190 replies to this topic

[françoisb]

Rear of this car is ELVA MK1...front is slightly different...
Any ideas? late car? race modification?...other car?
Thanks!
François.

[ianselva]

I really need some better photos of both end , but certainly the front suspension is Triumph herald.
Send me some goodd photos of the chassis and I'll see what I can do ?

Ian

[D-Type]

Originally posted by ianselva
I really need some better photos of both end , but certainly the front suspension is Triumph herald.
Send me some goodd photos of the chassis and I'll see what I can do ?

Ian

The chronology doesn't fit. Elva Mk1 about 1953; Triumph Herald 1959. Or was the Herald front end the same as the Standard 8/10?

[francoisb123]

Probably: the arms are the same than an ex "works car" MK1B (previously for sale by Paul Grant in Belgium) .But not exactly same location...
François.

[Ray Bell]

Standard 8/10 front end is very similar to Herald (see thread on Alford & Alder uprights), but smaller in many items. Like brakes, for instance...

[francoisb123]

Interesting thread.So, it's OK for Standart front end.
And for other location differences with first MK1, mine should be a late model (serial number is more MK2, but still live axle rear).
Some said me ELVA was selling in the same time MK1 and 2 (nearly half price for an MK1!). Any information about that?
François.

[Peter Morley]

I can't claim to be an Elva expert, but here are some photos taken, many years ago, when I rebuilt 110023 (1956 Mark 1)

Front suspension as found:


Front of part restored chassis:


Rear of part restored chassis:


Front chassis:


Front suspension:


Rear axle:


Front view with engine fitted:


What I know about the parts is as follows:

Front suspension is standard Triumph;
Rear axle is pre-Ford Anglia (100E?);
Consequently the wheel stud pcds are different front and rear, Elva used specially made bolt on wire wheels - since these weren't available I had knock-off hub adaptors made so that standard wire wheels could be fitted.

Engine fitted is an Anglia type, with aluminium head and 4 Amal carbs rebuilt by Stuart Rolt - I understand that a later French owner replaced this with a Formula Ford type engine (which was probably a lot easier to start!).

It had the fibreglass body rather than the ugly aluminium one that they also used:

[francoisb123]

Great thanks, Peter, it's a great help.
About body, I have also the same one (with lights).
About the engine, the car was Climax engined when it come in France (I have a picture).Later was fit the Ford unit.
But now, the front end is quite same than mine (suspension is ok, steering not).
But now, rear end, which was nearly same than 100017 (in France), is different on yours...

[img=http://img357.imageshack.us/img357/5828/p21713288jo.jpg]


Could be different cars in ELVA production (owner askings, engine fitted, race /road car)???

François.

[francoisb123]

[IMG]http://img525.images...p21713287qz.jpg[/IMG]

New try about picture.

[Peter Morley]

Chances are each car was different - every owner probably had their own idea of how it should be done, plus the factory probably 'improved' them as they went on.
They certainly weren't made on a production line, chassis were probably only made when they received an order.

It is likely that some owners only bought a bare frame and fitted their own steering, suspension, engine, gearbox etc. - so those details could be quite different.

Different engines and axles could have required different solutions - and parts like the steering rack and wheels probably depended on how much the owner wanted to spend (mine used something like a Cooper cast aluminium rack).

What is surprising are the differences in the chassis tubes - your rear bulkhead is the "other way up" to mine (e.g. the diagonal tubes meet at the top in yours and the bottom on mine). That could be due to the rear axle installation - perhaps the Climax engine meant the propshaft was lower for example, or maybe the design simply changed as they developed the cars.

[Peter Morley]

Have you seen the following photos:

http://www.racecar-c...ex.jsp?Elva.jsp

There are a couple of photos of them building Mark 2 chassis.

I think they are actually taken from Roger Dunbar's Elva site!

By the way Duncan Rabagliatti thought my car was a Mark 2 - but that was from the number rather than specification.

But looking at these photos I can see some similarities - given that it wasn't registered until 1956 it is possible my car was of a later specification (maybe something like a Mark 1½), but built with cheaper suspension.

[francoisb123]

Great pictures, Peter.

What's interesting is that the front end of my car is really MK2 ("assembly of a MK2")...with live axle rear!
And in "late 1957", works was still producing MK1 (other picture)...probably with front MK2 end, to be more simple.
I have a price list,badly without date:1255L for a MK2, 749 for a MK1...so Nichols probably sold MK1 for a long time, with such a price difference!

For the rear, this one, from "new england classic", seems nearly like mine:

http://www.newenglan...=inventory&id=5

Climax engined cars?

[elvaMKII]

I bought an Elva MK II from Bob Grunau of Tononto. If any old Elva racers recoginze the car please let me know.

The car was BRG and then red. Its final color was butterscotch yellow and with a KAMM style rear treatment.

It has a new (1992) body but I have the original body in my garage. It may have had a SAAB engine and run HM in its final days. The last American owner was Carl Schwab of New Jersery. In may have been owned by J. Michael Kruger from 1968-72. Previous or post owners please contact me. Thanks.

bobengberg@netscape.net





Photos also at http://www.tamsoldra...aIIMystery.html

Here is the car with its new (1990) body.

[Wolfgang Mathai]

Yes Peter, the old pics at www.racecar-collection.com are from "The ELVA story" by Rodger Dunbar, you will find the link on top of the pics. I am not sure that my Elva is a MK 3 oder Mk 2 ....
Wolfgang

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by Wolfgang Mathai
Yes Peter, the old pics at www.racecar-collection.com are from "The ELVA story" by Rodger Dunbar, you will find the link on top of the pics. I am not sure that my Elva is a MK 3 oder Mk 2 ....
Wolfgang

Wolfgang

Has Stan Mason been in contact with you?
He maintains a list of early Elva owners and said he thinks your car is a Mark 2.
I told him about your website so that he could contact you, if he did not do so then e-mail me and I will give you his details.

Peter

[Graham Gauld]

Surely the first Elva was not built in 1953. I have pictures of the CRM taken in 1955 and this was the car that came before the Elva. Or am I rambling again ?

[Wolfgang Mathai]

Peter

he contact me, but I dont know him and so I give no answer .... sorry
I will contact him by email (I have done ...)

Wolfgang

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by Graham Gauld
Surely the first Elva was not built in 1953. I have pictures of the CRM taken in 1955 and this was the car that came before the Elva. Or am I rambling again ?

Didn't Nichols start with a CSM (Chapman Sporting Motor) in 1954?

I think you are right that 1955 was the first year they used the name Elva.

[Graham Gauld]

I certainly have photos of Stuart Lewis Evans and Richard Mainwaring driving the first two Elvas at Charterhall in Scotland early in the 1955 season and another shot of Mainwaring that I took at the Tourist Trophy race at Dundrod that season early in the race : he was killed in the car later in the race. Ironically at the Charterhall meeting there was a CSM ( Sorry for calling it the CRM) which had just been bought by a young driver called Colin Kirkcaldie. There has been a book on Elva planned for a number of years now and I believe Janos Wimpfen has it on his plate.

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by Graham Gauld
I certainly have photos of Stuart Lewis Evans and Richard Mainwaring driving the first two Elvas at Charterhall in Scotland early in the 1955 season and another shot of Mainwaring that I took at the Tourist Trophy race at Dundrod that season early in the race : he was killed in the car later in the race. Ironically at the Charterhall meeting there was a CSM ( Sorry for calling it the CRM) which had just been bought by a young driver called Colin Kirkcaldie. There has been a book on Elva planned for a number of years now and I believe Janos Wimpfen has it on his plate.

I'm looking for detail (e.g. underbonnet/cockpit etc) photos of early Elvas to help get mine as correct as possible, do any of your photos show any detail that might be useful?

I'd like to get in touch with the person who is trying to produce an Elva book, I might be able to help them as much as they might be able to help me!

The car that Mainwaring was killed in could be the car who's remains were later sold off, rebuilt with Climax engine and registered as 800 BKN in 1957, the owner fitting an aluminium body, and abandoning the car in 1958 when the engine blew up. Bob Saunders found it in 1991, restored and raced it. It was recently sold by Belgian dealer Paul Grant.

[elvaMKII]

Here are some photos of Elvas at Watkins Glen in September, 1958. They come from a video made by Kendall Oil that was very kindly given to me by Rip Ripley II, whose dad is shown racing their car.

1. There is the green MK II of Rip Ripley (#178) that he had raced at Sebring the previous March.

2. The other green one probably is driven by Chuck Dietrich? (#146)

3. There's a red one with a headrest fairing and full width windscreen. (#35) This is the Frank Baptista car. He seems to have won his GM race and he appears in the main event. Class winners of EM and GM were sometimes allowed to compete in the Main.

These photos are taken from the screen with a digital camera and so are not too clear. These are thumbnails and you can click on each to see a larger image.

BTW, the main event was won by Ed Crawford in a Lister Jag.











Does anyone have the entry list for those races?

[elvaMKII]

More photos of Elvas....

Last summer I visited the shop of longtime Elva collector Bruce McCaw, near Seattle, Washington. They were very kind to show me their Elvas and let me take some photos. He has a MK I, the prototype MK II (chassis 20/100) and several MK VII's.

Here is the MK I with the overhead-valve Elva conversion:




Here is the prototype MK II that they believe is chassis 20/100:



















And a room full of fine cars.

[D-Type]

Is the aluminium car the one that was raced in Kenya by Colin McNaughton? Initially with a 1172cc Ford engine and later with a 1475 Climax (I think)

.

Edited by D-Type, 10 November 2019 - 18:43.

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by D-Type
Is the aluminium car the one that was raced in Kenya by Colin McNaughton? Initially with a 1172cc Ford engine and later with a 1475 Climax.

Aluminium car (I assume you mean the unpainted one) should be the Mark 1B car that Archie Scott Brown raced, originally with a fibreglass Falcon body. It was later modified becoming the prototype Mark 2.

[Sharman]

Cor! aren't Elvas history complicated. I thought the only 1500 car that Archie drove was AJB engined

[elvaMKII]

The aluminum MK II prototype that is in McCaw's shop they believe to be the first MK II (Chassis 20/100) that was restored in England some years ago. A photo in the February Motor Racing issue shows a white MK II with a canvas top and valances on the rear wheel arch and shows the plastic body. There is another photo in the March, 1957 issue of the magazine showing the white car and showing Archie Scott-Brown sitting in the prototype. The article says:

"Handsome plastic bodywork of the MK II is a modification of the 1956 design. Plastic valances have been fitted to all four wheel arches [of the white car].... The first model of the new line has left, with the prototype, for the Sebring 12-hours race. It is fitted with full-width windscreen to comply with the Championship Sports Car Race regulations. Later models will have a lengthened nose for better air penetration."

There is no record that the prototype Elva or the white "first model" showed up at the 1957 Sebring race. I heard or read somewhere that the protytype MK II received its aluminum body sometime later.

In 1958 Dr. Wyllie and Chuck Dietrich entered an Elva MK II with a 1476 cc motor that might have been a Climax FPF engine. These were rare and expensive. The car broke a suspension in practice and was a dns. The listing of the Wylie car is "MK II" but Stan Mason thinks it might have been a MK III.

[Sharman]

Hmmm I think the FPF was a 2.5 litre and was a long way down the line frm 1958. A 1500 would have been an FWB which (I may be wrong) i don't think were fitted by the works for Archie. IIRC Archie's last Elva drive was Brands On Ice 1957 when he won both the 1100 race FWA powered and the 1500 race AJB powered. He did not race an Elva thereafter and was killed at Spa in 1958.

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by Sharman
Hmmm I think the FPF was a 2.5 litre and was a long way down the line frm 1958. A 1500 would have been an FWB which (I may be wrong) i don't think were fitted by the works for Archie. IIRC Archie's last Elva drive was Brands On Ice 1957 when he won both the 1100 race FWA powered and the 1500 race AJB powered. He did not race an Elva thereafter and was killed at Spa in 1958.

FPFs started as 1500s and were gradually stretched to 2.5 litre (2.7 even) via 2 & 2.2 litres.

So it could have had an FPF, but it would be easier to fit an FWB in plave of the FWA since the engine mounts would be the same.

[elvaMKII]

Re. FPF vs. FWB. My thoughts too, Peter, but Stan Mason has a period article saying the car was fitted with a FPF. Dr. Wyllie, a transplanted South African who was living in Pennsylvania, raced a Lotus MK IX and Elvas and was an executive with Gulf Oil so perhaps finances were not a block to his buying a FPF. It would have been one fast car.

[elvaMKII]

Looking for info on former Elva MK II driver Donald C. Peters. He lived in New York and may have been associated with Watkins Glen Corp. Email address or phone number requested. Thanks.

[RA Historian]

Originally posted by elvaMKII
Looking for info on former Elva MK II driver Donald C. Peters. He lived in New York and may have been associated with Watkins Glen Corp. Email address or phone number requested. Thanks.

Mike Argetsinger reports that "Don was a great friend and a fine driver despite being handicapped with the loss of one arm. He was a quick and dependable driver -- good enough to be in demand to drive other people's cars. He was a charter member of the Glen Region and the first member of Glen Region to serve on the SCCA Board of Governors.

I am sad to report that Don died several years ago."
Tom

[elvaMKII]

Tom,

Thanks for the reply. Don Peters was a friend of Millard "Rip" Ripley who tells me he once loaned Don his Elva MK II so Don could compete in an event and get his license. I think that Don is pictured in the ex-Chuck Dietrich MK II at Watkins Glen in September, 1958, and that this is the car that I now own. Stan Mason tells me that the Dietrich car was chassis 100/27.

Do you know if Don ever owned a MK II? Or, is the photo a car you recognize?

Bob Engberg

[RA Historian]

Bob,

Here is what Mike Argetsinger told me today:

"Don Peters never owned an Elva but he drove one for both Ripley and for
Dietrich. The photo is in the Dietrich car at WG in 1958. Don is driving
down the access road that served as the false grid at the time. He finished
8th that day in the Queen Catharine Cup.

I talked to Bill Green this morning at the Research Center and he is
contacting Bob Engberg directly. They had previous communication and Bill is
going to give him the additional new data we have come up with together."

That should help you quite a bit!

Glad to be of help,

Tom

[elvaMKII]

Tom,

Bill Greene did indeed do some research on Don Peters and emailed me. We all seem to agree that the car in question (photo above) is the Chuck Dietrich car chassis 100/27. Chuck crashed this car at Marlboro sometime in 1957. He wrote in an Elva newsletter a few years ago that the after repairs in England the car "was sold to somebody in Buffalo." I'd like to get that name. It is possible that Millard Ripley owned it (he was from Ithaca) as well as the MK IIb that he raced at Sebring and elsewhere.

Thanks for you help. I am pretty certain I have the ex-Dietrich car but am looking for the "smoking gun" that will confirm it.

[elvaMKII]

Since writing the above I've found a color photo of the "Ecurie Ripley" Elva MK II's at Watkins Glen. Here is a frame from the movie made at the event by Kendall Oil. It shows the green MK IIb of Ripley #178 on the right, and the red MK II #172 (with hood open) that was driven by Don Peters that day and also enterd by "Ecurie Ripley."





My car, is like the Peter's driven Elva, was originally BRG and later painted red. I'm interested to learn what happened to this red car as I think it is the one I now have. I think it ended up in 1968 in the hands of Michael Krueger but I have no knowledge of its whereabouts in the early 1960s. Old photos of red MK II's would be a help. (Frank Baptista had a red MK III that was usually with race number 35.)

[elvaMKII]

Re. my 1957 Elva. I've been scraping into the original body (see the orange car above) and discovered that a third color seems to have been a metallic blue. Someone then created a full width windscreen for the car and painted it a butterscotch orange. At the same time (I believe) a KAMM tail end treatment was also created.

I think this was done after the car, painted blue, crashed and damaged the left front severely, as there are abundant amounts of body putty on the left front but only a black primer and orange color on top of that (no green or red or blue on top of the putty). My guess is that the car crashed in the early 1960's as a blue car and re-emered as an orange car with KAMM tail and perhaps SAAB motor.

So, here are more questions for you Elva folks:

1. Does anyone recall a blue MK II racing in the early 1960's?

2. Mike Kreuger tells me it may have competed in hillclimbs so any info you have on potential owners of the car or hillclimb photos would be appreciated. I think this would be in the 1959-1965 era.

3. Jake Jacobson seems to have owned two Elvas, a MK V now owned by Chuck Crist, and this MK II. He apparently never raced the MK II. Any info out there?

4. Does anyone know what became of the MK II ex-Detriech, ex-Ripley car shown in the photo above? (I think it's what I own.)

5. Mike Krueger says he sold the car in 1968 (or so) to someone in Charlottesville. (Fred ____ ?). Does this sound familiar to anyone?

Bob

[Wolfgang Mathai]

I found in my ELVA a Technical Inspection Sticker: Connellsville, PA., 8/9/65. How race the car? Do you know the chassic-no?

Wolfgang

[elvaMKII]

In 1957 Chuck Dietrich crashed his MK II (100/27) and had it repaired back at Elva.

It was raced in September 1958 at Watkins Glen by Don Peters. The car had been sold by Dietrich to "someone in Buffalo", NewYork. I've learned that a H. D. McPhail owned or raced an Elva MK II and lived in Buffalo in 1958.

So, does anyone have info on H.D. McPhail and his Elva?

bobengberg@netscape.net/

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by elvaMKII
A photo in the February Motor Racing issue shows a white MK II with a canvas top and valances on the rear wheel arch and shows the plastic body. There is another photo in the March, 1957 issue of the magazine showing the white car and showing Archie Scott-Brown sitting in the prototype. The article says:

"Handsome plastic bodywork of the MK II is a modification of the 1956 design. Plastic valances have been fitted to all four wheel arches [of the white car].... The first model of the new line has left, with the prototype, for the Sebring 12-hours race. It is fitted with full-width windscreen to comply with the Championship Sports Car Race regulations. Later models will have a lengthened nose for better air penetration."

There is no record that the prototype Elva or the white "first model" showed up at the 1957 Sebring race. I heard or read somewhere that the protytype MK II received its aluminum body sometime later.

Presumably the car with race number 13 is the same car - taken at Eagle Mountain 2nd June 1957:

http://www.racingspo...6-02-photo.html

[Sharman]

Peter
What was Peter Proctor doing in a Maser, he seems somehow misplaced in that setting
John

[David McKinney]

Can't see what you're referring to, Sharman, but it sounds as if it might mean F W 'Bill' Proctor

[Jerry Entin]

David McKinney and others:
The color photos taken at Eagle Mountain in June 1957 must have been taken during the unloading of the cars. Bright sunshine then, but this SCCA National Event went into the history books as The Texas Regatta due to the pouring rain that weekend.
Looking at the complete results, there is no #13 Elva that shows up in the race results, but race numbers may have been changed before the races started. The only Elva in the entire event was the #67 G-modified model, no further specifications. It finished 8th overall in race 2 ( a ten lapper) driven by Bill Parham and 9th overall in the feature, which was race 8 a 20 lapper driven by Jim Roberts.

Because of Shelby's retiring in both races, aboard #98 Edgar owned 300S Maserati, the results were surprising. Race 2 went to Paul O'Shea in the #30 Mercedes Benz SLS chased by Jim Hall's Ferrari Monza. Ebb Rose's SR2 Corvette and Bob Stonedale's XK-SS Jag. The feature went to Dick Thompson in Lindsey Hopkin's production Corvette, followed by John Wolf and Bob Donner in 550RS Porsches, Rose's SR-2 Corvette and Stonedale's XK-SS Jaguar.

With the name Jim Hall one had to be careful in those days, as there were two. There was an older Jim Hall and the younger one who later made the Chaparral cars. But the unnumbered Maserati 200SI or 250S shot in the paddock may indicate that Young Jim Hall brought both the Maserati and and Ferrai Monza to the event. The Maserati went unraced that weekend.

Last, the results do list Peter Procter and his 150S Maserati #51 in race 2, he finished 15th and last. In race 8 he was a DNF. But it is unlikely it was the British one.
all research provided by Willem Oosthoek.

[Sharman]

Jerry & David
If you look again at the listing on Peter Morley's post it shows Peter Procter with a Maser 150S as GB nationality, I did not look carefully enough it is Er not Or in the list but could it have been the same person? Well down the field but 150s were never that competitive and the company except for the Bandinis et& Giaur outclassed it.
John

[David McKinney]

I stand to be corrected, but F W 'Bill' Proctor raced Maseratis - including a 150S - in the US and the British driver Peter Proctor never did: in 1957 he was an amateur Cooper 500 driver.
Which of course is not to say that American Bill did not have a brother called Peter

[Jerry Entin]

The state of Texas produced two Jim Halls, who were not related but who both raced Ferrari Monza's in the same time period. As David McKinney mentions, Bill Proctor did race various Maserati's, including a 150S, in the U.S., but Peter Procter's name was spelled with an e in the SCCA race report on Eagle Mountain.
information provided by Willem Oosthoek.

[elvaMKII]

The white #13 was (among) the first Elva MKII's. It had a fiberglass "Falcon" body and full rear wheel coverings. I was told it later was rebodied with aluminum.

[elvaMKII]

Still looking for history on my 1957 Elva MKII. This photo shows the car sitting next to a red Stanguellini in 1960 at "June Sprints" at Road America. Possible owners/drivers include:

- Bill Bradley and Ralph Durbin,
- Geoerge E. Ranney,
- C.L. McDaniel,
- Nathaniel Weaver(?) or Nathaniel Day
- Owen Coon,
- Berdie Martin or Bill Peters.

I am also looking for photos or info on the Elva driven by Mike Rahal who raced a MK VI but perhaps also a MK II? Send info to me at bobengberg@netscape.net



Orange Elva on grid at Road Atlanta in 1960.

[elvaMKII]

Peter and Others:

The Elva MK II that M.R.J. "Doc" Wyllie entered at the 1958 Sebring race had, in fact, a DOHC Climax FPF motor. Wyllie wrote to me after I asked him about that car: He said he had a horrendous crash at night practice and torn up both ends of the car. It was sent back to Elva and they salvaged the engine and tranny and made a new car, returned it to Doc who raced it at Cumberland Nationals in 1959, then sold it to Burdette Martin. Martin raced it at least once in 1960 at the Road America "June Sprints."

[elvaMKII]

Just learned some things about Elva racecrs at the Sebring 1958 Race.

The Bentley (#58) car was unpainted aluminum. It has four headlights.

The Ripley MK IIb (#78) was BRG with a white swoop in the front and a red circle around its radiator opening.

The Burdie Martin MK III was white and may have had mag wheels and a fuel filler on the RHS cowling.

THe Kurtz MK III (#77) looks to be a MK II. It was blue, and had a simple full width windscreen with no side windows.
The Wyllie car has four-wheel disc brakes, first on an Elva.

bobengberg@netscape.net/

[Jerry Entin]

Bob: This comes from Willem Oosthoek: Eddie Crawford, after missing most of the 1959 season because of a bout of rheumatoid arthritis, came back in grand style by winning the under 2 liter race at the USAC event held at Meadowdale in September 1959. His car appears to have been Burdie Martin's Elva Mk 4, with a 1.5 Liter twin cam Climax engine. Martin confirmed that it was his car. According to Eddie Crawford's archives the car used was the ex Jesse "Doc" Wyllie car. Doc found it too fast after a factory rebuild and sold it to Martin.
Is this the same car that Wyllie crashed during Sebring practice in 1958, or was it the car he damaged in 1959 practice, after tangling with Lucky Casner's Ferrari 250TR?
all research Willem Oosthoek.