27 replies to this topic

[Holger Merten]

I saw a picture in Peter Morgans Porsche 917 - The winning formula with the whole team waiting during test-drives in 1968. It was interesting to recognize that the different team-members wear different overalls with different sponsor badges on it. Here a Dunlop overall, there a Good year overall with a Shell sponsor badge too. Compared to nowadays, a puzzle. Does anybody know why the drivers of one (Porsche-) team didn't wear the same overalls? And when did discipline in uniformed team overalls start?

[Ray Bell]

You just can't trust these journeymen drivers...

Don't forget, back in the sixties, there was an issue over tyres used by a Le Mans winner when the winning driver was contracted to another tyre supplier or something.

[Hugo Boecker]

Originally posted by Holger Merten
I saw a picture in Peter Morgans Porsche 917 - The winning formula with the whole team waiting during test-drives in 1970. It was interesting to recognize that the different team-members wear different overalls with different sponsor badges on it. Here a Dunlop overall, there a Good year overall with a Shell sponsor badge too. Compared to nowadays, a puzzle. Does anybody know why the drivers of one (Porsche-) team didn't wear the same overalls? And when did discipline in uniformed team overalls start?

In 1970 there were two different Porsche "works-teams" The drivers even had different personal sponsors and were released from their contracts to race with Porsche. For example Siffert was high on Enzo's shopping list for 1970 but Porsche did everything to hold the Suisse and "brought" him a March F1 contract. Imagine Seppi in the 1970 312 Ferrari F1 !!

here the main Porsche Teams in 1970
John Wyer Gulf Team Porsche
Jo Siffert, Pedro Rodriguez, Leo Kiunnen,Brain Redman, Dick Attwood, Bjorn Waldegard
Porsche Konstruktion Salzburg Shell - Dunlop/Firestone/Good Year
Hans Herrmann,Vic Elford, Kurt Ahrens,Dick Attwood, Rudi Lins, Denny Hulme
So the Hulme/Elford car at Brand Hatch used Good Years, Herrmann/Attwood won Le Mans on Dunlops and the Elford/Ahrens Nürburgring winner used Firestone (okay a 908 but) Larousse/Kauhsen used Good Years on their Martini Porsche. All main teamcars, exapt the Wyer's of course, ran on Shell.

It seems to be a time when racing and not money counts.

so long

[Holger Merten]

Thanks Hugo for that simple answer that brings clearness to a complex looking fact.

[WDH74]

You can see this in F1 as well, in the late sixties and early seventies. Drivers would have personal sponsors from, say a candy manufacturer in their home country (wasn't Jody Scheckter contracted to a chewing gum company that only sold in South Africa? Or did all team cars carry that logo, too?), and only that driver would have the logos on.
-Wm.

[Pedro 917]

...and Pedro Rodriguez winning the South African GP in 1967 on Firestones wearing a Good Year patch on his overalls. The same thing happened at Le Mans 1968 when he won with Bianchi in the GT40. I know Pedro had a contract with Good Year in 1968 and his BRM was on Good Years while the others had Firestones.

[Hugo Boecker]

Originally posted by Holger Merten
I saw a picture in Peter Morgans Porsche 917 - The winning formula with the whole team waiting during test-drives in 1970. It was interesting to recognize that the different team-members wear different overalls with different sponsor badges on it. Here a Dunlop overall, there a Good year overall with a Shell sponsor badge too. Compared to nowadays, a puzzle. Does anybody know why the drivers of one (Porsche-) team didn't wear the same overalls? And when did discipline in uniformed team overalls start?

Hello Holger,

please, can you bring us the photo (know you are a scanning wizzard) so we can puzzelout the drivers and their contacts


so long

[Holger Merten]

Originally posted by Hugo Boecker

...(know you are a scanning wizzard)...
so long

I'm a cool guy!;)

Wiil bring it next week, sorry out of office.

[Hugo Boecker]

Originally posted by Holger Merten



I'm a cool guy!;)

BTW: will post it next week, sorry out of office.

fine it's cool man

[Macca]

In Tony Rudd's 'It Was Fun!' he relates how Ernest Owen wanted the BRMs to be painted in the Owen corporate colour of orange in 1963; but once the then-requirement of national colours had been explained, they settled on the famous orange noseband and for all the mechanics to wear orange overalls.

But in 1966 when Frankenheimer was filming 'Grand Prix' and using footage of the real races and pits, when the film people became too troublesome the BRM mechanics would switch to different overalls for each practise session and the race, to mess-up the continuity.


Paul M

[Pedro 917]

Here's the picture Holger's talking about :



The picture was taken at Daytona 1968. From left to right are Peter Falk, Hans Mezger, Helmut Bott, Rolf Stommelen, the Baron, Joe Buzzetta, Hans Herrmann, Vic Elford and Gerhard Mitter.
It seems to me that Stommelen, Herrmann and Elford all wear the same overalls, just Vic has a Shell badge and Porsche was backed by Shell in 1968. Only Buzzetta has Good Year on his overalls but I believe he was an Italo-American who competed merely in the States and he was probably invited to drive a Porsche at Daytona.

[T54]

The answer is also a bit more simple: in these simpler days, most drivers only owned ONE set of overalls, and most actually had to purchase them.
Their names were not often on the overalls (most of them 2-piece a few one-piece) and when they were, it was free-hand embroidery. There was none of this electronic wizardry allowing direct embroidery in the top layer of the material as done today. There were embroidered patches sewn on the suit, period.

The "hot" ticket was to have a set of the American Hinchman brand which produced suits for Firestone and Goodyear and were made of a relatively new fiber, Nomex, the only ones the top driver could get "for free" and at the time, the safer ones. Jimmy Clark made them very popular for a while by winning the 1965 "500" with one. Virtually all were white but a few were made with red or dark blue material for NASCAR racers. By 1968 there was a new name pointing at the horizon, Bill Simpson, as he sneaked in and lifted the Goodyear suit contract from under Hinchman after the Inidanapolis-based company failed to deliver a batch of overalls in time. When Firestone hung their hat in the mid 1970's, Hinchman was all but out of the world racers biz and returned to making local Saturday-night racers suits.
In Europe, it was mostly all pale blue Dunlop 2-piece suits made of treated cotton, some more in cotton then Nomex sold by Les Leston, with a few French-made cotton suits made by a company specialized in firemen equipment. This all changed in 1972, but it is not our subject at this time.

So it is not amazing to find such a mix because often, what you see on the pics was the only set of overalls each driver owned.
Regards,

T54

[Holger Merten]

Thanks Pedro for posting the picture. And thanks T54 for the explanation.

[T54]

Thanks. You will be pleased to know ( weel, I hope! :yawn: ) that I am presently writing a booklet about the history of automobile racing safety equipment commissioned by a manufacturer.
Hopefully, truth will be told...

Kind regards,

T54

[Holger Merten]

T 54 thats sounds interesting, would you give us a short summary about the content? And when and wehre will the booklet be available?

[T54]

From 1982 to 1995, I was seriously involved with one of the world's top safety equipment manufacturers and a design pioneer in this field. I became very interested in the history of such after, as a rep for the company, being physically assaulted by wild man Bill Simpson in at least two occasions. I have gathered a lot of information about every progress made since 1895 after this person sued the company for a bogus design patent infringement on a helmet.
In 1992 and after the dreadful Indy 500 where so many drivers suffered feet and leg injuries, I pointed out that all 5 of "our" drivers wearing "our" belts who crashed had all walked out of their cars with no injuries, while EVERY other who crashed had suffered injuries. At their request, we supplied General Motors with several sets of belts for their own testing. Their conclusions were that our belts were more likely to cause MORE injuries because they stretched LESS than the other tested. At the time, I shook my head in disbelief...
In fact , all crash evidence in F1, Indy and sports car racing sustained with such belts proved otherwise, telling me that GM had drawn the wrong medical conclusions. Since this time, there has been very close collaboration between competent medical authorities in the racing world and the company in question, vindicating our designs (especially in the helmet field) and resulting in this company to now handle the manufacturing and distribution of the HANS devices worldwide except for the USA where Jim Dwning handles it.
On the other hand and about 13 years ago, I was also able to help a Belgian company sued by a German one about a wheel design, proving that the German company in question had obtained invalid patents on its designs. This happened after I provided the company in question a few simple photos of the GM-patented design of the...1965 Chaparral 2-piece bolt-on cast wheel, as well as a copy of the original 1964 patent as evidence.
Recently, I have been asked to put all these facts and gathered history on paper by that very safety equipment manufacturer, and they will publish this booklet. I expect to be done sometimes in 2005.
Regards,

T54

[Mark Bennett]

You worked for Schroth?

[T54]

No. It's in fact a little more complicated: Mercedes-Benz helped financing some development and testing of the HANS for use in DTM and insisted that there should be TWO manufacturing companies in Europe. Schroth is one, Stand 21 is the other.
USA, Canada, Mexico and Japan are handled by Jim Downing from Atlanta, while Stand 21 manufactures for themselves and soon for Downing and handles the rest of the planet. Schroth is mostly handling Germany but can sell also in other countries except the ones handled by Downing.
I have just seen the latest production handled in France by Duqueisne in collaboration with Stand 21, and the devices are exceptional, much lighter and with so much technical and fitment improvements over the current models in use. You might want to have a look here .



Regards,

T54

[Nikos Spagnol]

There`s a picture taken in Brazil `86 featuring Senna, Prost and Williams teammates Mansell and Piquet, wearing similar overalls - except that Mansell`s is red and Piquet`s is white.

In `94, Senna`s overall had a "Nacional" logo on it - a Brazilian bank who sponsered him troughout his Formula One carreer and went bankrupt in 1995 - while Hill didn`t. I guess it`s fairly commom until today, to have a logo of "your" sponsor only in "your" overall.

In 1999, BAR wasn`t allowed to feature 2 different liveries, but Jacques and Zonta weared different overalls.

Of course, nowadays the teams care more about their "market" look than before. So that everyone in the paddock have their clothes "marketing-designed" and stuff.

[Holger Merten]

Wow, we have the best and most interesting members here on TNF. Great.

[Nanni Dietrich]

Originally posted by Pedro 917
Here's the picture Holger's talking about :

Oooooooohhhhh... Mr. Peter Falk is Huschke von Hanstein son!!!

[T54]

There`s a picture taken in Brazil `86 featuring Senna, Prost and Williams teammates Mansell and Piquet, wearing similar overalls - except that Mansell`s is red and Piquet`s is white.

You mean, this one:



There are other period pictures here .

These are of course all "old-generation" Stand 21 racing suits before the revolution of 1989 when they introduced their new and still unique breathing fiber now used on their top of the line suits, allowing drivers to withstand very high cockpit temperatures. The works Corvette drivers and many other GT teams with cockpit temps of 150-degree F know this very well, the difference in comfort and health being enormous.
Regards,

T54

[Muzza]

Originally posted by Nikos Spagnol
There`s a picture taken in Brazil `86 featuring Senna, Prost and Williams teammates Mansell and Piquet, wearing similar overalls - except that Mansell`s is red and Piquet`s is white.

In `94, Senna`s overall had a "Nacional" logo on it - a Brazilian bank who sponsered him troughout his Formula One carreer and went bankrupt in 1995 - while Hill didn`t. I guess it`s fairly commom until today, to have a logo of "your" sponsor only in "your" overall.

In 1999, BAR wasn`t allowed to feature 2 different liveries, but Jacques and Zonta weared different overalls.

Of course, nowadays the teams care more about their "market" look than before. So that everyone in the paddock have their clothes "marketing-designed" and stuff.

Originally posted by T54


You mean, this one:



There are other period pictures here .

These are of course all "old-generation" Stand 21 racing suits before the revolution of 1989 when they introduced their new and still unique breathing fiber now used on their top of the line suits, allowing drivers to withstand very high cockpit temperatures. The works Corvette drivers and many other GT teams with cockpit temps of 150-degree F know this very well, the difference in comfort and health being enormous.
Regards,

T54

Actually the picture was taken at Estoril on the eve of the 1986 Portuguese Grand Prix, not in Brazil.

[T54]

Actually the picture was taken at Estoril on the eve of the 1986 Portuguese Grand Prix, not in Brazil.

I would'nt know. The spectators in the back look all the same to me.
I have no idea where the pic was taken and who took it but it is a nice one.

T54

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by T54
.....Jimmy Clark made them very popular for a while by winning the 1965 "500" with one.....

You mean the suit that Max Stahl lost changed the course of history?

Actually, you caused me to remember an incident about 1966... at the New South Wales Road Racing Club, where flag marshals were being briefed for an upcoming race meeting.

Fireproof overalls were required here already, and there was a discussion about these. Then some bright type asked if it was all right if cotton badges were sewn onto the suits, or would they spoil the fireproofing!

[Geza Sury]

Originally posted by Muzza
Actually the picture was taken at Estoril on the eve of the 1986 Portuguese Grand Prix, not in Brazil.

Portugal indeed. BTW were Mansell and Piquet the last team mates to wear different overalls? (Different colour I mean.) On a second thought no, because in 1988 Mansell still wore his customary red overall and his new team-mate, Riccardo Patrese used a white one.

[petefenelon]

Originally posted by T54


I have just seen the latest production handled in France by Duqueisne in collaboration with Stand 21, and the devices are exceptional, much lighter and with so much technical and fitment improvements over the current models in use. You might want to have a look here .


T54

The same Duqueine brothers who used to build gorgeously engineered F3 cars in the late 80s? (their chassis looked years ahead of the Martinis, Dallaras, Ralts etc, and really seemed to be built 15 years ago to the kind of "aerospace standards" that weren't all that common even in F1 at the time...)

I often thought they'd be an asset to higher levels of the sport - it's nice to see they're still involved.

[T54]

Fireproof overalls were required here already, and there was a discussion about these. Then some bright type asked if it was all right if cotton badges were sewn onto the suits, or would they spoil the fireproofing!

Believe it or not, this is still happening today... No one is more ignorant about fire and its effects than the decision-making person in modern racing teams. The drivers don't know too much either...
Of course there is no added danger in sewing cotton badges on top and through the fire-RETARDANT (note: NOTHING is "fire-proof") material. The fire has an affinity for what burns easily, so will consume the cotton material first, giving more heat-transfer time to the material under it. In fact, every and all racing suits made today by every and all the suit manufacturers (and there is a plethora of them now that it is "fashionable" for high-profile companies not in the business of auto racing apparel to spend a large amount of their advertising budget to dress top-level rally, ChampCar, IRL and F1 teams), have direct-embroidery of cotton thread over the top layer of a generally 3-layer suit. This is untreated cotton thread. No big deal.

The same Duqueine brothers who used to build gorgeously engineered F3 cars in the late 80s?

Yes indeed. A very capable bunch of very nice people, and some of the most competent composite experts in Europe and indeed, the planet.

were Mansell and Piquet the last team mates to wear different overalls?

This was a requirement by Williams Grand Prix Engineering on their purchase order, we did not ask questions. I still retain the very suit that Nigel wore when pushing his car to get points in my collection of racing "junk" as well as one from Nelson.

You mean the suit that Max Stahl lost changed the course of history?

Let say that Jimmy influenced the Euro-racing fashion for a while because most top-level F1 and sports car racing fellows suddenly gave a lot of business to the little Indianapolis-based manufacturer.
Regards,

T54