Timeteam is an archaeology based UK TV series, each programme lasting around 1 hr inc adverts, that’s been broadcast and repeated ad nauseum in the UK since 1994 with pretty good audience figures.

The early series were interesting given the variety of the sites concerned and I’m sure I’m not the only person who remembers the programme that featured the WWII Spitfire ( & it’s unfortunate pilot on, I believe, his first sortie) that they exhumed in Normandy and were subsequently able to assure his step brother some 50 years later that the hero he had mourned ever since had almost certainly been dead long before the impact.

Over the last 5 years or so however , the programme has become increasingly stale. It seems to visit similar places each week looking for the same thing as before then uses fancy graphics to show how things might have been, with no real evidence. More to point, these graphics just show people living mundane lives rather than doing anything exceptional.

This drives me mad since my wife loves the programme, but I see no differentiation week on week hence refer to it as the Pot’n tile programme.

In a bid to refresh Timeteam, I’d like to propose that we in TNF choose a motorsport archaeology site and ask that they investigate it. Given that both the petrol engine and the camera have both been around for much the same time, there’d hopefully be no need for fancy graphics just real evidence !!

Given it’s subsequent history as a US airforce base during WWII and beyond and assuming Col Gadhaffi ( an interesting character in his own right ! ) agrees I’d go for tracing the Mellaha circuit in Tripoli and comparing it to what exists there now ( which looking at google earth looks a bit packed ) and what has driven the changes since 1939.

So has anyone else got any suggestions ? Remember it’s got to fill an hour and be interesting to the general public.

Well, digging up old Bugattis from lakes seems to attract a decent amount of attention these days...

Might try for diggin up lost race cars..! Or drivers...

"Thunderbolt has been located in a rubbish tip, a long way down, but the museum in New Zealand is supposed to have the two Rolls-Royce R types that were with it, still on display, though they are only empty cases."

From a thread about Land Speed Record cars. Excavating this would be a great project for a TV program!

Time Team is just a show with no real credibility amongst archaeologists. Having resided in Scole for nearly 50 years I have seen several digs for Roman remains, each one lasted over a year and involved painstaking scraping with tiny trowels whilst looking for the tiniest artefact. For some unknown reason Time Team set themselves a limit of few days to do the dig and rush to get it finished.

Surely if Thunderbolt is exhumed from the tip it has to be properly; no matter how long it takes.

I agree that proper archaeology requires painstaking progress because they are seeking full information on a site. I do wonder whether the Time Team deadline and the rush is genuine or a series of jump cuts "to make good television". This quick approach can only be acceptable on sites of minor interest where in the greater scheme of things it doesn't really matter what archaeological artefacts they destroy along the way. In that context, excavation of Thunderbolt would be ideal as anything else in the tip is of no interest or archaeological value.

Other possibilities:
(1) The concrete wall at the old Bentley factory that is reputed to contain a load of Bentley parts
(2) The TT Garage which allegedly has the remains of a racing car buried under it (Don Beauman's Connaught?)
(3) Denis Jenkinson's "back garden"
(4) Are there any remains at Brooklands that the Brooklands Society would like to con persuade the Time Team to excavate for them?

It's the curse of TV "reality" shows of all sorts that they feel they must operate at speed against an unrealistic and unnecessary deadline.
There was one on "engineering" some time ago where they "restored" a steam traction engine showing us a trivial part being machined and a "boiler test" of the completed machine (a boiler test is something completely different and is done before you assemble the rest of the machine onto the boiler).
Even the current series on learning old crafts which is rather better than average gives the participants six weeks to learn what is normally the subject of a six year apprenticeship (last week thatching, last night blacksmithing).

They ought to be b----- careful digging in DSJ's old back garden...

(I seem to remember something about Home Guard training caches... )

We had one about 400 yards away some 12-15 years ago which the UXB squad from Aldershot rated too dangerous to move, and detonated it on site...grenades and mortar bombs.

DCN

But it would make "good television" wouldn't it!
Especially if they could get a certain J***my Cl***son to be a guest presenter driving the digger as they exposed the artefact.

There was also another series (again Channel 4 I think) where they restored various items including a F5000 Llola, a racing Model T Ford, etc. This series didn't do the restoration against the clock and there were none of Tony Robinson's pathetic jokes & insults. To my mind a far better series as it was more applicable to the practicalities of motor sport.

As for sites to explore how about Shelsey Walsh?

One of the rare Welsh models?

Yes it ws a rarebit!

Was it not "Scrapyard Challenge" or something similar! It's buried (sic) somewhere in this forum. Was it not Keith Holland's "Grand Prix winning" T142?

Glad to see the Master Crafts prog getting a mention as it was actually surprising how much the apprentices picked up in a few weeks... Some or even a lot of what they made came from using a fine old coke hearth and lots of clever little tools, tricks of the trade if you like, which made the impossible possible, and they hardly got a mention. But I could sense a number of veteran restorers getting excited watching, imagining some genuine early part taking shape. It gives one even more respect for what the Edwardians achieved technically in the earliest days of motoring, as the standard of engineering then was remarkable.

I take it that it was the otherwise execrable "Salvage Squad" to which you refer. Great idea, but ruined by the "presenters"; was it Lee Hurst and Suggs (from Madness)? The "hands on" people were quite good. I believe that Claire Barratt had steam engineering background and Jerry Thurston still writes for some of the classic car mags. The whole thing did looked rushed however and I think it was only the final final few programmes that actually acknowledged the input by professional restorers. There is still scope for a programme, Classic Gear included, that allows the expertise of such restorers to be championed. To be fair, Salvage Squad did put funding into the projects that were featured and, hopefully, they all fared better than some of Anneka Rice's challenges!

Hasn't Silvestone been the subject of several archaeological digs? Beckett's being the site of a mediaeval chapel?

On the Thunderbolt front, I wonder if our resident TNF LSR guru (F1STEVEUK) any further news or pics from NZ? I have carried out some research on this vehicle over many years and the reference to the engines and other remains being in the possession of MoTaT (Museum of Transport and Technology) in Auckland stems, I think, from the first edition of "Land Speed Record" by Cyril Posthumus. I have tried to verify this on several occasions and MoTaT have never been able to confirm this. I was also in touch at one stage, via Eoin Young, with Sir Len Southward. Shortly before he died he had commissioned a ground radar survey of the site where the car was supposedly buried a few years after suffering extensive damage as a result of the wool store fire in September 1946. Thunderbolt had been exhibited, following its 357mph record in 1938, in the United Kingdom Pavilion at the New York World's Fair in 1939 and then at the New Zealand Centennial Exhibition that ran from 1939 through to the early part of 1940 at Rongotai. As war requirements took over, the site (near part of Wellington Airport's complex) was used by the NZ armed forces. After the war, the pavilions were used for wool storage as well and despite personnel being on site, the fire that broke out was too great to control. Ironically, this was just days before shipping back to the UK had been arranged and the vehicle became the subject of an insurance settlement. The remains were simply left on site for several years (I think) before being used as infill.

I was in the National Motor Museum at Beaulieu last Wednesday and noted that the display case behind the four record breakers contains a copy of the letter informing Captain Eyston of the loss of his car.

So, as a "dig" with motorsport connections, it would certainly top my list. A few years ago, Time Team did a really great piece on Jamestown - America's first colonial settlement and has completed other work outside of the UK. As a popular programme it would probably offer the most appropriate framework to take this subject into the public domain.

Gosh. This reply is nearly as long as those on the FIAT S76 thread!

It was SL142/36, the Alan Frazer car for Keith Holland that won the Grand Prix of Gibraltar or something or other. And thanks Pullman99, it was indeed "Salvage Squad" from 2001.

Hi Giraffe!

It might as well have been Gibraltar! I think they referred to it throughout the programme as "the winner of the Spanish Grand Prix of 1969" which may have come as a surprise to JYS and Matra. Presumably they meant a specific F5000 round rather than the GP? There was just no acknowledgement of any of the restoration companies who actually carried out the work as, clearly, very little appeared to be actually done by the three resident restorers. The piece at Mallory Park was good for reuniting Keith Holland with the car but, inevitably, the programme had to turn it into a "race". Is the car still with its owner at that time? The opening shots of the programme showed it being extricated from a domestic garage.

I've posted on the Donington Park thread, by the way, to enquire as to protocol for the 7th March. Unless, of course, Time Team are there already!

I thought that Lee Hurst was the presenter on the first series & Suggs the second. I agree though the "presenters" were a waste of space.

Thunderbolt is probably under one of the aprons at the airport now. The picture I posted on the LSR thread is late forties I think, although I do recall a later picture in Motorsport, not so many years ago that showed the chassis, minus what was left of the bodywork, and "turned turtle", it was in this state that she slowly became buried.

Len's surface radar shots difinitley showed what could only be Thunderbolt's chassis, though I wasn't allowed to keep a copy. My concern was that remarks had been made at the time of the runway extension, that it may be better to remove the chassis before work commenced. There's no record it was, but there is no record it wasn't either!

Strangely, Len didn' know the whereabouts of the two "dummy" R types either, though there's no record they have ever been sent back to the UK, or if they still had there engine plates attached.

I've tried to sell this as a documentry idea so many times, and always, it's landed on deaf ears, a massive shame......................

the aforesaid Lola won the 1969 Grand Prix de Jerez (pronounced by Lee Hurst on air as 'Jer-ez', i.e. completely wrong.) Would have been nice if that had employed a resident motorsport 'expert' for the programme. Aside ; wasn't our own David Force in the programme??

The original thread on the Lola / 'Salvage Squad' programme : http://forums.autosport.com/index.php?show...l=salvage+squad

ISTR that the late Rodney Felton arranged his own dig via a colleague in the US. After a major fire years before, the remains of 2 burned out cars had been bulldozed into an embankment on the same owner's plot. Rodney had them exhumed and shipped over here and restored them. They were, of course, his pontoon fendered Ferrari 250TR car and the Alfa 2900 2 seater, both of which which he campaigned with vigour. This was in the early 90s. I recall some very sniffy comments at the VSCC meeting when he brought out the Alfa. A much missed enthusiast.

There is also the concreted-over pit in which all of the Daimler 4.5ltr V8 factory new spares were dumped at Lord Stokes' specific and envious behest when Daimler was absorbed into BLMC or whatever it was.

What we need are more finds like the Maserati 4CS whose chassis had been used as a roof support in a bungalow in the far east.
Roger Lund

If the sniffers had spoken to Rodney I'm sure he would have told them the same as he told me - it's a replica

That was the glory of the man, he never made any pretence of it. ISTR that it was about the same time as Mr Wheatcroft's Royale lookalike was in-build, and Tom had just explained a few basic facts to those people. There was a detailed article and interview in one of the magazines about the RF cars in period. Rodney's attention to detail was superb IIRC
RL

I'd suggest the floor of BRM's main workshop at Bourne, the dirt one, which ought to have a ton of stuff under it.

Perhaps an investigation under the banking at Brooklands to see what's been dumped there over the years.

The paddock at one of the seriously old Hillclimb venues.

Money.
Having TV crews around is expensive. They could in theory spend a much longer period digging, and only film for a few days out of that (something they've done for some episodes where they're only documenting somebody else's dig.) Even so, doing that will push up the cost of the archaeology side. Thus, rightly or wrongly, they always try to do what they need to in the minimum amount of time.

Did anyone ask why?

The complaint about the artificiality 'reality cram' remains - whatever the reason

I think the 'reality cram' is just to retain the viewer's interest and attention. I was of the understanding that programmes such as this are popular with the producers as like cookery programmes, they are very easy and cheap to film as all the 'action' remains more or less in one place, either a hob or a hole............

The archaeologists and others who are on the team all have full-time jobs as university lecturers, working archeologists, etc and so on, with many other professional commitments. So these are in effect "weekend" digs. All the projects are selected, it seems to me, to offer a fair chance of turning up something of sufficient interest in the time given, and you can see that they do what long-term digs often can't: pitch a complete team of experts in different fields onto a site at the same time, from geophysical experts and landscape archaeologists to coin and ceramic specialists.

The results often justify more painstaking digs afterwards, the Team turning up enough to enable the local archaeological society to prepare funding submissions to Universities, Government etc. People like English Heritage have used them, not to mention Lincoln's Inn, so they're no hit-and-run amateurs. Last time I was in London wandering through Kew Gardens I found the results of one of the digs: the outline of the once-lost Tudor palace in the grass. Discovered by Time Team, and of course their quick, concentrated approach meant minimum dispruption to the public and the Park keepers as well.

Motor sport archeology is something that hasn't been tried yet, so far as I know. I mean, apart from walking and photographing long-dead tracks, which I guess counts as "landscape archeology".

Seriously, what could you use the team for? There's not an awful lot to dig up. Most of it is on the surface, more or less, or in industrial estates. Excavate the old McLaren premises at Poyle? Except without doubt someone else is in there now, and might object to having the yard (or even the floor) dug up.

"If the sniffers had spoken to Rodney I'm sure he would have told them the same as he told me - it's a replica"

While appreciating Mr. Felton's honesty, this does illustrate one of the problems of replicas. That same Alfa, a bit further on, was represented as "the real thing" by a well-known U.S. classic car dealer.

I suspect that after another owner or three it may well become "one of the most original Alfa 2.9s known to exist, and a true bargain at this price . . . . "

And it's far from the only one in this category.

Cynic

Just so, and nobody that I know reacts well to being assumed to have such a short attention span.
So what if TV costs money, if it's good enough it will earn money for its owners.
Can any of us begin to guess how much money the BBC has made from the David Attenborough programmes where the producers are allowed to do the job properly and the programmes are broadcast all over the world no doubt bringing revenue to their owners far and away above the cost of making them.

I think that this was also the underlying (no pun intended) problem with the aircraft programmes on Time Team. They were, essentially, excavations but the archaeological approach allowed an enhanced awareness of the relationship of the objects with the circumstances of the aircraft's demise. It's possibly much more of an historical approach than conventional archaeology but I am not sure if this could be applied to motorsport in any major way. Buildings with transport history (Coventry's "Motor Mills" perhaps) possibly but many early sites will have been built over by now.

As for keeping film crews in place over a prolonged period; this does present quite significant obstacles. I remember discussing this with Rob Widdows when he was covering Thrust 2's exploits in the Black Rock Desert in 1983. Rob was working for TVS (predecessors of Meridian) and was sending back daily reports. He had previously covered the recovery of The Mary Rose in 1982 and I suggested to him that there were many similarities between the two in terms of reporting. The common thread here was that everyone had to be VERY patient. Both projects required specific weather conditions - amongst many other factors - to be suitable and there was,undoubtedly a very large commitment by many TV companies in the case of Henry VIII's flagship. The BBC, with "man in the white suit" Martin Bell (then their North American correspondent) turned up on the desert on the 29th September (the anniversary of John Cobb's accident at Loch Ness) as I think they felt that date was "right" for setting a new LSR. I believe Martin did a reasonable piece about the attempt's progress but afterwards they were off to cover something in Washington or wherever. They just have to make the best of whatever is available to them on the day. The footage that was shot throughout 1983 (and previously in 1981-1982), and including the final record run of Thrust 2 on 4th October, was by Neil Parker Associates was also used in the news programmes that followed and eventually, as part of the BBC's QED series. The programme was called "For Britain and the Hell of it!".

That's why the format of Time Team is so economical and I remain a great fan. They have done an enormous amount to generate public interest in not only archaeology for its own sake but in the related issues of conservation, protection, restoration, interpretation, and display. Long may it continue.

Bearing in mind what Rodney started with, viz the chassis and remains of 2 genuine cars, I do not think he was out of place building them up and badging them accordingly. After all there are many rebuilt old racing cars recreated, allegedly, from little more than an original gear lever knob and a broken wing mirror, so to speak, so let's not get too prissy. It is unlikely that anyone in the know as a potential buyer would not research or be told the provenance from recognised experts. But, caveat emptor.
Roger Lund

edit
I have now turned up the April 1992 C&SC article by Mick Walsh, so for anyone who might be contemplating purchasing either of these cars I am happy to scan and e mail a copy of the article to ensure that you can look the dealer/vendor in the eye fully cognisant of the cars' provenance, prior to making your offer or walking away. I suspect that Rodney should/could have used the term "recreation" possibly, or "reconstruction" more probably, since he started with key original components, whereas for a replica you surely start with a bare garage floor.
RL

My earlier post was written in haste whilst getting ready to go to the Pomeroy Memorial Trophy; and upon reflection I realise that it could be misinterpreted. I did not mean to imply that the Time Team members were not experts in their chosen subject, these people are serious about what they do, and have the use of some equally serious equipment.

My comment was based on the fact that in the past I have had to deal with archaeologists regarding Roman remains in the village. It is from these conversations that I ascertained that the Time Team’s work was seen as more as a reconnaissance for a later visit than as a thorough excavation of a site.

As stated the costs of the production crew means that a Time Team visit has to be short, but the programmes popularity is an indication of the publics interest in history and this can only be a good thing!

There's supposed to be a least one car in what used to be the sewage works at Brooklands, and I am sure the Bluebird Project would like the sponsons for Bluebird K7 found and dug up! These were returned to Sussex after Campbell's crash at Coniston. Then after years, they were said to have been tipped into a hole at Mark Tidy's yard as hardcore for an office floor. I've been there several times and wondered!

As for proper 'treasure', I've got a racing driver/treasure hunt programme written, and STILL no production companies want to know. The last company to look at it said "can you get a bit of scandal in it", well no, not without making it up, but it just about sums it up!

'As for proper 'treasure', I've got a racing driver/treasure hunt programme written, and STILL no production companies want to know.'
Ah yes.