44 replies to this topic

[ian senior]

Apologies if this has been covered before, but I'm new around here! Does anyone know anything about the Pearce-Martin F1 cars that appeared (or did they) in early 1967? I gather the "Martin" bit was the Martin V8, but who was Pearce, and was the car just a hacked-about version of something else?

[ensign14]

Some info here:

http://www.atlasf1.c...=&postid=761272

Thanks for giving me the excuse to revive the thread! Anyone able to add to this enigma?

[Allen Brown]

Originally posted by ian senior
Apologies if this has been covered before, but I'm new around here! Does anyone know anything about the Pearce-Martin F1 cars that appeared (or did they) in early 1967? I gather the "Martin" bit was the Martin V8, but who was Pearce, and was the car just a hacked-about version of something else?

Ian

The team's original 1966 Cooper-Ferrari was sometimes entered as a Pearce so you could class that as a "version of something else" but it really wasn't a hack.

The 1967 Pearce-Martins (three were built) were created from scratch. The first one was, to be polite, a bit naive but this one was really just a prototype. The second car was the one that tested at Brands Hatch and didn't go very quickly. Doug was there that day so perhaps he can speculate on why it was quite so slow. Chris Lawrence wasn't an especially gifted driver but he wasn't bad. Tony Lanfranchi, IIRC, drove the Cooper-Ferrari that day and went quicker which is why Pearce thought Lawrence overdid it and stuffed the Pearce. The third Pearce was then built and was consumed in the fire along with the Cooper and the prototype.

JA Pearce was a wheeler-dealer and wheel manufacturer in the western suburbs of London. Not to be confused with Jack Pearce the libre racer and trials car builder.

Allen

[David Beard]

The Pearce chassis…don’t know much about that except that I remember going to the A J Pearce shop on Southall for reverse rim 4 ½ j wheels for my hotted up mini and a tiny leather rimmed steering wheel.

The Martin V8 though…I can tell a bit more about that.

When Doug went to Ted Martin’s place in Haddenham in the 60s he would have met my cousin Oz. He was Ted’s apprentice and was turning cranks for the V8 from solid billets. I’ve just been on the phone to Oz to test his memory.

Apparently Ted Martin was at MG and was involved with the record breaking cars. He moved on to make 3 valve heads for Ford pushrod motors using forked rockers. The V8 was designed from scratch with an aluminium block and what must have been one of the earliest applications of a toothed belt for the camshaft drive. It was single cam per bank with rocker valve actuation, Opus ignition and down draught carbs. There was a 2 litre version which was used by John Burton in a Ginetta. Apparently this baby version was a sod to assemble. The pistons with rods ( fork and tongue arrangement) were fed in from the top of the block BEFORE the liners were fitted in the heated block.

Ted Martin had two test beds at Haddenham…It gets complicated now. Charles Lucas and Roy Thomas from Chequered Flag (Gemini) all got involved and the end result was Titan cars. I can’t remember this at all but Oz tells me there was a Titan “F1” fitted with the 3 litre Martin V8 that did a couple of races (or perhaps a modded Lotus under the Titan banner?) It was raced to a second place at Mallory by Roy Pike and subsequently written off by Piers Courage.

Then there was Chris Lawrence’s Monica (sp?) road car : used the Martin V8, and I think Brian Cutting used it too in an Escort.

Ted Martin is still around and absolutely absorbed in the manufacture of small scale steam railway engines. He reckons the precision required is much greater than was needed for his racing engines!

[Macca]

The Lucas-Martin was a modded Lotus 35 Formula 2 which came third at Mallory in the rain on Boxing Day 1966 driven by Roy Pike, and was then entered for the Race of Champions driven by Piers Courage. It was quite slow in practise and then bent a rocker while the engine was being warmed-up on race morning and non-started. Courage then crashed it while testing at Snetterton, and Lucas seized the excuse to drop it to concentrate on manufacturing F3 Titans; it was said to have been written-off but was offered for sale by J. A. Pearce Motors (ironically) about a year later.

Chris Lawrence was contracted by Frenchman Jean Testevin to design the prototype of the Monica sportscar (named after Testevin's wife) and called in Ted Martin to supply engines, but his 3-litre F1 engine had to be reduced to 2.8-litres to meet French road tax breaks which were based on capacity, and was then short of power; in the end only the prototypes had the Lawrence body and the Martin engine.

Lawrence kept marketing the 3-litre Martins with adverts in Autosport, and sold a couple to special saloon racers, and used one in his own Deep Sanderson sports-prototype which ran in the Nurburgring 1000k in 1969. The early prototype V8 engines had been of 2-litre capacity and at least one was used in sportscar racing in the USA.

I still have my original programmes from the 1967 Race of Champions and International Trophy; the two Pearce-Martins were down to be driven at Brands by Tony Lanfranchi and A N Other, and at Silverstone by Robin Darlington (I think - I'm doing this from memory at work) and an American sportscar driver named Earl Jones.

There were quite a few pictures of the original Pearce F1 car in at the 1967 Racing Car Show in Motor Racing, Road & Track, and Motor magazines, but the only photo of the second car running that I have seen was in Doug Nye's article about Ted Martin in Motor Racing in June or July 1967. If it was a different chassis to the prototype at the show, it must have been fittedwith the same body panels. Perhaps Doug can throw some more light on it, or even dig into his photo archives?

[GIGLEUX]

From my memory it was Jean Tastevin instead of Testevin.

I remember reading (but where?) that Matra had contacts with Martin to use a V8-3 liter engine
in MS5 car to race in F1 events in 1967.

[Allen Brown]

I have a picture of all three cars lined up outside Pearce's workshops. John let me take a print from his wall to get it copied.

But where did I put it? The F5000s seem to have taken over round here...

Allen

[Macca]

These are the Pearce-Martin F1 car at Brands in 1967, and a reversed pic of Dan Gurney rounding Nouveau Monde at Rouen in a Brabham BT11 in 1964.

Very similar, aren't they? Look at the top front wishbone, with the diagonal brace in it; only 1.5-litre F1 and Tasman Brabhams (and BT19 and the BT20s) had that, IIRC.

Anyone know if John Pearce ever owned one of those Brabhams?


Paul

[Allen Brown]

Interesting observation!

One of the BT7s went to David Hepworth at the end of 1965 as a backup to his newly acquired "BT19" and to replace the BT3. There are two possibilities from this point. It may have been sold almost immediately to John Scott-Davis, which coincides with Hepworth's recollection of selling a second car to the Lancastrian and also tallies with a series of adverts for such a car in Surrey, less engine, between January and March of 1967 and in Bootle later that year. Alternatively it may have become the car used by Bill Wood in 1970. Given that it re-emerges in Lancashire in 1977, the former seems most likely.

The period the car spent in Surrey have always been a mystery to me. I wonder if this could have been when Pearce had it? The advert also advertised a "Cooper Intercontinental" so it's the sort of wheeler-dealer that Pearce was.

I can't find the advert just at the moment but I think it was a Kingston number - remember this is the 1960s county, not the modern-day one, when Surrey went right up to the Thames.

Allen

[Macca]

Pearce-Martin at Brands, 1967, Chris Lawrence up, from 'Motor Racing'.




Brabham BT11 at Goodwood Revival (Duncan Dayton, 1999).



Look at the rear arm of the front top wishbone, and the run of the rear radius arms......

I think they are either Brabham bits or copies thereof.





Paul M

[mike21]

I know this response is belated but I have just joined the site.

I carried out a lot of research a few years ago on F1 specials - including the Pearce cars and the Shannon. I did intend to turn this research into a book - but business took me elsewhere.

Among the people that I met during my research was Ted Martin and one of the Pearce mechanics. Both had interesting views and comments on this project - some of which are reflected in this thread. Ted Martin was a fascinating guy - we met at his house and sat in his large garden which featured a complete working minature railway. He showed me around his workshops where he created and built the trains. We also visited the depths of his garage where he unearthed some of the original equipment used for casting the V8 engine parts.

I subsequently visited the site of the J.A.Pearce workshop/shop which had been transformed into a Q8 filling station.

I have got a number of photos of the burnt out transporter - one of which clearly shows the cam cover and twisted exhausts of the V12 Ferrari engine. Several others show Pearce kneeling by the car and chatting to Lawrence. I also have ones of the Pearce Martin at the racing car show - including a close up of the very compact engine. This shows a square tube space frame car which does not look ready to race!

I seem to be having a bit of trouble loading these to this post so if anyone can advise on how best to do this I will add them.

I also have some interesting shots of the Climax engine fitted in the back of the Shannon at the '66 BRitish Grand Prix. A very " special" looking car.

[MCS]

Welcome Mike!

Have a look at this thread for posting images...
http://forums.atlasf...?threadid=70638

[macoran]

Originally posted by mike21


I seem to be having a bit of trouble loading these to this post so if anyone can advise on how best to do this I will add them.

I also have some interesting shots of the Climax engine fitted in the back of the Shannon at the '66 BRitish Grand Prix. A very " special" looking car.

You might e-mail the pics to someone else to post for you ?

[Macca]

Welcome Mike.

Picures are quite easy, even for a dummy like me - you have to have the Internet open in two windows, then click on the 'Thumbnail Code' against 'Forums' next to the desired photo on your My Images page of Imageshack (one at a time) and paste onto the Reply page here - like this:



There are various other threads if you search under 'Pearce Martin' - look forward to seeing your pictures and hearing all about them.


Paul M

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by mike21
I know this response is belated but I have just joined the site.

I carried out a lot of research a few years ago on F1 specials - including the Pearce cars and the Shannon. I did intend to turn this research into a book - but business took me elsewhere.

I also have some interesting shots of the Climax engine fitted in the back of the Shannon at the '66 BRitish Grand Prix. A very " special" looking car.

Mike

Having owned the Shannon until very recently (this summer it joined several other Paul Emery cars in Austria), I'm very interested in anything you know about the Shannon (as would the new owner, I can forward anything to him) and to see any pictures you might have.

Peter

[GeorgeTheCar]

There is a Martin V8 in the Canadian Motortsport Hall of Fame Museum

What can you tell me about it?

[David Lawson]

Just in case anyone has it in their book collection there is a piece with several large photographs about the Shannon-Emery entitled "First time out" in a book, Grand Prix Gift Book which I bought for 12/6 in about 1967. It covers their entry for the 1966 British Gand Prix.

David

[mike21]

Thanks for advice on adding images. I have attached the Pearce ones. These came from the archives of LAT. If there is any objection to them being shared then I will remove them. Farcinating stuff.

Will post the Shannon ones seperately.

Mike

[mike21]

Originally posted by Peter Morley


Mike

Having owned the Shannon until very recently (this summer it joined several other Paul Emery cars in Austria), I'm very interested in anything you know about the Shannon (as would the new owner, I can forward anything to him) and to see any pictures you might have.

Peter

Peter

I do not have much information on the Shannon. However, I have posted a picture of the CLimax engine. Am I right that the car had a later career as an F3 racer. Do you have any pictures of the car in its current form?

I also had a copy of the "Grand Prix Gift Book" (where is it now?) which if I remeber rightly featured shots of Trevor Taylor actually driving the car.

Any one got any more information on these cars?

Also, I have a copy of Motor Racing featuring an interview with Ted Martin. If I can dig it out will add some more information.

Mike

[Huw Jadvantich]

I seem to remeber a hillclimb sports car called a Martin - any connection?

[macoran]

Originally posted by mike21


Peter

I do not have much information on the Shannon. However, I have posted a picture of the CLimax engine. Am I right that the car had a later career as an F3 racer. Do you have any pictures of the car in its current form?

Is this the engine known as Godiva ?

[Allen Brown]

No, no connection.

[Ray Bell]

It sure looks like it!

[mike21]

I always understoood that it was the CC Godiva engine project acquired by Paul Emery. The engine was increased in size to 3 litres to facilitate F1 entry in '66.

Here are a couple of quotes:

1. From "A-Z of Formula Racing Cars" (David Hodges):
"In 1966 form it was powered by one of the Coventry Climax FPE V-8s, which had originally been intended for the 2.5-litre formula a dozen years earlier but were never used in racing, and which had been acquired by Emery. He enlarged them and modified them to run on pump fuel, with Tecalemit fuel injection (apparently 312bhp was acieved on test)."

Another photo of the engine takenfrom this book:




2. From "Motor Racing Year 1966-7" (Motor Racing magazine annual):
".... and the Shannon monocoque powered by a stretched 3 litre version of the never raced 2.5 Climax V8"

Is this not so?

Mike

[mike21]

Back to the Pearce Cooper Ferrari. Just looked in Doug Nye's book "Cooper Cars".
He states:

"Chris Lawrence was last in the J.A.Pearce Cooper-Ferrari special, confected by levering an sohc Ferrari 250GT V12 engine into the rear of the old works F1-2-64 frames."

One comment I was given (by a source who was reluctant to expand) was that the frame was connected to one of the (2) cars burnt out in Phil Hill's 2 crashes at the '64 Austrian Grand Prix pracitice and race.

Any further thoughts on this?

Mike

[Macca]

I think Allen Brown's comment was in reply to Huw Jadvantich's query about the Martin sports car, rather than about the C-C Godiva engine.

Doug Nye posted a couple of photos (now deleted) in another thread, showing Trevor Taylor in the Shannon on the startline at Brands for the 1966 British GP, complete with the pannier tanks which had been added overnight - they were Geoff Goddard photos I believe.

The Shannon certainly did become an F3, I have a picture of it somewhere.

I don't know whether the 1964 Cooper crashed by Phil Hill was the one sold to Pearce - apparently there were 4 of the T73/T77 series built, of which one got a 3-litre ATS engine fitted in 1966 and was driven by Bonnier and Moser, and one was used in filming 'Grand Prix.

Anyway, it is said that the frame of the Pearce car survived the Silverstone fire and is being used as the basis of a 'restoration' by a firm called Jacob Ltd.

Have you talked to Chris Lawrence? I could PM you his contact details.

And I still have my original 'Grand Prix Gift Book', not to mention the 1967 copy of 'Motor Racing' with an article by Doug Nye about Ted Martin, and a 1990 Classic Cars with an interview with Ted.


Paul M

[macoran]

Originally posted by mike21

Anyone know the exhaust setup ? were a certain two exhausts twinned ?

Looking at the photo in Huw's post a few posts up it looks as if 1 and 2 might be paired just
where the pipes are blocked from view by the rear wheel.

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by Macca
I think Allen Brown's comment was in reply to Huw Jadvantich's query about the Martin sports car, rather than about the C-C Godiva engine.....

Ahhh... sigh of relief, didn't expect Allen to be that far off beam!

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by macoran


Anyone know the exhaust setup ? were a certain two exhausts twinned ?

Looking at the photo in Huw's post a few posts up it looks as if 1 and 2 might be paired just
where the pipes are blocked from view by the rear wheel.

The photo that Doug posted sometime ago showed the exhausts more clearly (I daren't post it for copyright reasons, but maybe Doug will do so).
There are 4 pipes, but the 2nd one in from the outside is shorter than the others.

By the British GP they had also been flared at the ends - no idea if it is a different system or just an improved version.

The Grand Prix Gift book has a lot of photos of the car, taken at the British Grand Prix test day, when (according to the book) Trevor Taylor broke the existing F1 lap record in the Shannon. Given that engine sizes had doubled for the 1966 season that probably wasn't as impressive as it sounds!

A lot of the GP Gift book photos are in colour, it would be great to find out where they came from and obtain full size prints - a lot of them are thumbnail size. But no one seems to know anything about the producers of the gift book!

The engine was known as the Coventry Climax Godiva V8, but is more correctly the FPE, Emery stretched it to 3 litres and converted it to run on petrol - it produced something like 312 BHp on Chrysler's dyno at Kew.

The burnt out Pearce cars look pretty bad - hard to tell how many cars but there are at least 2 different sets of brakes discs, fortunately modern restoration techniques are so good that in (almost) the words of the 6 Million Dollar man "we can rebuild them"..............

[macoran]

Originally posted by Peter Morley
Having owned the Shannon until very recently
Peter

As an owner I presume you must have some pics you might share with us Peter ?

Thanks for the info in your other posts.

[mike21]

Anyway, it is said that the frame of the Pearce car survived the Silverstone fire and is being used as the basis of a 'restoration' by a firm called Jacob Ltd.

Have you talked to Chris Lawrence? I could PM you his contact details.

How recently was the restoration said to have been taking place? A BIG job!

I did not get to talk to Chris Lawrence. I had a contact for him being based in Los Angeles running a tuning firm out there at the time.

Mike

[mike21]

Just dug out some old Autosports and got some J.A.Pearce ads. Interesting to see what was available, particularly the cars.

Mike

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by macoran


As an owner I presume you must have some pics you might share with us Peter ?

Thanks for the info in your other posts.

Here are a few recent photos from the Grand Prix Gift Book:











Here are some photos from when I collected the Shannon:





And to show a Pearce connection - here is one of the wheels:

[macoran]

Posting for bradbury west as he's off to OZ



taken at the HSCC event at Donington in 91 for 25yrs of the 3 litre F1 rules

[macoran]

Might be a good time to put the Shannon stuff on its own thread now.

[Gerr]

Peter Morley wrote: "And to show a Pearce connection - here is one of the wheels:"

Sorry Peter, no connection. That is a LeGrand wheel, not one of J.A.Pearce's.

[Macca]

Here's a link to the Jacob Engineering website which mentions the ex-Pearce Cooper:

http://www.jacobengi...uk/services.htm

Other relevant threads:-

http://forums.autosp...&threadid=74730

http://forums.autosp...&threadid=57305

http://forums.autosp...=&threadid=8087



Paul M

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by Gerr
Peter Morley wrote: "And to show a Pearce connection - here is one of the wheels:"

Sorry Peter, no connection. That is a LeGrand wheel, not one of J.A.Pearce's.

That's good to know.
Who made LeGrand wheels?
Thank you
Peter
p.s. it's a bit late for a Shannon thread, now I've sold it I don't need to know more about it!

[mike21]

Originally posted by Peter Morley


That's good to know.
Who made LeGrand wheels?
Thank you
Peter
p.s. it's a bit late for a Shannon thread, now I've sold it I don't need to know more about it!

Great to see the photos of the car and also the pictures from the 'Grand Prix Gift Book'.

Were LeGrand wheels connected to Max Le Grand who made the LeGrand F3 cars of the late 60's? If I remember correctly the company was U.S. based and at least one was entered over here. They were very light cars for European F3 events.

Mike

[Vitesse2]

Originally posted by Peter Morley

A lot of the GP Gift book photos are in colour, it would be great to find out where they came from and obtain full size prints - a lot of them are thumbnail size. But no one seems to know anything about the producers of the gift book!

Young World were at that time an independent publisher. In the early 70s they were absorbed by Thomas Nelson - in turn part of International Thomson - and became Nelson Young World.

At this distance I doubt that even if you could find any of the original Young World staff - and there are probably no records of them extant - anyone would remember anything!

[Gerr]

Red LeGrand was the name not Max.

Some info here:

http://sports.racer....and/history.htm

[mike21]

Originally posted by Gerr
Red LeGrand was the name not Max.

Some info here:

http://sports.racer....and/history.htm

Yes, my mistake.

I am sure I remeber references in period copies of Sports Car Graphic. Also I can remember a photo of the car Bruce Eglinton was going to drive in something like "Pit and Paddock" in Autosport. B&W photos, but looking distinctly like a version of U.S. racing colours of white with blue stripe and trim.

Mike

[Macca]

As has been mentioned on another thread, C&SC this month has an article about Ted Martin, still happily engineering at 84!

There are some interesting comment in relation to John Pearce, including "rat-faced", "scrap dealer", "with big dogs and big men who scared us"...............

Also a couple of comments regarding Chris Lawrence's Brands testing crash in the Pearce-Martin F1 a few days before the 1967 Int. Trophy and the transporter fire in the Silverstone paddock.........

Paul M

[jdtreelines]

The third Pearce was then built and was consumed in the fire along with the Cooper and the prototype.

When I arrived in the Silverstone paddock the following morning, mechanics from various other teams were all discussing the fact that although plenty of badly burned and even partially melted parts and spares were visible in the wreckage - there was not a single spanner or other tool to be seen. The conclusion that most people had come to was that the Pearce mechanics had removed their toolboxes from the transporter before the fire.

The inference they drew from that conclusion was that the fire was premeditated..

[Bloggsworth]

I seem to recall that the Shannon, in F3 guise, was taken over the edge of the Avus banking in a similar fashion to that of Jean Behra, fortunately without the same consequence. I also have a feeling that I have A) seen it and touched it as it were, and B) that the monocoque was fabricated in steel rather than aluminium - But it's probably just my failing memory.

Paddy also makes an appearance in "The Ausper Story" - I have no idea where he is now, I only met him once at the house of a step-cousin about 40 years ago.

I assume that this PEARCE was no relation to the putative F5000, but mostly F.Libre car; which bore more than a passing resemblance to a Lotus 24; that would regularly appear at Brands Hatch with a Ford V8 in the back, for the life of me I can't remember the driver's name, I'm pretty sure that also running in those FL races was Tiny Littler.

Told you my memory was faulty - It was the Kincraft driven by Jack Pearce.... I knew there was a Pearce in there somewhere.

Edited by Bloggsworth, 21 November 2010 - 18:28.