primotipo…

‘There is no point rueing the good ole days!, you just sound like a silly old tugger!’ my youngest son observed of his father with all the respect typical of the ‘friggin millennials…

He is right of course. Every era of motor racing is interesting, the challenge is to keep up. But I must say, as a humanities graduate, the physics of kinetic recovery systems and the like is simply beyond the conceptual capacity of my noggin. No way can I write about it as I simply don’t geddit.

During the same research session that i was reading about McLaren’s use of 3D-Printing (announced April 2017) to more quickly design and deploy components on their cars- hydraulic line bracket, rear wing flap, radio harness boot and carbon fibre brake ducts to be specific, i also found some photos of those designer/builders Messrs Brabham, Gurney and Surtees.

I smiled to myself at the thought of those inveterate fettlers, fiddlers and finessers of racing cars and the manner and pace at which they would have used the tools of today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Its Dan Gurney bearing down on Jack who is just pulling his Brabham BT24 Repco up in the 1967 Monza pitlane having tried the ‘cockpit streamliner’ he and Ron Tauranac concocted to squeeze a few more top speed revs out of the reliable- but not as powerful as the new-fangled Ford Cosworth DFV V8 in the hands of Clark and Hill, Repco SOHC ‘740 Series’ V8.

Dan is anxious to know the response of his mate and former employer, his own F1 experiment is about halfway through its life at this point. The Gurney-Weslake V12 engined variant of Len Terry’s Eagle Mk1 design (#10 in the pitlane- the car behind Dan’s is the Eagle raced by Ludovico Scarfiotti) made its debut at this very race meeting twelve months before.

‘Black Jack’- he of the permanent 5 o’clock shadow, would have driven Tauranac bonkers with the 3D technology and his ideas- imagine what Colin Chapman, always a man of the future and of overnight tweaks would have done with it!

Meanwhile at Warwick Farm John Surtees is looking for a way to get a few tenths out of his Surtees TS8 Chevy F5000 car during practice for the 1971 Australian Grand Prix at Warwick Farm.

One of the reasons Alan Jones left Surtees was just how painful ‘Big John’ was with car adjustments he ‘knew would not make the car quicker’ observed Jones of Surtees attitude on Jones requested TS19 chassis changes- despite Surtees ‘pottering around 2 seconds off the pace’ whilst forming his views.

The beauty of the 3D production process is the cost-effective manner in which (some) ideas can be tried, something all three of the impecunious owner/engineer/drivers mentioned would have approved.

There is no reason why engineer/drivers are not in F1 now, either in a formally qualified manner or via the ‘school of hard knocks’ but so far no-one has challenged an article i wrote a while back which anointed Larry Perkins as the last of the engineer/mechanic/racers at F1 level?

The truth is that we misty-eyed enthusiasts do look back with fondness at the racing we savoured to watch or contest in our youth, whereas the pro-elite level fellas never cast a glance to the rear but only forward to find the next means to win…

Credits…

salracing.com, oldracingcars.com, Bernard Cahier, thisisf1racing.com, McLaren

Tailpiece: McLaren MPL32 Honda, 2017 Singapore GP…

Finito…