Who said Webbo and Sebbo can’t play nicely in the sandpit together?…
Cheesey Australian Grand Prix promotional shoot prior to the 2010 Albert Park weekend taken at St Kilda Beach close by.
Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel had a few territorial disputes along the way didn’t they?, it did get a bit nutty I spose but I’ve always liked a lack of team orders- or drivers obeying them anyway!
At Albert Park in 2010 the pair qualified their Red Bull RB6 Renault’s 1-2 with Seb in front, he failed to finish with brake problems whilst Mark gave Lewis Hamilton’s McLaren a tap up the bum late in the race ruining a podium for both.
Jenson Button’s McLaren MP4-25 Mercedes won from Robert Kubica, Renault R30 and Felipe Massa in a Ferrari F10.
I was travelling down Alexandra Avenue in the twee Melbourne suburb of South Yarra last summer and fell in line behind a Lotus Elite and Lotus Elise, it reminded me of a magic day a few years ago…
My mate David Mottram is a doyen of the Victorian MG and Lotus Clubs. He is a racer, restorer and fettler of renown of these and other marques. On occasion he invited me along to the MG Car Club Driver Training Days to help out, it was always fun to attempt to impart some knowledge, the only downside being scared shitless once or twice alongside people whose levels of bravery made Gilles Villeneuve look like a ‘Big Sheila’.
The best part of the day was always the final 45 minutes during which the instructors had the track to themselves. At the time I had a standard’ish Series 1 Elise, the original Rover K-Series powered jobbie. It didn’t have a lot of power but with a free-flowing exhaust, a smidge stiffer springs which the standard Koni’s could just control, some decent track tyres on original wheels and competition brake pads it was both a fun road and track car.
My frame of reference at the time was a Lola T342 Historic Formula Ford I raced for over a decade. My 911 Carrera 3.2, using the same Formula Ford prism was a horrible track car! The Elise’ standard gearset was the only circuit shortcoming really- second was too short and fifth ‘moonshot tall’ even at Phillip Island without a strong tailwind. The 111S gear cluster was the solution but I never quite got around to making that change.
Lotus Elite cutaway (James Allington)
(S Dalton)
Anyway, on this particular Sandown day David brought along his ex-Derek Jolly Lotus Elite Super 95. This buttercup yellow car will be familiar to many Australian enthusiasts of historic racing as David and Pat Mottram have contested a gazillion Regularity events in it across this great brown land of ours for the best part of 25 years. Whilst I had ridden in it on the road I’d never had a steer before.
I jumped out of the Elise after 15 laps or so and straight into the Elite, cars built forty years apart.
The thing which struck me like the proverbial bolt from the blue after only a couple of laps was the sibling similarity of these two wonderful, light, low powered, beautiful handling cars.
Chapman had nothing at all to do with the Elise of course, the design team were fiddling about with its key design elements 15 years or so after the great mans death of a heart attack in late 1982.
But the Lotus brand values transcended the founder, which is of course exactly as it should be. ‘Brand Essence’ is what we ‘arty-farty, limp wristed commo-poofter bastard’ branding practitioners call the intrinsic elements of a brand. One of my buddies used to refer to me in those glowing terms during my years as a Partner of one of Australia’s foremost branding consultancies.
Lotus Elise 111s cutaway (Lotus Cars)
Elise conceptual drawing or sketch (Lotus Cars)
The first thing which impressed about the Elise as I drove what became my own car down bumpy, rutty Church Street Richmond on the initial test drive was the ‘pitter-patter’ of the cars tyres as the wheels rode the bumps with the chassis absolutely stiff. It was like a honeymooners todger- rock solid.
You can feel what the wheels and tyres are doing as they are so beautifully controlled with a light aluminium chassis of amazing torsional stiffness by road car standards. Still, our Col did invent the modern aluminium monocoque, the 1962 Lotus 25 GP car was his first expression of the art.
These cars have relatively soft springs, the bushes are firm to give good control- the cars are noisy as a consequence of minimal sound deadening but the springs themselves are softish and have reasonable travel. Just like the Elite, the chassis of which, famously, was the worlds first fibreglass monocoque.
It was a bastard to make, but magnificent in conception and in use as long as you didn’t have an early, ‘problem-child’ car. Things improved when Bristol Aircraft took over construction of the chassis from Maximar, the original ‘trail blazers’ in interpretation and manufacture of Colin’s baby.
The Elite is also ‘drummy’, noisy just like its younger cousin, mind you I’d rather do the Melbourne to Sydney trip in the older of the two cars despite the lack of a tall fifth, cruisin’ down the highway gear.
Lotus Elite and 16 Climax FPF F2/F1 car at the London Motor Show in 1958
David Mottram aboard the family Elite 95 at Phillip Island (Mottram)
Your freckle is very close to the ground too, the Elise’ seat is a ‘form-fit’, no barge-arses should apply thing. To sit in it is the closest thing to the feel of a sports-racer on the road as is possible to experience. Use enough imagination and the view is pretty much what drivers of a Lola T70 Coupe had with the ultra low seating position, curved minimalist dash, exposed aluminium each side of you and guards not much higher than your nose. The seat isn’t sprung, its solidly mounted to the cars tub so all of the messages from the road are transmitted to your bum, fingers, wrists and toes- the sensory side of things, if that kinda stuff gives you your jollies, is amazing. Lotsa rubber bushings, who needs ‘em?
The Elite is more generous in the comfort department but only marginally so.
You sit up a little more and the seats whilst thinly padded are more comfy than the Elise. Even with a lap-sash road type belt you are retained nicely between the high transmission tunnel and the door with an array of Smiths instruments in front of you which is oh-so-period. My Elise was fitted with a six-point Willans harness which held me in the standard seat rather nicely for competition work, the Elite was not so endowed but the driving position is the same, a very comfortable one with long arms to the wheel and pedals nicely set for heel-‘n-toe operation
Steering of the Elise is delicious- in my experience there is nothing close to it on the road. Jumping from the Lola to the Elise was ‘same, same’- that’s not an indictment of one of 1975’s most competitive Formula Fords but an acclamation of Lotus design.
The weight of the steering, its feel, the wheel’s design, size, material and rim thickness, feedback and directness are superb in the way you can place the car on the road and the warning you get as the limits of adhesion are approached. The Elite rack is a Triumph item, the Elise’s was made by Titan Motorsport. Both have the same characteristics though in terms of the way the cars have steering of exceptional feel, delicacy and precision. The Elites wood-rimmed wheel is larger and thinner, the suspension, wire-wheels, tyre width and aspect ratio are period differences which mitigate against the same Elise level of precision but the Elite was a steering benchmark in the late fifties-early sixties period and a pleasure to guide around Sandowns fast corners. The Elite rolls about a bit, as you would expect, the Elise sits much flatter and ‘points’ or turns in much more nicely despite the lack of a rear roll bar- its mid-engined and 40 years younger after all.
That other marques/supplier donated the steering rack highlights another Lotus attribute down the decades. In part they are an assemblage of parts made by others. It doesn’t impact in a negative way in use. Mind you if you are in the market for an alternative to a 911, the bragging rights of an Evora powered by a Toyota V6 are not quite on a par with a Porsche despite the utility of the Japanese motor.
The Elite’s Coventry Climax FWE engine was revolutionary in its day, the 1216cc SOHC, 2 valve all aluminium road version of the very successful FWA race engine was quite something in the context of the wheezy, mainly push-rod engines of the competition. Sensitive, regular maintenance was important. In Super 95 spec, the twin-Weber fed engine produces over 100bhp and punches the car along nicely but the lap times are achieved by the cars brakes, entry speed, neutrality with limited power thru the corners and fine aerodynamics rather than outright mumbo.
It’s a ‘momentum car ‘ just like the Elise and lower powered single-seaters. Whilst the performance variants of the Elise/Exige are a different kettle of fish, the original all alloy DOHC, 4 valve, fuel injected 1796cc 118bhp Elise was all about economy of power, weight (circa 725Kg) and delivery. They are subtle delicate things which respond well to inputs of a similar type, they are not tools for the ham-fisted. So too was the Elite, its competition record belied its specifications.
The Elite’s ZF gearbox is a much nicer snickety-snick thing to use than the Elise’s. The linkages of the modern car are sub-optimal but familiarity and ‘light hands and wrists’ as Frank Gardner put it, soon has you slicing thru the gears ok. Both cars have superb brakes too- unassisted discs all round, inboard on the rear of the Elite, all outboard on the Elise with the latter rotors in aluminium to help keep unsprung weight down.
‘Uncle Dave’ was soon waving at me from the pitlane, I pretended it was encouragement for a couple of more laps but his intent soon became clear when he waved an empty fuel drum at me.
I buzzed for hours afterwards, it was a magic, fun day- the Elite was a vastly better car to drive than I had imagined. On the suburban grind back to Camberwell I reflected on just ‘how right’ Chapman would have thought Julian Thomson and his design and engineering team got the Elise. Chapman bottled the essence of Lotus- his designers have since periodically dispensed it in a manner in which he would be proud…
Pat Mottram and Elite at Wakefield Park, Goulburn (Mottram)
Etcetera: Clark/Whitmore Elite at Le Mans in 1959…
How youthful does white-shirted Jim Clark look?
The pair were tenth outright and second in class behind the Peter Lumsden/Peter Riley Elite, the Roy Salvadori/Carroll Shelby Aston Martin DBR1 were victorious.
Photo Credits…
M Bisset, Mottram Family and Stephen Dalton Collections, Getty Images-Klemantaski
Touring Car and Sportscar tustle at Longford in 1965…
Don Gorringe, John Goss, Bob Curran and Greg Ellis blast over the River Esk- they have just completed the fast left-hander onto Long Bridge.
These blokes are all Tasmanian’s- I think it’s probably one of the locals only races, Gossy learned his trade pretty well down south- the only fella to win the Australian GP and Bathurst 1000 race double of course.
Goss is in an Appendix J Holden FJ, in front Gorringe is aboard a Jaguar XK150- which is clearly the successful businessman’s ‘daily driver’ given the rego plate affixed to the front bumper. Bob Curran’s Triumph TR4 was a machine he raced through to 1970 at least and the last car is Ellis’ MGA, it too appears as though he raced it for quite a bit.
Do any of these cars still exist? Who won the race?
Love this David Keep photo, it’s very much a ‘feel the noise’ shot…
John Surtees, the reigning World F1 Champ, aboard his Cooper T75 BRM P80 during the ‘London Trophy’ weeekend at Crystal Palace in June 1965…
He was a busy boy that year, fitting in F2 races around his primary programs for Ferrari in F1 and Endurance events.
Ken Tyrrell entered two Coopers that weekend, the other for Jackie Stewart, above, very much on his career ascent- he scored his first GP win with BRM that season at Monza in September aboard a P261 after a great dice with his teammate Graham Hill.
Surtees, Cooper T75 BRM
The London Trophy comprised two heats of 25 laps, the top four in each race were the same, Jim Clark, Lotus 35 Cosworth SCA, Graham Hill, Brabham BT16 BRM, Richard Attwood, Lola T60 SCA and Jochen Rindt, Brabham BT16 SCA.
(Getty)
The off, Heat 1.
Stewart at left and Clark right, Brabham on the inside of row 2.
Clark won both heats, the Tyrrell Coopers had problems in this heat which were fatal for their chances of a start in the second race- Stewart had half-shaft failure after completing 16 laps and a rod let go in the BRM engine after 21 of the 25 laps in Surtees case.
There was plenty of depth on the grid, other starters included Mike Spence, Trevor Taylor, Chris Amon, Denny Hulme, Jack Brabham and Peter Revson with the DNQ list including Jo Siffert, David Hobbs and Chris Irwin.
Credits…
Getty Images
Tailpiece: Jim Clark, Lotus 35…
Jim Clark aboard his Lotus 35 SCA, final chat to his mechanic who has a tyre pressure gauge at the ready. I’m not sure this is Crystal Palace, if it is, the car behind is Bill Bradley’s Brabham BT10 SCA.
An impressionist’s perspective of the Ferrari 126C4 or thereabouts.
I cropped it off an AGIP ad of the period, I rather like it…
These turbo-charged Ferraris were an evocative series of Gee Pee cars for those of us in Australia who saw our first F1 machines ‘in the metal’ in the early Adelaide years.
Dangerous cars, high powered, towards 900 bhp depending upon the specs, aluminium monocoque chassis early on and then carbon fibre from the 1982 Harvey Postlethwaite designed 126C2.
Alboreto off to the shops in Turin- 126C4 in 1984 (unattributed)
Carbon fibre and kevlar monocoque chassis, disc brakes all round, rack and pinion steering. Pull rod and twin wishbone suspension front and rear. 1496 cc DOHC, 4-valve, twin-turbo charged 120 degree V6- 660bhp @ 11000 rpm. 5 speed manual transaxle (unattributed)
Gilles Villeneuve died in one at Zolder in 1982 and Didier Pironi had a huge career ending shunt at Hockenheim six races later.
Some talented fellas raced the cars to ten wins from 1981 through 1984- the roster included Villeneuve, Pironi, Andretti, Tambay, Arnoux and Alboreto. All won at least one race except Mario who had only two starts- at Monza and Las Vegas in late 1983.
(Getty)
Patrick Tambay 126C3 montage from 1983, above, and Michele Alboreto in a C4 at Monaco in 1984 below.
Tambay took two 126 wins at Hockenheim and San Marino in 1982 and 1983 respectively, whilst Michele won at Zolder in 1984.
Credits…
AGIP, Getty Images, Paul-Henri Cahier, LAT Images
Tailpiece: Ferrari 126C4, Monaco June 1984…
Arnoux and Alboreto were third and sixth at Monaco in 1984, Alain Prost won the race in a McLaren MP4 TAG- Porsche from Ayrton Senna’s rapidly closing Toleman Hart.
Only the early red flagging of the race- because of the awful wet conditions prevented the precociously talented Brazilian taking his first F1 victory.
Prost, McLaren MP4-2 TAG Porsche from Mansell, Lotus 95T Renault early in the race- Mansell lost it on lap 16- and we saw it all from the in-car footage. Monaco in the wet with 800 bhp or thereabouts to tame (unattributed)
Factory Porsche 956 driver Jacky Ickx was the Clerk of The Course, he took the decision to red flag the race in favour of the TAG-Porsche engined McLaren, at a time the rain had eased somewhat- without recourse to the race stewards.
Mind you, it’s said that Senna’s car had damaged suspension and would not have lasted too many more laps- and then there is Stefan Bellof, Tyrrell Ford mounted who was catching them both hand over fist, he too was disqualified later for weight restrictions broken by Tyrrell…
(unattributed)
Senna, Toleman T184 Hart 415T and Bellof, Tyrrell Ford DFY with Ayrton pulling away, but Stefan surged back to third later in the race- and was threatening Senna and Prost.
Speed, drama, excitement, politics- all the elements that make GP racing great.
Ron Tauranac’s two Brabham BT5 Lotus-Ford twin-cams’s were built in 1963…
The Ian Walker Racing ‘SC-1-63′ achieved plenty of success in the hands of both Frank Gardner and Paul Hawkins.
The car used a typical Tauranac multi-tubular spaceframe chassis with upper and lower wishbones at the front and lower links, inverted top wishbone and two radius rods- coil spring/shocks front and rear. Rack and pionion steering, disc brakes all around, a Hewland 4-speed gearbox and a Cosworth tuned Lotus-Ford Twin-Cam of 1596cc giving circa 140 bhp completed the package.
The photograph below is a BT5 test session at Goodwood early in 1963 with the Aussies out in force, oh, and a Kiwi.
From left in the nice, warm ‘jumper’ is Paul Hawkins, lanky Frank Gardner, the Guvnor and Denny Hulme. All rather handy at the wheel of a motorcar- and on the end of a ‘spanner’.
Mark Webbers Porsche 919 looking somewhat alien-like during the June 2014 running of the Le Mans 24 Hour classic…
He shared the car with Timo Bernhard and Brendon Hartley, the trio led the race a couple of times, as late as during the twenty-first hour but a broken roll bar forced them into the pits at that point and the car was retired.
Ultimately the Andre Lotterer/Marcel Fassler/Benoit Treluyer Audi R18 e-tron 4 litre turbo-diesel V6 won from the similar car of Tom Kristenson/Marc Gene/Lucas di Grassi with the Toyota TS040 Hybrid 3.7 litre V8- its crew Anthony Davidson/Sebastien Buemi/Nicolas Lapierre, third.
The best placed Porker was in eleventh- Marc Lieb/Romain Dumas/Neel Jani aboard the 2 litre turbo-V4 919 Hybrid. Webber and Co completed 346 laps but were non-classified, the winners did 379.
Most of you will recall Mark Webber left Formula 1 for Endurance Racing at the end of 2013 doing three seasons with Porsche before his retirement at the end of 2016.
He won the World Endurance Drivers Championship together with Hartley and Bernhard in 2015, the trio took eight wins over the three years they raced together helping Porsche win the Manufacturers Championship In 2015 and 2016.
Getty Images is an orgy of photography, regular readers will be well aware of the value of the resource to me, do have a look- key ‘Le Mans’ into the search engine and the 62,351 images which pop up will keep you busy for a while.
This piece is visual, with a focus on the more creative of Getty’s Mark Webber 2014 ‘Lee Manz’, as Larry Perkins calls it, shots. More on the Porsche 919; https://primotipo.com/2016/02/10/testing-testing/
My posts may be a bit hap-hazard over the next three weeks, I am on safari in England and Italy for a bit.
Ralph Morris about to leave the line in his 1937 Riley Sprite, Bacchus Marsh, Victoria 19 September 1937. He won the half-mile sprint with a time of 22 4/5 seconds…
The event is being conducted on the road between Bacchus Marsh and Gisborne. Bacchus Marsh is 60 Km to Melbourne’s west on the Western Highway- the road to Adelaide and beyond.
The TT Sprites were a series of cars built to take part in the Tourist Trophy races run in the UK in the mid thirties, it is thought that as many as 10-12 were built, with a variety of engines- 12/4, 15/6 and at least one with a six-cylinder engine.
The chassis was either the 22T or 44T. The 12/4 engine was an undersquare 1496 cc 4 cylinder unit fed by two SU carbs and gave 61 bhp @ 5500 rpm. A 4 speed pre-selector gearbox was used and semi-elliptic solid axle suspension front and rear. Top speed was quoted as 88 mph.
The Melbourne ‘Argus’ announced the arrival of the first Sprite in Australia in its 4 May 1937 issue, has to be this chassis surely?
Rileys were popular light sporting cars in Australia, the ‘lineup’ from front to rear above are ’37 Kestrel, probably a ’34 Sedan and a 1931/2 Australian bodied Riley 9 Coupe.
The photo below is of the same group of cars- the car in the centre is the Kestrel owned by Club President Norman Horton who is doubtless at the wheel, he was second with a time of 26 3/5 seconds. Ralph Morris is standing next to the car. To the far left is the front of the Imp and to the right the Riley 9.
(G Morris)
Click on this link for an excellent website on Rileys in Australia, it is amazing just how many of these light, sporting and robust cars came to Oz.
It has the feel of final practice/qualifying about it doesn’t it? The wing in the foreground is either Jacky Ickx’ winning Ferrari 312 or Chris Amon’s sister car.
Graham Hill stands patiently at left whilst the mechanics make adjustments to his car with Lotus boss Colin Chapman leaving the boys to it, resting against the pit counter.
At far left, obscured, Jack Brabham is being tended to in his Brabham BT26 Repco 860 V8. Jochen Rindt popped his BT26 on pole proving the car had heaps of speed if not reliability from its new 32-valve, DOHC V8. The speedy Austrian took two poles with it that year.
The dude in the blue helmet is Jackie Oliver who is about to have the mother and father of high speed accidents when wing support failure saw him pinging his way through the French countryside, clobbering a set of chateau gates and dispensing aluminium shrapnel liberally about the place at around 125 mph. He survived intact – shaken but not stirred you might say. It wasn’t the last of his career ‘big ones’ either. Click here; https://primotipo.com/2017/01/13/ollies-trolley/
In the distance is Goodyear blue and white striped, jacket wearing Tyler Alexander so there must be a couple of McLaren M7As down that way.
Ickx won a tragic wet race in which French racer Jo Schlesser died on lap two when he lost control of the unsorted Honda RA302 in the fast swoops past the pits, burned alive in the upturned car, it was a grisly death. Ickx’ first GP win, no doubt was memorable for the Belgian for all of the wrong reasons. He won from John Surtees, below, in the conventional Honda RA301 V12 and Jackie Stewart’s Matra MS10 Ford.
Surtees did not have a great Honda season retiring in eight of the twelve GPs, his second place at Rouen and third at Watkins Glen were the two high points of the season.
Honda withdrew from GP racing at the end of the year “to concentrate their energies on developing on new road cars (S360, T360 and S500), having cemented the Honda name in the motorsport hall of fame.” A racing company to its core, its interesting how Honda still use racing past and present to differentiate themselves from other lesser marques: https://www.honda.co.uk/cars/world-of-honda/past/racing.html
The offer of a works car (Honda RA302 #in your home Grand Prix, however badly your vastly experienced team leader felt about the radical magnesium chassis, 3-litre (88mm x 61.4 mm bore/stroke, four-valves per cylinder -torsion bar sprung – 2987cc) 120-degree air-cooled V8 machine would have been too much to resist?
The new car bristled with innovation, including the mounting of the engine, which was in part located via a top-boom extension of the monocoque aft of the rear bulkhead. This approach was adopted by the Mauro Forghieri led team which designed the Ferrari ‘Boxer’ 312B in 1969, one of the most successful 1970 F1 machines.
And so it was that poor, forty years old, Jo Schlesser died having a red hot go after completing only 12km of the race.
Denis Jenkinson looks on, above, as Schlesser prepares for the off during practice, the look on the great journalists face says everything about his interest in this new technical direction. The car behind is Richard Atwood’s seventh placed BRM P126 V12.
Douglas Armstrong wrote of the Honda RA302 as follows in his review of the 1968 Grand Prix season published in Automobile Year 16. “Although it was ill-fated the car was immediately recognised as a new and formidable approach to Formula-1 racing.”
“Taking a leaf from the Porsche air-cooling technique, Honda had mounted a large oil-tank behind the right of the driver, and this was meant to dissipate much of the engine heat. On each cockpit side was a light-alloy scoop to convey air to the engine, and the sparking plugs were also duct enclosed for cooling. To the left of the drivers head another scoop took cooling air into the crankcase where it became involved with oil mist and was then drawn out by a de-aerator which retained the oil but expelled the air from a vent on top of the magnesium backbone.”
(MotorSport)(unattributed)
A magnesium monocoque chassis supported the unstressed, fuel injected V8 which is variously quoted at between 380-430bhp at this early stage of its development, I am more at the conservative end of that range.
Inboard rocker front suspension and outboard at the rear, note the ‘boxed’ inboard lower inverted wishbones, single top link and two radius rods. As Doug Nye noted, “The suspension was the only conventional part of this wholly Japanese designed and built new comer.”
All the attention to weight saving and compactness – the Lotus 49 Ford DFV would have been very much top-of-mind in Japan – resulted in a car “reportedly weighing close to the minimum requirement of 1102lb.”
Politics and priorities…
John Surtees tested another RA302 (chassis #F-802 remains part of the Honda Collection) during the Italian GP weekend at Monza in September but declined to race the car, that chassis still exists. Instead Il Grande John put his RA301 V12 on pole!
Lola’s Derrick White developed an evolution of the ’67 Honda RA300 for 1968, the lighter, but still 649kg, RA301 was blessed with a 430bhp Honda V12. Let’s not forget these Hondolas spun out of, or off Lola’s very successful 1966 T90 ‘Indycar’.
A careful review of the year reveals a better performing car than the results suggest. Surtees was second at Rouen, third at Watkins Glen and fifth in the British GP at Brands Hatch despite a broken rear wing. Elsewhere, he ran well in Spain and at Monaco until the gearbox failed, then led at Spa and set fastest lap before a rear wishbone mount broke. At Zandvoort he was delayed by wet ignition, then alternator trouble ended his run. In a notable wet season, he was impacted by wet ignition and then overheating caused by a long delay before the start. Surttes started from pole at Monza, then led, and crashed…He was up-there in Canada until gearbox failure , then led after the start in Mexico before falling back and retiring with overheating.
Surtees, RA301, Spa June 1968 DNF (MotorSport)Honda RA301 cutaway (unattributed)Business end of Surtees Hondola RA301 in Spain 1968. 3-litre quad-cam, central power take-off V12 (MotorSport)
MotorSport wrote that the the ill-fated debut of the Honda RA302 took place against a background of strong opposition from Surtees. He had been expecting an improved V12 for the RA301 – a lighter 490bhp V12 with conventional power take-off at the rear of the engine – and was therefore surprised when the all-new RA302 was delivered to Honda’s UK base at Slough. Its 120-degree air-cooled V8 was a mobile test bed to showcase the technology Soichiro Honda was to use in his new road cars; remember the sensational air-cooled Honda 7 and 9 Coupes of the early 1970s for example?
“I tried it at Silverstone,” recalls Surtees. “You’d drive out of the pits and it would feel quite sharp, but it was impossible to drive any distance with it performing as it should. Mr Nakamura told Japan we could not take this to a race.”
During that Silverstone test, the car ran for only two laps before the oil blew out, even after modifications it still wouldn’t go far because the engine overheated rapidly. John refused to race it – not unreasonably given the pace of the RA301 – before further tests could proved its speed and endurance. In addition Surtees suggested they build an aluminium version to replace the flammable magnesium chassis machine.
Jo Schlesser during practice, Rouen 1968 (MotorSport)RA302 far forward driving position and distribution of weight, contrary to the trend of most teams then. Small oil radiator, steering rack, front bulkhead and rocker/wishbone front suspension clear (unattributed)With the cooling duct removed, look closely at lower left and you can see the cooling fins on the block. Fuel metering unit actuated by the inlet camshaft (unattributed)
When Honda arrived at the French GP in 1968, the French arm of Honda urged the team to race the new RA302 to promote its small but growing range of cars. Soichiro Honda was in France on a trade mission that week and, doubtless influenced by his local representatives, he decided to enter the RA302 under the Honda France banner, with Schlesser as the driver.
Surtees, and even team boss Nakamura, didn’t know of the plan until 7.30am on the Thursday, the first day of practice. “It was not run by the existing Honda team,” says John, “but people who’d previously worked with us were brought over from Japan. They worked as a totally separate unit” to the guys looking after Surtees V12 engined RA301.
Surtees shed no light as to the cause of Schlesser’s crash, but acknowledges the circuit is tricky at the site of the accident, describing it as “the sort of place on the circuit where you were fully occupied”.
It is thought a misfire or complete engine cut-out caused Schlesser to lose control. Honda acquired film showing him getting into a ‘tank-slapper’ before going off – but there were never any official conclusions. Engine designer and future Honda boss Nobuhiko Kawamoto was in Japan that weekend. “I thought the cause may have been a transmission seizure,” he says. “After three months, the residuals came back, small amounts of steel parts, the engine and transmission, but we found it was really clean. The cause was not revealed.”
Surtees in the Monza pitlane in September 1968, RA302. Note the additional oil cooler mounted atop the chassis boom not present at Rouen (unattributed)Rouen. Aren’t the spring/shock units mounted high on the uprights and relatively horizontally (unattributed)David Hobbs aboard the other Honda RA301 at Monza in 1968 (MotorSport)
Surtees would briefly drive a second RA302 in practice at Monza, but by then it was academic.
With Soichiro Honda present, Surtees refused to race it and the popular 40 year old, very experienced single seater and sportscar driver, was appointed to drive the new car. Unfortunately, Surtees’ doubts were proven true, when Schlesser lost control of the car in the downhill sweepers and crashed. The car overturned and caught fire. The full fuel tank and magnesium chassis burned so intensely that nothing could be done to save Schlesser. He became the fourth F1 driver to die that season (after Jim Clark, Mike Spence and Lodovico Scarfiotti).
“The episode of that car and the accident brought Honda’s whole Formula One programme to an end,” says John. “The fact that it didn’t work meant there weren’t the resources to go back to what we were originally going to do.”
Rouen paddock. Engine cover all-enveloping with all ducts in place. Ex -Ferrari team manager by then journalist, Franco Lini is the focus of Goodyear man and AN Other at left, is that Rolf Stommelen in the driving suit and glasses in the group at the right? (MotorSport)Monza. Good shot of the monocoque structure and top mount of the engine. Fuel metering unit at the front of the inlet cam, distributor at the rear. Note two coils and electronic spark-units at the rear of the top monocoque boom (unattributed)
“When you add up how far we progressed (in 1968) on a very limited budget we didn’t do too badly. If you add up how competitive we were and of we hadn’t had the silly problems, we could have been champions that year,” Surtees said to David Tremayne.
“Derrick White had drawn up a good chassis and Nobohiko Kawamoto had promised us a new lightweight 490bhp V12engine and gearbox for 1969.” The increasing focus on emissions and the road cars obliged Honda to cut their budget, and the F1 project was cancelled.
Surtees, “I understood why of course, but I really believe that Honda’s later situation in Formula 1 could have come sooner. The 301 was the right car, and with the new engine and gearbox it would have been shorter and much lighter…Instead it was a case of what might have been…”
Tremayne wrote, “Many years later when Honda were winning championships with Williams, Honda Motor Company boss Tadashi Kume – who had been a senior engineer on the RA301 in 1968 – sent Surtees a telegram which said in part, “None of this would have been possible without your investment.”
Credits…
Getty Images, oldracingcars.com, ‘History of The Grand Prix Car 1966-85’ Doug Nye, MotorSport, David Tremayne ‘Honda’s First F1 Chapter’ in hondanews.eu
Nice bit of promotional artwork, I wonder what car is being characterised though?…
The image is a crop from a London Midland & Scottish Railway poster to promote the Crystal Palace 21 May 1938 meeting. The Sydenham Trophy, the car feature event of the day, was won by the John HT Smith, MG at an average speed of 52 mph.
It seems possible the inspiration is the Alfa Romeo 308C, although the bodywork is not an exact fit, mind you maybe its a stylised Mercedes W125 or an Alfa 8C-35 or perhaps something else?
(forix.com)
The image above is of Manfred Von Brauchitsch taking some air on the Melbourne Rise during the October 2 1937 Donington Grand Prix weekend.
Bernd Rosemeyer won in an Auto Union B Type from the Mercedes W125’s of Von Brauchitsch and Rudy Caracciola, perhaps the artist, a ‘Mr Light’ attended the weekend with his art an impressionist interpretation of the car, but in red?
(Getty)
Mechanics attend to one of the W125’s in an unidentified paddock. Click here for an article about this great car;
Four of these Colombo engineered cars, with independent front suspension and 2991 cc versions of Vittorio Jano’s long-lived straight-8 were built and first raced by Tazio Nuvolari at Pau in 1938. A leaking fuel saddle-tank caused the accident which was the catalyst for the great Mantuan to leave Alfa.
(unattributed)
Raymond Sommer, above Alfa Romeo 308C during the July 1939 French Grand Prix.
Sommer and Chinetti in two of the machines were fifth and eighth. The race was won by Herman Muller from George Meier, both aboard 3 litre V12 Auto Union Type D’s- third was a Talbot MD 4.5 litre straight-6, the driver Rene Le Begue.
It is possible Mr Light used these cars as inspiration but the two vents either side of the radiator aperture are missing.
(unattributed)
Qsqui Jarillo advises ‘The photo was taken in Buenos Aires city in 1949 and is probably the car being moved in front of the Automobile Club of Argentina building. In the background is the ‘Bosque de Palermo’ park, the place where pre-F1 age Grand Prix cars were raced.’
‘The car is the 1938 Alfa Romeo 308 Tipo C, chassis number 50017, engine 80017 and raced by local driver Oscar Galvez, now displayed in the Fangio Museum.’
Etcetera: 1938 Sydenham Trophy…
Credit…
Light, Fox Photos, forix.com, ‘Alfa Romeo’ in kolumbus.f1
Tailpiece: Alfa Romeo 8C-35 perhaps?…
Light’s car could be I guess, the Alfa 8C-35- the donor chassis for the four Alfa 308C’s were ‘old 8C-35/12-C36 tubular chassis used with only minor updates’.
The car above is the Hans Ruesch Alfa Romeo 8C-35 cruising through the Brooklands paddock past the Clubhouse and about to be tested by wealthy Australian John Snow in 1938.
John Medley in ‘John Snow: Classic Motor Racer’ wrote that after the Brooklands test Snow hired the car for meetings at Crystal Palace, Donington, Brooklands and Cork. Unfortunately the car, with Buddy Featherstonhaugh at the wheel crashed badly during practice at Donington and was then sent back to the factory for repair.
In a sidebar of Australian motor racing history Snow brought another of Ruesch’s cars to Australia, the Alfa P3/2900 Tipo B #5002 which he sold to his friend Jack Saywell.
It’s possible Mr Light saw the 3822 cc car in the UK and liked it so much he used it as a base for his poster? The 8C-35 was Alfa’s post Tipo B response to the Silver Arrows onslaught.
(unattributed)
Hans Ruesch in his Alfa Romeo 8C-35 during the 1937 Monaco Grand Prix.
He was seventh, five laps adrift of the three W125’s at the head of the field raced by Von Brauchitsch, Caracciola and Christian Kautz. Three of the four 8C-35’s contested the event and finished line astern from sixth to eighth places- Giuseppe Farina, Sommer and Ruesch, ‘best of the rest’ behind five German cars…
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