202 replies to this topic

[pallas1970]

I have a number of items from ex Lotus mechanic Mal Simpson (nickname 'Digger') and am trying to organise them into some kind of chronological order.  Could someone tell me the year from the scanned image below:

 

 

I have a number of photographs, letters etc from his time with Lotus and Walker in the late fifties/early sixties if any one is interested and i can post some more.

 

Cheers, James

[Tim Murray]

I'd suggest 1960, as that was the year Maurice Levy left Lotus to look after Mike Taylor's cars, and David Lazenby joined as  a junior mechanic.
 
Maurice posts here occasionally, as 'llmaurice':

http://forums.autosp...4004-llmaurice/

so might be willing to help with this and any other queries if you PM him.

I'd certainly be very interested in seeing more from Mal's collection.

[pallas1970]

here is another shot, with Mal in the car testing.

 

 

and talking with some other bloke:

 

 

have no idea of tracks/dates

[bradbury west]

Beat me to it, Tim.  Like you, I would welcome any shots or info, especially '59 and earlier

Roger Lund

[pallas1970]

here is another shot, with Mal in the car testing

 

 

and talking with some other bloke:

 

 

 

have no idea of tracks/dates

[RogerFrench]

Some other bloke? Heresy!!!

[GMACKIE]

here is another shot, with Mal in the car testing.

 

 

 

 

 

Nice shot of David McKay, whose 'nickname', strangely,  was "Sir Mal". If that little bit of damage on his head is all he suffered, he was lucky.

 

The Beetle swing-axle rear end, and 'big lump' hanging out the back, take a bit of getting used to !

[Ray Bell]

A pre-'60 model too, Greg...

Too early to source stuff for a Vee but at least we can spell Volkswagen, can't we?

It seems that, with the repetition of one pic and the mis-posting of another, there are other pics to go with this topic.

[Glenn Moulds]

James, I for one would be very interested to see more from your collection as I had the pleasure of working with Mal for a brief period in the late 80's. A lovely bloke, truly one of nature's gentleman. Despite encouragement from a few sources he never got around to writing a personal history of his time with Team Lotus and Rob Walker, a real pity. Now and again he would tell a story from those days which just left us wanting more!

[Nick Planas]

Interesting to see this.

 

As for the year - were there any years with September 31st in them...?

[GMACKIE]

Ahaa...well spotted !

[Tim Murray]

I’m fascinated by some of the hours-worked figures. 1st January 1960 was a Friday, so there were five weekends in January and the average British working person would probably have worked no more than 160 hours. Yet Endruweit, Levy and Simpson each worked more than 300 hours in January, averaging around ten hours a day each, including weekends. Presumably most of the effort would have been getting the new 18 and the other cars ready to go out to Argentina for the two races at the beginning of February. Then everything stops – only 45 hours each for the three of them in February – did they go on holiday after the Argentine races? By midsummer there’s enough work to keep seven mechanics pretty busy.

[SJ Lambert]

My Dad & his mates joked that they'd go to work Tuesday and come home Thursday!

[richardspringett]

I may well have missed important details of this most interesting discussion, but a good friend was store manager at Rob Walker in the 60s and he is asking if Mal Simpson worked at Corsley or their other site at Pippbrook near Dorking.

 

Richard

[richardspringett]

Apologies - I read the word Walker and assumed Rob Walker - please resume normal service....

 

Richard

[pallas1970]

I may well have missed important details of this most interesting discussion, but a good friend was store manager at Rob Walker in the 60s and he is asking if Mal Simpson worked at Corsley or their other site at Pippbrook near Dorking.

 

Richard

He certainly left Lotus and worked at Rob Walkers, I have a number of photos I will post in the next few days.

[pallas1970]

This photo is dated 5/1/57.  Looks like some illegal testing on country roads, and before the volkswagen was rolled.

 

[pallas1970]

Letter from his old colleague Alf Francis, I would have been tempted to take the job offer ...

 

[pallas1970]

[Joe Bosworth]

Fascinating letter from Alf to Mal.  At the time of time the letter Mal was working with us at Comalco Pty Ltd at the newly commissioned aluminium fabricating plant at Yenora NSW, about 40 minutes west of downtown Sydney.  Mal was working in our tight little engineering group.  I sure didn't know of his Alf letter but he clearly hung in there with us.

 

In many discussions we had on matters racing I got the distinct belief that he had had enough of the crazy hours and hard work that went with dubious moments of glamour.  The good 40 hour per week job with regular paychecks looked good to him.  And besides, I suspect we paid him more!! 

 

Very interesting. 

 

Regards

[cooper997]

James, great thread you've started. The drivers' get the glory, but the mechanics are definitely the unsung heros and have their own story to tell.

 

The following is 2 consecutive pages from David McKay's SV book and offers a small insight to Mal. For those outside Australia, in very brief terms his former employer AWA was an Australian Wireless/Radio/TV maker/broadcaster.

 

 

 

Stephen

Edited by cooper997, 12 May 2018 - 01:53.

[GMACKIE]

Thank very much, Stephen !

 

When I went to grab my copy of David's book, to 'read on'...it wasn't there ! My son borrowed it some time back.

[pallas1970]

[pallas1970]

Some text from Mal's notebook:

 

Europe 1960.  A far cry from breakfast on the forecourt at the pensione at Eze sur Mer during the 1961 Monaco Grand Prix - or the fabulous strawberries and cream at the Hotel Meyershof in Zandvoort during the 1959 Dutch Grand Prix not to mention the pome fritte and salade de tomate during the breaks whilst working during the 1959 Le Mans 24 hours race with Team Lotus. Team Lotus entries were a Lotus 15 for Graham Hill/Derek Jolly and a Lotus 17 for Alan Stacey/Keith Greene. I was working on the 17 until it retired with ignition problems. That particular 15 is now owned by Paul Samuels and seeing the car at the Amaroo Park circuit near Sydney in late January 1993 bought back many memories, one such is Mike Costin driving a 15 from Hornsey to Oulton Park in Cheshire as Team Lotus were running late in preparation -not unusual for the Team in the late 1950's.

Team Lotus 1959. Graham Hill, Innes Ireland, Alan Stacey and Pete Lovely. The transporter was a Ford Thames modified to seat four/five in the cab with an Alvis gearbox, a stronger gearbox for towing the racing cars. The engine continually overheated, compartments built underneath the flat top the, registered number 903 PMT. The cabin was like an oven and continually over heated, travelling in the front was bearable with the windows down but sitting in the rear seats on a long drive with the engine between the seats was not on. I recall Maurice Levy a fellow mechanic and myself travelling all the way to Berlin in August 1959 for the German Grand Prix and again in September of the same year to Lisbon for the Portugese Grand Prix with a breakdown at Burgos.

[llmaurice]

 The guy in the Lotus Ford Thames transporter was Jack Moisey watching me counting out Mals pocket money for the days "enjoyment "---maybe .!

[pallas1970]

 

[pallas1970]

[pallas1970]

[pallas1970]

Reims, France, June 1962

[pallas1970]

 

Spain. Portugal.  Team Lotus, September 1960

[pallas1970]

 

John Surtees, Ferrari F1, Monaco 1963

[cooper997]

Great photos James.

 

No doubt everybody was under the pump at the time to prepare cars or get the transporter to the event. However the scenes captured in these photos certainly have a certain 'boy's own adventure' Mal was having when you look back over 50 years and what the circus is like now.

 

Stephen

[pallas1970]

"Who was boss?"  Stirling

 

 

German Grand Prix, Nurburgring, August 1961

1st, S. Moss, Lotus Climax

[pallas1970]

sorry, wrong photo above.

 

"Who was boss?"  Stirling

 

 

German Grand Prix, Nurburgring, August 1961

1st, S. Moss, Lotus Climax

[Doug Nye]

Wonderful set of photos here - just wonderful...

 

Thank you so much for posting them.

 

DCN

[pallas1970]

[pallas1970]

what a carpark!

 

[pallas1970]

[bradbury west]

Post 37 looks like the Oulton Park Gold Cup 1961 with SCM and P99, with Major Rolt in attendance. What a wonderfully atmospheric shot. A real piece of history. And I was there.
Roger Lund

[raceannouncer2003]

Post 38 appears to match up with the following:

 

http://www.racingspo...1963-08-25.html

 

Which green Ferrari was Bandini driving?  0792, but without the wing thingy?

 

VInce H.

Edited by raceannouncer2003, 30 August 2015 - 01:41.

[llmaurice]

[llmaurice]

 

 

What a nice touch,never happened with ACBC.

[Doug Nye]

That is a lovely photo of the Walkers. Note Rob's hand-writing. He wrote all his 'Road & Track' race reports and articles in the same manner, freely admitting that he had never ever mastered "joined-up writing". I am also very taken with what appears to be the Fiat-Bartoletti transporter pictured in Post 31, with what appears to be a yellow-wheeled Lotus 18 on the top deck - and with a gentleman who appears to be Jim Endruweit of Team Lotus in discussion with gents of an Hispanic persuasion.  I can't recall ever having appreciated that Team Lotus ever used a Fiat-Bartoletti transporter which appears here to be in Maserati's former grey livery.  What's the story there????  I don't think it's one I have ever heard before...and that really intrigues me.  

 

DCN

[raceannouncer2003]

That is a lovely photo of the Walkers. Note Rob's hand-writing. He wrote all his 'Road & Track' race reports and articles in the same manner, freely admitting that he had never ever mastered "joined-up writing". I am also very taken with what appears to be the Fiat-Bartoletti transporter pictured in Post 31, with what appears to be a yellow-wheeled Lotus 18 on the top deck - and with a gentleman who appears to be Jim Endruweit of Team Lotus in discussion with gents of an Hispanic persuasion.  I can't recall ever having appreciated that Team Lotus ever used a Fiat-Bartoletti transporter which appears here to be in Maserati's former grey livery.  What's the story there????  I don't think it's one I have ever heard before...and that really intrigues me.  

 

DCN

 

Would John Surtees remember?

 

Vince H.

[cedricselzer]

Jim Endreweit told me that they had used Reventlow's transporter on some occasions. It was apparently parked in the yard at Lotus and given permission to use it. I presume it was 1960 or maybe early 1961. There were odd bits from the Scarab team lying around when I joined Team Lotus in May '61. I still have a pair of axle stands from them which were surplus to requirements. 

[GMACKIE]

Thank you pallas1970, for opening this wonderful treasure chest.

[group7]

pallas1970, wonderful photos, thank you     in post #37, the image of the mechanics fitting the rear wheels, who is the gent in the suit and sunglasses on the right, beside Stirling ?

 

Mike (group7) in Canada

Edited by group7, 01 September 2015 - 19:11.

[Nick Planas]

pallas1970, wonderful photos, thank you     in post #37, the image of the mechanics fitting the rear wheels, who is the gent in the suit and sunglasses on the right, beside Stirling ?

 

Mike (group7) in Canada

Judging by the armband, an official... but which one I know not. I stand to be corrected...

[bradbury west]

That is Major Tony Rolt, the force behind the whole thing. A very accomplished driver in his own right, and a gentleman of the old school, like Rob Walker. Google Major Rolt for more info, or search here on TNF for details. ISTR he was given due respect in his obit and eulogy here.
Roger Lund

[Nick Planas]

That is Major Tony Rolt, the force behind the whole thing. A very accomplished driver in his own right, and a gentleman of the old school, like Rob Walker. Google Major Rolt for more info, or search here on TNF for details. ISTR he was given due respect in his obit and eulogy here.
Roger Lund

Ah, I should have known better... thank you for the correction.