salesman.

My thanks to The Rover 75 and MG ZT Owners Club for the details about today’s car which is seen at the The Classic Motor Show held at the NEC, Birmingham a couple of weeks ago.

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

Pick Up Man – Hillman Imp Super Pick Up

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Bob has a passion for Hillman Imps which can be traced back to learning to drive one. Since then he has owned many more and become something of an expert on the model.

Living out in the country not far from Bristol he has need of an all purpose run around and one day Bob had the good fortune to be in his autocross racer friend Philip’s garage when Philip was poking holes with a screw driver through an Imp he had just acquired.

Philip agreed to give the Imp to Bob for nothing and before Philip could change his mind Bob got the car home and chopped the roof off with an angle grinder and then strategically added some steel to maintain structural rigidity.

He then matched up the C pillars and tailgate with the remaining roof behind the door frame which allowed the seats, rescued from a Peugeot 205 GTi, to be moved all the way back on their runners.

Bob has made a few mechanical improvements to the car including removing the original transverse mounted radiator and installing one from a Nissan Micra longitudinally which improves cooling of the alloy engine.

With five years on and off work completed and expenses that “didn’t run in to thousands” Bob took his Imp Pick Up to an Imp Club meeting for it’s first run and came home with second place prize in the modified class.

Best of all his wife finds the pick up far more comfortable than his other car, a Sunbeam Imp but with out the Peugeot seats. Which all goes to show as Joe Diffie observed there is something women like about a pick up man.

Thanks for joining me on this “Pick Up Man” edition of “Getting a li’l psycho on tyres”. I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to came back now !

Measured & Realistic – Rolls Royce Ghost V12

Championship Clincher – Talbot Sunbeam Lotus (Type 81)

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In 1977 the European division of Chrysler launched the Chrysler Sunbeam hatchback which was financed with Government aid that was part of a strategic plan to keep jobs at Chryslers Linwood factory in Scotland where the Hillman Imp production had come to a halt in 1976.

The new hatchback used the floor plan of the Hillman Avenger, another model manufactured at Linwood, of which sales were falling and which was to be discontinued in 1981.

In 1978 Chrysler commissioned Lotus to develop a competition version of the Sunbeam hatchback, which appears to have shared the same type number ’81’ as the Lotus Ford ’81’ Formula One car.

Incidentally this appears to be the third of two completely unrelated projects have shared a Lotus Type number, I have read suggestions this occurred because some one lost the book in which the Lotus projects were recorded, I have also seen suggestions that what ever Lotus type numbers vehicles have now, they were not necessarily the same as those that appeared on the original Lotus drawings.

The Sunbeam Lotus was produced with a 150 hp for road trim and 250 hp for competition rally trim both versions using variants of the Lotus Type 907 motor first seen in the Lotus 62 sports racing car and later in the Lotus Elite, Type 75, road car.

The Sunbeam Lotus was first seen in early 1979 but by the end of the year Chrysler had sold it’s European operations to Peugeot for US$1 (One US Dollar) which came packaged with all of Chrysler Europe’s debt. For 1980 all of Chrysler Europe’s models including the Chrysler Sunbeam Lotus were rebranded as Talbots and all of the road going Sunbeam Lotus models appear with Talbot badges.

In 1979 a works Chrysler Sunbeam Lotus team entered selected World Championship Rally events in anticipation for a full scale onslaught in 1981. The following year the now Talbot entered team scored three wins two for Henri Toivonen one on snow and the other on gravel, while Frenchman Guy Fréquelin partnered by Jean Todt, since of Peugeot and Ferrari management and now president of the FIA.

In 1981 going into the final rally of the season the RAC Rally Guy and Jean led the World Rally Drivers Chanpionship and Talbot the manufacturers championship despite only managing to score one overall victory. For some reason Guy never got to grips with his second RAC Rally start and he retired while Ari Vatenen his only challenger finished second in a Ford Escort behind Hannu Mikkola in his Audi. After Henri Toivonen also retired the manufacturers championship was clinched for Talbot by Swedes Stig Blomqvist and Bjorn Cederberg in the #14 Swedish Dealer Team entered Talbot which carried the registration/license plated LAC999V.

However I can’t be sure that the car shown in the two photos above is the same car because all thought the car above carries the LAC999V plates it is painted in the factory Talbot Sunbeam Lotus colours which were not the same as the colours carried on Stig’s car in the 1981 RAC Rally.

Thanks for joining me on this “Championship Clincher” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at a Rolls Royce. Don’t forget to come back now !

Gettin' A Li'l Psycho On Tyres

Art Tidesco blogs on all things motoring