Charles and John Cooper, Cooper Climax and Babe, late fifties…
I’m a big fan of the Getty Images archive, there are so many photographs there to inspire thousands of articles but Joisus the captions are usually pretty blardy useless. Good enough for the mum and dad recipients of the newspapers they were most often published in but lacking the detail anoraks demand!
This one is a case in point, it reads as follows: ‘Building Cooper Formula 2 racing cars for British racing. Charles Cooper (left) with a fitter at (sic) a Cooper Formula 2 car’, no date of course.
I’m not a Cooper expert but am keen to date the shot, identify the Cooper’s type and the name of the lissom young lass on the workshop wall!
Some hints: the Cooper has coil spring (when fitted) rather than transverse leaf front suspension. The Coventry Climax FPF engine is fitted with twin-SU rather than Weber carbs. The chassis is of no help to me in terms of distinctiveness, it’s the same ‘offensive to purists’ but ‘perfect in practice’ curvy Owen Maddock designed spaceframe which went into all Coopers of the period. Having said that an expert will see what I do not.
My guess, and its no more than that, is a 1958 Cooper T45 Climax. Mind you, that fuel tank is a biggie, matched by another on the other side- none fitted at the moment its more likely an F1 Cooper T51. Or maybe an F2 Cooper running in Gee Pee events as the T45 did with 2 litre FPF’s fitted in 1958.
But most importantly what is the name of blondie-locks, she really has the looks to lift the mood of even the snarliest mechanic on the coldest of Surbiton, winter mornings…
Credit…
PA Images
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