81 replies to this topic

[Phil Rainford]

A "racing incident " between two hard charging racers?

PAR

[kayemod]

Originally posted by Phil Rainford
A "racing incident " between two hard charging racers?

PAR

More of a 'Professional Foul' I'd say, but we've seem far worse, hardly worth starting a fight over.

[PeterElleray]

Originally posted by Phil Rainford
A "racing incident " between two hard charging racers?

PAR

yes

[simonlewisbooks]

Originally posted by kayemod


More of a 'Professional Foul' I'd say, but we've seem far worse,

In fact almost par for the course in recent years ...

[MonzaDriver]

Originally posted by PeterElleray


Ref the earlier post, Patrick appears to have taken advantage of James having to slow when Mass had a moment at Casino - as he ought to be doing, thats what he's paid for by Ken Tyrrell (!) - and is on the inside line, albeit some way from the kerb.. James appears to 'sit it out' with him, offline, on the dirt, and as far as i can see, he does outbrake himself as a result... James would have known far better than any of us how delicate a position he was placing himself in. Patrick doesnt drive James off the road, how, apart from braking to let James back through was he supposed to give the Hesketh an alternative? The options lay with James, and it didnt come off...

Peter

Well I didn't get your points,
if Depailler is on the inside line, then he is away from the curb, there is only one explanation,
he goes straight ahead, he drove James out of track, he did not turn in when it was about time,
look at James's front wheel, at one moment he try to steer the car, that was more or less the entry point of the bend, but Depailler doesn't turn in.

It's obvious that Depailler took advantage from the fact that James come out from the Casino square,
somehow slower, because of Mass, but we are speaking about the way he negotiate the bend.
Ciao.

MonzaDriver.

[Phil Rainford]

Tambay in the M26 at the 1978 Dutch GP......


PAR

[Thundersports]

The Monaco 2008 Historic crash was with Bobby Verdon-Roe driving the car wasn't seen again last season I wonder whether a shunt like that in relatively unsafe 70s F1 car in the tunnel at Monaco would put you off driving them................

[alansart]

Originally posted by Phil Rainford



Tambay in the M26 at the 1978 Dutch GP......


PAR

Extra points if you can work out if it's Hunt or Giacomelli driving the M26 in front

[Phil Rainford]

There were five McLarens out in the race

Hunt,Tambay, Giacomelli, Lunger and Piquet.

However Alan in answer to your question ....Giacomelli obviously; as James was round the back of the pits having a fag ;)

PAR

[PeterElleray]

Originally posted by MonzaDriver


Well I didn't get your points,
if Depailler is on the inside line, then he is away from the curb, there is only one explanation,
he goes straight ahead, he drove James out of track, he did not turn in when it was about time,
look at James's front wheel, at one moment he try to steer the car, that was more or less the entry point of the bend, but Depailler doesn't turn in.

It's obvious that Depailler took advantage from the fact that James come out from the Casino square,
somehow slower, because of Mass, but we are speaking about the way he negotiate the bend.
Ciao.

MonzaDriver.

with apologies for hijacking me own thread, but this is more interesting the more you look at it..

up until the point that the pair pass the first camera depaillier is behind hunt but clearly faster as a result of james being baulked by jochen. when the video shifts to the next camera patrick is alongside, marginally in front, and appears to have a slight wobble, whether this is due to the undulation in the road or when he first applies the brakes im not sure.

james then looks like he might be trying to make an early turn in - perhaps this is a belated attempt to shut the door on patrick, but its too late, if he turns in here then he will stuff the tyrrell into the barrier. likewise depaillier now has no where to go and the only thing he can do to avoid james going off is to brake heavily (although already having passed james!) and let the hesketh have the corner. not very likely...

from the moment patrick got on the inside of james, and james didnt then immediately recognise that the corner was lost, the end result was inevitable. it doesnt matter whether patrick took a wide entry (i dont think he did in the circumstances), james was going to go off - tangentially.

you have to laugh actually, who was it who said at zandvoort in 1977 'we dont pass on the outside in formula 1'...

anyway a racing incident imho - (and that, i think, is my last input - back to the m23's and m26's - i have the list of type numbers b,c,d etc, ill post it later.

Peter

[beighes]

Greeting.........Regarding chassis designations. I just had a quick look through my "boxes of previous life", & I found copies of McLaren's test/practice/event set-up sheets from 23 September 1975 (Paul Ricard) through much of 1976. They only made reference to the chassis numbers. There are a few engine numbers, one or two Hewland numbers, & the date M23-6 was finished. This bit of twaddle has been brought to you...........due to the fact that it's too early in the afternoon for a notso wee dram.
cheers,
Steve

[macoran]

there should be one here .....

[PeterElleray]

Originally posted by beighes
Greeting.........Regarding chassis designations. I just had a quick look through my "boxes of previous life", & I found copies of McLaren's test/practice/event set-up sheets from 23 September 1975 (Paul Ricard) through much of 1976. They only made reference to the chassis numbers. There are a few engine numbers, one or two Hewland numbers, & the date M23-6 was finished. This bit of twaddle has been brought to you...........due to the fact that it's too early in the afternoon for a notso wee dram.
cheers,
Steve

and ofcourse you'll be posting the setup test and event information shortly..

well, from Doug's 'History of the GP car, we have the following: (perhaps Doug can confirm if these originate from withn mclaren or elsewhere):

M23A: 1973
M23B: 1974, longer wheelbase (bellhousing spacer),parallel link rear suspension, alt front suspension pickups for rocker arm:
M23C:1975, further revised suspension, revised airbox, short nose and extended sidepods
M23D:1976, low airbox regs
M23E:1977, new front uprights for new front tyre
M23F:1978 customer cars..

a few comments about this.

Firstly, the original 1974 spec cars, - the TEXACO MARLBORO's - ran the longer wheelbase bellhousing spacer and 1 metre overhang rear wing, along with a subtly revised airbox right from the season opening argentine GP. The parallel link rear suspension appeared, along with revised front, on new car M23-8 for 'emmo', or emerson as he still was at that point, only at the British GP. throughout 1974 the wheelbase spacer, rear geometry airbox pattern and also nose form chnaged backwards and forwards on an almost race by race basis,as doug catalogues in the same book, so its difficult to pin point any definative 'b' spec.

In 1975 things calmed down a bit. The rocker front suspension, was standardised for the european races, along along with the other mods above and a more definative 'c' spec can be followed from race to race after that.

Likewise in 1976, the change in rear wing overhang, lowline airbox and, infamously, the oil cooler placement were more or less standardised as the 'D' spec after the spanish gp. the air starter and 6 speed box preceded them at the season opening brazilian gp, laong with new, lighter bodywork to the 1975 pattern.

several of the cars were updated as this gestation took place. in principle it would be possible to convert m23-1 to the same spec as the last car built m23-14 without extensive work to the chassis, or for that matter, vice versa. an m23 was always recognisably an m23..

Like most race cars, the m23 changed from race to race, making definative 'b' or 'c' spec a bit fuzzy. For that matter, this als applies to the Lotus 72, which was referenced when this first came up.

there are a mass of articles and some data out there on the m23, but if ever a car deserved a book dedicated to it , the m23 is the car - and if somebody doesnt hurry up and do one, maybe i will...

peter

[fines]

Originally posted by PeterElleray
there are a mass of articles and some data out there on the m23, but if ever a car deserved a book dedicated to it , the m23 is the car - and if somebody doesnt hurry up and do one, maybe i will...

peter

[alansart]

Tony Matthews rendering of the M23



I've just finished reading James Hunt's book Against All Odds. His comments on the first race of 1977.

"We ran into a special kind of problem with getting the M26 off the ground. Most teams introduce a new car because they bloody well need it and therefore are prepared to speculate, to chuck the old car away and get on with the new car on the theory that the old car wasn't good enough and even if it means struggling with the new car for a couple of races, it's a good investment. We were faced with the problem of trying to run two completely different cars - the M23 and the M26 - with a team that's big enough to run only one type of car at a time. We have been only able to snatch the odd day of testing with the M26 when we can afford 'days off' from the racing program with the M23, and this makes the development programme slower than perhaps it should be. So in South America we were commited one hundred percent to the M23, because it is still doing well. When you've got a car that can win races, why change for the sake of change? Don't change your winning line....."

This was a car starting it's 5th season

[Nigel Beresford]

Originally posted by PeterElleray


well, from Doug's 'History of the GP car, we have the following: (perhaps Doug can confirm if these originate from withn mclaren or elsewhere):

M23A: 1973
M23B: 1974, longer wheelbase (bellhousing spacer),parallel link rear suspension, alt front suspension pickups for rocker arm:
M23C:1975, further revised suspension, revised airbox, short nose and extended sidepods
M23D:1976, low airbox regs
M23E:1977, new front uprights for new front tyre
M23F:1978 customer cars..

With all due respect, I just don't recall any references within the team to generic type numbers like this, and I can't find it in any paperwork, but as ever I could be wrong - it will be interesting to read Doug's take. He doesn't refer to any M23 sub-types in his "McLaren, The Grand Prix, Can Am And Indy Cars". It's possible the drawings were given such prefixes to differentiate from year to year - an example from personal experience is that we called the 1999 Penske the PC28 on drawings and in internal correspondence, even though it was publicly known as the PC27B. McLaren certainly reverted to the practice of adding suffix letters for the distastrous M28 and the M29.

Nigel

[Tony Matthews]

The only things that my cutaway shows of the M23 are that it had four wheels and the engine was at the back.

[alansart]

Originally posted by Tony Matthews
The only things that my cutaway shows of the M23 are that it had four wheels and the engine was at the back.

And a bit of deformable structure plus the brake and clutch pots

[PeterElleray]

Originally posted by Nigel Beresford

With all due respect, I just don't recall any references within the team to generic type numbers like this, and I can't find it in any paperwork, but as ever I could be wrong - it will be interesting to read Doug's take. He doesn't refer to any M23 sub-types in his "McLaren, The Grand Prix, Can Am And Indy Cars". It's possible the drawings were given such prefixes to differentiate from year to year - an example from personal experience is that we called the 1999 Penske the PC28 on drawings and in internal correspondence, even though it was publicly known as the PC27B. McLaren certainly reverted to the practice of adding suffix letters for the distastrous M28 and the M29.

Nigel

Nigel - i think you're right - i cant find any contemporary reference anywhere to these sub typres - the first time i came across them was in 1986 when i bought Doug's book. I repeated them here ,as much as anything, to pose the question. Nevertheless, they do help to chart the models's development, even if applied retrospectively, although as i have pointed out, the pace of development appears to have been so intense that you would be hard pressed to point down any definative 'b', 'c' or 'd' spec. interesting to compare part counts for a 1976 model with a 1973 - i wonder what percentage remained 'current'?

Did this with the Lotus 72 once with maurice, tried (and failed!) to convince him that the car that Peterson drove in the models' final GP appearnce at Watkins Glen in 1975 had only a cosworth dfv in common with the one Rindt debuted in Spain 1970 (not even the gearbox - the original ran a dgb, changed to an fg400 mid 1970) - but i think i'm not far from the truth when you get down to it! Still a Lotus 72 though..

back to m23's and m26's

peter

[PeterElleray]

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by PeterElleray
there are a mass of articles and some data out there on the m23, but if ever a car deserved a book dedicated to it , the m23 is the car - and if somebody doesnt hurry up and do one, maybe i will...

Originally posted by fines

really?

[fines]

Yes, why not? If you're keen to do it, I'm keen on buying it - the M23 was always my favourite F1 car! It's a "first cut is the deepest" thing, you know.

[PeterElleray]

Originally posted by fines
Yes, why not? If you're keen to do it, I'm keen on buying it - the M23 was always my favourite F1 car! It's a "first cut is the deepest" thing, you know.

ok - in the menatime, these are from silverstone last july, copyright is mine. not sure which m23 chassis, the spec appears to be 1975 mecjnaically , 1974 aero.
edit: actually also a mix of 75 rad pods and 74 airbox after a second look.

first one:

[PeterElleray]

second:

[PeterElleray]

front bulkhead

[alansart]

The John Foulston M23 at Oulton in the 80's.

[PeterElleray]

front upright

[PeterElleray]

and the rear suspension (with the upright again, experimenting with multiple uploads from imageshack)




peter

[IrishMariner]

If anyone's looking for pictures, perhaps this place might help. They sell a DVD of Hi-Res photos of various cars, including the M23:- Motorsport In Detail

[macoran]

Tony Matthews rendering of the M23



Adding these in to keep Tony's company

[doc knutsen]

dont really understand the philospophy with the skuttle or the cockpit sides - they dont appear to be structurally fixed to the tub and so are they just 'thick bodywork' ? - as i said earlier, i do recall reading of driver resistance to the non removable cockpit sections. perhaps someone can tell us more. - wonder what james' reaction was when he saw the 1979 wolf for the first time...?
peter

Would it not make sense to give the cockpit sides a little bit more penetration protection than what was afforded by two layers of f/g? Many of the contemporary tubs were very shallow, with the driver's torso being virtually unprotected in a side impact, except for a flimsy f/g cockpit shroud.

[zakeriath]

Ref the M26 and the 'bollock cooler' in the floor - yes i spotted that too and would like to know a little more, but i think what Marc is refering to is the plain unducted nose - oil coolers at the rear - in the cutaways. i am sure that he is right, and the the m26 made its debut in holland in 1976 in this format, and that it also appeared in this guise at the kyalami tests in early 1977. it was after James had his accident there in the prototype m26-1

Stupidly I sold this for R50.00

[uechtel]

Something I've always been curious about is that (at least from most sources I've seen), the Lotus 72 raced under several Chassis Type "modifications". By that, I mean there was a Lotus 72 then over the years, there was a 72B, 72C, 72D and so on. That never seemed to happen with the M23. It was always just "M23". Did McLaren choose not to indicate any updates with the Chassis Type designation the way Lotus did?

 

 

and ofcourse you'll be posting the setup test and event information shortly..

well, from Doug's 'History of the GP car, we have the following: (perhaps Doug can confirm if these originate from withn mclaren or elsewhere):

M23A: 1973
M23B: 1974, longer wheelbase (bellhousing spacer),parallel link rear suspension, alt front suspension pickups for rocker arm:
M23C:1975, further revised suspension, revised airbox, short nose and extended sidepods
M23D:1976, low airbox regs
M23E:1977, new front uprights for new front tyre
M23F:1978 customer cars..

a few comments about this.

Firstly, the original 1974 spec cars, - the TEXACO MARLBORO's - ran the longer wheelbase bellhousing spacer and 1 metre overhang rear wing, along with a subtly revised airbox right from the season opening argentine GP. The parallel link rear suspension appeared, along with revised front, on new car M23-8 for 'emmo', or emerson as he still was at that point, only at the British GP. throughout 1974 the wheelbase spacer, rear geometry airbox pattern and also nose form chnaged backwards and forwards on an almost race by race basis,as doug catalogues in the same book, so its difficult to pin point any definative 'b' spec.

In 1975 things calmed down a bit. The rocker front suspension, was standardised for the european races, along along with the other mods above and a more definative 'c' spec can be followed from race to race after that.

Likewise in 1976, the change in rear wing overhang, lowline airbox and, infamously, the oil cooler placement were more or less standardised as the 'D' spec after the spanish gp. the air starter and 6 speed box preceded them at the season opening brazilian gp, laong with new, lighter bodywork to the 1975 pattern.

several of the cars were updated as this gestation took place. in principle it would be possible to convert m23-1 to the same spec as the last car built m23-14 without extensive work to the chassis, or for that matter, vice versa. an m23 was always recognisably an m23..

Like most race cars, the m23 changed from race to race, making definative 'b' or 'c' spec a bit fuzzy. For that matter, this als applies to the Lotus 72, which was referenced when this first came up.

there are a mass of articles and some data out there on the m23, but if ever a car deserved a book dedicated to it , the m23 is the car - and if somebody doesnt hurry up and do one, maybe i will...

peter

 

 

With all due respect, I just don't recall any references within the team to generic type numbers like this, and I can't find it in any paperwork, but as ever I could be wrong - it will be interesting to read Doug's take. He doesn't refer to any M23 sub-types in his "McLaren, The Grand Prix, Can Am And Indy Cars". It's possible the drawings were given such prefixes to differentiate from year to year - an example from personal experience is that we called the 1999 Penske the PC28 on drawings and in internal correspondence, even though it was publicly known as the PC27B. McLaren certainly reverted to the practice of adding suffix letters for the distastrous M28 and the M29.

Nigel

 

 

Nigel - i think you're right - i cant find any contemporary reference anywhere to these sub typres - the first time i came across them was in 1986 when i bought Doug's book. I repeated them here ,as much as anything, to pose the question. Nevertheless, they do help to chart the models's development, even if applied retrospectively, although as i have pointed out, the pace of development appears to have been so intense that you would be hard pressed to point down any definative 'b', 'c' or 'd' spec. interesting to compare part counts for a 1976 model with a 1973 - i wonder what percentage remained 'current'?

Did this with the Lotus 72 once with maurice, tried (and failed!) to convince him that the car that Peterson drove in the models' final GP appearnce at Watkins Glen in 1975 had only a cosworth dfv in common with the one Rindt debuted in Spain 1970 (not even the gearbox - the original ran a dgb, changed to an fg400 mid 1970) - but i think i'm not far from the truth when you get down to it! Still a Lotus 72 though..

back to m23's and m26's

peter

 

An old question, still without a final definitive answer. Did the M23 and M26 have sub-types or not?

 

Now I also found another thread where there seems top be more confirmation for M23"E" and "F" customer cars

http://forums.autosp...ies/?hl=mclaren

 

So if there were "E"s and "F"s, there must have been "A"s to "D"s as well? And wouldn´t it be logic as virtually all other McLaren GP cars from the pre-Dennis area did have subtypes, starting with the M2B in 1966, M5A, M7A to D, M14A to D, M19A to C, even the M9A FWD and then again from 1979 M28A to C and M29A to C, with even a M29F (!) as stop gap in 1981, waiting for the MP4/1A...

 

So were the M23 and the M26 really exceptions?

 

Also finally, there seems to have been at least a M26E

http://forums.autosp...26e/?hl=mclaren

 

 

Hello,

I would like to know if anyone here knows more abut this car.

It was used for the 1978 British GP at Brands Hatch.
I think it was a M26 but with groundeffect added to it.

Does anyone have phot's or links to it?

Thanks a lot.

Roland
Holland

 

So what about M26A to D?