18 replies to this topic

[Perruqueporte]

We visited the Penlee Gallery in Penzance today, which is currently exhibiting various local artists and one local photographer, Harry Penhaul who died in 1957. We learned that Penhaul had been a celebrated local news photographer of his day. One of his wonderful photographs, which I hope will appear below when I post this, shows a Lotus 11 which I have just found to be chassis no. 211, the Team Lotus machine that Cliff Allison and Keith Hall drove at Le Mans in 1956 (until Allison collided with a dog on the Mulsanne Straight during the night).

The photo shows the car filling up with fuel at the Carn Bosavern garage at St. Just.

Do any of you recognise either of its occupants, or indeed know what it would have been up to in Cornwall?



Christopher W.

[Rupertlt1]

"To further demonstrate the Eleven's extraordinary versatility, one was driven the 892 miles from Lands End to John O'Groats at an average speed of 51.06 mph, consuming fuel at the rate of only 38.52 miles per gallon!"

 

Autocar, 9 November 1956:

LAST FRIDAY night, at 9 p.m., an 1,100 Le Mans Lotus left Land's End, bound for John O'Groats. Drivers were Ian H. Smith, Club Lotus committee member, and Tim Martin; weather was perfect, with a clear, starry sky. On Saturday, at 2.28 p.m., they arrived at John O'Groats, having averaged 52 m.p.h., and 38.5 m.p.g. Apart from half an hour's rain in Gloucestershire, weather was good. Smith drove as far as Appleby, where they stopped for half an hour for refreshments and fuel at Cliff Allison's garage. Martin took over the wheel, and completed the run; the only hold-up was by a traffic jam in Inverness, which cost them five minutes or so. The run was sponsored by the Esso Petroleum company, and Club Lotus.

Oddly enough, the fuel consumption figure is not quite as good as might have been expected-judging by previous performances by this engine (Cooper record runs at Montlhery last year, for example, when an average of 111.63 m.p.h. for six hours was maintained at 35 m.p.g.). A 3.9 rear axle was used, and the car's cruising speed was kept, wherever possible, to around 70 m.p.h. During tests around North London before the run Colin Chapman averaged 57.5 m.p.g. with the same carburettor settings. Even so, it is an impressive enough figure. 

 

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 29 January 2024 - 20:01.

[Perruqueporte]

"To further demonstrate the Eleven's extraordinary versatility, one was driven the 892 miles from Lands End to John O'Groats at an average speed of 51.06 mph, consuming fuel at the rate of only 38.52 miles per gallon!"[/size]
 
Autocar, 9 November 1956:[/size]
LAST FRIDAY night, at 9 p.m., an 1,100 Le Mans Lotus left Land's End, bound for John O'Groats. Drivers were Ian H. Smith, Club Lotus committee member, and Tim Martin; weather was perfect, with a clear, starry sky. On Saturday, at 2.28 p.m., they arrived at John O'Groats, having averaged 52 m.p.h., and 38.5 m.p.g. Apart from half an hour's rain in Gloucestershire, weather was good. Smith drove as far as Appleby, where they stopped for half an hour for refreshments and fuel at Cliff Allison's garage. Martin took over the wheel, and completed the run; the only hold-up was by a traffic jam in Inverness, which cost them five minutes or so. The run was sponsored by the Esso Petroleum company, and Club Lotus.[/size]
Oddly enough, the fuel consumption figure is not quite as good as might have been expected-judging by previous performances by this engine (Cooper record runs at Montlhery last year, for example, when an average of 111.63 m.p.h. for six hours was maintained at 35 m.p.g.). A 3.9 rear axle was used, and the car's cruising speed was kept, wherever possible, to around 70 m.p.h. During tests around North London before the run Colin Chapman averaged 57.5 [/size]m.p.g. with the same carburettor settings. Even so, it is an impressive enough figure.[/size] [/size]
 
RGDS RLT[/size]

As always, Rupert, you are a star.

Thank you.

That is an extraordinary story, wonderful. I shall send it to the Penlee Gallery if you don’t mind.

Christopher W.

[Vitesse2]

Ian H Smith (full name Ian Vernon Hardy Smith) was the author of 'Lotus: The Story of the Marque' (1960, 2nd ed 1961). Republished as 'The Story of Lotus 1947-60' in 1970. Some bloke called Nye wrote the second volume ...

[Rupertlt1]

As always, Rupert, you are a star.

Thank you.

That is an extraordinary story, wonderful. I shall send it to the Penlee Gallery if you don’t mind.

Christopher W.

 

Thanks for your kind words.

Send to anybody you please.

My aim in digging this stuff up is so that it should be wider known.

The more the merrier!

BTW a truly historic photograph.

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 30 January 2024 - 01:38.

[BRG]

 The run was sponsored by the Esso Petroleum company, and Club Lotus

Which makes the photo less surprising!  St Just is just (sorry!) after leaving Lands End and the garage is still there

 

 

They must have needed to refuel several times en route so maybe there are other shots taken at other Esso stations en route - Cliff Allison's garage, for instance?

[Vitesse2]

Pre-motorways that's an extraordinary average speed, considering there would have been lots of places which didn't even have by-passes at that time. Route was presumably A30-A38 via Exeter and Bristol, then dodging round the west side of Birmingham to join the A6 further north. A6 to Carlisle and then presumably the A74 to Glasgow before cutting over to Perth and then up to Inverness and John O'Groats on the A9.

[Derwent Motorsport]

Yes, you would be pushed to do that average these days.  Appleby is of course 14 miles east of Penrith and the A6. so that would have meant 28 extra miles unless the route was via the A1 and A66? 

A9 was horrendous north of Perth until much later. I remember it from childhood holidays. 

[Vitesse2]

Yes, you would be pushed to do that average these days.  Appleby is of course 14 miles east of Penrith and the A6. so that would have meant 28 extra miles unless the route was via the A1 and A66? 

A9 was horrendous north of Perth until much later. I remember it from childhood holidays. 

Probably cut off the A6 just after Kendal and up through Tebay and Orton? An effective way of avoiding the long queue of lorries grinding their way up Shap Fell at walking pace. Then A66 back to the A6.

 

Equally, further south there are long stretches of the A38 each side of Bristol where you could easily do over a ton in the small hours, so that would bump up the average a bit.

[Doug Nye]

Ian H Smith (full name Ian Vernon Hardy Smith) was the author of 'Lotus: The Story of the Marque' (1960, 2nd ed 1961). Republished as 'The Story of Lotus 1947-60' in 1970. Some bloke called Nye wrote the second volume ...

 

I was asked to opick up the cudgel of a Lotus book by Lotus-related publisher Patrick Stephens when Ian Smith apparently said he wasn't interested in obliging - possibly because of some un-detailed rift with Lotus, Club Lotus or Colin Chapman himself during the intervening years.  

 

I never met nor knew him so I have never really known what became of that former relationship.  

 

Pat Stephens proposed me as a substitute because he knew me from my formative years with Knightsbridge Publications - publishers of 'Motor Racing' and of 'Airfix Magazine' - and of which he'd been, IIRC, contemporay Advertising Manager/MD.  Pat was himself very closely involved with Club Lotus and their magazine 'Sports Car & Lotus Owner', which had become another Knightsbridge publication.  Something like that, anyway... 

 

DCN

[Vitesse2]

 

They must have needed to refuel several times en route so maybe there are other shots taken at other Esso stations en route - Cliff Allison's garage, for instance?

Not many 24-hour garages in those days, even on trunk roads, but presumably Esso made special arrangements to meet them at pre-arranged points?

 

Also worth noting that the run took place on November 2nd/3rd 1956. Israeli forces had invaded Egypt on October 29th and British and French troops joined them on November 5th, seeking to depose Nasser. We know how that ended, of course, but by the end of the month the government had announced petrol rationing, which came in on December 11th. So if Esso had hoped to gain some publicity from the run - you certainly wouldn't have seen an Eleven on the Mobil Economy Run! - it probably withered on the vine.

[Rupertlt1]

Lotus may have been prodded into this stunt by the efforts of Buckler in 1953 and 1954.

Viz the Cheltenham Motor Club Economy Run, 19-20 June 1954.

Crew G. Tapp and L. Drew, class-win, at 86.6 mpg.

See Motor Sport, July 1954, Page 360.

 

https://www.stilltim.../aap/aap239.jpg

 

I think this picture is somewhere near Ross-on-Wye?

 

I've got 1953:

 

Cheltenham M.C.—With the present high

cost of fuel and its resultant emphasis on

fuel economy in everyday motoring, the

results of a miles-per-gallon competition are

of especial interest. Entrants in the National

Road Fuel Economy Contest last weekend

were divided into two main classes: standard

production cars, that competed under a per-

formance index worked out by weight of

the car against engine size; and specials,

having a free run in which only the m.p.g.

counted towards the final result. All types

of road were included in the 600-mile course,

which had to be covered at an average speed

of 30 m.p.h., including a night section. The

most amazing performance was that of

C. D. F. Buckler, whose Buckler Special

managed the distance at a consumption of

90.02 m.p.g. Fitted with an old, but speci-

ally tuned, Ford Ten engine, the car has a

Buckler chassis and bodywork. Second in

this class was J. Lucy, whose Renault re-

corded 77.84 m.p.g. First of the standard

car contingent was a Jowett Javelin, driven

by J. Lowrey; runner-up was T. Becking-

ham's Standard Vanguard. Best perform-

ance by a Riley was put up by S. K. Bickley.

The ladies' prize went to M. Pearson, in

a Standard. Incidentally, the average m.p.g.

figure for the whole contest was 53.17.

Autocar, 26 June 1953, Page 877

 

What else did Harry Penhaul photograph?

Do the museum have a collection?

Blimey, he is the subject of a PhD:

https://ualresearcho...inal thesis.pdf

See page 148.

 

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 31 January 2024 - 02:58.

[BRG]

90mpg?  From a car using a Ford Ten engine??  That must have involved a lot of dodgy driving, freewheeling and so on.  I think the Mobil Economy Runs of yore placed an observer in each car to prevent such things - you had to drive 'normally' without recourse to potentially dangerous tactics.

 

My Renault Clio hybrid is giving me around 64mpg in everyday driving and that is with all the technfrolic gizmos of the 21st century, so 90mpg from a 'orribe old sidevalve engine is hard to credit.

[Rupertlt1]

Cheltenham Motor Club Economy Run, 1954: "The author's little 750 Renault, which recorded 92.2 m.p.g. in the contest."

Every trick in the book was used: carb jets, tyre pressures, thin oil, freewheeling etc.

 

https://www.stilltim.../abi/abi840.jpg

 

Where is this?

 

This event also sponsored by Esso Petroleum. Note Esso pumps in photograph.

 

See also: Three Small 'Uns, Motor Sport, August 1954, Page 435

 

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 31 January 2024 - 13:23.

[69seven]

There's some information about the Cheltenham MC economy runs, and the Mobil economy run that replaced it, in the Hants and Berks MC Jubilee book, which is a great read. 'We already knew that peculiar driving techniques were highly advantageous because petrol engines are usually at their most efficient when working at about three quarters of full load in the middle rpm range. In practice this meant accelerating in the highest possible gear and then switching off and coasting in neutral as far as possible - sometimes repeating several times a mile. We found that driving like this for a thousand miles demanded prodigious anticipation and concentration but could reward you with a 50% increase in mpg. It was a technique that we had ourselves developed and refined for the Cheltenham MC events, in which Joe Lowrey and I had averaged over 60 mpg in a Jowett Javelin.'

 

Charles Bulmer entered the 1956 Mobil economy run in a Lotus Eleven.

 

[Rupertlt1]

The 1956 Mobilgas Economy Run,16-17 June, organised by the Hants and Berks Motor Club, visited Goodwood, for "an hour's high speed lapping." (They took out the chicane.)

Charles Bulmer, with Mrs Bulmer, Lotus-Climax, 2nd in All Comers Class, 48.49 m.p.g.

The car must have been road registered.

Could this be XJH 781? No, it was XAR 11.

 

See: https://forums.autos...ulmer-has-died/

 

Did Charles Bulmer write about his Mobilgas adventures in The Motor?

 

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 01 February 2024 - 19:39.

[Odseybod]

His accomplice in the Jowett Javelin, Joe Lowrey, was of course Technical Editor of The Motor at the time and a regular (successful) competitor in the Mobil Economy Run. I think Charles Bulmer only joined The Motor in 1960, initially as Joe's assistant (they were both ex-Farnborough), becoming the magazine's editor in 1967.

[Rupertlt1]

His accomplice in the Jowett Javelin, Joe Lowrey, was of course Technical Editor of The Motor at the time and a regular (successful) competitor in the Mobil Economy Run. I think Charles Bulmer only joined The Motor in 1960, initially as Joe's assistant (they were both ex-Farnborough), becoming the magazine's editor in 1967.

 

According to a bio Charles Bulmer contributed to Motor Sport, Autocar and The Motor in the 1950s.

 

"NOT MANY PEOPLE realized that the Lotus in which C. H. and Mrs. Bulmer averaged 60.49 true m.p.g. in the Mobilgas Economy Run (48.49 m.p.g. after penalties had been deducted for lateness and so on) was the car in which Chapman won the 1,101 to 1,500 c.c. class at Rouen at 109.91 m.p.h."

 

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 02 February 2024 - 04:33.

[RTH]

I was asked to opick up the cudgel of a Lotus book by Lotus-related publisher Patrick Stephens when Ian Smith apparently said he wasn't interested in obliging - possibly because of some un-detailed rift with Lotus, Club Lotus or Colin Chapman himself during the intervening years.  

 

I never met nor knew him so I have never really known what became of that former relationship.  

 

Pat Stephens proposed me as a substitute because he knew me from my formative years with Knightsbridge Publications - publishers of 'Motor Racing' and of 'Airfix Magazine' - and of which he'd been, IIRC, contemporay Advertising Manager/MD.  Pat was himself very closely involved with Club Lotus and their magazine 'Sports Car & Lotus Owner', which had become another Knightsbridge publication.  Something like that, anyway... 

 

DCN

I bought this in WH Smiths in Maidstone as a 9 year old   it was to be life changing .