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Another vehicle ident!


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#1 f1steveuk

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 16:26

I have been looking at this, and thinking "home built special", just the way the exhaust comes out screams "backyard engineering", but just in case someone knows better, can anyone identify this, I am guessing at the Brighton Speed Trials, but not 100% certain of that either!

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#2 nicanary

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 16:45

It's Robert Waddy's Fuzzi. Two 500cc JAP engines in each end, and 4-wheel drive.

#3 f1steveuk

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 16:49

It's Robert Waddy's Fuzzi. Two 500cc JAP engines in each end, and 4-wheel drive.



Thank you, nice and short, as is the car!


#4 D-Type

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 17:10

I think that in 1936 Fuzzi only had two engines - one each end. The four-engined development was postwar.

#5 Tim Murray

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 17:19

I'm not aware of it ever having had four JAP engines. After the war it was rebuilt around a single Ford Mercury V8 engine.

#6 David Birchall

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 18:14

I love the "Heater". :eek:

#7 D-Type

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 19:31

I'm not aware of it ever having had four JAP engines. After the war it was rebuilt around a single Ford Mercury V8 engine.

My mistake - I was posting at work from memory :o

#8 arttidesco

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 19:32

How hot can a JAP exhaust get on a 1/2 mile run ?

#9 Doug Nye

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 19:49

Robert Waddy was a widely respected and very popular character, and Fuzzy - which had a multi tubular truss-type chassis rather like a contempary light aircraft's fuselage, or 'fuzzy-lage', hence the name - a much-loved car. It's a story most here will know but the contemporary commentators at Shelsley, for instance, often got into a possibly contrived but amusing muddle with "Here comes Robert Fuddy's Wazzy - err Fubert Wuzzy's Buddy - umm Wobert Widdy's Wazzy..." etc.

DCN

Edited by Doug Nye, 14 February 2013 - 19:50.


#10 Robin Fairservice

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 19:55

John Bolster's book "Specials" published in 1949, only refers to two engines, and then says that the "Fuzzy" was rebuilt afer the war with a Ford Mercury V8 engine, and that Lance Macklin owned it. That book also has a picture of the "Fuzzy" at the Brighton Speed Trials being driven bt Robert Waddy. His descripion of Robert and his life style is interesting!

#11 Tim Murray

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 20:05

How hot can a JAP exhaust get on a 1/2 mile run ?

It looks to have been a cold day at Brighton - the onlookers appear to be well wrapped up, so he was possibly glad of the warmth. :lol:

The car obviously didn't stay long in that configuration. There are several photos of the car in the Pre-War sprints and hillclimbs photos thread, including one from Simon Lewis and these from Richard Atkinson (taken by his uncle) when Waddy crashed the car at the Whitchurch Sprint in May 1937:

Cue more pictures!

Whitchurch May 1937

Waddy and Fuzzi:

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The exhaust has been repositioned so that the driver is no longer actually leaning on it, but it must still have been uncomfortably close.

#12 Doug Nye

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Posted 14 February 2013 - 20:39

Jenks helped Waddy saw the frame in half when it was modified to accommodate the Mercury V8 engine. He recalled it as a sad event, from which Fuzzi never recovered.

DCN

Edited by Doug Nye, 14 February 2013 - 20:52.


#13 Stephen W

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Posted 15 February 2013 - 09:59

It is Fuzzi with Robert Waddy at the wheel - twin engine & 4 wheel drive.

#14 nicanary

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Posted 15 February 2013 - 11:19

I'm not aware of it ever having had four JAP engines. After the war it was rebuilt around a single Ford Mercury V8 engine.


Sorry. I posted at 4.45 and was due at work at 4.50. I meant one at each end. Maybe the four-engined special D-Type is thinking of is the later Bolster Special? Those were happy days - listening Bernie?


#15 Dutchy

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Posted 15 February 2013 - 16:00

Sorry. I posted at 4.45 and was due at work at 4.50. I meant one at each end. Maybe the four-engined special D-Type is thinking of is the later Bolster Special? Those were happy days - listening Bernie?


It was indeed the later Bolster Special that had 4 engines.

#16 D-Type

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Posted 15 February 2013 - 20:44

To quote DSJ in my 50-year old copy of The Racing Car Pocket Book

... In 1946 Robert Waddy saw the possibility of developing the idea still further, using one large engine in place of two small ones. Unfortunately his enthusiasm ran away with him and instead of starting from scratch he cut Fuzzi in half, lengthened it and tried to carry on from there. A Mercury V8 engine was put in the centre and a complex system of chains and shafts took the drive to the front and rear axles. Suspension and driving members able to cope with the 42bhp of a J.A.P. could not deal with the power of a V8, so everything was redesigned until the final car bore no resemblance to Fuzzi, apart from the conception of space-frame and 4-wheel-drive. Poor little Fuzzi no longer existed, and in its place was a complicatedcontraption that defeated itself by its complexity, but due to various differences of opinion never reached fruition. the writer can recall working with Waddy at the time and shedding a tear as he helped to saw the original Fuzzi frame in two.



#17 racingreen

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Posted 16 February 2013 - 00:08

To quote DSJ in my 50-year old copy of The Racing Car Pocket Book


Where is FUZZY today????

#18 f1steveuk

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Posted 16 February 2013 - 09:21

Where is FUZZY today????


Partially the reason I asked the question, although based on the discovery of a chassis, which the owner thought might be this car, but with this background, it blatantly isn't this car (as it's still being very short). The initial question to me was, "what's this chassis, is it this, and where is the Swandean Special?".


#19 Tim Murray

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Posted 16 February 2013 - 10:15

... where is the Swandean Special?".

Last heard of in the USA:

http://www.conceptca...re-Special.aspx

http://www.hadesign...._for_speed.html

http://www.flickr.co...ero/2791191675/