Tag Archives: Aston

Coffee, Croissant, Vintage & Classic – Avenue Drivers Club

The Avenue Drivers Club was formed in 2009 by a small group of enthusiasts of cars that will do at least 100 mph and the Avenue Café on Queen Square, Bristol. Every second Sunday of the month they meet at 9 am at Queen Square for coffee and a chat.

Being Bristol the 100 mph criteria is not strictly adhered to, as I found out yesterday when I was pleasantly surprised to find several interesting Vintage vehicles, like this 1925 Talbot 10/23, which would struggle to reach that 100 mph speed under their own steam.

Like wise The BSA Ten powered by a twin cylinder air cooled engine from 1925/26 would struggle to reach 100 mph and if it did the owner would not know about it as his speedometer fell out on the way over to the meeting.

Not too sure what the function of these accessory is it appears to shine red yellow or green lights forwards and rearwards and one was mounted either side of a 1933 Morris Cowley. If you know what purpose these lights were designed for please chime in below.

GALPOT regulars may remember this Austin 10 choking on a clothes peg from an earlier blog, turns out the full name for the car is Austin 10/24 Ripley Sport. This car is thought to have been first owned by the Debyshire County Constabulary in black.

Despite my many recent Tuesday MG blogs I have not yet been able to establish exactly what model MG this nifty little 1936 racer is, if you know please chime in below.

In the running for car of the day was this absolutely immaculate 1953/55 Bristol 403, the condition of this car really has to be seen in the flesh to be believed, I can imagine this car will still be turning heads in 60 years time.

Another vehicle falling into the sub 100 mph bracket was this 1962 Austin Gipsy a would be competitor to the otherwise ubiquitous Land Rover this one with a 110″ wheelbase. There was also an immaculate Series One Land Rover and an early ‘proper’ Range Rover in attendance.

Representing Triumph was a 2000, 2500PI a GT6 and this 1966/67 TR5PI which rather took my fancy.

At the more powerful end of the scale was this 1969/70 Aston Martin DBS, with an even more powerful Ferrari 365 GTB/4 parked up behind it.

Among many things I learned yesterday was the existence of Fisher cars, I mistook this for a Ginetta G4, it is actually a Fisher Fury powered by a 1 litre / 61 cui motorcycle motor.

Car of the day was without doubt this K1 Attack, another vehicle I had never heard of before which originates from Slovakia and is powered by a Honda Type R engine. Sundays blog will reveal more about this car. Only 4 are thought to exist in the UK and this is the only one with RHD.

At the end of the meeting which lasted a very short 3 hours David Roots, who told me about the Avenue Drivers Club a couple of weeks ago kindly gave me a highly entertaining ride home ‘aboard’ his unique Lenham ALFA Romeo.

My thanks to David and everyone else who brought out their pride and joy I simply did not have time to include in today’s blog, can’t wait for the next meeting on the second Sunday in May.

Thanks for joining me on this Coffee, Croissant, Vintage & Classic edition of ‘Gettin’ a li’l pscho on tyres, I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

12 04 12 Errata I originally had the cool white car down as a Attack K1, it’s actually a K1 Attack and it is not powered by a motor cycle engine but a Honda Type R, apologies to all concerned.

Parts Bin Special – Aston Martin Virage

Goodwood Revival #1 – Track Action

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After four all to brief hours sleep I woke up at 4:30 am on Friday and got togged up in swinging sixtyish accessorized fancy dress which included button collard shirt, period scarf, flat hat and a pair of round blue shades.

By 5.30 am I was headed back towards Lord Marches renowned Goodwood estate, this time to visit his private race track which I had not seen since in 1987. Back then I was visiting to take part in a track day, the circuit had not been used for racing since 1966 and the facilities were in a sad state of disrepair.

Five years after the runaway success of the inaugural 1993 Goodwood Festival of Speed, held on a special hill climb track round the main buildings of his estate, Lord March decided to revive events on his racing circuit with an event dedicated to vehicles that raced in the Circuits halcyon days from 1948 to 1966.

The Revival has become a huge fancy dress party covering possibly the most optimistic two decades the Western World has ever known. More on the fancy dress side of the Revival will follow with a special blog on Saturday. Like the Festival of Speed the Goodwood Revival has also become a runaway success both racing days this year were completely sold out. Seen here a Standard 6CWT Pickup, XK140 and a Mk2 Jaguar.

I got to the track in plenty of time to catch all the practice sesions which were held on the Friday, but I had not counted on spending well over an hour dribbling around the car park reserved for those spectators arriving in classic cars ! The first action I caught on track came courtesy of the touring cars, here Brian Redman in his Mercedes Benz 300SE leads another former Grand Prix driver and, in my humble opinion, one of the better former Top Gear presenters, Tiff Needell driving a Ford Anglia through Woodcote.

Organisers hoped to gather 15 Supermarine Spitfires at last weekends event here a Mk5, short wing 5 blade screw Mk 15 and two seater Mk9 fly past these awesome machines are powered by 24 litre / 1465 cui Rolls Royce Merlin motors.

Ford of Britain celebrated it’s centenary with a stupendous collection of passenger, military and commercial vehicles, none quite as breathtaking as the Ford 3 litre / 183 cui formula 1 DFV powered Ford P68 /F3L designed by Len Bailey and built by Alan Mann Racing. Jim Clark was to have driven this car on it’s debut at Brands Hatch but because of conflicting tyre contracts Jim ended up racing a Formula 2 car at Hockenheim with fatal consequences.

Surprise car of the meeting that I had never heard of before is the #23 Marina Special powered by Rolls Royce V8 driven by Mark Ashworth, turns out this car was built by Alan MacDonald at the Beagle Aircraft Hanger in Shoreham for Alan Mann who would later be responsible for the Ford P68. Rolls Royce were not in the least impressed with the Marina RR and the car appears to have been exiled in Belgium for fear that it might be impounded.

Ueber Formula One aerodynamicist Adrian Newey has an important day job at with reigning Formula One Champions Red Bull Racing, during this rare weekend off he teamed up to drive the #25 E-type Jagaur with 10 time Grand Prix winner Gerhard Berger. Some interesting tweaks to the boot lid helped the pair stick this car on pole over 2 seconds clear of the rest of the field for Saturdays Fordwater Trophy Race.

I had never seen or heard a screaming formula Junior car before Friday and their 1100 cc / 67 cui 4 cylinder motors scream enough to make your eyes water. The #9 Elfin Ford above of Bill Hemming was one of two Antipodean designed and built Formula Junior cars entered in the Chichester Cup.

Among the many features was a display of cars driven by the first five time world champion Juan Manuel Fangio. The #1 Maserati 250 F seen above was driven by Fangio to his last and perhaps the most masterful Grand Prix victory of all time at the Nurburging in 1957, after a botched pit stop Fangio made up over 50 seconds on two Ferrari’s over taking them on the penultimate lap and holding on to win by three seconds. Seen at the wheel of a 250F for the first time in his trade mark hat is Sir Jackie Stewart, who by his own admission also drove his finest race at the Nurburgring winning a wet and foggy 1968 German Grand Prix by four minutes despite driving round the torturous 14 mile track with a broken wrist !

Among many evocative vehicles of US origin at Goodwood was this 1953 Chrsyler Hemi powered Cunningham C4R replica roadster, initially designed to compete at Le Mans, driven by Ben Shuckburgh during practice for the in the Freddie March Memorial Race.

The Madgwick Cup for under 3 litre / 183 cui sports cars built between 1960 and 1966 featured this rare Elva Porsche Mk 7P driven by Helmut Ries. Most Elva’s entered for the Madgwick Cup were BMW powered.

The Richmond Trophy of the last front engined Grand Prix Cars had a fittingly international entry of vehicles, Hubert Fabri is seen here at the wheel of his Aston Martin DBR4.

The one and only Stig Blomquvist, 1984 World Rally Champion, mercifully no relation to the poor imitation on Top Gear, shared the 2 stroke #28 1963 Saab 96 Sport with Anders Jensen seen here at the wheel during the second touring car practice for the St Mary’s Trophy.

I made time to take a break from the on track action to catch fellow blogger artist Paul Chenard who came all the way from Nova Scotia to promote his latest publication the illustrated story of the 1934 Grand Prix season “Silver Clouds”. Apparently the Daimler Benz Museum were so impressed with this hand bound limited edition they have acquired two copies. Going fast, act now ! To avoid forthcoming seasonal disappointment you can contact Paul to order your copy on his blog here.

A number of incidents during the days qualifying sessions for the races held on Saturday and Sunday conspired to delay the proceedings by up to an hour. Gerhard Berger, sharing Grahame Bryant’s #1 AC Cobra entered in the Glover RAC TT Celebration race, left the course going into Woodcote,

the resultant damage precluded the vehicles participation in the rest of the weekends proceedings.

Fortunately Gerhard was not seriously injured and finished second sharing Adrian Newey’s E-type Jaguar in the Fordwater Trophy Race on the Saturday.

The 1.5 litre / 91.5 cui era of Formula One goes back to the heyday of British driver participation in Grand Prix racing when Graham Hill, Jim Clark and John Surtees took three consecutive World titles from 1962 to 1964 and Jim Clark won his second title in 1965. Above Kurt DelBene in the 1964 #29 BRP-BRM, Roy Walzer the 1964 #1 Brabham Climax BT11 and Paul Drayson in the 1962 #18 Lotus BRM during qualifying for the Glover Trophy. This era of cars were immortalised in the film Grand Prix, though many of the chassis used in the film are actually cheaper Formula Juniors.

For romantic dreamers like myself there is a sad tale to relate to the prototype E2A ‘VKV 752’ seen here being driven by Tony Dron. This was the second of two E type Jaguar prototypes featuring components including the independent rear suspension that would be carried over into the production ‘E-Type’ model.

E2A was driven at Le Mans by Hangsen & Gurney without success in 1960 and used by the Cunningham team in the USA with Sir Jack Brabham and Bruce McLaren amongst others at the wheel scoring a single minor victory against weak opposition. In 1961 Jaguar used E2A as a test mule back in England.

Roger Woodley Jaguar’s customer competition manager at the time was allowed to save E2A from the scrap heap on condition that the car would not be raced again. Sadly the first thing new owner Stefan Ziegler did after acquiring E2A for US$4,957,000 was turn E2A into a weapons grade racer and disregard Jaguars request that the car not be raced again.

Seems rather pointless when any number of weapons grade ‘D-types’ can be acquired for a fraction of the cost of E2A. More on the ‘to race or not to race E2A’ argument can be seen on this Nostalgia Forum thread.

After the qualifying sessions were over it was time to head back through the spectators Classic Car Park, I could have stayed longer but it was getting to the dark end of an already long day.

Thanks for joining me on this Goodwood Revival edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’, I will continue to bring you more stories from Goodwood all week, I hope you will join me again for the first anniversary edition of ‘Gettin a lil’ psycho on tyres’ tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

Who Said A Spider Couldn’t Fly ? – Aston Martin DB2/4 Mark II Touring Spider AM/300/1161

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The Aston Martin DB2/4 launched in 1953 was a 2+2 hatchback based on the Aston Martin DB2 dating back to 1950.

In 1953 David Brown the owner of the marque sent several bare chassis to a variety of Italian styling houses and coach builders and presented the finished cars at the great motor shows of the day where orders were taken for limited production runs.

The Mark II DB4/2 was launched in 1956 with a 140 hp 3 litre / 183 cui straight six motor. Three of these new chassis were sent to Carrozzeria Touring to have flamboyant Spider bodies designed by Signor Formenti fitted.

Formenti’s design was a clean break from what had gone before with exceptionally clean lines for the period with unusual twin air scoops on the bonnet

and further air scoops ahead of the rear wheels.

Sales of the vehicle did not materialise as expected after the first car, seen here at the recent Silverstone Classic, was displayed at the 1956 Turin Motor Show and the second car had appeared at the Paris Motor Show.

After it’s launch in Italy this particular vehicle was acquired by Associated Newspapers in London who ran a competition in the Daily Express in which the winner who could best sum up the drophead would take it home.

Mr Alexander Smith, entry “Who Said A Spider Couldn’t Fly ?” was adjudged the winner, and took the, then left hand drive, car home.

AM/300/1161 remained in England and was converted to right hand drive while the two remaining examples were sold to customers in the United States where they remain to this day.

Although the first collaboration between Aston Martin and Carrozzeria Touring was not an immediate success the two companies worked together on a long line of vehicles that included the DB4/2’s successors the DB4, DB5 and DB6.

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

Gold Cup Classic – Oulton Park

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Oulton Park circuit is one of Britain’s more difficult tracks, while attending racing school there I spun off on two separate occasions, located near Little Budworth in Cheshire.

The last time I was spectating at Oulton Park in Cheshire then future world champion Damon Hill was given a one off drive in the British Formula 3000 Championship race by Colin Bennett and future Oulton Park circuit owner Dr Jonathan Palmer had a one off drive in the Celebrity car that featured in the Honda CRX championship in 1989.

On Bank Holiday Monday I got to the track for the second day of the Gold Cup Classic meeting, just as qualifying got under way for the Sir Stirling Moss trophy race. Former FIA Historic Formula One Champion Bobby Verdon Roe, seen here driving a 1957 Aston Martin DBR1, going through a much altered Druids Corner on his way to qualifying on pole.

Oulton Park now has a tarmac Rally Stage and an interesting variety of vehicles were to be found trying to navigate the slippery conditions, including this Surprising Skoda Estelle, keeping spectators entertained with numerous 360 degree spins.

The Historic Formula Ford race for Ford Kent powered single seaters built from 1969 – 1972 was highly entertaining with Rob Wainright piping Ben Mitchell and Benn Simms in a three way last lap shoot out. Former Grand Prix driver Ian Ashley driving the #62 Lola T200 is seen here passing Stuart Baird in the #6 Merlyn MK11A for fifth prior to Ian’s early retirement.

I missed the Historic Touring Car race won by Mark Jones in favour of having lunch with friends from The Nostalgia Forum, afterwards the Derek Bell Trophy race for a mixture of open wheel cars was run. Richard Evans in a Formula Atlantic March 79B snatched a last lap victory from Michael Lyons Formula 5000 Lola T400. I did not realise it at the time I took the photograph above but this is a recreation of the Lotus Martin built to Formula One regulations in 1966.

Judy Lyons, Michael’s mother, driving the #33 Lola T332 above, gambled on rain returning during the race and opted for intermediate tyres, at the end of the race she showed no sign of disappointment that her strategy had failed or that she was not classified in the final results.

The small grid of Group 6 2 litre / 122 cui cars for the Martini Trophy race included this Martini liveried Chevron B31 belonging to Graeme and James Dodd which failed to finish.

Charlie Kemp did his best to make a race of it driving the 1970 vintage #10 Lola T210 but was eventually unable to keep up with John Burton who took the Martini spoils driving a Chevron B26.

The E Type challenge was probably the race of the day helped by tricky weather conditions, earning my personal vote for driver of the day was Jon Minshaw who worked through the field from the back of the grid to second place behind Martin O’Connell in a race filled with lurid ‘moments’.

John Ure and Patrick Blakeney-Edwards won the Woodcote Trophy driving a Cooper Bristol finishing ahead of the #57 Allard J2 seen here of Malcolm Verey and Dennis Welsh after Stephen Bond, who had rarely been more than a few car lengths behind the Cooper, lost up to a minute making his mandatory pit stop.

Benn Simms made up for his disappointment in the Formula Ford race by winning from the back of the grid in the Classic Formula 3 race driving the #1 March 803B seen here lining up
to pass the Keith White in the blue Ralt RT1.

Brian White and Keith Stantton drove their Triumph TR2 in both the Stirling Moss and Woodcote Trophy races, Brian is seen here exploring the outer limits of the track at Old Hall during Woodcote Trophy on his way to a 19th place finish.

Jon Minshaw teamed up with John Stretton to win the Woodcote Trophy in the #133 ‘Knobly’ Lister Jaguar above lapping the D-Type of Ben Eastick which finished 7th.

Final race of the day was the ‘Amitsead Barnet Financial Services’ Historic Formula Ford 2000 championship race for Pinto powered cars circa 1978 – 1981 which was won by Nelson Rowe. Nelson Duke, in the yellow helmet above driving a Reynard SF79 about to pass the Delta T79 of Robert Trusting, impressed the event race sponsor ‘Mallory Dan’ sufficiently with his drive from the back of the grid to 13th place to win the FF2000 driver of the day award.

In between races and watching the rally car demonstration there was a feast of classic cars on display including my personal nomination for car of the day this Piper GT

After a great day out all too soon it was time to say ‘until next time’ to Barry, Roger, David, Mallory Dan, Alan, Phil and Simon from the Nostalgia forum and head for home.

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

Bespoke Luxury Shopping Trolley – Aston Martin Cygnet

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A couple of weeks ago, returning from a trip to the Cotswold Motoring Museum, I was playing I spy with an auto knowledgeable Italian 13 year old as we drove through Cheltenham looking at the back of this car it was my turn to say I spy something beginning with C, we dispensed with the manufacturers initials after only a coupe of rounds.

C-Max he said pointing to the Ford in front of us, no I replied, he gave up quickly and I pointed to the back of this Aston Martin and said ‘Cygnet’.

No no he appealed Toyota iQ just like my Auntie in Milan. I pulled over at the next junction parked the car and we went to have a look.

To stay ahead in the automotive industry just like in motor sport one has to think laterally, so when the European Union announced regulations that car manufacturers had to reduce the average fuel consumption across their fleet average Aston Martin wasted little time in finding a partner making low emissions vehicles.

Settling on a partnership with Toyota to make a high end, at £30,000 that is the extremely exclusive high end, version of the Toyota iQ a vehicle that will cost as little as £10,000.

From the rear the two cars, apart from the badging and diffuser are identical, while the front gets the Aston Martin look with grills and trim that is without doubt not from the Toyota parts bin.

The interior is also bespoke Aston Martin customers choosing abundant stitched leather in a variety of two tone colour combinations.

Performance is quoted as 107 mph with the CVT (constant velocity transmission) automatic being 0.2 secs faster than the 6 speed manual in the 60 mph dash that takes 11.6 seconds.

Aston Martin hope to sell 4000 Cygnets, which went on sale in the UK earlier this year, annually.

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

To Roll And Not to Rock – Silverstone Classic

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Thanks to my friend Caroline lending me her Audi Convertible for one last time I managed to cram a substantial part of what was happening at the Silverstone Classic this weekend into just one 10 hour visit.

If you like discovering vehicles you never new existed the Silverstone Classic is just the place for you, amongst many vehicles I have never seen before are this streamlined Porsche ‘Diesel’ powered Allgaier agricultural vehicle.

Unfortunately my visit coincided with qualification sessions only, Roger Willis, seen here, shared this Mercury Cyclone with 1966 British Saloon Car Champion John Fitzpatrick making a welcome change to a field dominated by Mustangs, Galaxies and a couple of Jags all of varying 1960’s vintages.

The Vauxhall Ventora on which this cut down funny car is loosely based was a 4 door saloon / sedan by a General Motors owned marque.

This well known transporter reg JAH 1L was in use by Team Lotus from 1973 until the 1980’s is painted here in it’s original 1973 John Player Special colour scheme.

I was disappointed not to see the CGA Engineering March 761 out but this 1977 spec Formula 1 March 2 4 0 more than made up for it. Allegedly the car was built as a publicity stunt, it never raced but was used to good effect on hill climbing events.

Six wheel vehicles, and steam powered vehicles were very much in evidence at Silverstone, found the idea of having this Sentinel steam powered truck delivering tea quite amusing.

I believe the brave lads from the British Army had the tallest vehicle present, I believe this is a Foden 6×6 DROPS vehicle, the Foden marque has disappeared as has a significant contingent of the British Forces.

At the other end of the scale one of the smaller, electric kiddy Land Rover was the smallest , 4 wheel vehicles I saw was this 1959 Berkley.

Rain added a little authenticity to the late Group C practice session which was only about 20mins long, I could have stayed out all night listening to the mighty roar that eminates from the Sauber C11 of Bob Berridge by far the best sounding and looking Group C ever IMHO.

Car of the day for me was this 1953 Touring Aston DB2/4 I believe the RHD is a giveaway that this car was won by a Mr Smith who responded to a newspaper competition to sum up the cars design with a catch phrase.

Even if I had been camping I probably would have been too exhausted to catch the line up of tribute bands on the first night of the Silverstone Classic festival I guess all of my passion is focused on cars and very little of it on music.

PS It would appear NASCAR contractors who prefer to settle their differences in pit row rather than on track might want to take a leaf out of events that unfolded at the Silverstone Classic in the pit lane. See linked story by Tony ‘Giraffe’ Gallagher.

Thanks for joining me on another Classic edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ 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