The unsung heroes with greasy hands and no sleep

The #7 tallies with 1971. This was the first race appearance for the side-radiatored TS9B, but it suffered from overheating and was converted back to a front radiator layout for the race.

Image unattributed
 

 

Unless I'm very much mistaken, there's Bob Mills tending to the TS9, Rob Walker in the apricot chinos and John Surtees gloving up at Monza, 71 or 72....

Very casual!  Compare that with todays view. Rough dirty lane, Mechanics in work overalls, Sponsors wandering around,,, and a clutch of last nights [at least I hope] empty beer cans in the pit box.

 

"Robert Mills (I know him as Robert) retired from Ilmor Inc. last year. He's one of the best machinists I've had the privilege to work with and I learned a huge amount from him. A true gentleman."

Patrick Morgan mentioning Bob after his 2013 retirement, Bob's motorsport career spanned some 5 decades, in addition to Elfins and Surtees, he also spent considerable time working for Count Van Der Straten and in/for the Penske stable on Ilmor engines amongst others. 

Edited by SJ Lambert, 06 September 2015 - 08:41.

I'd like to think those are oil cans!

How many of these heroes of the past are alive and well?

With 18 mechanics per car just for a pit stop, the list would be significantly longer for modern teams than for the late Bob Anderson's Brabham BT11. I don't know how many mechanic(s) he had but the team and his car fitted into his VW Kombi...as seen here

With 18 mechanics per car just for a pit stop, the list would be significantly longer for modern teams than for the late Bob Anderson's Brabham BT11. I don't know how many mechanic(s) he had but the team and his car fitted into his VW Kombi...as seen here

 

Either I've gone blind or dense or you forgot the photo, but dying to see… Viva la Kombi!

There are a couple of photos of the Brabham mounted on the Kombi in Mark Bisset’s Primotipo article on Bob:

https://www.google.c...t11-climax/amp/

... and here’s Pete Lovely’s similarly-mounted Lotus 49 parked next to a rather larger car mover:

http://www.hardtuned...us49VWTrans.jpg

Whoops! My link disappeared, but thanks for posting Tim - that was the very photo I had! Somewhere in my archives I may have some slides of Bob's car from 1966/67.

Back then the mechanic was 50% of the team but today he seems to be lost in the crowd of modern technology that takes the glory away

Looking back at the privateer racer 1950/early 60s Which more often than not Driver & mechanic/gofor my involvement was "helper" to Philip Robinson through his Motor cycle 500F3 F jnr & F1 days 54/63were a max of 2 helpers was the norm the present F1 teams have 8 guys just for the wheel changes  I think the old days the racers & others had happier times

... the present F1 teams have 8 guys just for the wheel changes  I think the old days the racers & others had happier times

Edited by 2F-001, 01 May 2018 - 11:17.

Looking back at the privateer racer 1950/early 60s Which more often than not Driver & mechanic/gofor my involvement was "helper" to Philip Robinson through his Motor cycle 500F3 F jnr & F1 days 54/63were a max of 2 helpers was the norm the present F1 teams have 8 guys just for the wheel changes  I think the old days the racers & others had happier times

A comparison



 

It's interesting to see that at Indianapolis only 4 pit crew were allowed "over the wall" and took 67 seconds to change 2 tyres.
By way of comparison, the prewar Mercedes and Auto Union teams with hand tools but no limit on personnel numbers would take about 20 seconds if all went well.

Edited by D-Type, 02 May 2018 - 18:43.

This topic reminds me of a great quote from Peter Warr's Book "Team Lotus-My View From the Pit Wall". Speaking of racing mechanics:

"But, most remarkably, they had a way of dealing with everything that was thrown at them with intelligence, intuition, versatility, experience, application and never failing good humor. And yet none has a cabinet of medals recording their successes. They should have".

Amen to that.

How many of them are still around us?

I recall going to work at Delemare Road at 8AM in April '64, and being told by Trevor Shan to report to Team Lotus, where I was introduced to the bare tub of a Lotus 38. I left at 2AM on the Friday morning after 66 hours (minus meal breaks of course). When checking my pay packet the following week, I thought I was well short of what I should have had, bearing in mind that 55 hours were effectively overtime, only to be told that at 8AM every morning we went back onto normal time... Don't recall a cross word during the whole time, with the exception of a tantrum from Chapman at about sparrow's fart on the Thursday morning.

Go to work Tuesday, come home Thursday (and that was just the build team!)

Cross populating on another of my own threads but I'm currently about three quarters of the way through writing Beaky Sims autobiography, take a look at www.beakysims.com

As I was reading through this thread I thought I'd add that "Beaky" Sims was still active in racing as of a very few years ago, and then came across your post.  He worked for a number of years (and may still) for Giuseppe Risi's Risi Competizione in Houston, Texas.  That team raced Ferraris: 333 SPs in the late 1990s, 360/430/458/488 GTs since about 2000 (including a LeMans GT2 class win at LeMans in 2009.  Risi also ran a team in the North American Ferrari Challenge since it began in 1994, but I don't recall Beaky ever being involved in that program.

Somewhere I have a very nice booklet on the Hesketh team, with Beaky pictured in it.

Gary, when might the book be available?

Cynic2, thanks for your note. Beaky's manuscript is now to all intents and purposes finished. We were looking for a publisher but after the 'success' of my book we may now self publish instead. We have an absolute ton of photos and memorabilia to go through before we really finish so it's probably looking like the end of the year, hopefully. Keep an eye on the website or the Facebook page for the latest news.

Your deadline must be the end of October so you get the Christmas present sales.