Elfin 300 tyres
#51
Posted 24 October 2014 - 05:13
#54
Posted 19 November 2014 - 04:15
When was it taken?
#55
Posted 19 November 2014 - 19:24
Around 2008.
#57
Posted 16 August 2016 - 12:18
Edited by SJ Lambert, 28 April 2018 - 12:57.
#58
Posted 16 August 2016 - 22:23
#59
Posted 16 August 2016 - 22:45
They trounce Lotus 23s!
#61
Posted 17 August 2016 - 01:51
It's just a shame more weren't built. But a good thing that this one was retrieved from the USA.
#62
Posted 17 August 2016 - 06:18
My favorite Elfin.
Dale.
#64
Posted 23 August 2016 - 17:42
Hope so, she's way too purty to stay so impeccable. ;-)
#65
Posted 23 August 2016 - 20:57
Just as soon as someone finishes off the fibreglass body work so that aluminium nose & tail can come off!
#66
Posted 24 August 2016 - 04:40
Such a great looking car James! Still looks as fresh as when Mike Bruce rolled it out at Symmons for its first run on Tassy soil in 1969. Alan Ling's Lotus 23 (one of my favourite cars back then) looked quite dated by comparison. My dad took a colour shot of it coming around past the control tower where you can just about make out what it is - blur, camera shake, light leak in his Hanimette rangefinder - the whole bit! I can't bring myself to chuck it out though...
#67
Posted 24 August 2016 - 05:08
#68
Posted 24 August 2016 - 06:19
Not really Eric! And I think I can feel my old man turning uncomfortably in his grave, but what the hell - it was a cheap camera..... His later shots with better gear were a lot better!
#69
Posted 24 August 2016 - 06:31
Such a great looking car James! Still looks as fresh as when Mike Bruce rolled it out at Symmons for its first run on Tassy soil in 1969. Alan Ling's Lotus 23 (one of my favourite cars back then) looked quite dated by comparison. My dad took a colour shot of it coming around past the control tower where you can just about make out what it is - blur, camera shake, light leak in his Hanimette rangefinder - the whole bit! I can't bring myself to chuck it out though...
Our 300 is the Holbay down draft engined prototype, Mike Bruce's 300 was a subsequent Twin Cam powered fibreglass bodied car ( that still looked mighty fine).
The prototype went to New York from new after a single shakedown at Mallala when Garrie and Kevin Bartlett both assessed it. Not being in front of my records I can't say for sure, but I imagine the Bruce 300 was initially a Mal Ramsay car!
#70
Posted 24 August 2016 - 06:43
Way to go, Lindsay! (and to keeping it, some memories are wholly res-independent) :-)Not really Eric! And I think I can feel my old man turning uncomfortably in his grave, but what the hell - it was a cheap camera..... His later shots with better gear were a lot better!
#71
Posted 24 August 2016 - 07:19
Too true Eric........ Yes the Bruce car was ex Ramsey with T/C Ford James.
#72
Posted 25 August 2016 - 04:32
It still shows those lovely lines and brings back memories.
#73
Posted 29 August 2016 - 09:42
#75
Posted 22 July 2017 - 08:13
Reading that text,, the CAMS insistence on spare wheels. And where is the spare on all those historics,, it is supposed to be as raced!
It also happened with the Production cars. I can remember watching a smaller class driver [Datto 1200?] changing a tyre somewhere near the cutting with the also required jack and wheelbrace.
Just imagine that happening now!
#77
Posted 22 July 2017 - 09:27
I'm inclined to think that it was Garrie's greatest legacy...
It's just a shame more weren't built. But a good thing that this one was retrieved from the USA.
Seconded!!!
(I do admit, I'm a teeny weeny bit biased, but that doesn't matter!!!)
#79
Posted 22 July 2017 - 21:07
They were well-built, very quick and looked right. As I have said before, definitely a favourite of mine.
#81
Posted 07 December 2017 - 19:08
When Mike Bruce first bought the Elfin 300, he and Bruce Gowans (in Alan Ling's Lotus 23 T/C) had some cracking battles, with Bruce even having a spin in the Esses at Bask during one of those - unheard of! I'd never seen Bruce have any sort of "moment" before. The first shot is early '69 with Bruce G on pole at Baskerville. 2nd shot is later in the year at the Cambridge Trophy (Cambridge were a cigarette brand at the time trying to get a foothold in the Oz market) where Mike has got the better of Bruce and is not far off McCormack (ex K Grant NZ Brabham Climax 2.5) and David Sternberg (ex Jim Clark Lotus 32B Climax 2.5). Alan and Bruce then bought the Glyn Scott Lotus 23B FVA to get him back on the pace.
Edited by ellrosso, 07 December 2017 - 19:08.
#82
Posted 07 December 2017 - 22:53
Just for the sake of accruacy, the cars mentioned had these histories to that point:
Brabham BT4a, raced by Jack Brabham in 1962 Australian GP, damaged in collision with Arnold Glass; sold to David McKay, who raced it through 1963 and put Graham Hill in it for a couple of Tasman Cup races in 1964, of which he won at Longford. Spencer Martin then drove it until the BT11 arrived and it was sold to Kerry Grant (looked awfully rough at times) and then returned to Australia in McCormack's hands.
Lotus 32B, built for Jim Clark's Tasman venture in 1965, won the series, then to Jim Palmer in New Zealand, who altered the rear bodywork as shown. After the 1966 Tasman Cup purchased by Greg Cusack, had many suspension changes (went outboard at the front) and then went to John Roxburgh, then Sternberg. Who sold the wheels to John Goss for the Tornado as wider ones became necessary.
As for the 23s involved, the Ling/Gowans car shown above was also a Cusack car. Originally raced by the Geoghegans, it was the first 23 in the country sporting a pushrod engine. After racing it in this form for several months, Cusack shelled out for an upgrade to wider wheels and other 23B spec stuff and the twin-cam engine. He sold it to Ling.
The Glynn Scott car was bought new by him, his FVA went into it when he changed his open-wheeled stablemate from the Bowin P3 to the Elfin 600, which had a Waggott TC4V. He was still racing the 23B until the time of his death in late 1970 and had, in fact, recently been to Tasmania racing at that time.
And the relationship between the 300 and the 23 is much the same as the relationship between the Elfin 600 and the Lotus 22. The Elfin was a much more up to date car.
And such a good-looker... but I've said that before, haven't I?
.
Edited by Ray Bell, 07 December 2017 - 22:55.
#83
Posted 08 December 2017 - 02:09
Ray, great to read the history of the cars, thank you. Just regarding the Sternberg Lotus, I was under the impression Mel McEwan owned it before the Sternbergs and John Roxburgh bought it from them.
Interesting, Bruce Gowans bought a print of us a few years back of him in the Scott Bowin P3 FVA at the Symmons Gold Star meeting. Glyn let him have a run in it in the Racing and Sports handicap run later in the day.
#84
Posted 08 December 2017 - 03:29
I had the wrong filler in the gap. McEwin from Cusack in March, 1967. In March, 1968 it went to Sternberg and John Roxburgh bought it in November, 1969, John Dawson-Damer prised it away from 'a reluctant' Roxburgh in 1979 and later swapped it for a Lotus 79.
Now you've got me digging into Marc's book, the Cusack/Ling 23 cum 23B went to Alan Watts in '72, then Leo Triffit the following year, Wayne Clark bought it in 1977 and still had it at least until a couple of years ago. The Scott/Ling 23B went to Ian howard in '75, when it was fitted to a pushrod engine, then via Tassie's own John Walker (who raced it with a turbo Crossflow version) to Murray Bryden in Victoria in 1981, he spent several years restoring it and refitted a twin-cam (not FVA) and in 2001 it was sold to America.
So where is the Mike Bruce Elfin 300 now?
And please remember my comment, the Elfin 300 was to the 23 what the Elfin 600 was to the Lotus 22. Streets ahead, with the added advantage for the 300 of being way better looking.
#85
Posted 08 December 2017 - 05:23
I wonder if James would know anything re the Elfin 300.... I think Alan and Bruce could clearly see they were going to be left behind pretty quickly once Mike came to grips with the 300 - Mike was a good driver, much newer car etc, etc.
Here are a few shots of the Ling/Gowans Lotus 23 and the ex Scott car too. Wayne Clark is a longtime ORP client and always seems to have at least a couple of Lotus cars on the go - wonder if he has the 23 still.
#86
Posted 08 December 2017 - 05:49
Just to get back on topic......... Tasman Sandown Feb 1969 Malcolm Ramsey
#87
Posted 08 December 2017 - 06:12
..........
So where is the Mike Bruce Elfin 300 now?
..............
Last I heard it was with Phil Segat (he had a look at my Elfin Mono with his mate Phil Randall at Phillip Island recently, as Phil Randall is doing up Mono MD6755)
#88
Posted 10 December 2017 - 07:47
Slightly off topic, but but it always pains me to see the original lines of the Lotus 23 ruined to cater for larger tyres, let alone wings...
#89
Posted 10 December 2017 - 08:24
Interesting to see the two cars side by side in colour. Tas Sports Car Championship race 1969 - Gold Star round at this meeting too. Peter Mawdesley Lotus Super 7 (just visible 2nd row of grid) actually won it as Jane was not Tassy resident.https://s33.postimg...._Grid_69-lo.jpg
#90
Posted 11 December 2017 - 01:18
Slightly off topic, but but it always pains me to see the original lines of the Lotus 23 ruined to cater for larger tyres, let alone wings...
That is development. I was thinking the same about those bigger arches and flares. But if you do not continuing developing you lose!
Sometimes with the benefit of hindsight the developmnt was wrong. And somtimes the original car was too!
Edited by Lee Nicolle, 11 December 2017 - 01:25.
#94
Posted 30 April 2018 - 09:30
#96
Posted 30 June 2018 - 20:39
When was this taken, James?
#98
Posted 01 July 2018 - 11:00
Garrie should have stopped at the 300. It is just so naturally beautiful, it could never be eclipsed.
And it performed as well as it looked, too.
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#100
Posted 24 October 2018 - 21:58
I'm thinking those times given weren't realistic for that car in those conditions.