66 replies to this topic

[Henri Greuter]

BTW,

 

@Fat Boy,

 

No offence intended but is your alias by chance inspired on the legendary mechanic who made so much body panels for AJ Watson's Roadsters of the late 50's and early 60's?

Edited by Henri Greuter, 18 May 2022 - 07:01.

[Fat Boy]

BTW,

 

@Fat Boy,

 

No offence intended but is your alias by chance inspired on the legendary mechanic who made so much body panels for AJ Watson's Roadsters of the late 50's and early 60's?

I could lie to you and say, "Yes", but it's not. I'm named after my uncle in real life. When I was signing up for this board, I randomly grabbed his nickname.

[Henri Greuter]

I could lie to you and say, "Yes", but it's not. I'm named after my uncle in real life. When I was signing up for this board, I randomly grabbed his nickname.

I see, makes sense.

[Magoo]

Much of Reynard's success in IndyCar/CART was due to the fact that the 94I was so good right from the start. It won the first race in which it appeared (Surfers, 1994, Andretti, Ganassi) and swept through the paddock in its first year. It's not often mentioned that the Reynard chassis was based on a Galmer design that was never built, as Rick Galles decided to get out of the chassis business. 

 

The fastest car in Speedway history in 1996 -- Arie Luyendyk, Reynard 94I-Ford --- was the fourth Reynard Indy chassis ever built. See tag below. Was originally sold to Forsythe-Green for the '94 season, then acquired by Jonathan Byrd. My friend the late Tim Wardrop (aka Dr. Who) was the engineer on this car, and he gave me copies of the telemetry report from The Lap. A most remarkable document. I still have it, of course. I made multiple copies and stuck them in various places so I never lose it. 

 

 

 

 

[Henri Greuter]

From what I found out, Chip Ganassi was another major factor in getting the Reynards off the ground.


As for preserving history, Can I persuade you to contribute/donate or discuss about some material you have for my article about the car 94i-004 I wrote for 8W ???

[Ross Stonefeld]

Much of Reynard's success in IndyCar/CART was due to the fact that the 94I was so good right from the start. It won the first race in which it appeared (Surfers, 1994, Andretti, Ganassi) and swept through the paddock in its first year. 

 

 

Swift, also in the hands of Andretti, managed the first part of this. 

[Fat Boy]

Much of Reynard's success in IndyCar/CART was due to the fact that the 94I was so good right from the start. It won the first race in which it appeared (Surfers, 1994, Andretti, Ganassi) and swept through the paddock in its first year.

 

 

Reynard made much ado of winning their first race in every category (even to the point of putting this pressure on BAR for it's F1 debut), but it was reasonably good everywhere and the car was reliable. It's no wonder why they were so quickly and widely adopted. This is the exact thing which shot them in the foot later. Initially, the Reynards had relatively wide setup window in comparison with the Lola, but as they chased better aero numbers, they made the car too platform sensitive and Lola was able to respond with the more raceable compromises.

 

It's the exact same as the current story between Ligier and Oreca in LMP2 over the last several years.

Edited by Fat Boy, 19 May 2022 - 15:31.

[Catalina Park]

I remember Malcolm Oastler before he went to England to eventually work for Reynard. In the early 80s he was spruiking body panels made from Kevlar and carbon fibre. We were thinking, who is this goose and what's wrong with fibreglass anyway?
He was way ahead of the game.

[Magoo]

Malcolm Oastler is a cool guy. His YouTube channel.... 

 

 

https://www.youtube....G5jqajXQ/videos

[Catalina Park]

My brother knew Malcolm, they both worked for the NSW railways, Malcom was a cadet engineer and my brother was an apprentice fitter/machinist. They were getting trained on trains. They would get shuffled around the different workshops to learn new things.
 
Malcolm bought an old Bowin Formula Ford that had a reputation for being impossible to set up. It had rising rate suspension and was a good thing in its first year in a works team but since then the car had been through a lot of hands without much success. Malcolm used the computer at I think the Sydney Institute of Technology to work out what was going on. Suddenly he was running in the top bunch in a 10 year old car. 

[GreenMachine]

My brother knew Malcolm, they both worked for the NSW railways, Malcom was a cadet engineer and my brother was an apprentice fitter/machinist. They were getting trained on trains. They would get shuffled shunted around the different workshops to learn new things.

 

 

FTFY 

[Magoo]

Reynard made much ado of winning their first race in every category (even to the point of putting this pressure on BAR for it's F1 debut), but it was reasonably good everywhere and the car was reliable. It's no wonder why they were so quickly and widely adopted. This is the exact thing which shot them in the foot later. Initially, the Reynards had relatively wide setup window in comparison with the Lola, but as they chased better aero numbers, they made the car too platform sensitive and Lola was able to respond with the more raceable compromises.

 

It's the exact same as the current story between Ligier and Oreca in LMP2 over the last several years.

 

 

The Reynard business arc in IndyCar loosely follows March a decade earlier. Not a whole lot, but there is some resemblance. Competitive, competively priced, user-friendly product. 

[Henri Greuter]

The Reynard business arc in IndyCar loosely follows March a decade earlier. Not a whole lot, but there is some resemblance. Competitive, competively priced, user-friendly product. 

 

 

I don't think I would call the two final `customer-at-large` March types 87C and 88C as user friendly......

And I've read all kind of comments about the March Customer Service Dept. not being that much of a positive PR generating outfit for the company either.

 

The 87C may be given something of the benefit of the doubt because of the issues Goodyear had with gong from crossply to radial which appeared to be hard for the 87C's. But the 87C really wasn't that much better than the 86C, if it was better to begin with as a whole.

[Magoo]

I don't think I would call the two final `customer-at-large` March types 87C and 88C as user friendly......

And I've read all kind of comments about the March Customer Service Dept. not being that much of a positive PR generating outfit for the company either.

 

The 87C may be given something of the benefit of the doubt because of the issues Goodyear had with gong from crossply to radial which appeared to be hard for the 87C's. But the 87C really wasn't that much better than the 86C, if it was better to begin with as a whole.

 

That was my point. Note the use of the term "arc." Both entered the series with straightfoward, user-friendly products and then gradually headed off in the other direction. 

 

In my view the 86C was superior to the 87C. An 86C won the 1987 Indy 500 and a number of teams often rolled out their 86Cs instead of the newer chassis. 

[Magoo]

That was my point. Note the use of the term "arc." Both entered the series with straightfoward, user-friendly products and then gradually headed off in the other direction. 

 

In my view the 86C was superior to the 87C. An 86C won the 1987 Indy 500 and a number of teams often rolled out their 86Cs instead of the newer chassis. 

 

 

The 86C is distinguished by its pyramid-shaped roll structure. In period photos and videos, take note of how many are still running in '87 and even in '88. 

[Henri Greuter]

funny but I've found out there is another car that did the almost the same as the 86C, though it never won a 500

 

86C: debut 1986, last car in race: in 1989 (1 single car, an A.J. Foyt entry)

 

but:

 

They are difficult to identify in later years compared with later cars of the type T8800 and T8900, 'cause they look very simalar to another and to the car I had in mind.

But the Lola T8700, despite there being only 13 of them built was another car that like the 86C was good enough for more years of duty.

Several of them still were in the '88 and '89 500, and even as late as 1990 (3 years on) there was still a single T8700 in the starting field.

Think about it: the newman-Haas team, the closest to a factory team that Lola fielded had an updated T8700 entered in 1988 for Mario Andretti.

After selling a nunmber of T8800's.....

 

And Mario was a pole contender in 1988 if it wasn't for a hand of oil-dry at the track.....

[Magoo]

funny but I've found out there is another car that did the almost the same as the 86C, though it never won a 500

 

86C: debut 1986, last car in race: in 1989 (1 single car, an A.J. Foyt entry)

 

but:

 

They are difficult to identify in later years compared with later cars of the type T8800 and T8900, 'cause they look very simalar to another and to the car I had in mind.

But the Lola T8700, despite there being only 13 of them built was another car that like the 86C was good enough for more years of duty.

Several of them still were in the '88 and '89 500, and even as late as 1990 (3 years on) there was still a single T8700 in the starting field.

Think about it: the newman-Haas team, the closest to a factory team that Lola fielded had an updated T8700 entered in 1988 for Mario Andretti.

After selling a nunmber of T8800's.....

 

And Mario was a pole contender in 1988 if it wasn't for a hand of oil-dry at the track.....

 

 

Quite so. I remember talking to some Newman-Haas guys in 1988 about that T8700. Mario and the crew loved the car. It was just righter somehow. Responded to very small trim changes.