135 replies to this topic

[Giraffe]

Thankyou Red Socks. That is probably why it is nominally a P67? I am trying to discover which car I saw in Yorkshire, and am hoping to speak with the museum's curator later today.

[Alan Cox]

Taken from a French forum

La voiture qui a appartenu à David Piper (#003) a été exposée pendant quelques années au « Skopos Motor Museum », à Batley (West Yorkshire – GB). Piper l’aurait revendue à Alan Mann (2008)

Make of that what you will

[Giraffe]

#003 when there were supposedly only ever 2?!?! Earlier, we have Piper's F3L (P67?!?!) tagged as #002? And what became of the P69???

[Stephen W]

#003 when there were supposedly only ever 2?!?! Earlier, we have Piper's F3L (P67?!?!) tagged as #002? And what became of the P69???

If we want to get into speculation .....

1) Alan Mann's concern may have built at least one spare tub.
2) Maybe P69 was converted to a P68 seeing as the P69 never raced!

[Giraffe]

If we want to get into speculation .....

1) Alan Mann's concern may have built at least one spare tub.
2) Maybe P69 was converted to a P68 seeing as the P69 never raced!

Great mind think alike Stephen! However, I'm trying to avoid speculation and deal with "facts Hercule!".

The ex-Piper car would seem to be the remnants of the car crashed by Irwin put back together and developed with many mods that current owner John Young is trying to eliminate and restore the car to as near original. The d'Amsembourg is also being restored in Belgium, but was near original. The P69 was scrapped by Alan Mann.
I now need only confirm which car resided in Batley, which I hope to do today.

[Giraffe]

Having spoken to the Skopos Motor Museum in Batley, they have no record nor can remember who the P68 they had in belonged to!!! The only clue that they could give me was that soon after leaving the museum, the car was raced and crashed heavily. That rings a bell with me......

[June han]

Hi there,

I would like to try to contribute to the sketchy history of the F3L's. Many htings are known, thanks to this forum, but there are still some blanks. After gathering all the information on this website, plus what I do know, here is what I can say or add... especially about 003
It is definitely not garanteed that the chassis numbers are corrects, mistakes might have been made, maybee for a long time, but this is still another topic, and a very complicated one...

001 - As agreed by most, crashed by Irwin, then dismantled, and recuparated by Piper for spares. looking at the pictures of the crash, only few part could be saved (at best). Piper then created an F3L maybee using some of the parts... The only question for this car is whether Piper continuation F3l can claim the 001 chassis number or if it is just a continuation with some parts Irwin's car. This F3L can be recorgnized because it was designed a bit longer than the original F3L, and Piper made a few changes to improve the car. Driven for some time by J. Baker (rented or leased from Piper)... Seen in many historic events including Goodwood in 2007.

002 - One of the two cars sold by Wheatcroft, New zealand to Gavin Bain, the Cummings (Australia), article in 1996 driven by Surtees, then article in 2003 in Motorsport. As said in this forum, belongs now to Christophe d'Ansembourg who race it for historic events. no misunderstanding on this one.

003- the other car sold by Wheatcroft to Piper who kept it a long time. People know that Piper had two F3L, this one and the "001"continuation (longer), but because the original has rarely be seen for more than 10 years, the continuation is sometimes mistaken for the 003. Back to the real 003 (even though like I said the chassis numbers are not so cristal clear) ,it was seen on display in Paris Pantin in 1991 (saw pics on another forum), then used in the early 90's by Piper along with Hobbs, Attwood, and Knight for the opening of a new racetrack in Japan: IT Aida (host of the Pacific GP F1 in 1994-1995). The corners of the racetrack were named after them. Piper then sold the car through a dealership in Marseille, France to its current owner, a French collectionner Mr Fabre. I saw the car at "Le mas du clos" racetrack of Mr Bardinon, and took pictures (but don't know how to post them). The car looked very original, and had a nice fight with a modern lola. The car is raley seen since (not to say never).

I hope I didn't get some of you more confused, but at least I filled the blanks on a missing F3L...

[bradbury west]

" racetrack of Mr Bardinon, and took pictures (but don't know how to post them). The car looked very original,

I am sure that we all thank you for your detailed information
There are many people on TNF who will help you to post your photographs, which will be most welcome.
Roger Lund

[EDWARD FITZGERALD]

IIRC , Competition Car magazine carried a photo of a tub on a scrapheap, will go to my library (storage ) this week and check.

[June han]

Question to Giraffe:

You mention that the F3L in the Skopos Motor Museum in Batley museum, had a big crash, and that apparently it rings a bell with you... do you have any information about that crash?

[Giraffe]

Question to Giraffe:

You mention that the F3L in the Skopos Motor Museum in Batley museum, had a big crash, and that apparently it rings a bell with you... do you have any information about that crash?

Can't be of much help, I'm afraid. The guys at Skopos were aware it had been badly crashed after it left them, and that triggered a memory of a report IIRC in Autosport that it had been extensively damaged in private testing.

[Neil Smith]

Hi

for those following this thread, I found the following :

http://www.gt40s.com...avid-piper.html

It's 5 pages, goes into some interesting stuff about the Piper car and it also tells the story of a guy in Austria who is building a replica P68...

cheers

Neil

[Alan Cox]

....it also tells the story of a guy in Austria who is building a replica P68...

Neil

That looks like a fantastic piece of work by Leopold Figl

[MCS]

Can't be of much help, I'm afraid. The guys at Skopos were aware it had been badly crashed after it left them, and that triggered a memory of a report IIRC in Autosport that it had been extensively damaged in private testing.

Tony, is the car still there?

I passed a sign for the museum the other day and thought little of it. Had I known what was there I would have made a quick detour on my way back to the motorway.

[Giraffe]

I visited the Skopos Museum today (more to appear on the museums thread in good time) and spoke with the Canadian curator. He insists that the car was badly crashed shortly after it's couple of years sojurn there. An off-duty employee kindly located the Loan Agreement for me, and I now have a copy. It arrived there on 11th November 1996, and was owned at the time by Richard Thwaites and recorded as chassis No.1000 ?!?! & valued at £500,000
I now have Richard's contact details, so more to follow soon, hopefully..............

Edited by Giraffe, 24 October 2009 - 22:00.

[June han]

Wow, really impressive work Giraffe, congratulations... if it was recorded chassis 1000, then it's the one belonging now to DAsembourg... Do you know when the car left the museum?

[Giraffe]

Wow, really impressive work Giraffe, congratulations... if it was recorded chassis 1000, then it's the one belonging now to DAsembourg... Do you know when the car left the museum?

I'm now making some progress on this, although the actual timings are yet to be confirmed, but will be in due course. I have spoken this morning to Jamie Thwaites, son of Richard who now resides in Malta. The car was purchased from Tom Wheatcroft (Jamie remembers as a schoolboy going with his dad to collect it from Donington), and a 250F went to Tom in part exchange! All dates will be confirmed by Jamie once he has spoken to his dad later today.
I know from the copy of the loan agreement that I have that the car went to the Skopos Museum in Batley on 11th November 1996, and I am trying to establish from Jamie how long it stayed there, but it went from there to Hall & Fowler (as they were at the time) for restoration and it was after this that it was crashed by non other than Barrie Williams in testing at Silverstone, resulting in extensive frontal damage. I am trying to confirm that upon rectification, it then went to Belgium. I have been promised a phonecall later today, so more hopefully to follow...............

Edited by Giraffe, 29 October 2009 - 12:19.

[Giraffe]

With the kind assistance of Jamie Thwaites, I have received an e-mail from his father Richard, now resident in Malta. It makes interesting reading, so I am copying it here verbatum...........

Hi Tony / Giraffe,
Jamie passed on your enquiry regarding my F3L. As I now live in Malta and my records are in the UK please forgive me if some of the dates are a little vague. I think it is a good idea to set the records straight as obviously there are many misconceptions regarding the cars.
Circa 1988 I swopped my Maserati 250F CM1 for the Ford with Ian Cummins. He is either an Australian or a New Zealander who at the time was working as the curator of Tom Wheatcrofts museum. He bought the car from Gavin Bain who had done the deal with Tom regarding the Alfa Bimotor. The car was stored in the basement of Toms museum.
When I bought the car it was totally original but minus engine and Tom Wheatcroft supplied the Hewland DG 300 gearbox which had been a spare when he ran Roger Williamsom in a F1 March. I am sure the car is the one that raced in the 1968 BOAC 500 as the bodywork is identicle to the race pictures and the car came with solid discs. I believe David Pipers original car is the one that was built after Irwins crash and subsequently raced in the 1969 Boac 500. My car did not have the holes in the alloy rear bodywork for the wing supports, nor were there any signs of welded patches. When I bought the car the chassis No. 1000 was dynotaped on the dashboard, I believe this was original as it was exactly the same faded dynotape as the labelling for all the switches. I had the car restored by Hall + Fowler 1994-96 and subsequently took the car to a demonstration at Nurgurgring ( I think it was to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Porsche winning at Le Mans with the 917).
John Surtees tested the car at Silverstone for Classic Car and then I put the car in the Skopos Museum in Batley late 1996.
Just under two years later in October, Barrie Williams was testing the car at Silverstone when he aquaplaned on the river at Abbey and went straight on and whilst bouncing over the grass the nose lip dug into the turf and damaged the nose, the radiater and the radiater mountings.
Eventually had the car repaired and it was sold to I believe a Belgian by Gregor Fisken (Gregor never told me who had bought it).
With regard to the engine problems in 1968 which were mainly bearings, when we restored the car we found a major design fault with the oil tank.
Whilst the oil was collected from the bottom of the tank, the outlet piipe came out of the top of the tank and the over the monocoque before going down to the oil pump. The oil had to be sucked up about 18 inches and I believe that with the thick oils that were used at that time, it caused cavitation in the oil pump which led to bearing failure. We changed the oil tank so the pipe came out of the bottom of the tank and did not have any problems.
The Piper continuation car has nothing to with Ford F3L history. No part of the car is original and it only looks like a Ford F3L because it has a fibreglass replica body with about 10 inches added on the engine cover to cover the extended wheelbase.
Hope this information is helpful.
Best regards
Richard Thwaites

Edited by Giraffe, 04 November 2009 - 07:53.

[Peter Morley]

I heard a story that just before the last crash (e.g. late 80s) the sale of one of these cars had been agreed with the Rosso Bianco collection.
The price crash meant the museum tried to back out of the deal but they could not do so.
The seller apparently got to keep the car and was awarded more than enough money to have it fully restored.

Edited by Peter Morley, 03 November 2009 - 12:10.

[Pedro 917]

Here's some correspondence I had with Alex who's currently building a replica of the P68 :

8 July 2008 :

Dear Sir,

my name is Alex F., I am from Austria and currently live in Munich.
I have seen, that you have posted some very interesting photos of the Ford P68 in the Atlas F1 Bulletin Forum. By that I mean the pictures of the bare chassis. I would be very interested to see these pictures in better resolution, or even, if possible, some more of them.

We are currently working on a remake of the P68. I have already collected a bunch of photos from our project to send to you. Unfortunately in this standard form from the forum you cannot attach pictures, but I will send them to you when you give me your mail address. I just wanted to show you what we are working on and in which quality we are doing this.

At the moment we have our set of CNC machined moulds for the whole body done, and I am further processing with the optimization of the monocoque. We want everything to look as original as possible, but unfortunately I just have detailed pictures of the Piper monocoque, which is different than the original one from the cockpit backwards.

That is why I would very appreciate it to see some more of your photographs.
With the best regards,

Alex

9 July 2008 :

Dear Luc,

thank you very much for the photos. That is a whole lot of unreplaceable information for me.
I added a set of pictures that covers our work with the body. At the moment I'm concentrating on getting the monocoque design right, and I think it will take me another two months or so until the first aluminium sheets are cut. Our engine is being built at the moment, the gearbox is already waiting.
Well as far as the racing goes, I don't know, what my financer is planning. All I can say as the engineer is that the car will be developed to withstand all the racing loads, and I hope I can give it some benefits, which the original didn't have (i.e. monocoque topology optimized)

Ah, before I forget: I only have very few and very bad photos of the original dashboard. As far as I know, the d'Ansembourg car still has the original one fitted. If you have pictures of it, it would help me a lot if you could show them to me. Sorry for troubling you, but you seem like a source for F3l photos like nobody else...

I hope the pictures I attached are explaining,

thanks a lot again,

best regards,

Alex

Pictures :


Body


Main front mould


Main tail mould


Center mould


Main front (ready)


Main tail (ready)


Center honeycomb layup

Edited by Pedro 917, 28 January 2010 - 10:10.

[Pedro 917]

7 January 2009 :

During the last few days our F3L project made a lot of practical progress (the designing takes a lot of time, too..), so my father and me wanted to send you some pictures of it.
We finished mouldmaking and, more importantly, finished the sideparts, centerpart and tail of the car. The ply-layup took us really a lot of time, due to the honeycombs (it requires three steps, everyone finished by vacuum forming) we introduced. The tail for example (inclusive bulkheads and fittings) took us 132 man-hours to manufacture (the mouldmaking is of course not included in this number). But, as you will assume, it payed off:
• sideparts 1.55 / 1.6kg (3.4 / 3.5lbs)
• center part 1.9kg (4.2lbs)
• tail 12.1kg (26.7lbs)
Well, thats all I can tell at the moment.

Pictures :


Windscreen check


Weight


Honeycomb layup


Vacuum


Fitting bulkheads


Tail


Tail 2


Tail weight

[Pedro 917]

26 July 2009 :

Although we had quite some delay with the F3L project, we got some success during the last few days. As I finished my other vocational tasks, I had some time for fabrication since the end of june. So the last and most striking part of the body is done now: The front end. As I don't want to draw too much on your time, just some keywords:
• complete piece fabricated in one shot (no glueing in of extra pieces after demoulding, etc).
• 11 mould pieces for this part
• fabrication time about 100 man hours
• 6.2kg/13.9lbs weight (less bulkheads at headlights, but with all the composite nuts and fittings)
• demoulding took us 7 hours (no joke, this was a nightmare, just like the plylayup, too).
Well, I hope the pictures are better than my description.

With all the best regards from Austria,
Rudolf & Alex

Pictures :

Edited by Pedro 917, 28 January 2010 - 10:07.

[Pedro 917]

5 October 2009 :

My father and me had the opportunity to take some pictures of the finished body parts as we were cleaning out the shop. Well, this was a month ago.. sorry for the delay.
Here some pictures of this - don't be too critical on the gaps, they look awful on the pictures because we just assembled the parts very loosely. In reality they do fit perfectly.
Anyway, we are currently cranking on the design of the monocoque, I am sure it will take some time (delay seems to be my middle name ), but I will keep you updated.

All the best from Carinthia,

Rudolf & Alex

Edited by Pedro 917, 28 January 2010 - 10:07.

[June han]

I'm now making some progress on this, although the actual timings are yet to be confirmed, but will be in due course. I have spoken this morning to Jamie Thwaites, son of Richard who now resides in Malta. The car was purchased from Tom Wheatcroft (Jamie remembers as a schoolboy going with his dad to collect it from Donington), and a 250F went to Tom in part exchange! All dates will be confirmed by Jamie once he has spoken to his dad later today.
I know from the copy of the loan agreement that I have that the car went to the Skopos Museum in Batley on 11th November 1996, and I am trying to establish from Jamie how long it stayed there, but it went from there to Hall & Fowler (as they were at the time) for restoration and it was after this that it was crashed by non other than Barrie Williams in testing at Silverstone, resulting in extensive frontal damage. I am trying to confirm that upon rectification, it then went to Belgium. I have been promised a phonecall later today, so more hopefully to follow...............

On the answer to you from Richard Twaithes, i noted something, he refered to his car as Chassis n°1001, (the dymo on the car). His answer was very interesting and detailed, so I print a copy to read it. The paper is in front of me and says Chassis n° 1001! however, when i look now to the same post on the forum, it's now written chassis 1000! did you make a correction on the chassis number? was it Twaithes who made a mistake, and then sent you a correction? Im a bit (totally) lost, but I saved his answer, and he originally refered to 1001...

[Giraffe]

As e-mailed to me by Richard Thwaites early on the morning of November 4th......




Hi Tony,
After sleeping on it, I gave you the wrong chassis No.
The correct No. is 1000


.....I then edited the post accordingly.

Edited by Giraffe, 10 November 2009 - 11:53.

[June han]

Good, it means i'm not halucinating... one question though, it seems that Twaithes car (now D'Ansembourg) wearing dymo 1000 is the car that raced with chasssis number 002. How to make the connection between 1000 and 002? It looks like there have been chassis 1000, 1001, 1002 but for racing they were labeled 001, 002, 003. So, if one follows that path, then: 1000= 001, 1001= 002, 1002= 003. However that doesn't match for Twaithes's car. If 1000 still exists, then it must be chassis 1001 that was destroyed in Irwin's crash, and chassis 1002 the last car (003). They might have switched cars for some reason in Nurburgring 1968, and that was the 002 not the 001 that was destroyed, but this is just a guess...
,

[Andy Somerton]

I see the ex David Piper P68 is now for sale at Coys with the following claim
Chassis Number: F3L/002
The on offer from Coys under Private Treat is the Nurburgring car, Chassis No: F3L/002 and comes direct from Alan Mann Racing.
According to the vendor, when the P68 programme was retired after only one season, the damaged Nurburgring car was returned to Alan Mann Racing headquarters in Byfleet, where it was laid up and stored for many years. In latter years, after Alan Mann Racing had closed its doors on motorsport, designer Len Bailey took control of the damaged car and a project to return it to the circuits was undertaken by respected Le Mans driver, David Piper. The rebuilt car was run by David Piper in several historic races before Alan Mann bought back the rebuilt car.
In true Alan Mann style – the car was entrusted to AMR's original chief mechanic, Brian Lewis, who undertook a complete revision of the previous restoration. The Cosworth DFV was rebuilt by Nicholson McLaren and the transaxle was totally overhauled by Hewland, New front and rear uprights were fabricated for the car in accordance to FIA regulations. Since being rebuilt for Alan Mann, the car has raced at the Silverstone Classic (John Young) and has been demonstrated at the Goodwood Festival of Speed (Rupert Keegan) and the Goodwood Revival meeting (Henry Mann, Brian Lewis, Richard Atwood). After seeing the revived P68 F3L/2 in action Alan Mann commented “It's now faster than it ever was”.
Here is an opportunity to acquire an unique piece of motorsport history with a remarkable pedigree – direct from the original team owner - Provenance doesn't get much better than this!

Does this agree with what has previously been discussed as it has been stated that the Piper car was a recreation?

regards

Andy

Edited by Andy Somerton, 13 February 2012 - 16:36.

[arttidesco]

I see the ex David Piper P68 is now for sale at Coys with the following claim
Chassis Number: F3L/002
The on offer from Coys under Private Treat is the Nurburgring car, Chassis No: F3L/002 and comes direct from Alan Mann Racing.
According to the vendor, when the P68 programme was retired after only one season, the damaged Nurburgring car was returned to Alan Mann Racing headquarters in Byfleet, where it was laid up and stored for many years. In latter years, after Alan Mann Racing had closed its doors on motorsport, designer Len Bailey took control of the damaged car and a project to return it to the circuits was undertaken by respected Le Mans driver, David Piper. The rebuilt car was run by David Piper in several historic races before Alan Mann bought back the rebuilt car.
In true Alan Mann style – the car was entrusted to AMR's original chief mechanic, Brian Lewis, who undertook a complete revision of the previous restoration. The Cosworth DFV was rebuilt by Nicholson McLaren and the transaxle was totally overhauled by Hewland, New front and rear uprights were fabricated for the car in accordance to FIA regulations. Since being rebuilt for Alan Mann, the car has raced at the Silverstone Classic (John Young) and has been demonstrated at the Goodwood Festival of Speed (Rupert Keegan) and the Goodwood Revival meeting (Henry Mann, Brian Lewis, Richard Atwood). After seeing the revived P68 F3L/2 in action Alan Mann commented “It's now faster than it ever was”.
Here is an opportunity to acquire an unique piece of motorsport history with a remarkable pedigree – direct from the original team owner - Provenance doesn't get much better than this!

Does this agree with what has previously been discussed as it has been stated that the Piper car was a recreation?

regards

Andy

See post #25 and post #85

[Alan Cox]

http://www.coys.co.u...php?itemID=1391

[eldougo]

Found i SCW magazine july 1969.

http://imgur.com/4aIre
http://imgur.com/AHGlA

Edited by eldougo, 19 February 2012 - 08:26.

[small block]

Found i SCW magazine july 1969.

http://imgur.com/4aIre
http://imgur.com/AHGlA

Great find Eldougo!

I'd be very interested in reading the article that goes with the photos if you can post it.

[eldougo]

A 2 page artical of the above car.
http://imgur.com/70BX9
http://imgur.com/ddTto

Edited by eldougo, 20 February 2012 - 05:22.

[small block]

A 2 page artical of the above car.
http://imgur.com/70BX9
http://imgur.com/ddTto

Thanks Eldougo!

[group7]

Just came across this short clip of testing of the P68 !

 

 

 

Mike (group7)

[Emery0323]

Just came across this short clip of testing of the P68 !

 

 

 

Mike (group7)

Great footage!    Is that Mike Spence in the gold helmet?

[MCS]

Looks like Spence, but isn't the initial action sequence quite eerie?

 

The Alan Mann website continues to incorporate some terrific images I have just noticed:  http://www.alanmann.co.uk/