61 replies to this topic

[Steve L]

I have been reading up on the great Jean Pierre Wimille, and one account stated that he was working on a road car which was almost ready to go into production at the time of his death?

I had not heard of this before, and was wondering what form this car was to take - an all-new design, or a warmed-over & rebadged existing model?

I then tried to think of other similar driver/manufacturer efforts.

There was the Rickenbacker (Eddie Rickenbacker), the Raymond Mays, a special Singer (or was it a Standard?) (Kaye Don), and wasn't Mike Spence working on a hot (hotter?!) Lotus Elan when he was killed?.....

[Vitesse2]

The Wimille road car thread:

http://www.atlasf1.c...&threadid=42232

[anjakub]

Wimille car:
Http://www.atlasf1.com/bb/showthread.php?t...ghlight=Wimille

[anjakub]

Ouch,
Vitesse was faster

[Ray Bell]

Jack Brabham Conversions did a few...

The Triumph Herald with a Coventry-Climax engine stands out...

And there was a ... (can I actually type this out?) ... Brabham Viva.

Bruce McLaren built one M6 with a roof and other road equipment... DSJ, I'm fairly sure, commented that it was interesting that, with silencers, the noise of the straight cut gears became the dominant sound inside.

Bill Buckle raced various cars, from early fifties Citroens on... he built a Buckle coupe with a Ford Zephyr 6 engine in the late fifties... sold a number of them.

Louis Chevrolet put his name to an obscure make of American road car that was promoted by a chap named Durant, as I recall...

[Vitesse2]

One which springs to mind is the McLaren M6GT, which was Bruce's personal car, based on an M6 chassis, and the prototype of a projected production model. The project was abandoned after his death, but it was basically the antecedent of the McLaren F1 road car of thirty years later.

And at the other end of the scale, the Brabham Viva, which was supposed to be Vauxhall's answer to the Lotus Cortina.

[Ray Bell]

And does Chapman count as a driver?

There must be others among the specialist builders in England who were drivers...

[Vitesse2]

There was some chap called Ferrari who raced a bit before he ever built a car. And some brothers called Maserati ....

[Ray Bell]

And which came first, the chicken or the egg...

I mean in the case of Louis and Marcel?

[Vitesse2]

Originally posted by Ray Bell
And which came first, the chicken or the egg...

I mean in the case of Louis and Marcel?

I think Renault were building road cars before they first raced. And I don't think the brothers ever drove for anyone else.

[Vitesse2]

CS Rolls, of course - raced Panhards and Mors before turning to sprints with Mors and even a Dufaux.

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by Vitesse2
I think Renault were building road cars before they first raced. And I don't think the brothers ever drove for anyone else.

Yes, you're right...

Louis started it when he was very young.

Not so young was Carroll Shelby, who used to make a car called the Cobra. Well, not the whole car, but he sort of brought the chassis/body stuff into contact with Mr Ford's little thinwall cast iron V8.

[Ray Bell]

Donald Healey had some history in competition...

Won the 1931 Monte Carlo Rally in an Invicta... after WW2 produced a line of cars starting with the Healey Elliott. Many were Riley powered, but he designed the Nash Healey and the Austin Healey, later going on to turn out the Jensen Healey.

[Ray Bell]

Then there was a chap named Soichiro Honda...

He raced a variety of self-built cars in the thirties, then turned to motorcycle manufacture in the late forties. By the mid-sixties he was making road cars...

[Vitesse2]

Sydney Allard raced Morgans before building the first Allard Special and then going on to road cars. He still rallied in the 50s.

And mention should be made of Alec Issigonis, driver and builder of the Lightweight Special. Although never a manufacturer per se he designed two iconic cars - the Morris Minor and the Mini (three if you count the BMC 1100/1300 as iconic)

[Ray Bell]

Rodney Clarke and Ken McAlpine raced together and worked together to produce Connaught cars... of which a small number were road cars. This model, the L3, was based on the cars they raced through 1950 and went on the market later that year.

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by Ray Bell
.....Louis Chevrolet put his name to an obscure make of American road car that was promoted by a chap named Durant, as I recall...

But Louis left Durant after only a couple of years...

He then designed the Frontenac racing cars and the Cornelian cyclecar. Frontenac brought out a road car in the early twenties designed by Louis, who had actually designed the cars he and Durant built after the latter lost control of GM.

His design abilities got him a long way, even producing aircraft components, but with the depression this business failed and he went to work for... Chevrolet division of GM.

[Vitesse2]

Vincenzo Lancia raced for FIAT, as did Felice Nazzaro. Both later built their own cars, although Vincenzo was rather more successful than Felice ....

The short-lived CGV was created by three Panhard drivers - Charron, Girardot and Voigt. Not sure if they built any road cars though. There was also a Charron car.

[Paul Medici]

Didn't Zora Arkus-Duntov race Porsches before contributing to the development of the Corvette?

And Briggs Cunningham raced everything from MGTCs to Ferrrais before building his cars, some of them being GT cars.

[dmj]

Unbelievable! 18 posts before Lancia is mentioned!
In early days a lot of constructors raced their products, some of them designed them being unsatisfied with other's cars. Even Henry Ford did race.
What about Gastonides, Melkus, Abarth (he raced motorcycles), Jean Redele (Alpine), Schorsch Meier (worked on Veritas with Loof), Monteverdi, Arnolt, Nardi, Dusio (Cisitalia), Ken Delingpole (Dellow)...
Didn't Lionel Martin do some racing, too? Or Duesenbergs?

[Vitesse2]

Originally posted by dmj
Unbelievable! 18 posts before Lancia is mentioned!

18 posts in an hour and a half Dino! Ray and I were trading them across the world!

[dmj]

Ooops... I didn't check... Sorry.

[Vitesse2]

Pfft - no problem!

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by dmj
Ooops... I didn't check... Sorry.

Sorry? Why sorry?

You just pointed out how slack we are... especially me, I never mentioned Lancia at all!

I'll bet Hans could come up with some more out of that era too, if he'd just get out of the surf...

[Tepid shoe]

There once was a motor sport competitor called Henry Ford who tried to move into car production. Does anyone know if he had any success?

[Ray Bell]

Henry was excluded because he was a manufacturer before he had anything to do with racing...

[nick stone]

Aussie Vern Schuppan who drove F1 cars for BRM, Ensign and others in the early to mid seventies converted a number of Porsche 962 sports-racers to road-going specs in 1994. He called the car the 962CR and priced it at $2.5 million. Apparently only five - or maybe six - were built. (At that price it's a wonder any were built at all!)

Contemporary reports say it was something of a screamer - which isn't hard to imagine.

Sites I found with a photograph had too many pop-ups to warrant inclusion, but it you're interested, type 'Porsche 962CR' into Google.

[Ray Bell]

Man... when I knew Vern he was a happy chap if he could import a US-spec MGB into Australia and make a quid on it after they stopped selling them here...

[Graham Clayton]

In 1952 Louis Rosier attempted to make a sports car under his own name. The Rosier used Renault 4CV mechanicals clothed in an elegant coupe body designed by Turin coachbuilder Motto. Its high price meant that very few, if any were sold. Rosier made an open version which he drove in the 1953 Le Mans 24 hour race. His final attempt to build a road car was in 1955, with a coupe built over Renault Fregate mechanicals.

[Ray Bell]

That sounds like a real ball of fire...

The Fregate-engineed car probably had some performance potential. Undoubtedly still too dear?

[Henri Greuter]

Steve Saleen  anyone???

 

 

Henri

[arttidesco]

Jochen Dauer also springs to mind, though just how much input into the Dauer 962 Le Mans Road car was his and just how much was Porsche’s might be grounds for debate as to whether or not he counts 😉

Edited by arttidesco, 26 November 2017 - 13:28.

[john aston]

Emerson Fittipaldi is also responsible for producing a road car - inevitably yet another iteration on the supercar theme. Doubtless we will see them on the secondhand market in five years time with the inevitable risibly low mileage . Actually driving one of the daft things  is just so last century .  

[David Lawson]

Frank Williams raced before becoming an entrant and subsequently an F1 manufacturer, he was involved in the road going Renault Clio Williams.

 

David

[Graham Clayton]

1911 Indianapolis 500 winner Ray Harroun's Harroun Motors Corporation built just over 1,100 4-cylinder powered road cars in Wayne, MI between 1917 and 1922.

 

[Henri Greuter]

Frank Williams raced before becoming an entrant and subsequently an F1 manufacturer, he was involved in the road going Renault Clio Williams.

 

David

 

No offence intended but if this badging job qualifies, then I think the work that Williams GP engineering did in assistance on the creation and development of the MG Metro 6R4 of more importance and being more sginificant, even if id didn't result in the Williams name on the eventual car....

That Clio was put the name on the car (likely pay Frank a fee for it) ad not much else....

 

Henri

[john aston]

Indeed - see also Brabham Viva ?

[GeoffR]

Are Peter Brock's modified Lada Samaras and variations of the EA Falcons worthy of mention??

[David Lawson]

There are examples of badge engineering with many cars but Williams did build and run Renaults BTCC programme with the Laguna in the 1990s so I assume there would have been an exchange of engineering expertise which could have transferred to the Clio.

 

David

[2F-001]

I'm pretty sure that particular warm Clio was the work of RenaultSport; I don't think Williams did much beyond signing a licensing agreement (unlike the racing Laguna). Quite a nice little car though (the original one); a friend who had one - and plenty of fancier stuff before and after it - remembers it fondly.

[Doug Nye]

Mike Spence Lotus Elans?

 

CGV - Charron, Girardot, Voigt...  

 

DCN

[B Squared]

Apologies if the John Fitch Corvair has already been mentioned and I missed it:

https://www.hemmings...sa/3695851.html

[bradbury west]

Maurice Gatsonides, and purely out of personal interest Jean-Albert Gregoire with a whole range and variation of eponymous vehicles, not just odd one-offs.
Roger Lund

[Henri Greuter]

Maurice Gatsonides, and purely out of personal interest Jean-Albert Gregoire with a whole range and variation of eponymous vehicles, not just odd one-offs.
Roger Lund

 

Ah, yes, the Gatso cars! He built 8 of them, 7 had Ford V8 engines, one a Fiat straight 6 and the latter is the only surviving one.

Before the Gatso cars, Maus built a special named "Kwik" (The Dutch pronouncement for the English word Quick) but also the dutch translation for Mercury, the liquid metal.

"Kwik" also survived the times and is owned by Maus son.

 

 

Henri

[arttidesco]

Pertinent given last weeks sad news it is perhaps poignant to remember that the late Bobby Bell and Martin Colvill were racers when they developed the first turbocharged Bell and Colvill Esprit. 

[Lee Nicolle]

For the Aussies I am surprised noone has mentioned Peter Brock. Some of the Holdens were little more than a sticker on a car but the true performance ones, homolgated for racing were heavily modified by Brocks business. He brought himself undone with the infamous polariser, and the VL based HDT Director. 

Though there was about 10 years of HDT Commodores.By Brock.

 

With simple badging there was both Alan Moffat and John Goss Falcons as well.

Even Wayne Gardner Commodores as well.

And Dick Johnson Falcons, Both of these were built with some consultation with the drivers, as were the Brock Falcons and Ladas

 

And the Veskanda's built by K&A for Bernie Van Elsen a well known SA driver who funded the first car of I believe 4. Two racecars and two built for street use. The original still holds a couple of outright records. And only the original is still in plain site unfortunatly.

And the one known as the Bapmobile made by Barry Lock and funded by Bap Romano. AFAIK only one but originally designed to be a limited production road car. As was the Veskanda. The Veskanda was built to all the then design rules of the day for limited Production cars. The original racecar had heater demisters, reverse lights, turn signals etc etc. 

Edited by Lee Nicolle, 27 November 2017 - 21:37.

[Doug Nye]

The Raymond Mays Specials...

 

DCN

[GMACKIE]

A couple more Aussies :-

 

Peter Bladwell - PRB Clubman

 

Ted Proctor - Manx sports cars [a few found their way onto the road]

[Ray Bell]

The proper name of the car occasionally known as the 'Bapmobile' was Kaditcha...

Built by Barry Lock originally, it was rebuilt by Wayne Eckersley and renamed the Romano WE84.

[Odseybod]

Jeff Uren Savage?