26 replies to this topic

[Doug Nye]

Some years back I was given a photo showing New Zealander Bob Smith's ex-Peter Whitehead Ferrari Super Squalo following a violent collision in a minor race at Pukekohe.  I believe the race date was during January, 1963.

 

Needless to say, I've lost the photo.  Might anyone here a) have that image - and b) be willing to share it?

 

From what I remember I believe it shows the Squalo effectively broken in two, front end of the frame broken away from the rest.  Once repaired, the frame became the basis of Garth Souness's Chevrolet V8-engined, Morris Minor-bodied 'Morrari' - while the Ferrari 860 engine was adapted for use in a speedboat.

 

One point - I have seen references to Graham 'Seuness' being the Morrari man; so spelling check, Souness or Seuness?

 

DCN

Edited by Doug Nye, 23 November 2024 - 20:18.

[Bloggsworth]

Didn't he play for Liverpool...........

[GregThomas]

Souness with an O afaik.

 

There's a Morrari replica nearly completed and ready for first running.

[LittleChris]

Didn't he play for Liverpool...........

Usually kicked people rather than playing😬

[d j fox]

Just a suggestion but Mark Bisset with his excellent Promotipo site may be able to help?

[Catalina Park]

Allan Dick / Classic Auto News would be my suggestion.
Actually, he was asking a Ferrari question this morning about one of the other NZ cars.
You might need to use Facebook to get to him.

https://www.facebook...classicautonews

[cooper997]

Early 1963, but perhaps not the exact meeting...

 

The Motorman reported that (at what I believe was the 2/2/63) Auckland CC Trophy meeting at Pukekohe... "Bob Smith led the field away at the start of the 10 lap feature race, but overshot the right-hander before the back straight to finish up through the straw bales and almost on the railway track. The car was only slightly damaged but could not continue the race." This was the meeting Ross Jensen ran Arnold Glass BRM V8.

 

 

Stephen

[opplock]

Vercoe (The Golden Era of New Zealand Motor Racing) also gives date as 2nd February. 

 

"Bob Smith led the field away in his Super Squalo but crashed at Railway and, while damage was minimal, he was unable to continue." No mention of a collision. 

[marksixman]

Didn't he play for Liverpool...........

Bloggsworth - you should be ashamed !!!!!!

[Doug Nye]

Thanks everyone.  Roger Clark has just put me right on this one.  The collision photo I recalled didn't involve Bob Smith and his big-engine 555 Super Squalo at all.  

 

The Ferrari which was broken in two was instead Frank Shuter's ex-Pat Hoare car which had started life as a 625 and which Ferrari sold to Hoare with an engine enlarged to 3-litres, and a slightly modified body.  Shuter's big accident in it occurred not at Pukekohe but at Wigram aerodrome Christchurch on January 21, 1961 - reputedly after 13 laps. That modified the car far, far more...

 

It was subsequently sold to John Brown in England who raced it in VSCC events with a 2-litre 4-cyl Ferrari engine, thence to Nigel Moores of the Littlewoods Pools family and - after his so-unlucky fatal road accident (as a passenger) - notionally to Hayashi in Japan.  Today it is a long-held exhibit within the Louwman Museum collection.

 

ECoF

 

(Easily confused (these days) of Farnham)

Edited by Doug Nye, 24 November 2024 - 20:42.

[Bloggsworth]

Bloggsworth - you should be ashamed !!!!!!

No, just easily amused...

[cooper997]

Thanks everyone.  Roger Clark has just put me right on this one.  The collision photo I recalled didn't involve Bob Smith and his big-engine 555 Super Squalo at all.  

 

The Ferrari which was broken in two was instead Frank Shuter's ex-Pat Hoare car which had started life as a 625 and which Ferrari sold to Hoare with an engine enlarged to 3-litres, and a slightly modified body.  Shuter's big accident in it occurred not at Pukekohe but at Wigram aerodrome Christchurch on January 28, 1961. That modified the car far, far more...

 

It was subsequently sold to John Brown in England who raced it in VSCC events with a 2-litre 4-cyl Ferrari engine, thence to Nigel Moores of the Littlewoods Pools family and - after his so-unlucky fatal road accident (as a passenger) - notionally to Hayashi in Japan.  Today it is a long-held exhibit within the Louwman Museum collection.

 

ECoF

 

(Easily confused (these days) of Farnham)

 

Just to set the date correctly, Wigram was 21/1/61 and on the 28/1/61 it was the Dunedin Festival Road Race meeting.

 

 

Stephen

[Doug Nye]

Thanks Stephen - now corrected.

 

DCN

[GregThomas]

I believe that accident prompted the change where my father moved from lapscoring to a mobile infield steward's job

This as a result of a car .being parked in the wrong place.

 

From my point of view as the pillion on my father's motorcycle we always went to any accident scene so I got around the circuit more.

He had the authority to stop the meeting if someone wouldn't shift out of a dangerous spot - and used it a couple of times too.

Given the circuit was a temporary setup only in use 2 days in the year, no-go spots weren't well marked so someone mobile

on the infield was needed.

 

So founder member, to scrutineer for at least the first meeting, to lapscoring then a mobile infield Steward.

The deal was when you joined the Motor Racing Club you either competed or worked

 

He stopped working on the day when his health got too bad - and i was riding there by then.

[bradbury west]

The Ferrari which was broken in two was instead Frank Shuter's ex-Pat Hoare car which had started life as a 625 and which Ferrari sold to Hoare with an engine enlarged to 3-litres, and a slightly modified body. 

 

It was subsequently sold to John Brown in England who raced it in VSCC events with a 2-litre 4-cyl Ferrari engine, thence to Nigel Moores of the Littlewoods Pools family and - after his so-unlucky fatal road accident (as a passenger) - notionally to Hayashi in Japan.  Today it is a long-held exhibit within the Louwman Museum collection.

 

ECoF

 

(Easily confused (these days) of Farnham)

Was that the 625 which Ian? Sievewright raced in the mid60s?.  From the copious period programmes I have read or bought  and race reports which I have read for my own research I recall entries for him quite often at Oulton or Silverstone in those years. I remember  it , or another 625, for sale via Healeys at the Cape Works in Warwick.

Roger  Lund

[Doug Nye]

No Roger,

 

Sievwright's 625 was ex-de Portago, and (un-used) Donald Healey Motor Co.  It went to the Bardinon Collection in the late '60s, then Setton in the '80s and to Germany in the early '90s.  After a period with Carlos Monteverde, then David Vine back in the UK, I believe it re-sold recently through the RM/Sotheby's Monaco Sale.  I have no idea to whom.

 

It was a late-bodied 1954 car, which originated as '0208F' - the Belgian-yellow Jacques Swaters, Charles de Tornaco, Roger Laurent 'Starlet' customer Ferrari 500 of 1952-53, which was then uprated as a 2 1/2-litre 625 for 1954.  The unfortunate Baron de Tornaco rolled it fatally while testing at Modena, late in '53.  The car when sold to de Portago had been re-numbered as '0540'.

 

The 1957 Pat Hoare 625 special in NZ carried the out-of-series (for a 625) chassis number '0712', I believe.

 

Here (thanks to Roger Clark's filing system) is what happened to it in Frank Shuter's 1961 Wigram collision with, I believe, a marshal's car parked at trackside - original photographer unknown to us:

 

 

DCN

Edited by Doug Nye, 25 November 2024 - 10:10.

[Sterzo]

I may have misread the picture, but that looks like a full face crash helmet on the cylinder heads. If so that is amazingly early for one.

[Doug Nye]

Nope - open-faced conventional helmet with rain visor attached beneath dark peak.

 

DCN

[Ardmore]

This is the car the Ferrari hit.

 

[JonnyA]

Which corner is that? Just after the course joins the runway?

[GregThomas]

I'd pick it's about 1/3  way down the main (runway) straight.  Bombbay corner is visible in the Ferrari pic in the background.

 

That's about right for the location of the speed trap - and the personnel running it.

In later years the infield side of the straight was one of the areas kept clear of people and vehicles

except for a well policed and protected area at the hairpin end where marshalls and recovery crews worked.

[Odseybod]

This is the car the Ferrari hit.

 

I think it was a Rover P3.

[cooper997]

This is the second page of the 3/61 Motor Racing Jack Brabham column with reference to the crashed Ferrari

 

 

 

Stephen

 

[Myhinpaa]

From the article: "There were four people in the parked car, and miraculously they were not badly hurt.."

 

The car looks like a 1945 - 48 Standard Fourteen.

[cooper997]

The following NZ race reports come from 3/61 Sporting Motorist, as you will spot there's reference to the front wheel being torn off the officials car. Going by Milan's post 19 that doesn;t look the case

 

.

 

 

Stephen

[GregThomas]

I would doubt if the reporter ever saw the marshal's car. It was over the back well away from the pits in an area with no public access.

When reovered it would IMO have been taken out the circuit exit over that side and not brought across to the pits.

Truck movements on the grass infield would have been kept to a minimum to avoid damage. It was after all a working airfield.

 

I remember the good showing by Lennie Gilbert in the 250F. He'd damaged a piston at Levin and it was repaired in our home workshop.

The guy he had looking after it that season was a family friend who knew what equipment we had.

As a 12 year old,i was allowed to polish the front suspension.  More than enough at that age.

[hatrat]

I have a colour photo of the bent Ferrari but haven't posted for a while and can't remember how to load an image ........