Magneto Magazine Issue 13: Spring 2022

ISSUE

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SPRING 2022

S C H U P PA N 9 62 C R PORSCHE ON STEROIDS

T H U N D E R B O LT !

A 5000BHP LEGEND

FERRARI DINO E P I C R E S T O R AT I O N

T H E M E R C E D E S T H AT S PAW N E D T H E G U L LW I N G

£10 | SPRING 2022

PRINTED IN THE UK

A CELE BR ATION OF THE AU TOMOBILE LIKE NO OTHER March 3-6, 2022 | Amelia Island, FL | ameliaconcours.com

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18 COMING SOON Events to look forward to in 2022, including Le Mans Classic and The Amelia

29 S TA R T E R Singer’s new Turbo Study, the stolen Bond DB5, new Airstream museum, kei cars, Jaguar testing great Mike Cross

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GIOTTO BIZZARRINI

FERRARI DINO R E S T O R AT I O N

FAT H E R S O F T H E G U L LW I N G

LALIQUE COLLECTION

Winston Goodfellow pays homage to his automotive hero, the legendary engineer behind a multitude of Italian icons

What’s involved when a 246GT is restored to the levels normally reserved for the likes of the 250GT? We investigate...

We go back to where the Mercedes-Benz 300SL began, with a rare drive in two of its most unique W194 progenitors

The National Motor Museum’s stunning line-up of glass Lalique mascots – and the stories behind them all

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HERITAGE IS ABOUT

PLACES

In the completely renovated spaces of the Officine Classiche workshop in Turin, a team of experts is at your disposal to restore and certify any historic model of the Alfa Romeo, Fiat, Lancia and Abarth brands.

Discover our world. www.fcaheritage.com

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SCHUPPAN 962CR

LUDVIGSEN ON...

T H U N D E R B O LT

TOP 50 B R U TA L I S T C A R S

The tale of this Group C-bred road car is one of perseverance and passion, betrayal and broken dreams

Captain George Eyston’s heroic Bonneville battle against John Cobb for the coveted Land Speed Record

The motor sport-inspired brutalist aesthetic led to some of the most hardcore car designs ever.

Here are our favourites

171 ACQUIRE

Buying a Miura; predictions for 2022; collecting motoring art, watches, vinyl records and Michele Conti models; plus new products and books

196 LEGAL: CAREFUL CONTRACTS

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198 COLLECTIONS: F1 CARS IN UAE

200 HISTORIC RACING: HONING RACE CRAFT

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BEHIND THE LEGEND: 962LM’S FIERY END

Magneto

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Editor’s welcome

13 Welcome to the first Magneto issue of 2022. I know it’s rather late to wish you Happy New Year, but... Happy New Year!

Already, 2022 has thrown us a few curve-balls, good and bad. On the latter, there are still indoor events being postponed, the most notable being Rétromobile in Paris. February should be the time for bumping into collectors and specialists from around the world, usually on the main walkway outside Fiskens and Girardo & Co. That pleasure will now have to wait until mid-March.

At the end of 2021 we saw Hagerty go public on the New York Stock Exchange at around the same time as the formation of a new collector car trading company, Broad Arrow Group. Then, in the first week of 2022, the two companies announced a partnership that gives more power to Broad Arrow and adds car-selling platforms to the fast-growing Hagerty empire, to enhance its core businesses of insurance, media and events.

A few days later Bonhams launched the US arm of its recently acquired digital selling platform The Market, headed up by collector car sales and concours veteran Caroline Cassini, and RM Sotheby’s announced a partnership with the fast-growing Canossa Events.

This is also the year that the Le Mans Classic returns, Ferrari celebrates the 60th anniversary of the 250GTO and the happy team at Magneto launches the inaugural Concours on Savile Row, London.

If you were expecting a quiet 2022, best think again...

David Lillywhite Editorial director

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Contributors N AT H A N C H A D W I C K Nathan has been writing for Magneto for a few issues now, but here he makes his feature debut with two pieces: the inside story of the Schuppan 962CR, and a deep dive into the brutalist automotive aesthetic – a subject close to his heart.

Prior editorial endeavours include stints at Modern Classics and Strada magazines.

WINSTON GOODFELLOW Having fallen in love with Italian supercars in his teens, Winston has become a world expert on the subject.

In this issue he tells the story of Giotto Bizzarrini, and relates it to his own 1981 pilgrimage to Italy to track down the great but by-then-elusive engineer, followed by their subsequent meetings over the years.

GREG WHITE As a child, a series of underwhelming photographs he took at an air show spurred Greg to learn more about the craft. Now a multiple award winner, he is known for his highly graphic style, which you’ll see in his stunning studio shots of the brutal Schuppan 962CR further on in this issue.

Jay’s job title is creative director of franchise at Pixar Animation Studios, but unofficially he’s ‘the guardian of the Cars movies’. His automotive expertise and design skills were crucial to the success of Cars; and he also uses those attributes as a concours judge and a writer. In this issue he visits the new Airstream museum.

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ILLUSTR AT IONS P ET ER A LLE N

J AY WA R D

fope.com

Who to contact

Editorial director

Managing director

David Lillywhite

Geoff Love

Art director

Advertising sales

Peter Allen

Sue Farrow, Rob Schulp

Managing editor

Staff writer

Accounts administrator

Sarah Bradley

Elliott Hughes

Jonathan Ellis

Lifestyle advertising

West Coast US contributor

Sophie Kochan

Winston Goodfellow

Contributors in this issue Marshall Buck, Jonathon Burford, Nathan Chadwick, Sam Chick, Robert Dean, Massimo Delbò, Andrew English, Rob Gould, Rick Guest, Sam Hancock, Dave Kinney, Jensen Larson, Karl Ludvigsen, Charlie Magee, John Mayhead, Debbie Nolan, Doug Nye, Andy Reid, Clive Robertson, John Simister, Zach Stovall, Jay Ward, Greg White, Rupert Whyte

Single issues and subscriptions Please visit www.magnetomagazine.com or call +44 (0)208 068 6829

HOTHOUSE MEDIA Geoff Love, David Lillywhite, George Pilkington Castle Cottage, 25 High Street, Titchmarsh, Northants NN14 3DF, UK Printing Buxton Press, Palace Road, Buxton, Derbyshire SK17 6AE, UK Printed on Amadeus Silk supplied through Denmaur as a Carbon Balanced product.

Made from FSC® certified and traceable pulp sources Specialist newsstand distribution Pineapple Media, Select Publisher Services Who to contact Subscriptions and business geoff@hothousemedia.co.uk Accounts accounts@hothousemedia.co.uk Editorial david@hothousemedia.co.uk Advertising sue@flyingspace.co.uk or rob@flyingspace.co.uk Lifestyle advertising sophie.kochan2010@gmail.com

©Hothouse Media Ltd. Magneto and associated logos are registered trademarks of Hothouse Media Ltd. All rights reserved. All material in this magazine, whether in whole or in part, may not be reproduced, transmitted or distributed in any form without the written permission of Hothouse Media Ltd. Hothouse Media Ltd. uses a layered privacy notice giving you brief details about how we would like to use your personal information.

For full details, please visit www.magnetomagazine.com/privacy/

Magneto [mag-nee-toh] noun, plural mag·ne·tos 1. Electrical generator that provides periodic high-voltage pulses to the spark-plugs of an internal-combustion engine, used mostly pre-World War One although still fitted for emergency back-up of aircraft ignition systems.

2. Fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.

3. Great quarterly magazine featuring the most important cars in the world.

ISSN Number 2631-9489. Magneto is published quarterly by Hothouse Publishing Ltd. Great care has been taken throughout the magazine to be accurate, but the publisher cannot accept any responsibility for any errors or omissions that might occur.

The editors and publishers of this magazine give no warranties, guarantees or assurances, and make no representations regarding any goods or services advertised in this edition.

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More from Magneto

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70 YEARS OF PEBBLE BEACH

SUBSCRIBE TO MAGNETO

Order this beautiful collectors’ book, produced by the Magneto team on behalf of Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. Standard Edition: Case bound, $90.00.

Publisher’s Edition: Limited-edition slipcase, $180.00.

Chairman’s Edition: Leather-bound, signed, $550.00. www.magnetomagazine.com/product/ 70-years-of-pebble-beach

Don’t miss out on any issues of Magneto! You can subscribe for one year for £48 ($90) or two years for £84 ($151), including p&p. Magneto is now delivered in new, stronger cardboard packaging to ensure your copies arrive in perfect condition. www.magnetomagazine.com or telephone +44 (0)208 068 6829

NEW WEBSITE

MAGNETO SLIPCASES

With improved design that makes it easier than ever to use, the new Magneto website is packed with the latest news from the classic and collector car world.

Ordering issues and subs is simple, and there’s an events diary as well. Keep up to date digitally at www.magnetomagazine.com

Slipcases are once again available to pre-order, each one designed to hold four issues. Each is cloth covered with an embossed Magneto logo. You’ll find them under the ‘Magneto Store’ heading.

Slipcase £40 ($65) including p&p. www.magnetomagazine.com

Magneto

Entries now invited Monte Carlo | 13 May 2022

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Ex-Jack Brabham 1962 BRABHAM BT3 FORMULA 1 Chassis no. F1-1-62 Est. €450,000 - €650,000 No Reserve

Mulsanne dreams at the Le Mans Classic

New name, same excellence: The Amelia

Mediterranean marvels on The Temple Rally

Round-up of more of our favourite events

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Coming soon

LE MANS CLASSIC

MATHIEU BONNEVIE

June 30-July 3, 2022 After four years away due to the pandemic, the Le Mans Classic is finally back. It was due to celebrate its tenth running in 2020, and as such you can expect the postponed celebrations to be something truly special.

While the organisers are still to announce the majority of the line-up, they are promising never-before-seen attractions. What they have confirmed is that 40 years of Group C will celebrated “as it should be” – we’re hoping to hear a certain rotary Mazda in full cry down the Mulsanne – while the Endurance Racing Legends series, which caters for GTs from 1990 to 2018, will also be making an appearance.

Last time out in 2018 195,000 visitors came to La Sarthe, and we’re betting that figure will be trounced in 2022. However, with an open pit and a suitably laissez-faire feeling, this is a great way to get up close and personal with some truly iconic motor sport machinery. www.lemansclassic.com

Magneto

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THE AMELIA March 3-6, 2022

DEREMER STUDIOS LLC

Arguably one of the premier concours on the calendar has a fresh name and a fresh logo, courtesy of new owner Hagerty. This year also sees a host of revised content with events such as RADwood, plus the Concours d’Lemons being more closely integrated.

Themes include the 60th anniversary of the Daytona 24 Hours, 70 years of the Sebring 12 Hours, 75 years of Ferrari, 100 years of Lincoln and 90 years of the 1932 Ford.

The concours will also honour racing legend Chip Ganassi, Indy roadsters, aluminium Porsche race cars, Waterhouse Coachwork and more. Add in the gala dinner on the Saturday night, seminars, auctions and plenty of events happening around The Amelia’s orbit, and there’s plenty to look forward to. www.ameliaconcours.com

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SUMMER

AU T U M N

WINTER

SPRING

Coming soon

Coming soon

SUMMER

AU T U M N

WINTER

SPRING

THE TEMPLE R A L LY September 1-13, 2022

FR RASTRELLI

This all-new event from HERO-ERA is a chance to experience legendary Acropolis Rally and Targa Florio routes, with some of the finest Mediterranean scenery acting as a backdrop to two weeks of cars and culture across Greece and Italy.

The event starts near The Parthenon in Athens, and as it’s the birthplace of the Olympics, you can expect special tests and regularity events to sharpen your competitive edge. It then passes through Greece and, via an overnight ferry to Brindisi, takes in Puglia, Basilicata and Calabria, before spending three days in Sicily, incorporating parts of the Targa Florio and some time on local race circuits. The event then heads back to the Italian mainland for a sojourn up the Amalfi Coast, before finishing with a series of regularity tests on the way to journey’s end in Rome. www.hero-era.com

Magneto

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Coming soon

BELOW The superb Donington Historic Festival offers something for all the family.

ICE ST MORITZ

SALON PRIVÉ LONDON

February 26, 2022

April 21-23, 2022

Set on the frozen lake of St Moritz – which invites the viewing and driving of cars in a totally unusual setting – the International Concours of Elegance is different from any other event. Spectacular!

A new event at Royal Hospital Chelsea, this is a chance to be part of the world of luxury cars – new and old – and to enjoy the lifestyle that goes with this exclusive set.

Its Concours de Vente features 60 rare historic automobiles, all of which are for sale.

https://theicestmoritz.ch

SYDNEY HARBOUR CONCOURS D’ELEGANCE March 3-5, 2022 The fourth edition of this concours will see a stunning collection of carefully curated cars displayed in the lush gardens of the 1875 Swifts mansion. It expounds the philosophy of haute automobilisme on the edge of the Pacific. https://sydneyharbour concours.com.au

RÉTROMOBILE March 16-20, 2022 What a joy it will be to finally get back to this huge event at the Paris Expo Porte de Versailles.

After several years of cancellations and postponements, it promises to be bigger and better than ever, with 620 exhibitors, 1100-plus vehicles on show and over 120 specialist clubs in attendance. www.retromobile.com

TECHNO CLASSICA ESSEN March 23-27, 2022 Next it’s Germany’s turn to host a huge, world-class event. First held in 1989, this expo sets the standard for many other shows around the world to copy but rarely beat. www.siha.de

MEMBERS’ MEETING April 9-10, 2022 The fantastic mini-Revival is open only to GRRC members and associates – and it’s rammed with the best racing, featuring competition vehicles from the dawn of motoring to the recent past in their full track glory. www.goodwood.com

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www.salonprivelondon.com

LA JOLLA CONCOURS D’ELEGANCE April 22-24, 2022 An immersive weekend in beautiful La Jolla, California, starring 125 world-class cars. The featured marque for 2022 will be Bugatti, while the Mercedes-Benz 300SL coupé will be celebrated, too. www.lajollaconcours.com

C A R R E R A E S PA N A April 24-May 5, 2022 Rally the Globe returns to explore a new area of Spain. Taking in the Pyrenees and the Rioja region, it starts in Barcelona, touches into Portugal and finishes in Santander on the Cantabrian coast.

DONINGTON H I S T O R I C F E S T I VA L

BEST OF BRITISH COFFEE AND CLASSICS

April 30-May 1, 2022

June 5, 2022

Two exhilarating days celebrating eight decades of motor sport, at one of the UK’s most revered circuits. Fun for all the family.

A special event at The Motor Hub in Bibury, Gloucestershire, UK, specifically for British classic, vintage and interesting vehicles.

It is being held to mark HRH The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.

www.doningtonhistoric.com

GREENBRIER CONCOURS D’ELEGANCE

https://rallytheglobe.com

May 6-8, 2022

T O U R A U T O 202 2

This celebration of the automobile is now in its fifth year. Drives, dinners, shows and more, with a concours starring nearly 100 cars.

April 25-30, 2022 The 31st edition will see 220 competitors start in Paris and finish in Andorra via La Baule, Limoges, Bordeaux and Pau. It’ll visit three circuits (Bugatti – Le Mans, Val de Vienne, Nogaro) and 14 special stages (below). www.peterauto.fr

www.greenbrierconcours.com

CONCORSO D’ELEGANZA VILLA D’ESTE May 20-22, 2022 The world’s most beautiful cars grace the world’s oldest concours, on the shores of Italy’s Lake Como. www.concorsodeleganza villadeste.com

https://classicmotorhub.com

C O N C O U R S O N S AV I L E R O W June 15-16, 2022 Stunning collector cars and worldclass tailoring on one of London’s most stylishly prestigious streets.

An exciting new event from the team behind Magneto. www.concoursonsavilerow.com

MILLE MIGLIA June 15-18, 2022 This world-famous Italian event needs no introduction. It’s an all-action adventure of a lifetime that’s simply not to be missed. www.1000miglia.it/en

GREENWICH CONCOURS D’ELEGANCE

R A L LY E P È R E- F I L L E

June 3-5, 2022

June 24-26, 2022

Now Hagerty owned, this premier event also features the Grand Tour, ‘hands on the wheel’ experiences and youth-focused activities.

The Father & Daughter regularity rally is open to GT machinery of all periods, and is based in and around glamorous Monte-Carlo.

www.greenwichconcours.com

https://en.happyfewracing.com

LA

ST FE CL OS W EN IN T G SO RIE ON S

5 - 22 JUNE 2022

CARBON NEUTRAL EVENT

Photo: Gerard Brown

The Gobi desert landscape and it’s desolate beauty will become the base for a cross desert route that hasn’t been used since 2007 and a final ‘Hinti’ loop, that for HERO-ERA, has remained untrodden since they ran the reincarnated Peking to Paris Motor Challenge through Mongolia in 2007.

With four half days to relax or tinker with cars, the longest half day is 230 kms and the shortest 140 kms with a 360 km average per day.

This Mongolian stand alone event will take adventurers and their rally cars into the wild to test both their skill and the endurance of crew and car. Teams will be subjected to the extreme climate as it changes hour by hour, day by day in probably the most remote motoring event in the world.

Spending 15 nights under canvass in high standard camps, teams will be thrilled by the often cloudless skies and vast canopy of stars above, whilst below, the camaraderie of entrants from around the world will add friendship to the magical experience.

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@ heroerarally

LENGTH OF ROUTE:

6,500 KM DAYS:

18 VEHICLE ELEGIBILITY:

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Turbo Study: new Singer has 450bhp and whaletail

Update on 007’s ‘lost’ Goldfinger Aston Martin DB5

Pixar’s Jay Ward visits new Airstream Heritage Museum

Honda Type R: the timeline of a performance icon

Jaguar legends Mike Cross and Norman Dewis

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Starter

Singer goes for its first turbo study LA-based Porsche ‘reimagining’ specialist unveils stunning new vision complete with whaletail and 450bhp

WHEN SINGER ANNOUNCES A new study, you know there is something interesting on the way.

The Dynamics and Lightweighting Study (DLS) of 2018 gave us arguably the ultimate evolution of the naturally aspirated air-cooled Porsche 911, while the All-Terrain Competition Study, which arrived in 2021, produced a startling exploration of capabilities – and possibilities – on the rough stuff.

Understandably, both of these projects dominated automotive news agendas around the world. But there was one facet of 911 lore that was

Words Nathan Chadwick

curiously absent – the Turbo. Until now, that is. Say hello to the Turbo Study, which not only adds forced induction to the Singer repertoire for the first time, but also marks an evolutionary shift in the bespoke restoration firm’s design language.

The classic pre-1973-inspired looks of the 911s reimagined by Singer have been swept away and replaced with an aesthetic fully rooted in the 1980s whaletail Turbo era, complete with extensive use of carbonfibre to aid lightness and stiffness.

As with all Singer restorations, the Turbo Study takes the Type 964

generation of 911s as its starting point and uses a new evolution of the famous Mezger air-cooled flatsix. Now in 3.8-litre form, the engine features twin turbochargers with an electric waste gate, while bespoke airto-water intercoolers are mounted inside the intake plenums.

To help keep everything from overheating, the shark fin on the rear wing has been cleverly converted into an intake, pumping cold air into the engine bay to enhance combustion and cooling performance.

This particular study has been designed with long-distance grand

BELOW Singer’s ‘third act’ sees a starring role for twin turbos in the Turbo Study.

Motive theatrics are to be brisk, with 450bhp on tap from its 3.8-litre flat-six.

Starter touring in mind, but it is still impressively powerful – Singer quotes 450bhp for this Wolf Blue car.

Keeping to the GT theme the Turbo Study has prioritised comfort, complete with compliant damping and suspension settings, while noise levels are said to be lower than those of some of the more raucous Singer restorations we’ve seen. Again this aids long-distance comfort, although future cars can be tailored to be more extreme. Singer says a fruitier exhaust and higher outputs are available, should an owner choose.

That configurability goes as far as

Starter

the transmission. This car has a sixspeed gearbox and rear-wheel drive, but following Singer’s first fourwheel-drive road-car restoration in 2014, which used the transmission from a 993 911, the Turbo can also be built with power directed to all corners. You can also specify ABS carbon-ceramic discs and traction control – as this particular owner has.

Inside the cabin, the focus has clearly been on luxury rather than the more spartan sportiness we have thus far seen from Singer. A fresh steering wheel and set of gauges kick off the alterations.

The electrically adjustable seats are heated, while the car comes with inductive phone charging, cruise control and air-conditioning for long hauls. Bespoke Singer fitted luggage sits atop the folded-down rear seat back; if you’re wondering, the trim is called Malibu Sand and the wood accents are Black Forest.

It’s clear that this is just the

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CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT This car’s colour is Wolf Blue. The study’s focus has been on grand-touring capabilities, so the interior is plush.

start of what’s possible. Although no official figures from Singer suggest more than the current 450bhp, twin-turbocharged Mezger engines have been taken up to 850bhp and beyond in road trim by the traditional modification scene.

As such, it will be fascinating to see how the car develops amid both Singer’s rigorous testing and development programmes, and the whims of the company’s customers.

Singer’s naturally aspirated engines include a 3.8-litre flat-six, originally developed with Cosworth, and a 4.0 evolution, developed with Ed Pink Racing Engines to develop 390bhp.

The ultimate expression is the aforementioned $1.8m DLS, codeveloped with Williams Advanced Engineering – its naturally aspirated 4.0 engine revs to 9000rpm and kicks out 500bhp, with the help of unique four-valve cylinder heads. Imagine that with two turbos to aid progress...

The Singer team is tight lipped on

what its development plans are, but the first Turbo Study already looks suitably tasty, even without specific figures for its weight, performance and projected cost.

For Singer, it’s a fine way to start 2022, after two years that have seen its sales double and US operations move into a new facility in Torrance, California, as work continues in the UK on the DLS restorations.

However, for Singer founder Rob Dickinson, the Turbo Study has a more personal resonance, as it completes a cycle started 45 years ago. “My first-ever ride in a Porsche 911, as an 11-year-old in 1976, left me dry mouthed and speechless. It was a black 930 Turbo with red tartan seats,” he says, before turning his attention to his company’s new creation. “I believe this is a fitting tribute to a car that changed my life and that of many others.”

Find more details on the Turbo Study at www.singervehicledesign.com.

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How can the lost Bond DB5 be recovered?

In 1997, one of the Bond Goldfinger movie cars disappeared overnight.

Last year, sightings were reported – but what next?

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Words David Lillywhite

YOU PROBABLY READ THE headlines in August 2021, claiming that the long-lost Bond DB5 had been found. Maybe you read further, to realise that actually the Aston Martin was reported to have been seen and identified, but hadn’t been recovered. The story reappeared last December, stating that investigators were closer to recovering the car. But what’s the truth? We spoke directly with the people involved.

The missing 1964 model, chassis DP/216/1, was the first DB5 built. It was initially painted Dubonnet Red, registered BMT 216A and used for press drives. It also appeared in The Saint with Roger Moore, before being repainted to become one of just four used in the Goldfinger movie – and the only example fitted with 007’s arsenal of weapons and gadgets. After filming it was returned to Aston Martin, where it was rebuilt (without the Bond extras), reregistered 6633 PP and, in 1968, sold as a regular DB5 to Gavin Keyzar. He soon reinstalled the car’s gadgetry.

In 1981 it was sold to Richard Losee, and it appeared in The Cannonball Run before ending up

with American businessman and pop-culture collector Anthony V Pugliese III, who bought it in 1986 for $275,000 at a Sotheby’s auction in New York. His other famous possessions have included a witch’s hat from The Wizard of Oz, Superman costumes and Oddjob’s hat from Goldfinger. Some of these were sold in later years to help fund a troubled development in Destiny, Florida.

Pugliese stored the DB5 in a private aircraft hangar at Boca Raton Airport in Florida. On the night of June 18, 1997, it seems that thieves sliced through the hangar door, cut a padlock and disabled the alarm, before dragging the car onto a waiting truck, as shown by scuff marks on the hangar floor.

Following investigations, Pugliese was recompensed $4.20 million by his insurer. Now, the car’s estimated value is around $25m, and the insurer is offering $100,000 (£73,000) for information that leads its recovery.

Christopher Marinello – a trained lawyer, Art Recovery International chief executive and one of the world’s foremost experts in tracking down stolen high-value works of art – has been spearheading efforts to recover the elusive Aston for nearly 15 years. He points to Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain as being “areas of particular interest”.

“I’ve been working on this case since 2007,” said Christopher when we spoke with him again in January 2022. “There was a significant breakthrough a couple of years ago, when an individual who has seen the car was able to identify the serial number DP/216/1 in at least two places, and knew about a number in a secret third place. He had some details that only someone who knows the DB5 and had seen the

‘I’m taking baby steps to let the possessor know that I’m getting closer; they need to contact me’

actual car in person would know.”

He continued: “Several months ago we narrowed the possibilities down to a few collectors. We think the car may have been loaned privately or travelled between these collectors, and we are giving them the opportunity to come forward before I have to ring their doorbell. I’m taking these baby steps to let the possessor know that I’m getting closer and that they need to contact me.

“When we find something that’s stolen in a collection of a high-networth individual, be it a Hollywood star, a member of royalty or even a government or a head of state – and we’ve had those cases – they always complain, why didn’t you come to us first? Why did we have to be named?

Why were we embarrassed in the press? Why did you have to bring an action in court? They want to know why they weren’t discreetly alerted.

“Obviously, if I’m dealing with a criminal, they’re going to lose everything. If somebody bought this car knowing it was stolen, they’re going to lose it all. Okay, but I don’t believe that’s the case here. I believe that the current possessor did not know the car was stolen, and he may have acquired it in good faith.

“When I’m faced with a goodfaith purchaser, I’m willing to make a deal. I can’t say what that would be, but it could mean a couple of things.

Insurance companies are not known for their art collections. When they recover something that belongs to them, they attempt to sell it in the open marketplace to recoup the funds that they paid out.

“So rather than have that happen, if the possessor wants to keep the car they can always talk to me about settling the sum with a cheque. But alternatively, if they don’t want to cooperate, I will just continue to pursue the vehicle itself, until I can find law enforcement or somebody to act on behalf of the insurance company. It is still considered an open criminal investigation with the Boca Raton Police Department.”

An automobile collector himself, Christopher can be commissioned to help track down, or resolve disputes over, classic cars. www.artrecovery.com

ASTON MARTIN

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Words David Lillywhite

Photography Matt Howell, Martyn Goddard

PICTURED Classics and concepts will be parked along the Row – including the new Bizzarrini Continuations and the famous Aston Martin Bulldog.

Tailors and cars on Savile Row Big names confirmed for the first Concours on Savile Row, including a partnership between RM Sotheby’s and designer Ozwald Boateng OBE

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WE’RE GETTING EVER CLOSER to Magneto’s inaugural Concours on Savile Row in London, which is set to take place on June 15-16.

Around 40 classics, concepts and hypercars will take over the London street so famous for its two centuries of tailoring history.

Over more recent years, many Savile Row tailors have collaborated with car manufacturers: JP Hackett and Aston Martin; Lotus and Norton & Sons; Bentley and Huntsman; Henry Poole and Range Rover; Cad & The Dandy and McLaren, to name but a few. Such partnerships

will form the basis of Concours on Savile Row, with manufacturers and classic specialists displaying their cars along the road.

In addition, auction house RM Sotheby’s and fashion designer Ozwald Boateng OBE have also formed a partnership for the event.

The Concours is being organised by the Magneto team, working with The Pollen Estate, the historical owner of much of the Row. All the tailors will be open for the two-day event, hosting VIP gatherings and demonstrations. A stage will feature music performances

and talks from designers, tailors and motor sport stars, as well as car manufacturers. Exclusive Mayfair locations will host reception parties on both evenings. The Concours will be free of charge for the public, but VIP area access will be via ticket.

Sponsors include The Pollen Estate, Hagerty, RM Sotheby’s and Fope, with tailors such as Henry Poole, Ozwald Boateng, Norton & Sons, Gieves & Hawkes, Huntsman, JP Hackett, Dege & Skinner, and Cad & The Dandy.

See www.concoursonsavilerow.com or email geoff@hothousemedia.co.uk for commercial information.

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Words Nathan Chadwick

Photography Motoring Research

Lagonda love at first sight ANY COLLECTOR, WHETHER of cars, records or stamps, has a favourite. But to own 25 examples of one car? And the Aston Martin Lagonda? Rodger Dudding explains.

“They’re the ultimate ‘Marmite’ car – you either love them or you don’t,” the businessman says from Studio 434 in Hertfordshire, UK, where the Lagondas are kept.

Although his 200-plus car collection is wide ranging, it’s British marques – and this Aston Martin model in particular – that take centre stage.

“There are very few cars that are original thinking,” explains Rodger.

“If you look at any other car, then or since, few are completely original.

William Towns’ design was true blue-sky thinking, and all credit to Aston Martin for building it.”

The car has become legendary for its foibles and development hell; the budget for the entire car was spent on the wiring, which in the end rarely worked. However, as Rodger points out, for all the negativity, the company owes its very survival to the Lagonda. “Without selling that model at a ridiculous price, the firm would have gone bust,” he says.

Rodger’s experience with his first Lagonda, in the early 1980s, would have put most people off. “I was very proud of it, but my late wife said:

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Despite getting off to a less than auspicious start, it was the thin end of the wedge for this fan of the ‘Marmite’ Aston. He now owns 25...

‘That is bloody horrible – sell it!’ I kept it for three months, but we had four or five situations where it would get us to our destination, have a hissy fit and refuse to come home.”

The worst of these occurred on a trip to Devon. After a pub visit, Rodger came out to find a crowd around the Lagonda. “I was suitably proud, of course,” he laughs. “Then I put the key in and the thing wouldn’t start. I was so embarrassed, I wanted the ground to open up before me.”

The car was returned to Aston Martin. “It took them four-and-ahalf hours to find the cause; the fuel

cut-out. It was behind the dash.

What was I to do if it caught fire; take the dash out? If you weren’t mad like I am, you wouldn’t have one.”

That first Lagonda was sold – “it was cheaper than getting a divorce!”

– but Rodger’s business successes meant he was able to indulge his passion. He also owns other examples of William Towns’ work, including two Mini-based Hustler six-wheelers.

“I met William, and I told him I loved the Lagonda,” Rodger recalls. “‘I’m glad someone does,’ he replied.”

The collection includes two longwheelbase models, Tickford editions and one with 18ct gold trim inside and out. “I love them all. It’s like BELOW Rodger’s latest Lagonda: the first publicly sold car, chassis 13010 – but will it be the last?

having three children – you can’t have a favourite,” he laughs.

One intriguing example belonged to Dodi Fayed. Rodger knew of the car after designing a queueing system for Harrods, which was then owned by Dodi’s father Mohamed Al-Fayed. After Dodi’s death the car was sold to a woman in Edinburgh, who later got in touch.

“I bought it unseen,” Rodger says.

“I asked a restorer to look at it. He said if you braked hard, the engine would fall out. Typical Aston Martin – it could never understand the reaction of ferrous and non-ferrous metals. The car had rotted all the way through. It was a full restoration.”

Rodger’s latest purchase is the first production car delivered to a customer, in February 1979. “We’ve also got the very last Series 4 built, a special order for the Drambuie liqueur company,” he says.

But is this the final Lagonda?

Rodger’s got house renovations and a wedding to plan for, and he’s still taking an active role in his businesses as he enters his 84th year. However…

“I have been offered a beautiful, unmarked Series 4. The seller wrote to me and said: ‘We’ve got two cars you WILL buy.’ I like that approach!”

Thanks to Chris, Luis and everyone else at www.studio434.co.uk

Where the greatest cars come to be challenged...

...and new Legends are made

@motorracinglegends motorracinglegends.com Photo: Andrew Coles

Words Elliott Hughes

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Rooftop racing, in 1:32 scale The latest creation from Slot Mods Raceways is this remarkable diorama of the famous Lingotto Fiat factory, with working rooftop track

DETROIT-BASED SLOT MODS Raceways is well known for its superb, often room-sized, slot-racing creations. Ever since being made redundant from his job in 2008, founder David Beattie has been building these bespoke, wooden 1:32 scale tracks for homes, garages, museums and shows. He’s been commissioned by big names in the car world, including McLaren CEO Zac Brown, Ford CEO Jim Farley and three-times CART champion and team owner Bobby Rahal.

The latest is our favourite yet; this mind-blowing 1:32 scale recreation of the Lingotto Fiat factory.

The real one-million square-foot Lingotto factory is located in Turin, Italy. It opened its doors in 1923 as the largest automotive factory, and second-largest factory, in the world.

Raw materials entered the ground floor and gradually transformed into cars as they ascended the assembly lines on each level. The completed cars then circled the test track on the roof before taking the spiral ramp down to terra firma and off to the Fiat dealerships. Now Lingotto is a hotel, but the rooftop track remains intact and can still be visited.

Slot Mods Raceways’ version of Lingotto is almost as impressive as the real thing. David Beattie and his team of artisans undertook hours of

ABOVE & RIGHT Period Lingotto production-line scenes have been carefully recreated in 1:32 scale. painstaking research, which included tracking down archive photos and film footage, so that the iconic building and the work that took place within it could be reproduced.

With the research completed, the team set to work on custom building 4000 pieces of track, 500 Fiat slot cars (100 of which can race), factory equipment and tools, interior décor pieces and gaggles of people. All of these were hand-made and painted.

The result is a piece of artwork that feels alive and bustling with activity. Workers can be seen busily building cars through the windows, the design room is adorned with clay models and detailed drawings, two Fiats rotate on their plinths in the showroom as customers look on. It’s no surprise that such a masterpiece comes at a cost of $225,000.

The Lingotto project came to fruition after the idea was pitched to an avid Fiat enthusiast who boasts an impressive collection of classic cars. The client is so impressed with Slot Mods’ work that he is now considering a similar recreation of Ford’s Piquette Avenue plant in Detroit – birthplace of the Model T. For more, see www.slotmods.com.

Magneto

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Aluminium dreams Pixar’s creative director Jay Ward knows a thing or two about design – so we sent him to find out more about that most stylish of travel icons, the Airstream

Words Jay Ward

Photography Airstream

WITH A POPULATION OF fewer than 1500 people, Jackson Center, Ohio seems like an unlikely home for what is undoubtedly the most iconic caravan brand in the world... the all-aluminium, handbuilt Airstream (‘travel trailer’ as they are known in the US).

The company’s massive, stateof-the-art campus opened back in late 2019, boasting an expansive, 723,000-square-foot factory that produces bespoke units ranging from 16 to 33 feet long. There is also a brand-new Heritage Museum, displaying an array of stunning vintage trailers from Airstream’s esteemed history for the first time (more on that in a moment).

So exactly how did this global phenomenon created by Wally Byam in the early 1930s in Los Angeles end

up in such an unlikely, tiny town in the Midwest? A quick history lesson is in order – and Airstream’s inhouse historian Samantha Martin is the one to conduct it.

“By 1952, Airstream had outgrown its LA plant and desperately needed to expand,” she explains. “Rather than staying on the West Coast, Wally headed east to scout locations across the Midwest. He spent a summer looking in Indiana, Illinois and Ohio, before finding a factory for sale in Jackson Center.”

I was lucky enough to stop by the HQ, affectionately known as ‘The Mothership’, for a factory tour and an exclusive look at the freshly completed Heritage Museum. After walking though the pristine displays of vintage units, here are just some of my favourites from the collection...

1957 A I R STR E A M WO R LD TR AVE L E R (‘WA L LY’S GOLD A I R STR E A M’) Stella Byam designed this floorplan to maximise space for her and husband Wally.

The 22-foot unit was built in the then-new Jackson Center factory, with personalised features including the gold-anodised Reynolds aluminium outer skin. It would serve as the lead Airstream for the 1959-60 Capetown to Cairo Caravan.

1955 AIRSTRE AM CRUISER (‘WALLY’S WHITE WHALE’) In 1956, Wally took on the daunting mission of shipping 36 Airstreams and 87 enthusiasts across the Atlantic for the first Caravan to Europe. He and Stella led it in this 26-foot Cruiser, which they painted white to make it easier to identify as well as to match their 1956 Cadillac tow car. Over six months, the Caravanners visited 16 countries and traversed 16,000 miles.

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1938 C L I PPER (‘O L D G R A ND DAD’) Wally introduced his original Airstream in 1931, but the Clipper – which arrived in 1936 – was the first to use an aircraft-inspired all-aluminium, riveted, semi-monocoque construction that was light years ahead of conventional trailers of the era. As you can imagine, there aren’t many original pre-war Clippers left, which is why this ultra-rare 1938 double-axle model (interior pictured right) is considered to be a special part of the company’s history.

1957 AIRSTRE AM B UBBLE (‘TIN Y WORLD TR AVELER’) The ‘Bubble’ was the tiniest Airstream of its era at only 16 feet long. It was designed to provide minimalistic space for two people, typically on shorter voyages.

However, this 1957 Bubble owned by pensioners Oscar and Etta Payne is quite possibly the most travelled Airstream in existence, having circled the globe over 869 days and 200,000 miles.

Overall the couple participated in an astonishing 11 Caravans with this trailer, including to Mexico and Central America in winter 1958, Africa and the Holy Land in 1959-60, Europe in the summer of 1960 (and one of only four Airstreams to divert from this tour and go behind the Iron Curtain to visit Russia), then on to Western Canada in the summer of 1962 and Alaska in summer 1966. This special trailer was donated to the Heritage Collection

by Oscar and Etta’s granddaughter.

Magneto

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Words Nathan Chadwick

Whole Lola trouble After years of work, lost materials and an AWOL collaborator, Lola: The T70 & Can-Am Cars writer Gordon Jones deserves a medal for perseverance

ANY GOOD PIECE OF WRITING is never the work of a moment.

However, for Gordon Jones, author of Lola: The T70 & Can-Am Cars, those ‘moments’ became decades. In fact, when he first set out to write a definitive history of Eric Broadley’s most outrageous creations, Lola was still producing cars.

That was in 1985 – and Evro has only just published the book after decades of research, lost materials and an AWOL collaborator. So we asked Gordon how it all started.

“I’d just finished my Ford GT40 book, and I was hanging around the Lola factory a lot,” he recalls.

“Lola’s staff were quite happy to help me with information, and were enthusiastic about the project.”

It was during this time that Jones met Anders Hedberg, a Swedish enthusiast for all things Lola T70, who owned Sid Taylor’s SL73/102 MkIII coupé. “We got on very well,” says Gordon. “He came to stay with me for a few weeks while I was living in Doncaster, and we went around circuits visiting people who were testing their cars. I mentioned I was writing about these cars, and he said ‘Oh, so am I!’ – we both decided it was best to compare notes.”

There followed a free-flowing information swap, checking that their databases were correct and up to date. Anders would spend a great deal of time tracking down US race programmes and copies of Autoweek, and Gordon would meticulously accumulate further information.

Then disaster struck. “In 1988 I sent him 125 photographs and

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copies of all my notes for him to put into a computer, but I heard nothing back from him,” Gordon recalls.

At the time Gordon was working as a computer industry consultant, with writing as a hobby. After receiving no reply to letters and calls, in 1991 he set off to Sweden to find Anders. “He wasn’t at his address; the neighbours said that he hadn’t been well, and had moved to central Stockholm,” he recalls. “He wasn’t there, either.” Gordon even reached out to Anders’s parents, to no avail.

It seemed like all the work was for nothing. “I gave up, I was so disheartened,” he says. He abandoned other book projects, too. “I’d wanted to do a book on Chaparral, but I realised that unless you could live next door to Jim Hall in Texas, you’d never get the answers.”

However, as with all great stories, there was a twist. In 2012, the unopened package was returned to Doncaster – only by this point Gordon had moved to France. “The new occupants asked their neighbour, my friend Barbara, about it and she said ‘Ah, it must be the lost parcel’.”

Reunited with his work, Gordon set about further research. Then in 2016, some of Anders’s friends got in touch – they’d found him, in Motala, Sweden. “He’d been unable to contact me because I’d moved around, too.”

Gordon was re-enthused about the book, although Anders was more wary, citing ill health. Still, databases were shared and contact went back and forth, yet in late 2017 Anders wrote to say he couldn’t continue.

“He agreed to send his notes over,

ABOVE & BELOW SL75/122 was campaigned by Dan Gurney in the 1967 Can-Am and then by ‘Swede’ Savage, while Jo Bonnier’s T70 competed at Le Mans. New Lola book covers these cars and many more.

but then I heard nothing,” Gordon says. “I knew a photographer who lived in Motala, who discovered that Anders had died in January 2018.

His Lola had been sold to a dealer in central Europe, then to an American.

It’s now in England being restored.”

With help from Anders’s brothers, the database and materials were passed to Gordon to complete the book. The only issue was that Lola’s Can-Am exploits were much wider ranging than the T70. “It was the T163, T220, T260 (as driven by Jackie Stewart) and T310,” he says.

Cue more years of research, aided

by Martin Krejčí, the creator of www.racingsportscars.com.

While Gordon’s relief at publishing the book is palpable, there are no plans for more. “I don’t think I’m allowed to spend more time writing – it’s upset the family, me just sitting in front of a computer for five years, doing nothing else,” he laughs.

Read the review in our Acquire section, and buy at www.evropublishing.com.

Find Your Passion.

PASSION – This is ultimately the driving force behind who we are. We are more than a brand; we are a team of car enthusiasts with a desire to develop the best car care products possible while creating and fostering authentic connections with others who also share a love for cars.

For free personal car care advice, go to Meguiars.com

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Words Nathan Chadwick

Thoroughly distinguished Types Honda recently announced the Civic Type R’s death in the UK. With the car’s Swindon birthplace not long for the axe, the announcement came as no surprise. There will be one last hurrah, however, with a new, potentially petrol-hybrid version believed to be making its debut in the spring.

While we wait for news on the next Type R, let’s reflect on the cars that have created the legend…

1997 INTEGRA TYPE R DC2 (US) Although visually similar to other DC2s, the American version was marketed as an Acura and featured slight changes to its mechanical set-up (2bhp less and a lower compression ratio).

1995 INTEGRA TYPE R DC2 (Below)

The NSX was cool, but this is the car that grew the Type R buzz – it was the first available outside Japan. The 1.8-litre four-pot B18C engine revs to 8600rpm, with between 187bhp and 197bhp delivered to the front wheels via a helical LSD. It has been hailed as the finest FWD car ever made…

1997 CIVIC TYPE R EK9 (JDM) (Above)

This pocket-rocket had the highest-ever output per litre for a naturally aspirated engine – its B16B 1.6-litre four-cylinder delivered 182bhp at 8200rpm.

The monocoque was seamwelded to help torsional rigidity, while a helical LSD kept the driven front wheels in order.

1992 NSX-R NA1 (Right) The NSX was designed to be ‘the usable supercar’, which meant it had to have a certain degree of luxury. However, those within Honda felt it could do with a hardcore version. The engineers stripped 120kg from the standard car, increased the final-drive ratios, blueprinted and balanced the crankshaft assembly, and tweaked the suspension for better rear-end grip. A mere 483 were built for Japan only; you’re looking at around £200k for one these days.

Although it wasn’t called a Type R, it was the first in the line of special sporty Hondas that, at least in Japan, meant lighter weight and racetrackcentred performance gains.

All the better to enjoy those high-revving VTEC thrills…

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1998 ACCORD TYPE R CH1 (EUROPEAN) (Below)

2000 ACCORD EURO R CL1 (JDM) (Above)

Spotting the appetite for self-imported Japanese performance cars such as the Subaru Impreza and Mitsubishi Evo, Honda’s European arm set about creating an Accord to appeal to such tastes. Built in Swindon, it used a 2.2-litre, four-cylinder H22A7 engine that produced 209bhp.

Despite low sales of the European version, the Japanese were enamoured with the idea and produced the Euro R, based on the CL1 Accord. It used a similar H22A engine, but with more power (217bhp at 7200rpm).

It was updated in 2002, with upgraded gearbox synchros.

2017 CIVIC TYPE R FK8 (WORLD) (Left)

2001 INTEGRA TYPE R DC5 (JDM) (Left)

Bigger, longer and styled with unrestrained exuberance, the FK8 Type R was an aesthetic challenge. Happily, it had the credentials to match the in-your-face looks, with its 306-316bhp 2.0-litre turbo’s oomph matched by incisive handling that saw it top the hot hatch class year in, year out. It was seven seconds faster round the Nürburgring than its predecessor, and held the title for fastest FWD car there for some time.

The second-generation ITR never officially came to Europe, but plenty did make their way here via grey imports. Aside from Japan, it was sold in Oceania, Canada and the US; it was marketed as an Acura in the latter two. Other than in Oceania, which used a tuned Type S-related engine, the Type R had a 217bhp K20A four-cylinder. Matt Neal won the British Touring Car Championship in it twice.

2015 CIVIC TYPE R FK2 (WORLD) (Below) 2001 CIVIC TYPE R EP3 (EDM)

2007 CIVIC TYPE R FN2 (EUROPE) (Left)

The first Type R to be built in Swindon and available worldwide was also a performance bargain at the time. Its 2.0-litre K20A four-cylinder produced 197bhp. The car was reworked for 2003 with revised steering and suspension settings.

Honda split its Type R philosophy completely for the third generation. The EDM FN2 took the form of the swoopy three-door hatch, which added weight but only 1bhp over the previous EP3. It also lost the independent rear suspension, leading to a critical mauling at the time. It still sold well, but…

(Below right)

2001 CIVIC TYPE R EP3 (JDM)

The first turbocharged Type R lived only a short life, appearing late in this Civic era. The 2.0-litre K20CI engine produced 306bhp, but the most noticeable change was the meaty 295lb ft of torque from a lowly 2500rpm. The era of high-revving Type Rs was over – the FK8 delivers its peak at a ‘mere’ 6500rpm.

2007 CIVIC TYPE R FD2 (JDM)

The Japanese saved the best EP3 for themselves, shipping a much more track-orientated drivetrain to Swindon for entire cars to be constructed and sent back home. Extensive engine tuning led to more power (212bhp) at the expense of mid-range torque, and it received the helical LSD the normal EP3s missed out on.

(Below)

The FN2 is not quite the same as the Japanese-only, Suzukabuilt FD2 version – ‘the closest you can get to a roadgoing touring car’. The FD2 had more power (222bhp) and a close-ratio six-speed manual; it was roughly three seconds quicker around Castle Combe than the Swindon-built FN2.

2002 ACCORD EURO R CL7 (JDM) (Left) Poor sales of the original meant that the sportiest seventh-gen Accord model was a Far Eastonly affair. It had the same 2.0-litre K20A four-cylinder engine as the JDM EP3 Civic Type R, which boasted 217bhp.

2002 NSX TYPE R NA2 (JDM)

2005 NSX-R GT (JDM) (Right)

As the NSX moved into its second phase, its V6 growing to 3.2 litres, the Type R team set to work removing 100kg with extensive carbonfibre use. Each blueprinted engine was hand-built, while the suspension was tuned for track performance and the power steering removed for greater feel. Honda says the power remained at 290bhp, but it’s believed to pack far more.

To homologate aerodynamic improvements for Japanese Super GT racing, Honda needed to build five roadgoing cars. However, just one is believed to have been sold. The key differences to the normal R were an extended front spoiler lip and a large rear diffuser, and a huge roof-mounted snorkel that was useless on the road car, but helped cool the race cars’ individual throttle-body intake plenum.

(Left)

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Words Elliott Hughes

Kei to the city Pint-sized kei cars are designed to adhere to Japan’s dimensionbased keijidōsha (light car) regs. Here are some of our favourites

What is it?

What’s it like to drive?

Was it a success?

Was there a successor?

Should I buy one?

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AUTOZAM AZ-1

HONDA VAMOS

SUBARU 360

SUZUKI JIMNY LJ10

A mid-engined, rear-drive sports car with gullwing doors. Suzuki developed it in 1986, but scrapped it in favour of the Cappuccino. Mazda took the reins, launching it under its Autozam sub-brand in 1992. Suzuki regretted its decision; a badge-engineered variant arrived later on.

Perhaps the weirdest car in Honda’s storied history of making weird cars. This utter chimera mixes styling cues from off-roaders, pick-up trucks and buggies – it looks like nothing else. The Vamos was designed to be an automotive Swiss Army Knife, as usable for moving (very small) things about as it was for sunny jaunts to the beach.

Honda built the loveable Vamos for just three years, between 1970 and 1973.

This looks like the offspring of a Volkswagen Beetle and Fiat 500. It shares those cars’ mission of mobilising the masses with affordability, clever packaging and endearing styling. These important little worker ants helped to rebuild post-war Japan by providing transport for the working classes, and the 360 was also the first mass-produced kei car. It’s ironic that the first model from the muscular Subaru marque was nicknamed ‘The Ladybug’.

You’ll have heard of the Jimny, but maybe not the LJ10, which kicked off one of Suzuki’s most loved model lines. Effectively a shrunken Willys Jeep, it started out as the HopeStar ON360, the Hope Motor Company’s mash-up of Mitsubishi and Daihatsu parts.

Its turbocharged threecylinder engine produces only 63bhp, but with a mere 720kg to push around, an absurd 9000rpm rev limit and a comically small wheelbase, this is one of the few cars that make a Lotus Elise look lardy. It’s like driving a pinball.

Slow – if full of personality!

Its 354cc air-cooled two-pot sends 30bhp to its rear wheels via a four-speed ’box. At least the pint-sized engine means it could be stuffed in the middle, making this Honda’s sole midengined road car, NSX, Beat and T360 pick-ups aside.

Rear-engined, rear-wheel drive, air-cooled... it’s basically a mini Porsche. Well, it would be if it didn’t put out just 16bhp, although spicier Young S and SS versions had 25bhp and 34bhp respectively. Raw, cheap and utilitarian, but it does just what it was designed to do.

With its 359cc air-cooled two-stroke two-cylinder and crude, uncomfortable ride, it is at least capable. Somehow, its 25bhp manages to power a 4WD system. It also has a high/low-range transfer case so it’s great off-road, too – if the inclines aren’t too steep.

If you were on Mazda’s board in the 1990s, you’d probably say ‘no’; just 4923 were built (including 531 Suzukis) and it was in production for a rather apt short period from 1992 until 1994. However, we don’t think success is measured by production figures, and that is proven by the efficacious cult following the AZ-1 enjoys some 30 years later.

The Vamos is rare: just 2500 were built. So it was never a sales hit, but it was made in an era of experimentation and only seven years into Honda’s history as a car company. The fact that the firm predicted the market for an outdoorsy lifestyle vehicle well before crossovers came into existence – and that it did so with such charisma – is commendable.

Over 400,000 were sold in Japan, but it was a failure in the US. It’s had the last laugh, though; Hagerty says it had one of the largest single-year value increases during 2021.

Due to Suzuki’s limited production capabilities, the LJ10 sold in relatively humble numbers domestically upon its 1970 launch. Once it got a dedicated build facility, though, it became an icon.

The idea behind the LJ10 has won Suzuki 2.85 million sales.

Sadly not, but it did help create a special sports car category continued by the Cappuccino, Yamaha Ami, Daihatsu Copen and today’s Honda S660.

In name only. In 1999 Honda applied ‘Vamos’ to a fairly dull lineage of micro-vans. Sadly, the first-generation Vamos is a rarely seen automotive oddity.

Its Mini-esque R2 replacement gave way to the Rex on its way to becoming the Daihatsu Mira.

First came the LJ20, SJ10 and SJ20, with three generations since then – the latest in 2018.

Yes! At £15k-£22k ($20k-$30k) the cheapest gullwing you can buy is fun, rare and unique.

If you don’t reside in SaintTropez, probably not. It ranges from £15k-£18k ($20k-$25k).

Got a time machine? Go back a year and buy one for £7000.

Now £15k-£32k ($20k-$40k).

Want an iconic and capable offroader? Then get one. Valued from £5.5k-£11k ($7.5k-$15k).

TM

R A C I N G F E W H A P P Y Organized by

FATHERS+DAUGHTERS+RALLY

Monte-Carlo JUNE 24-26, 2022

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xclusively for pre-1946 cars, this event spends eight days exploring the remarkable scenery and incredible roads of the Italian Dolomites and Austrian Alps. Starting and finishing near Innsbruck, we venture over the imposing Alpine ridge to spend three nights in Bolzano, exploring the Brenta Dolomites and the intricate network of roads around this apple-growing region. We then head to Cortina d’Ampezzo for four nights to make the most of the many memorable mountain roads around this chic resort town, before returning to the Austrian Tyrol.

The event will have Regularity sections on lesser-used Alpine Passes, driving tests at a variety of venues and time to enjoy this unique area.

Sponsored by:

RALLY

CHALLENGE

MARATHON

For more information and to register your interest visit www.rallytheglobe.com +44 113 360 8961 info@rallytheglobe.com The Vintage Dolomites is open to cars of a specification produced before 31st December 1945.

Starter

Words Nathan Chadwick

Storm from the East (via the US) Hagerty is forecasting 2022 as the year a JDM car could sell for $2 million – and all the signs are that things are heading in the right direction

A POWERFUL STRAIGHT-SIX engine. An aerodynamically honed, curvy body. A true screen icon. A worldwide fanbase. Responsible for perhaps the most controversial auction result of 2021.

No, we’re not referring to Jaguar’s E-type. Instead, the year’s most talked-about sale comes via Toyota’s bewinged Supra MkIV. In late July, online specialist Bring a Trailer sold a 1995 example for a huge $206,000.

Cue an inter-generational online debate that probably caused more internet-fuelled energy sapping than any bitcoin-mining operation.

For some, the very idea that any Toyota – barring a 2000GT – let alone one from the 1990s, could garner such sums was ridiculous.

For others, it was about time, and a portent for what’s to come.

It wasn’t an isolated incident, even if it was a bit of an outlier. The car itself was an unmodified six-speed manual twin-turbo that had covered just 7000 miles. It wasn’t the first six-figure Supra; that one, sold at Mecum’s Spring Classic in 2015, was the stunt car from the first Fast & Furious. However, such figures started to become more common for non-Hollywood cars in 2019, spurred on by the Supra’s 25th anniversary.

Is the $206k contender here to stay?

Regarding the Bring a Trailer

ABOVE Toyota Supra MkIV sold via Bring a Trailer for $206,000 last July. A taste of things to come?

Supra, John Mayhead of the Hagerty insurance specialist comments: “It was obviously low mileage, but it had a sport-roof and the colour wasn’t the most collectable for the model: red on tan. We are seeing it as an outlier or an anomaly.”

Before the Toyota doubters take this as an affirmation of their beliefs, there is an upward trend for the cars. “Values are definitely rising,” explains Mayhead. “Another Supra sold at Barrett-Jackson in Houston last September, for $110,000. This had been sold at Bonhams Quail Lodge in 2020 for $89,600, and has cleaned up ever since.”

Explanations include that it’s hard to ignore the cultural relevance of the Fast & Furious franchise. The

‘How much did the orange Fast & Furious Supra retail for?

A Ferrari F355crushing $550k’

films might not score marks for their plots, scripts or acting (but arguably neither did Le Mans, Bullitt or Vanishing Point), but it spoke to a generation disenfranchised from traditionally coveted marques. The concept of building something in a garage to blow away a Ferrari or Porsche is nothing new – it’s just that the cars come from Japan rather than Detroit, and it turns out there is a substitute for cubic inches; a turbocharger – or two…

However, the big driver behind the six-figure Supras is the heady mixture of that twin-turbo engine, manual transmission and left-hand drive. The appeal of the motor is fairly obvious – even though a gentleman’s agreement between Japanese brands mandated that all power outputs be listed at 276bhp, in standard tune the twin-turbo pushes out around 330bhp.

The second factor is the gearbox.

Despite the reputation that the Supra MkIV has built up for hyperhorsepower performance motoring, plus the quite enormous rear wing, its intended audience was rather different. It was built to challenge the Porsche 928 and Jaguar XJS, so most US-market cars were automatics. It didn’t sell that well – aside from marque loyalty to the Europeans, the presence of that

huge wing was, for its targeted clientele, somewhat extravagant.

Finally, there’s the left-hand-drive factor. Most Supras had the steering wheel on the right, with a relative handful sold as ‘lefties’. Toyota pulled the Supra from the US market in 1998 as an ever-stronger yen increased prices and slowed sales; the turbo was also outlawed in California in 1998 and deemed too expensive to re-engineer. Add all this together and you’ve got a relatively rare, very collectable car, and as 1993’s 18-year-old enthusiast is now in his 40s with money to spare, it’s not hard to see where this is going.

It’s an upward trend demonstrated with other ’90s and ’00s Japanese cars. Hagerty is forecasting 2022 as the year we could see a $2m JDM car – and a Nissan Skyline GT-R R34 Z-Tune, of which just 20 were constructed with bored-out engines and many Nismo additions post-R34 production, was among the insurer’s suggestions. Within days, Harlow Jap Autos in the UK had listed a Skyline GT-R R33 400R at £1.6m.

Still unconvinced? Want to see further evidence of Fast & Furious fever? The movie’s orange Supra was auctioned at Barrett-Jackson in 2021. To paraphrase the film, how much did it retail for? A Ferrari F355-crushing $550,000...

Magneto

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Starter

Words Nathan Chadwick

The art of recycling Italian artist Stefano Notargiacomo crafts sculptures and lamps from broken parts of luxury or classic cars

FOR AN ITALIAN ARTIST FROM Rome, Stefano Notargiacomo’s philosophy is rather more Japanese.

“It’s called wabi-sabi,” he explains.

“The beauty is in the imperfections, because they’re unique and original.”

Wabi-sabi is derived from the Buddhist philosophy of the three marks of existence: impermanence, suffering and emptiness. This may chime with anyone who’s dealing with a grating sabbatical from onward movement with their classic car.

Stefano’s own take on it is to use the broken or worn-out mechanical pieces and craft them into something new. He’s utilised such items as a discarded Ferrari 348 cam cover, Jaguar Mk2 bonnet hatch or Alfa Romeo hubcap, and turned them into lamps or individual sculptures.

“My passions are classic cars and

interior design, so I put these together to create one-off artworks,” he says. After choosing the parts and designing the shape, he picks the materials – fabric, acrylic or marble – and has the item created by Paralumi LAR, a small craft workshop that dates from 1938.

Stefano has also made lamps from Harley-Davidson and Vespa parts.

“Different markets have different tastes. In Asia they love Ferrari and Lamborghini, while in Europe it’s all about Porsche,” he explains. “I like Ferrari and Porsche because there is an elegance in the shape of the cars.

This makes it better for me to design something interesting for interiors.”

His talents have seen him being commissioned to create the prize trophies for concours d’elegance in Germany, Italy and Switzerland, and

ABOVE AND LEFT From interior decor to event trophies, Notargiacomo’s work highlights the imperfections of well worn parts to artistic perfection.

at the time of our chat his next big project was the UAE Concours d’Elegance. “It’s important that clients feel the passion through my work – each creation has a name, a title, that also describes the artwork – but also the feeling that I try to communicate.”

Despite this, and a diploma in graphic arts, his art is not yet his day job. His degree is in political science and he works in a separate field.

“When someone commissions a lamp, I’m constantly thinking about how to harmonise the design throughout the day,” he laughs. “My dream is to have a boutique in Milan, Rome or London to show my passion for interior design and classic cars.”

More at www.stefanonotargiacomo.it.

A MAJOR AUCTION OF 180 FINE CLASSIC & COLLECTOR CARS

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Great minds think alike Norman Dewis and Mike Cross: two engineering legends who between them have shaped the past, present and future of Jaguar dynamics. And the similarities don’t end there...

Words Andrew English

Photography Charlie Magee

HEAD ACROSS THE WELSH Marches west of Shrewsbury, and into what used to be called Montgomeryshire, now Powys. Just up from the Severn flood plain is the pretty market town of Welshpool, with its curvaceous, climbing high street, home to a cheerful melee of fish bars, hair salons, estate agents and 16th-century inns promising hidden treasures beyond – at a price.

It’s a different sort of hidden treasure, however, that has been known to Jaguar engineers for nearly 70 years. Generations of test drivers have used the hilly, twisting moorland roads to evaluate and hone chassis on cars from the 1951 C-type to today’s 2019 Car of the Year-winning iPace.

Norman Dewis, Jaguar’s chief test driver in the 1950s, ’60 and ’70s, came out here with his many charges, and

developed an abiding love for the area.

“We did most of our testing on circuits, and MIRA [The Motor Industry Research Association’s proving ground near Rugby] with its handling circuit and pavé was pretty representative,” he said to me during a 2014 interview at his home in Church Stretton, Shropshire. “But if I had a favourite road, it would be round Betws-y-Coed. I used to have a circuit up there. If a car was good there, it was pretty good anywhere.”

So too Mike Cross, who is about to retire from his long-time role as director of vehicle targets and signoff (“Sounds very grand, doesn’t it,” he grins). He’s Jaguar Land Rover’s go-to car guy just as Dewis was in his day. Cross started as a student apprentice in September 1975, then moved to Land Rover development

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in summer 1978. He joined Jaguar’s ride and handling team in September 1984, although his career came full circle when in 2000 Ford bought Land Rover from BMW; Cross was working with both marques once more. He’s currently driving me in a new iPace north on the A490 out of Welshpool, turning onto the B4391 to Llangynog and then onto Bala Lake.

“We do our development work at Gaydon and MIRA, then the Nürburgring,” he says, “but then we come out here for polishing.”

These are clearly much-loved roads for this very important yet unassuming, softly spoken engineer as he points out the best small hotels, pubs and extinct fish-andchip shops in tiny villages. It’s not just work that draws him back to these roads; he stays here in his own

time, riding one of his five Ducati motorcycles in convoy with friends.

“I’m 64,” he says, “but still crazy about cars and bikes. I like these roads because there’s a lot going on.

They’re twisting, but quite uneven and narrow, so you need to have well sorted suspension and precise steering to give good control.”

BACK THEN Norman Dewis joined Jaguar in January 1952 from Lea-Francis. He’d received a phone call in late 1951 from chief engineer Bill Heynes, offering him a job he didn’t really want.

“I thought if I asked for lots of money, they’d never give it to me,” he said. “So I said I wanted £4 a week on top of what I was earning – and they said yes!”

So commenced a career spanning

1952 to 1985, in which Dewis had a hand in signing off every new Jaguar model. He helped develop some of the world’s most important saloons and sports cars, as well as working to perfect the disc brake that will undoubtedly have helped to save countless lives since. Having been awarded an OBE in 2015, he died aged 98 in June 2019.

In his retirement years, Dewis was excellent company. Aged 94, as guest of honour at the Jaguar barbecue at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, he richly entertained my wife and I into the wee small hours with stories and anecdotes while comprehensively drinking me under the table. He did admit, however, that his driving speed coupled with the exactitude he demanded of his staff meant they had two acronym sobriquets for

him: HSN (High Speed Norman) and LBH (Little Bloody Hitler).

One of the first cars he was asked to evaluate was the C-type, 1951 Le Mans winner in the hands of racing Peters Walker and Whitehead.

Dewis was not impressed. As reported in Paul Skilleter’s excellent Norman Dewis Of Jaguar – Developing The Legend, Dewis made his report to Heynes, saying: “‘Well it’s nice to drive, but when you take a corner on the limit, it’s just a pig – too much oversteer.’ I think they were surprised – I could appreciate their viewpoint, because after all it has won Le Mans.”

Most of the development work on OPPOSITE AND BELOW As with Norman Dewis, Jaguar’s engineering supremo Mike Cross loves the Welsh moorland’s hilly, twisting roads.

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the first disc brakes took place on C-type XKC 001, so Dewis and the team were up against the untried brakes and the car. One test involved Dewis doing repeated hard stops from 130mph on the main runway at Perton airfield, and he admitted that on occasions the car would leave the Tarmac and take to the grass, and that spins at the end of the straight were commonplace.

WHAT WE KNOW NOW With the benefit of hindsight, how does Mike Cross think today would inform the past in suspension development? I am expecting a litany of trick damper internals, precision-machined leaf springs, nylon-voided suspension bushes and sneakily altered geometry, which are the lingua franca of a modern-day historic-preparation business. Not so, according to Cross.

“It’s less a case of what they didn’t know then, more what they weren’t able to achieve,” he says as we examine the magnificent sportsracing machine which these days is insured for £5 million. “Body stiffness is so key to what we do these days. It allows us to precisely set up the car with progressive springing and damping, and deformable bushing, knowing that the body isn’t flexing at the same time. Just think what that flex does to steering efforts, for instance.”

We have been driving in convoy, with Cross in the C-type and me in the iPace. Cross is a hugely talented driver capable of getting the best out of pretty much anything, yet it’s reasonably easy to keep ahead. “Look at that road today,” he says. “In the C-type, I couldn’t keep up with you – you could have just cleared off.”

There’s a quality of stillness about Cross, yet an almost tangible impression of cogs spinning in his head. He will seldom volunteer a conversation, but if you start one, it always takes an unexpected turn. And when you are driving with him, his observation coupled with his silences make you want to be a better driver.

“Crossy is an incredibly important man at JLR,” said one insider. “You might think he’s shy and retiring, and that might be true in his outside

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life, but what he says in here, goes.

He drives with Thierry Bolloré (JLR chief executive) a lot, and did so with Ralf Speth before that.”

I’ve got enormous admiration for him, as have many of his contemporaries. One recently wrote that he could close his eyes and still recognise a “Crossy car, with its unique relationship between the steely steering feel and the lush suspension quality, which allowed the cars to breathe, yet still change direction almost telepathically”.

Whatever you think of JLR products, they seldom have anything less than a sensational ride-andhandling balance, and a steering precision and progression most rivals struggle to match. How does Cross do it? That’s not so easy to define, but I got a clue when he generously advised me on setting up the steering system on my rally Triumph TR3A. I needed to understand exactly how bump steering affected this medieval-chassised model, whose suspension would throw it in the air and make it nervous and hard to control. Cross explained that getting the wheels to toe in minutely but precisely and progressively as they deflect into their arches is an essential part of inspiring confidence when you push it through the turns.

What was highly revealing, was when I discussed Cross’s advice with the head of chassis-development from a rival company.

“We think that JLR is incredibly clever with bump steer,” he said. “In theory you don’t want it in the system, but JLR’s engineers manage to tune it into their cars so precisely that the wheels are helping the vehicle turn in without you actually being aware of it, or without the car being nervous. It’s one of the reasons why JLR’s models steer so well.”

HOW SHOULD A JAGUAR FEEL? So, what should a Jaguar feel like to drive? Period advertising said “Grace, Space, Pace”, while Jim Randle, engineering director on the 1986 XJ40, said it should ride like a “magic carpet”. Cross agrees that ultimate grip should be subordinate to a fine ride – but only a bit.

“More capacity in the dry can be a

bit of a handful in the wet,” he says.

“So, for a Jaguar we might turn down the dry grip a little to get a better allround capability. For me the steering is a key attribute. It’s a thing you use all the time, and it gives you confidence, so you want it to feel connected, precise and intuitive, but never nervous.”

He quotes the famous 50-metre test of the late and much-lamented Richard Parry-Jones (RP-J), Ford’s global product-development boss who worked with Cross at Jaguar.

“In the first 50 metres you should be aware that the steering is connected, so you turn the wheel and you get a proportional response and there’s no feeling of free play or compliance.”

Fine on-centre steering response is one of the traits that tend to mark out a Cross-tuned car, and I ask him about the tricks he plays with the front suspension; again, I don’t get the answer I expect…

“The response of the powered steering system is important,” he says. “The valves or motors, along with the car’s roll response and damping, but while you’d think steering would be all about the front axle, a lot comes from what the rear axle is doing. Of course, the steering response is about fundamentals, but you’ve simply got to get the rear axle to respond predictably and quickly.

“Suspension bushes are also quite complex,” Cross continues. “The tuning of those in particular gives you steering and handling, and reduces noise, vibration and harshness.

They’re tricky things to optimise.”

He lists a variety of qualities, which include responsiveness and smoothness, plus that indefinable quality of flattering the driver. He learned the latter from Jackie Stewart, who was retained by ParryJones to work on Fords along with its Premier Automotive Group cars.

Then he laughs and says: “To be honest, those things are all just ‘motherhood and apple pie’. I can’t see why all car marques wouldn’t want to achieve that. I suppose it’s mainly a case of doing it well…”

But what about all those hours in cars with RP-J, who was fast and often scary? Cross grins and recounts being driven down this

OPPOSITE Backto-back drive of the C-type and iPace highlights the changes in Jaguar technology that have taken place since the 1950s.

‘With past suspension development, it’s less a case of what they didn’t know then, more what they weren’t able to achieve...’

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same twisting road by RP-J in a Focus ST: “He was going so fast and cornering absolutely on trust. I kept thinking, if we come off there, that’s drama; if we come off here, that’s really serious…”

So, which of Cross’s cars is he most proud of? He mentions the XFR, still a landmark car, which beat the Germans at their own game.

Autocar magazine gave it a full five stars, saying it was: “A crushingly effective super saloon. Its 503bhp supercharged V8 has relentless pace and it’s the prettiest car in its class.”

Cross is also proud of the iPace, which still shows most battery rivals the way home in chassis dynamics.

“We wanted it to feel lighter than it is,” he says. “So there was a lot of tuning of the response and the weight of the major controls.”

BATTERY FUTURE But the days of Jaguar’s monster XFR and arch-rival BMW’s M5 and

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ABOVE “Crossy is an incredibly important man at JLR,” says one insider of the car- and bike-mad director of vehicle targets and sign-off, Mike. “What he says in here, goes.”

‘When you are driving with Mike Cross, his observation coupled with his silences make you want to be a better driver’

Mercedes-Benz’s E63 are drawing to a close. Battery cars such as the iPace are taking over, and Jaguar is planning to be an ‘all-electric’ brand by 2025. Either way, these EVs can weigh as much as half a tonne more than their combustion-engined equivalents, and electric cars tend to have wide stances and long wheelbases to accommodate the batteries in the floors. Is this the end of the small, lightweight and finehandling automobile, I ask?

“To a degree,” says Cross, “but there’s as much reason now to make a car lighter and smaller as there was before, because range is dictated by weight, aerodynamics and size. I don’t think it’s a given that cars are going to keep getting bigger; range is going to be a key EV selling point.”

Nevertheless, the current choice of EVs is very far from the last word in ride and handling.A few are downright awful, crashing through potholes and picking up the broken edges of the road, which makes passengers’ heads sway from side to side.

Cross explains that with larger, taller vehicles such as sport utilities, suspension geometry is key. “We call it head toss,” he says, “and it’s hard to control on big, tall vehicles. If you can get the roll centre height close to the centre of gravity, you don’t need such a strong ARB [Anti Roll Bar].

“The ratio of a stiff ARB to stronger springs is important, too,” he continues. “An ARB is reducing the independence of the front springs and will affect the ride. On the new Range Rover the use of active ARBs has been a key, because you can disconnect them when travelling in a straight line to give a better ride.”

Active anti-roll systems are part of a line-up of suspension tech that is starting to be introduced on premium cars. Range Rover, for example, has multi-chamber air suspension, active anti-roll system, four-wheel steering, adaptive dampers, a drivetrain that can distribute torque front and rear, along with the electronic stability control, anti-lock brakes and driver aids that allow tuning on the road.

“The tuning task has become very complex,” sighs Cross, who says that while JLR’s driving simulator can save a lot of time tuning systems on track and road, it doesn’t suit everyone.

Cross finds it makes him nauseous.

“There are several separate

calibrations for the gearbox, dampers, engine, active anti-roll and four-wheel steering, which can make the car feel really agile at low speeds, and then you can virtually lengthen the wheelbase at high speeds to make it feel more stable. And all that’s got to be optimised, so even if you think you’re saving time and resources in the simulator, you then lose it with the vehicle’s increasing complexity.

“While the advantage of these modelling and simulation tools is that they should allow you to get to the answer faster and more cheaply, I still believe the final polishing will be done by a human...

It’s an important point as Jaguar begins a three-year development of an entire EV range. Inherent perils aren’t just the cost of battery electric, which threatens profits and removes the option of independent travel for the less well-off. There’s also the rush into battery raw materials, which threatens people and environments in areas deemed worthy of digging up. And there’s the predicament of established car makers, particularly premium ones such as Jaguar.

At the recent launch of the new Mégane e, Renault chief executive Luca De Meo said that the brand’s new cars must be more than just electric white goods. “In the switch to electric cars, if we lose the emotion, then we are done,” he said.

The following week, two things happened to bear him out. The huge, debt-ridden Chinese property group Evergrande improved its depressed share price markedly by announcing its diversification into building EVs, and Volvo’s over-optimistic IPO valuation from its Chinese owners was heavily scaled back.

Draw your own conclusions, but one is that established brands count for little with Generation Z buyers.

Design and the way a car feels and drives will be more important. In other words, Jaguar has to reinvent itself; its past is meaningless.

It’s a depressing thought for those who feel the future owes a debt to the past, but while Cross is retiring from front-line development he, too, understands the depth of the task that lies ahead.

We stand silently in front of the C-type; it’s that sort of moment.

“Shall we go and drive?” he says with a grin. There’s not much to say to that except, yes.

15th and 16th of June 2022 The Art of Bespoke www.concoursonsavilerow.com

Starter

Words Nathan Chadwick

So much more than a token gesture

LEFT The first NFT offering from Lamborghini was an auction for five ‘Space Keys’, each linked to an exclusive digital artwork.

The automotive world has entered the NFT universe – and the opportunities are endless

NFTS ARE HOT PROPERTY. Between summer and mid-December 2021, more than $40b-worth of cryptocurrency was delivered to NFT marketplaces, according to estimates from analytics firm Chainalysis Inc. The car world has caught on to it, too. In June, Barrett-Jackson sold an NFT of a new two-door Ford Bronco VIN 001 for $22,000. Nope, not the truck itself – a picture of the VIN. For the uninitiated, NFTs – nonfungible tokens – are certificates of ownership that are unique, irreplaceable, unrepeatable and can’t be traded on an equivalent basis (unlike fungible tokens, such as cryptocurrency like Bitcoin or Ethereum). Imagine having the receipt and certificate of authority for a signed baseball, for example, but kept online, and protected by a shared ledger – the blockchain.

RM Sotheby’s entered the NFT fray at Scottsdale in January. Not only did you have the chance to buy Giorgio Moroder’s Cizeta V16T, but a range of NFTs came with it, from art to bespoke musical pieces. Says RM Sotheby’s Jack Little: “We were approached by a number of our clients and automotive brands; people were taking notice of what was going on, and how it might apply to cars.”

As we went to press the auction was yet to run, but NFTs and the car world will clearly be bedfellows going forwards. However, there’s more to NFTs than art. Jack again: “Digital law struggled for a long time, as there was no way to prove ownership.

Blockchain tech and NFTs have made proof of ownership, chain of custody and provenance possible.”

The technology behind NFTs can therefore be used to maintain a

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record of a car’s ownership that will live forever on the blockchain. Jack does not see this as adding any bottom value to a car. The value may be in the experiences tokens can be exchanged for; for instance, some fashion houses have online clothes for in-game avatars that can be bought in the real world.

You can also exchange tokens for ‘VIP experiences’. “With a classic car you could include videos or sketches to create substance within a digital pack, which will then add value,” he says, adding a word of caution: “The market needs time to mature, adapt and better grasp the value of NFTs.” Fractional ownership could also utilise NFT tech: “This has excited some collectors, but as you start creating shares and investmentquality assets, it becomes subject to securitisation. That has to be traded on an exchange, and it’s subject to different legislation in different jurisdictions; if multiple people own a car, where’s that cost stored, is there an insurance product that covers it?”

Collectors making art NFTs out of their cars might also face legal issues. “Manufacturers could have a significant impact in the automotive NFT space, especially with reference to intellectual property (IP) rights on designs,” Jack says.

It’s one reason why Lamborghini has got involved. “The NFT world has been interested in the marque for a long time – many falsifications and imitations were being sold,” says communications boss Tim Bravo.

He sees it as a natural extension of the brand, whose first NFT offering, in February, was an auction for five units containing a piece of

‘With a classic car you could include videos or sketches to create substance within a digital pack’

carbonfibre composite that it sent to the International Space Station in 2019. Each ‘Space Key’ was linked to an exclusive digital artwork.

However, this is just the start for the marque. “We’ve planned projects with more affordable NFT drops, but we’re being selective,” says Tim. “We’re not just in it to make money; it’s about brand positioning.”

But what of legal concerns? VW Group doesn’t let people buy NFTs, let alone cars, via cryptocurrencies, so Lamborghini’s NFT offering is provided via a third party, NFTPro, which does the due diligence. As for RM Sotheby’s, it’s been partnered with BitPay since November, allowing cars – and NFTs – to be bought and sold. However, the usual checks and balances are followed: “It’s important for us to represent our sellers, and qualify our bidders,” Jack says. “We’ll apply to crypto the same measures we use with traditional currency.”

NFTs use a lot of energy, which is often criticised. Such concerns might seem odd for the car market, especially in the case of Lamborghini, but Tim disagrees: “The factory is carbon neutral, even after it doubled in size for Urus production – [ecological concerns are] taken seriously. Layer two of the Ethereum blockchain has many approaches that are optimising the resources needed for this tech, and we and our partners are always making sure that, in total, our project is not having an effect on the environment.”

NFTs may be controversial thanks to the art world, but this is only part of what the tech offers. The next step is the metaverse, which Lamborghini is already dabbling in – and that’s a whole different (virtual) boardgame.

A classic reborn Our mission has evolved since 2007, yet our founding principle has remained constant; to create the most authentic, restored Land Rover Defenders in the world. Defenders that are as influential and inspirational as our clients.

Our latest division, Special Vehicle Operations (SVO) takes those same ingredients but adds additional spice; such as an LS3 engine and 6 speed automatic transmission, culminating in a whole new level of performance and capability.

The ultimate tribute to this automotive icon. Find out more at arkonik.com

Arkonik Ltd. is an independently owned and operated business and is not affiliated in any way with Jaguar Land Rover Limited.

Starter

Words Elliott Hughes

The lady in black The Spirit of Ecstasy has adopted a daring new image as the Black Badge Ghost lends a brooding tone to Rolls-Royce’s traditional elegance

FROM TOP New Black Badge Ghost – designed for “risk-takers, rule-breakers and iconoclasts”.

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“CONTROVERSIALLY, WE HAVE cloaked our precious Spirit of Ecstasy in black,” proclaims the assured voice of Rolls-Royce CEO Torsten Müller-Ötvös in a moodily shot media video. Magneto is sitting in an appropriately villainous leather armchair in a darkened room in Dubai’s ME Hotel, preparing to drive the new Black Badge Ghost.

However, Torsten’s controversial message had already come across loud and clear from the moment we stepped inside. Blue neon lights bathe the room, a DJ plays deep house music in a gloomy corner, cocktail shakers rattle, everyone is wearing black. It’s a far cry from the stereotypical classical music, chandeliers and Champagne one would expect from Rolls-Royce.

Now it’s time to step onto the sun-kissed streets of Dubai to experience the menacing machine parked invitingly outside. The Black Badge Ghost is as imposing as it is stunning; its large, angular proportions perfectly complement the monolithic metal and glass skyscrapers that surround it. The aforementioned mirror-black Spirit of Ecstasy sparkles subtly in the sun.

The thick, chrome door handles feel luxurious and cool to the touch, the powered driver’s door welcomes you into a palatial sea of handstitched leather, polished metal and thick-pile wool carpets; plastic is a rarity. Right foot on the brake, press the piano-black ‘Engine Start’ button, and the 591bhp 6.75-litre V12

comes to life with a refined growl.

Glass-clad buildings reveal an opulent red reflection as you surge your way through the city, the majestic Spirit of Ecstasy protruding from the tip of the bonnet some distance away from the driver’s vantage point. The car’s gargantuan size and weight are immediately apparent, and daunting.

But for all its brooding persona, the Rolls-Royce is keen to put you at your ease. The seats are impossibly comfortable, the crystalclear mirrors are huge and the beautifully finished controls are intuitive. And then there’s the GPSassisted Flagbearer suspension setup, officially described as “flying on the ground” – a perfect metaphor.

As soon as you are free of the city traffic, you are met by sand hypnotically dancing across the surface of the motorway asphalt.

The sky is stained orange and red by the setting sun, and the Black Badge Ghost’s laser headlights irradiate the gloominess of the desert dusk.

Rolls-Royce says the new Ghost is the “purest expression of Black Badge yet”, designed for “risk-takers, rule-breakers and iconoclasts”. By daring to repackage the marque’s stoic interpretation of luxury it may have initially aroused scepticism, but the way this new Black Badge alter ego fits into the gilded streets of Dubai means any controversy is soon forgotten.

Priced from £260,000 ($350,000).

Info at www.rolls-roycemotorcars.com.

WAY MORE THAN JUST VEHICLE STORAGE. WWW.HENRYSCARBARN.CO.UK

Starter

Words David Lillywhite

LEFT AND BELOW Porsche 924 GTR and Corvette CR.6 ZR1 are both currently available through William I’Anson.

Three class wins, two cars, one dealer UK specialist William I’Anson has released these two Le Mans 24 Hours class winners onto the market

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WHEN A LE MANS 24 HOURS class winner comes up for sale, it is always noteworthy. When two particularly striking winners become available with the same dealer, things get even more interesting.

Collector cars sales specialist William I’Anson Ltd has just released details of two important but very different class victors: the 1982 GTO class-winning Brumos, BFGoodrich and El Salvador Racing Porsche 924 GTR; and the 2011 GTE-Pro and 2012 GTE-Am classwinning Corvette C6.R ZR1.

Both of them are fascinating and important cars. It’s fair to say that the 924 GTR is one of the most important of all the front-engined Porsche race machines. Not only did it win its class in the Le Mans 24 Hours with just two drivers and one tyre change, it also competed three times in both the Daytona 24 Hours and the Sebring 12 Hours races in the early 1980s.

It was looked after throughout its contemporary race career by the famous Brumos motor sport team, and is still in only its third ownership from new. It’s one of just 17 924 GTRs built, developed by the factory following campaigns with the 924 Turbo in 1980 and ’81. The GTR features a full alloy roll cage and body panels in aluminium, polyurethane and glassfibre. It is powered by a turbocharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder

that develops a remarkable 375bhp and almost 300lb ft of torque, making for a 180mph top speed.

At its first outing, at Daytona in 1982, driving duties were shared between Doc Bundy, Jim Busby and movie actor James Brolin – now the husband of Barbra Streisand. During the race Brolin famously hit a pig, which fans had brought to the track.

Brolin escaped, but there were fatal consequences for the animal.

The car was raced through 1982, ’83 and ’84, when it was sold to the El Salvador Racing team. More recently it was restored to its original 1982 Le Mans livery, and it is once again ready to compete at events such as the Le Mans Classic.

The other car of note currently with William I’Anson is the double class-winning Corvette CR.6 ZR1 that also took the WEC GTE-Am Manufacturers’ Championship. This car competed at Le Mans three times, twice winning its class, and it also took its class in the 2012 Fuji Six Hours and Shanghai Six Hours.

It started out as a works entry for Corvette Racing – one of just six cars built for the team by Pratt & Miller – and after its first year it moved to Larbre Compétition.

Again, with a full spares and bodywork package, it’s ready to race, in both Endurance Racing Legends and Masters Endurance Legends.

More info at www.williamianson.com.

Multiple Le Mans Winners

THE 1982 LE MANS 24 HOURS IMSA GTO WINNING, BRUMOS, BFGOODRICH, EL SALVADOR RACING 1982 PORSCHE 924 CARRERA GTR One of the most important front engine racing Porsches of all time. One of only 17 examples built and an exclusive number of Porsches to take victory in their class at Le Mans. An achievement made even more impressive by the fact it did with just two drivers and only changing one tyre during the entire 24 Hours. A three-time veteran of both the Daytona 24 Hours and Sebring 12 Hours in period and wonderfully original, with original factory engine and gearbox. Only in its third ownership since new.

T. +44 (0)1285 831 488 / E. cars@williamianson.com / www.williamianson.com

THE LE MANS 24 HOURS GTE-PRO AND GTE-AM WINNING, 2012 FIA WEC GTE-AM CHAMPION, EX - WORKS CORVETTE RACING AND LARBRE COMPETITION 2011 CHEVROLET CORVETTE C6.R ZR1 GTE A two time class winner and three time Le Mans 24 Hour finisher, winning GTE-Pro in 2011 and GTE-Am in 2012. Raced competitively in the WEC for three seasons both as a works entry for Corvette Racing in GTE-Pro and GTE-Am for multiple championship winning team Larbre Competition. Class winner at both the 2012 Fuji and Shanghai 6 Hours. Instrumental in securing the WEC GTE-Am Team Championship victory for Larbre in 2012. One of only six cars built by Pratt & Miller for Corvette Racing and in its first and only private ownership from 2014. Accompanied by an extensive spares package including a full set of spare carbon bodywork, two sets of spare wheels and its 2012 Le Mans Class winning engine in a crate as a spare.

/williamiansonltd

/williamiansonltd

Giotto Bizzarrini, the genius engineer behind the Ferrari 250GTO, Lamborghini V12 and more, disappeared from the industry in 1973.

In 1981 Winston Goodfellow tracked him down. This is the story of his pilgrimage

ABOVE Found him! The elusive Giotto Bizzarrini when tracked down by Winston.

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XX

ABOVE Smiles all round as Winston (left) joins Giotto and friend Axel Gottschalk, acting as a translator.

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‘Franco’s Alfa was frequently on boost to keep up with Giotto’s 20bhp-odd Fiat 500’

WHO WERE YOUR SPORTS HEROES when growing up? What about guitar gods and rock stars? While I had my share on the playing field and in concert halls, the group that really grabbed this teenager in 1970s California came from Europe, most especially Italy. Typically, they were quite shapely, had four wheels and were, for the most part, the type that mothers everywhere warned you about – fast company.

That passion for Italian exotica likely germinated with a well-to-do uncle who drove a Ferrari daily. His single-headlight 330 2+2 and subsequent 308GT/4 were cool, yet the first automotive book I bought was History of Lamborghini – which, back then, was the only tome on the subject. Around that time, while perusing automotive want ads in San Francisco’s Chronicle newspaper, I saw one that said: “Ferrari looks and performance with American reliability.” The succinct description was my introduction to the Iso marque, and I bought the Corvette-powered, 140mph-plus Rivolta 2+2 for less than the cost of my brother’s Ford Pinto.

Iso and its models quickly captivated me, if for no other reason than decades before you could say “hey Siri” for answers, you had to become a serious automotive detective to discover anything. Very few people knew about Isos back then, and the more I investigated the marque the more it fuelled my wonderment of Italy’s exotic car scene and history.

Especially because one name kept popping up – an engineer named Giotto Bizzarrini. Who was this guy, and what was his back-story? How did he end up working for Ferrari, Lamborghini, Iso and more? He even made cars under his own name, and was that ever a maze to sort out.

Then there was the most perplexing question of all: If Bizzarrini was indeed an exotic car sports/rock star everything portrayed him to be, how come he completely disappeared?

In fact, was the dude even still alive?

Unknowingly, the first piece to solving the Bizzarrini puzzle was forming the Iso & Bizzarrini Owner’s Club with fellow enthusiast and Iso owner Louis Vandenberg. An individual who joined the IBOC early on was Earl

Waggoner; he visited Iso in 1966 and knew an ex-pat Italian who consulted for the company in 1964-65. Rino Argento was a friendly Piero Taruffi lookalike who offered first-hand insights into Iso and Bizzarrini but had lost track of the mercurial engineer.

He had an idea, however. A good friend was Franco Lini, a former Ferrari team manager who was one of Italy’s top automotive journalists. “If anyone knows where Bizzarrini is,” Rino said, “it’s Franco.”

A meeting was arranged, and in October 1981 I travelled to Las Vegas for the inaugural Caesars Palace Grand Prix. Franco was covering the race, we hit it off, and he offered to help in my quest. Several weeks later I boarded a plane to Europe and Italy for the first time, and while there Franco delivered – big time. I can still hear his Alfa GTV Turbodelta’s engine coming on boost as we sailed past cars while heading to Livorno, the location of Bizzarrini’s old factory.

Franco was an enthusiastic living encyclopaedia of Italian automotive history, so on the trip I peppered him with questions on Iso, Bizzarrini and other obscure marques and people.

We stayed in a hotel near the coast, and the following morning drove to a rendezvous point in the hills outside Livorno. Franco found a pay phone and placed a call. Several minutes later up came a somewhat tatty Fiat 500, and out jumped the elusive engineer. Casually dressed, Bizzarrini was a short, stocky man with a full head of hair, a handsome, weathered face and a soft smile that belied the hardship I would find out he had endured. He and Franco greeted each other like the long-lost friends they were, and after introductions, we followed Bizzarrini to his house. A sinewy road barely two lanes wide wound its way through the rolling hills, Franco and I chuckling because his 150bhp Alfa was frequently on boost to keep up with the smoothly (and expertly) driven 20bhp-odd Fiat.

We eventually turned off the rustic strada, went down an unpaved driveway and parked near Bizzarrini’s modest but comfortable country home. Scattered around the property in overgrown brush were partially completed Magneto

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Giotto Bizzarrini

GPL COLLECTION

Giotto Bizzarrini

bodies, jigs and forlorn frames, all relics of his car-building and engineering days.

Giotto’s wife Rosanna warmly greeted us at the door, and I must have been grinning ear to ear. Not only would I be spending time with my automotive ‘sports hero’, but by then I had pieced together enough on the man, his career and more to ask some reasonably intelligent questions. Franco would act as translator and history guide, and after the two caught up on life I turned on the tape recorder and we started our conversation – the first of many we’d have over the ensuing decades. Later a meal was offered, and Mrs B proved to be a fantastic cook; her tortellini alla panna became my favoured dish on subsequent visits.

We began by examining Bizzarrini’s early career and how, at age 31 in 1957, he joined Ferrari. “It was simple,” he said, unknowingly illustrating the tightly knit nature of Modena’s grapevine that existed back then. Several months after Giotto graduated with a mechanical engineering degree from the University of Pisa in 1953, he was hired by Alfa Romeo’s experimental department, where he quietly but steadily built a name for himself. A cousin in Florence worked with the brother of prominent Ferrari engineer Andrea Fraschetti, so he knew of Bizzarrini.

“One of Ferrari’s test drivers died,” Giotto recounted, “so Ferrari asked Fraschetti to find another, hopefully one who was also an engineer. The Fraschettis talked and the brother suggested me. Of course, I rushed to Ferrari.” Not long after that hiring, Fraschetti tragically perished while testing, and Giotto suggested Carlo Chiti, a cohort at Alfa, who

would go on to become Ferrari’s chief engineer.

Bizzarrini and his uncanny feel for a car saw him work as “a test engineer/test driver”.

He eventually became “controller of checking on experimental, sports and GT cars”, and in this role he cemented his reputation. Many of the era’s greatest Ferraris were engineered and tested by him – the pontoon-fender 250 Testa Rossa, SWB, Cal Spyder and the most famous 250 of all, the GTO. When queried about the atmosphere at Ferrari, Giotto replied: “I never heard about financial difficulty. I never heard Ferrari say: ‘We spend too much money, we have to be careful.’ This was very important for an engineer, because we had freedom.”

I then asked if the GTO was an evolution of prior models or was Ferrari trying to beat someone in particular. “It was Jaguar,” Bizzarrini replied. “Because Jaguar made the E-type, which was presented at the 1961 Geneva Motor Show, commercial manager Girolamo Gardini said: ‘It will be a disaster!

They are going to beat us with their competition GT.’ Ferrari said to me: ‘We have to do something.’ In response, we built a completely new car, the first one made entirely in the experimental department – even the body. We got a young boy and he built it. It was so ugly that we used to call it ‘the Monster’.”

Shortly after testing on the GTO prototype commenced, Giotto became embroiled in the ‘Palace Revolt’, a murky episode involving Ferrari’s highly respected, influential sales manager (and E-type protagonist) Gardini.

Asked why it happened, Bizzarrini replied: “Nobody knows the real truth, because there

THE BIZZARRINI CV

1953

1954-1957

1958-1961

Cars that Giotto touched or influenced in one way or another, shown either with year of debut, or the period during which he was working with Alfa or Ferrari.

Fiat 500 Topolino Berlinetta

Alfa Giulietta Sprint

Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa

Alfa Giulietta Spyder

Ferrari 250 Spyder California

Alfa Giulietta Berlina

Ferrari 250SWB

graduating thesis from college

Ferrari 250GTE (2+2) Ferrari 250GTO

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RIGHT Giotto Bizzarrini (left) with driver Willy Mairesse at Monza in 1961, testing the GTO prototype.

‘By then I’d pieced together enough on the man and his career to ask some intelligent questions’

Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa

Ferrari 250GTO

Lamborghini 350GT Powered by Giotto’s V12

Bizzarrini Grifo, Strada 5300

ILLUSTRATIONS (INCLUDING COVER) RICARDO SANTOS

‘He could explode at the drop of a hat; this did not endear him to some of those he worked for’

Giotto Bizzarrini

are so many reasons. Ferrari fired Gardini, and as soon as this was found out a group of us tried to unify to support Gardini, and have Ferrari bring him back. Ferrari said ‘no’, and fired everybody.”

The renegades were Bizzarrini, Chiti, Gardini and several others, with the firing initiating Giotto’s time as Italy’s top engineering gun for hire. His first stop was ATS (Automobili Turismo e Sport), primarily put together by Chiti and Gardini to combat Ferrari on the track and street.

They rounded up serious financial backing from prominent Ferrari client and top privateer Count Giovanni Volpi, industrialist Giorgio Billi and tin-mining heir Jaime Ortiz-Patiño.

The Formula 1 effort would be a disaster, the luscious 2500GT the first mid-engine supercar.

Giotto was long gone before either debuted, but I discovered an intriguing ATS-inspired nugget during a 1993 conversation. Ferruccio Lamborghini commissioned Bizzarrini to design a V12, and for decades it was written that the engine was created while he was at Ferrari. “Absolutely not,” Giotto said. “When I left Ferrari, I was never thinking of an engine.”

Instead, ATS was a blank canvas, so there was a debate on what type of motor its cars should use. “Gardini always started with an F1 engine,” Bizzarrini pointed out. “That’s why my design was 12 cylinders, 1.5 litres. First F1, then would come a production car. It was, in essence, to show Gardini what I could do.”

When ATS went with a V8, that and

shareholder troubles prompted Bizzarrini to leave the company. Giotto was thus prepared “when Lamborghini came to me, thanks to Giorgio Neri and Luciano Bonacini. At Ferrari they were considered the best in Modena.

Count Volpi always worked with them. They had a dyno room for testing, and were able to construct a new engine. But they were not designers, engineers; rather, people would come to them to have them build it.”

At the time Bizzarrini knew “nothing at all” about the aspiring car constructor, but his relationship with Neri and Bonacini gave him confidence to present the ATS-inspired V12 drawings. When they met, Lamborghini said: “I am not thinking about F1 or racing. I want a car like Ferrari, for the highways. Twelve cylinders is okay, but it needs to be 3.5 litres…”

The two wrote a contract stating that the engine had to produce “…350bhp. For every ten horsepower less, there was a reduction in the percentage of the balance to be received”.

Bizzarrini took a down payment and went to work. The V12 ended up exceeding the benchmark, but needed refining to run properly at low rpm – and this led to a vociferous disagreement. “I was expecting Lamborghini to say: ‘Bravo! Thank you,’” the engineer recalled. “Instead, he was very aggressive.

This caused me to have a bad reaction; I thought we were going to have a fight.”

Bizzarrini did get paid, but he recommended engineer Giampaolo Dallara (ex-Ferrari, then at

1962

1963

1964

1965

1966

Ferrari 250SWB ‘Breadvan’

ASA 1000GTC

Iso Grifo A3 Stradale

Bizzarrini Grifo, Strada 5300

Bizzarrini GT America

done for Scuderia Serenissima

Ferrari 250TR/61 modified for Scuderia Serenissima

Iso Rivolta GT ASA 1000GT

ATS 2500GT minimal role, if any

Iso Grifo A3/C Lamborghini V12 completed by Giampaolo Dallara

Lamborghini 350 GTV

Bizzarrini Corsa competition version

Nembo done mostly by Neri and Bonacini

Bizzarrini Spyder SI prototype

Bizzarrini P538 Bizzarrini Monoposto hillclimb car

Bizzarrini GT Europa 1900

completed by Giampaolo Dallara

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Giotto Bizzarrini

Maserati) to complete the V12 and more on the 350GTV, Lamborghini’s first car. The finished engine and the subsequent enlarged variants powered Lamborghinis for several decades.

Another client in 1962-63 was ex-ATS shareholder and Scuderia Serenissima patron, Giovanni Volpi. In a February 1994 interview, the Count told me: “I was supposed to take delivery of the first two GTOs, then the ATS thing happened. I got a call from Ferrari, telling me to forget it, so I made one in two weeks.”

Volpi’s ‘GTO’ was the Breadvan.

A heavily modified 250SWB masterminded

by Bizzarrini, the Breadvan’s memorable moniker came from the French press, who saw it at Le Mans and were startled by its avant-garde coachwork. “Bizzarrini moved the engine back 12cm, so it was like a frontmid-engine design,” Volpi remembered. “The car was very light, and while the bodywork was rudimentary, it was like the J-car Ford GT40 with a chopped back.” Volpi said the Breadvan ran away from the GTOs at Le Mans but was a DNF. Later in 1962 it proved its mettle with three top-five finishes and two class victories.

Giotto also designed ASA’s 1000GTC endurance racer, which resembled a miniature 250GTO, and did development testing on the road-going 1000GT. The diminutive fourcylinder production model started life as the ‘Ferrarina’ inside Maranello and, as Bizzarrini recalled in our November 2001 interview: “Enzo suggested the contact with ASA.” While the 1000GT was well received, its high sticker price saw fewer than 60 made over five years.

A much more ambitious effort, one that greatly influenced Giotto’s career through the remainder of the 1960s, came from Milan industrialist Renzo Rivolta. In the 1950s his Iso company was a very prosperous manufacturer of motor scooters, motorcycles and small

industrial vehicles. Iso also created and made the innovative Isetta city car, licensing its production to BMW and others. Renzo loved speed, and after being disappointed by the finicky nature of the GT models he owned, Iso entered the burgeoning gran turismo space in 1962. Rivolta hired Giotto not only for his testdriving and engineering acumen, but to bring credibility to Iso’s effort by constantly promoting Bizzarrini’s name and Ferrari credentials.

Working with Iso was the first time Bizzarrini sampled a Corvette engine. In one of our 1992 talks I asked what he thought of it. “No one in Italy knew about that engine,” he said. “I felt it was superior to Ferrari’s, and was very surprised by this. It had immediate throttle response, with power that was similar to the Ferrari’s.”

Iso’s first model, the Rivolta 2+2, entered production in 1963, but where Giotto truly made his mark with Iso was the legendary Grifo. Two versions broke cover at 1963’s Turin Auto Show – the A3/L (a street-going GT), and the competition-oriented A3/C. Giotto fathered the latter, feeling Iso needed “to have an exciting flag, like a sporting activity – to be in racing”.

By now his small Autostar facility in Livorno was up and running, and with competition in his blood, he pushed racing’s benefits. An agreement

was made where he would build Iso’s racers, and the road-going A3 Stradale offshoot.

The A3/C reflected Giotto’s thinking, as everything was done to optimise performance.

A front-mid-engine design, the 327ci was placed so far behind the forward axle that the distributor was accessed by removing a panel on top of the dashboard. Anything that could be removed to lighten things up was, the resulting kerbweight listed at just over 2500lb.

He also devised a crossdraught Weber set-up that bumped horsepower to over 400.

Reflecting on the A3/C in our 1981 conversation, Bizzarrini said: “It had the possibility to be GT class World Champion for three or four years,” to which Franco Lini agreed. In a later interview Giotto noted a strong interest in the Iso-developed A3/L, because its chassis was basically identical to that of the A3/C. If the right number were produced, he said, the A3/C would compete in the GT class. “For homologation,” he noted, “100 cars was the number, but the real figure was lower. Ferrari did only around 30 GTOs.” Unfortunately, Rivolta couldn’t fully support racing, nor an immediate ramp-up of A3/L production because the latter needed refining, and Iso’s cash flow took a nosedive when the US importer reneged on its contract. Still, the A3/C was an effective track weapon; one would place 14th overall and first in class at Le Mans in 1964, another – further modified and entered by Giotto – ninth overall and first in class in ’65.

The A3/L eventually became the 160mph Grifo GL, customers lining up to order what Autocar described as “the ultimate in transport”.

But by then it was too late, because Iso and Bizzarrini had parted company. Twenty-two Grifo A3/Cs and Stradales were built in 1964-65.

Bizzarrini moved to a larger facility in Livorno, and continued production under his

ABOVE Stabilimenti Bizzarrini in Livorno, 1968s, building 1900GT Europas and 5300s.

1967

1968

1970

1971

1972

Bizzarrini GT7000

Bizzarrini Spyder SI

American Motors AMX/3

Bizzarrini Sciabola (AMX/3)

Francis Lombardi FL1

Bizzarrini 128P

Iso Varedo

production version

Bizzarrini Duca d’Aosta Bizzarrini 2+2 Bizzarrini Manta

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Iso Lele

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K

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1965 ISO A3C

Chassis no. BO232 The last example of the 26 ISO A3C ever made.

Originally delivered to Germany. Original KFZ German papers dating from 1965 accompanying the car. Well documented.

Matching numbers. 24,440 kms.

1967 BIZZARRINI 5300 GT STRADA

Chassis no. IA3*0309 One of 86 examples built in aluminium.

Matching numbers. Restored by Diomante & Lecoq in the late 90’s.

Single ownership from 1990 to 2017. Superb condition. Matching numbers.

Provenance and authenticity confirmed by Bizzarrini expert Jack Koobs de Hartog.

gtc@guikasgtc.com

www.guikasgtc.com

+33442726199

Giotto Bizzarrini

1973

1976-1978

1990

1993

1994

1998

2000

Iso Lele Sport

Yamaha 250/350

Picchio

Bizzarrini BZ2001

Kjara

BEBI

Bizzarrini 128P Competizione

Kawasaki 900

Pininfarina Eta Beta

BELOW Giotto in 1967, leaning on Strada 5300, the enclosed version of the P538 in foreground.

own name. The Isos became the Strada 5300 and GT America – the latter having a glassfibre (instead of aluminium) body and an independent rear suspension (in place of the de Dion). Italy’s Quattroruote test Strada hit 100mph in 13.7 seconds, and saw 161mph. As quick and fast as the car was (the testers felt it would clear 170mph with taller gearing), what most impressed them was “the road holding”.

Road & Track’s December 1966 cover test of a GT America concurred, noting its “handling borders on the fantastic”.

Giotto also made several Bizzarrini Corsas, including one that competed at Le Mans in 1966 under the marque banner; it later became the GT7000 when fitted with a Corvette L88 (a 550bhp 427ci), and had a listed 340kph (210mph) top speed. Another big-block car was the Nembo, done by Neri and Bonacini. Built for HolmanMoody in the US, there was one issue, Giotto said in 1982: “Ford didn’t supply the engine.”

As the brand established itself with a small but consistent stream of Strada and GT America orders, in late 1965 an opportunity with real sales potential landed in Bizzarrini’s lap. “A man who had made a lot of money building on speculation in Rome approached me at the Turin Auto Show,” Giotto recalled.

At the time the Government was promoting industrial development in southern Italy. “The man said: ‘Why not do a 2.0-litre GT for the middle class?’ The plan was to ask the Government for funding and build the plant.”

Enthused by the idea, Bizzarrini designed and developed the GT Europa out of his own pocket. The prototype featured a Fiat 1500cc engine and five-speed transmission, and when completed he met the potential backer. “When I was talking with him,” Giotto said, “I realised the Government money was to go in every direction except building the car.”

The engineer promptly walked away.

Still, with the new model in hand, he 80

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presented it at 1966’s Turin Auto Show, where it garnered much attention. “Entirely new and very interesting was the Europa 1900,” Road & Track’s show coverage noted. “This car is styled along the lines of the big-banger Bizzarrini, but is smaller and powered by an 1897cc inline four-cylinder Opel engine.” Giotto said the engine change came from his connection with GM, and production was slated to start in 1967.

The Europa wasn’t Bizzarrini’s only debut in 1966. A personal favourite is the Spyder SI that was introduced at Geneva, and when I discovered Pete Coltrin’s brief report and photos in Road & Track’s August 1966 issue, my automotive lust shifted into overdrive. Giotto slightly burst that bubble when he said that car was a non-runner, but he then noted two actual cars were produced. These open-air Bizzarrinis used Strada or GT America underpinnings and reliable Corvette drivetrains, and in 1982-83 I found the last one made. I purchased it for Californian Iso owners Howard and Jane Turnley, put several hundred miles on it in northern Italy (including at Monza), and later did the same in California.

As the number of Bizzarrini models grew in 1966, ironically what he loved most – competition – proved to be the start of his undoing. He still sold the Corsa, but he knew his front-engine racer was becoming

obsolete. During his time with Iso he proposed a true mid-engine car, the concept leading to some Giugiaro renderings in 1964. Now that he was on his own, he literally bet the farm on designing and developing his own mid-engine racer.

Giotto started working on the P538 in 1965, and it had a tubular frame, swoopy aerodynamic open coachwork and a longitudinally mounted engine. While the name referenced the model’s 5.3-litre Corvette V8, American racer Mike Gammino (who drove an Iso Grifo A3/C at Sebring in 1965) “contacted me in 1966 and said he wanted a Bizzarrini chassis with a Bizzarrini engine. That’s why I did a P538 with a Lamborghini V12”.

That was chassis 002. Chassis 001 was presented in February 1966, but it slid off a wet track during demonstration testing and was damaged. Not having massive cash reserves, Giotto raided it for parts to use on Gammino’s car, then built chassis 003 to race at Le Mans where it would be a DNF. [Ironically, I came across the cannibalised (and thought lost) P538 in Switzerland in 1982.]

“The P538 was a big financial disaster for me,” Giotto said – noting that he sold everything he owned to create the car, figuring it would compete for three or four years. But a shock came in 1967 when the CSI: “Changed the rules. They made prototypes 3.0 litres, and sports cars 5.0 litres with 50 cars having to be built. The problem was building 50 cars.”

Franco Lini grasped the impact the sudden change had on his friend. He was then managing the Ferrari team, and recalled telling Le Mans they wouldn’t see any Ferraris in 1968 because: “Ferrari doesn’t have the money to build 50 cars – which meant it was a complete disaster to Bizzarrini because he was not Ferrari. He was a single man, with all his fortune invested.”

Giotto soldiered on, attempting to lessen the blow by enclosing the Le Mans racer and trying

1971 Ferrari 365 GTB-4 ‘Daytona’ This desirable late production, European spec. UK delivered RHD 1971 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 was ordered by Coombs & Sons of Guildford and delivered through Maranello Concessionaires.

It is a very well maintained example which presents superbly following a recent body refresh including repaint and brightwork re-finishing and prior engine rebuild.

• Rosso Chiaro with Nero trim and Grigio carpets • Options include Air-con option, Radio and spotlights • Original service book pack and warranty card • Detailed service history • One of fewer than 160 UK delivered cars • 60,623 miles

£499,950

RESTORATION | SALES | SERVICE

+44 (0) 1582 857 940 www.bellsportandclassic.co.uk

to sell it as a road car. This led to the Duke of Aosta, a favoured client, commissioning a one-off. The aptly named Duca d’Aosta was built in 1968, and had a 365bhp 327ci, a fivespeed transaxle and a claimed top speed of 320kph (200mph). It was slated to appear at Turin in 1968, but wasn’t completed in time.

Still, the Bizzarrini nameplate headlined the show. Because the enclosed P538 didn’t sell, Giotto listened when Giorgetto Giugiaro called him. The ambitious ex-Bertone and Ghia chief stylist had formed his own firm, Ital Design, and suggested: “You build the chassis and I put the body on it, and then we sell the car and spilt the profits.” The Le Mans P538 became the donor chassis, Giugiaro went to work, and the wedgy Bizzarrini Manta with three-abreast seating and central steering was Turin’s star attraction.

Surprisingly, neither Bizzarrini nor Giugiaro made a penny on the car, for during a trip to the US it was lost. When it eventually returned to Italy, it sat in customs unclaimed for years. It was bought by a collector in Cuneo, which was where I found it on that first European trip.

Bizzarrini also attempted to keep his company afloat via outside funding. A lawyer friend introduced him to three investors, whose capital infusion brought temporary reprieve. They requested a 2+2 to broaden the product line, which Bizzarrini built. But as Giotto related, two of the three weren’t what they appeared to be (one excelled in “dirty affairs”), and they used bank leverage and a sophisticated shell game to bleed the company while Giotto minded the store.

This went on until August 1968, when Bizzarrini learned that some creditors hadn’t been paid. Assets were seized and credit lines closed even though the company was operating “at break-even or slightly in the black”. The unseen financial shenanigans caused Giotto’s world to rapidly unravel, just as his company was on the threshold of a new model boom (Duca d’Aosta, Spyder SI, 2+2) and one of the year’s wildest show cars, the Manta.

The firm liquidated in mid-1969, but Bizzarrini seemed to get a reprieve when Giugiaro and others recommended him to the American Motors Corporation. “There was a meeting with an acquaintance who represented AMC to see if I would do work on a car styled

by Dick Teague,” Giotto remembered. “They wanted to know if I could do a chassis and more for a mid-engine car.”

Bizzarrini bit, and he ended up designing the AMX/3, working with BMW during development testing. In March 1970 the midengine AMC was presented to the press in Rome. “Cautious optimism seems to describe 82

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FROM TOP The one-off Ferrari 250SWB ‘Breadvan’; Bizzarrini Spyder SI; Bizzarrini P538 Duca d’Aosta, another one-off; AMC AMX/3; Testarossa-based Bizzarrini BZ2001.

American Motors’ plans,” Road & Track reported, and Bizzarrini felt the same. AMC gave the green light, he further developed the car, and a small production line was set up in Turin.

Unfortunately, right as production started, AMC got cold feet – possibly because of the recently debuted De Tomaso Pantera. AMC encouraged Bizzarrini to make 30 cars under his name, stating that it would purchase ten.

But Giotto was tormented by the recent bankruptcy. “It was so fresh on my mind,” he lamented. “I didn’t have the courage to do it.”

In ’71 at Turin, he displayed an AMX/3 called

the Bizzarrini Sciabola, alongside a heavily modified Europa with a mid-mounted Fiat 128 drivetrain. The following year he consulted for former employer Iso on its mid-engine Varedo and more, and in 1973 he entered an intriguing ground-effects barchetta in the Targa Florio.

It was quick but retired on the first lap.

Then Giotto pulled his disappearing act and left the auto industry, becoming a professor at his alma mater, the University of Pisa.

He consulted for Yamaha and Kawasaki, and built the occasional private commission, such as two Lamborghini-powered P538s for a Turin-based collector.

After our paths crossed in 1981, I visited him as often as possible. In 1990 the Bizzarrinis and several friends came to California, staying at the parents’ house before we headed to Monterey for the IBOC’s annual meet and the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, where Giotto was the headline feature.

By then the modern supercar boom was underway, and Bizzarrini’s name was again making headlines. There was a potential F1 effort out of America that remained stillborn.

Then came the mid-engine Picchio project that targeted becoming “the Lotus of Italy”; only one was made, thanks to the severe recession of the early 1990s. After the Picchio was the Ferrari Testarossa-based BZ2001, which also remained a one-off for the same reasons.

Still, all this reinvigorated Giotto’s spirit, which led to much experimentation. Later projects included the Kjara (a lightweight barchetta featuring a Lancia diesel engine and electric motors), the BEBI (another lightweight barchetta powered by a Kawasaki engine) and more. As new ideas germinated – some a bit out there and unrefined, others very intriguing – he continued to push boundaries on himself, machinery and the people around him.

Over the years I saw many sides of the man, from endearing host to despondency while discussing the difficult periods. I witnessed joy in reliving his accomplishments, and volatility where he could explode at the drop of a hat – a trait that didn’t exactly endear him to some of those he worked for, and with. And his coming back to life. “I feel like I’m 28 again,” he gleefully proclaimed in 2003 as we caught up at Lamborghini’s 40th anniversary bash.

Recently his health has been on the wane, and no one knows how much longer he will be with us. But that hasn’t diminished whatever the mystique is that surrounds his name – witness Pegasus Group’s concerted effort to resuscitate the marque.

Which isn’t too bad for a sports hero who all but vanished nearly 50 years ago…

WINSTON GOODFELLOW

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ABOVE Perfection! In looks, this early 246GT is closer to the 206GT than it is to later models of the Dino.

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IT’S ‘JUST A DINO’, RIGHT? NOT EVEN worthy of a Ferrari badge. Except surely no one thinks like that any more?

Escalating values prove that the Dino is more appreciated nowadays, but I remember driving one for the first time in the mid-1990s at the famed Chobham test track, and being astonished how good it felt after all the bad press. And the trouble is, it was back in the ’80s and ’90s when Dinos were relatively cheap that they were being restored – often badly. And that further skewed opinions against them.

So the question came up as to how a Dino would look and feel if it was restored to the same levels as, say, a 250GT or a 275GTB. And that led us to this car, chassis 00436, finished in August 1969. It was the seventh of just 357 L-series Dinos built between the low-volume 206GT and the more common M- and E-series production 246GTs.

Dino 246GT restoration

Within a month of its completion it had been sold to Auto Becker in Düsseldorf, and it was shown at the 1969 International Motor Show Germany (IAA) in Frankfurt – becoming the first Dino to be sold in the country.

The Dino later crossed to Strasbourg, France where it stayed until it was exported to Ontario in 1987 and then on to California in 1995.

Although the Golden State is surely perfect Dino territory, a year later the car returned to Germany. It remained in the ownership of a private collector there until it was bought in barn-find condition by UK specialist Bell Sport & Classic in 2017. By that point it had covered just 86,000km (53,400 miles), and had been repainted Rosso Corsa over its more orangetoned factory Rosso Dino and fitted with a non-original black-leather interior.

It arrived at the company’s Hertfordshire HQ looking presentable but tired. Deeper investigation proved otherwise, predictably.

“It looked superficially fine from a distance,” says managing director Tim Kearns.

“From a distance,” re-emphasises colleague Elliot East, who with Marc Holden, project leader Peter Ensor and technical director Attilio Romano was responsible for the Dino’s restoration. And then they list the problems...

Sill/rocker panels welded on top of the originals, locking in the rust and losing the seam lines in the process. Front wing panels welded on top of the originals. The trademark scoops in the doors didn’t align correctly with their corresponding body scoops – not just in height but in the angles of the scoops, too. The rear roofline was wrong and the wheelarch heights were different from side to side. All common Dino problems, often as they were from new.

The front and rear valances were misshapen and corroded, the rear especially so, and the front inner wings were rusted, too. As for the chassis rails and outriggers, that was anyone’s guess initially because the Dino has a glassfibre floor covering that hides structural parts from view but also traps moisture...

This L-series Dino was a curious mix, not quite a full production model, more hand-built using many parts from its predecessor that are now near-impossible to source.

The earlier the L-series, the more 206GT parts tend to have been used. The most obvious carry-overs are the Cromodora alloy wheels on knock-off hubs, clap-hands wipers, door locks mounted in the air scoops, external boot lock rather than internal release, deeper passenger

‘The question led us to this car, seventh of 357 built’

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Dino 246GT restoration

footwell, headrests fixed to the bulkhead and longer glovebox. However, many of the biggest differences are less visual. Not all were clear on this car until it was stripped to a bare shell.

The 206GT used an all-alloy body on a steel chassis, while the 246GT was a steel monocoque with certain panels in alloy, according to model, or what was available.

Our Dino here turned out to have alloy doors, bonnet, boot and engine cover, although later L-series went the same way as the M-series, with alloy doors but steel bonnet.

The E-series tended to use steel doors but reverted to alloy bonnet... but there is no hard-and-fast rule. Another widely accepted identifying point is that the 206GT had two rows of six louvres in the engine cover and the 246GT had two rows of seven – which you’ll see that our early L-series has, too.

Another difference: although all the 246GT models had a 60mm-longer wheelbase than the 206GT, the L-series used the earlier car’s more complicated style of chassis, with extra outriggers and structural members along with a different shape from the M- and E-series around the engine bay and bulkhead. Many of those outriggers had corroded, so replacements were fabricated and the chassis members repaired.

Hundreds of hours were spent reforming the wheelarches, fabricating and fitting new sills, and correcting the heights and shapes of the

RIGHT Knock-off hubs for the Cromodora wheels and clap-hand wipers distinguish this as an early L-series.

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scoops in the rear quarters. The doors were rebuilt by aluminium-welding the original scoops into newly fabricated skins.

The big difference, though, was the next step; the time spent perfecting the fit of all panels and components. It took two weeks to get the doors to close satisfactorily. Days to make the front indicators sit correctly (look at any Dino and most will be below the level of the panel). Yet more days ensuring the fit of the glass, particularly the curved rear screen.

“It’s bigger than the opening,” says Peter Ensor, “so you get one side in, put a hand in the middle of the screen and flex it... nervewracking! It didn’t sit right, so it was in and out numerous times.” Look through the quarter windows of many a Dino and you’ll see that the bodywork hasn’t been well finished, because the glass has to be removed to paint it.

‘Two days spent polishing the shell of the mirror’

Then the little touches: two days smoothing and polishing the thin aluminium shell of the interior mirror; days spent repairing and polishing the front grille; and making a new instrument panel, unique to the early cars.

These are just a few examples of myriad tasks.

Mechanically, Dinos are straightforward and tough. The five-speed transmission sits in a shared casing with the cylinder block – alloy in the 2.0-litre 206GT; cast iron in the 2.4-litre 246GT. Everything was rebuilt, with only the magnesium cam covers causing consternation; originally chemically coated in a green-bronze, it took time to find an equivalent finish.

The L-series seats are pure 206GT, so the decision was made to retrim them in the factoryoption orange towelling: an inspired choice.

They’re almost too good to sit in. Almost...

Driving a just-restored car is always stressful, although this one’s had a few shakedown miles put on it – and thankfully there’s a temporary wrap protecting vulnerable areas of the perfect, vibrant Rosso Dino paintwork. The thought of stone-chipping it gives me the shudders.

It starts up in the time-honoured Weber carburettor fashion of a couple of pumps on the accelerator followed by a brief churn of the starter. It fires and hunts a little before settling into a surprisingly smooth idle.

I’m reminded of my first drive of a 246GT, more than 25 years ago (where did the time

Dino 246GT restoration

RIGHT 2.4-litre V6 sits deep. Perfect paint visible through the rear quarters separates this from lesser restorations.

go?). The Dino has a delicate look to the styling, but that doesn’t translate in a negative way to its feel. Sure, the screen pillars are wonderfully slim, the wood-rimmed steering wheel smooth and slender, the dashboard switches discreetly small and the gearlever tall and spindly emerging from the famous open gate – but it doesn’t feel delicate in an easily broken kind of way. In fact, the floor-hinged accelerator, the clutch and the steering have a surprisingly hefty feel to them, while the gearlever takes more time and effort than expected to move between ratios. Again, this is exactly as I remember from all those years ago. Along with the dogleg-first shift pattern, cog swapping is something that’s soon mastered.

It’s small in here, too, but it doesn’t feel cramped, thanks to all that glass – it’s an almost panoramic view through the ’screen, and the lack of transmission tunnel gives it that unusual open feel of a Beetle, early 911 or 914.

And performance? The Dino 246GT was never intended to be a high-performance car, although it was quick enough in its day. Enzo’s beloved V12s were the real Ferraris, which is why the V6 Dino was never even badged a Ferrari. That policy continued into the early days of the later 208/308GT4, too, but we feel no qualms in labelling this a Ferrari Dino.

That V6, though, is a lovely little unit, unique in having the cylinder banks arranged at a 65degree angle, which made room for efficiently 96

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‘To spend time with a Dino 246GT is to fall in love’ straight inlet tracts over the usual 60 degrees.

Also unusually, it has a separate crank pin for every cylinder, allowing it an even firing order that makes it smoother than typical V6s.

You’ll probably know that the prompt for a V6 came from Enzo’s son Alfredo, or Dino, who fell ill with muscular dystrophy soon after.

The great engineer Vittorio Jano shared his designs with Dino in hospital – but Dino died in 1956, aged 24, so he never got to see its success in racing or its adaptation for the 206GT and 246GT, Ferrari’s first mid-engined road cars (named in his honour by the heartbroken Enzo).

This particular V6 truly does Dino and Jano proud. With those three juicy downdraught Webers feeding it, you’d expect it to hesitate occasionally, to be caught unawares by a footfull of throttle, but it never falters.

With the engine right behind the cabin, there’s mechanical noise initially, drowned out by intake roar on hard acceleration and morphing into a more Ferrari-like howl at

higher revs, which it’s always very happy to hit.

The big surprise, though, is the ride. It’s better than that of other Dinos I’ve driven or ridden in, riding the bumps without complaint and without kicking back through the steering. The rebuilt suspension and perfected geometry can take much of the credit, yet the period-correct high-profile tyres make a difference, too.

The rack-and-pinion steering is light once on the move, but you feel it take up the movement in the tyre sidewalls initially as you turn in.

Acclimatising to it takes a while, yet once you loosen your grip on the wheel and adapt to the lightness, it becomes more talkative.

From the driver’s seat the view up ahead – from those gorgeous Veglia dials to the curves of the wing tops – is unique and deeply evocative. Behind you, Dino and Jano’s V6 sings a song that can’t be beaten by any other sixcylinder of the period. All around you, there are quality touches – such as the slender interior door handles – that could only be 1960s Italian.

My goodness it’s lovely. To spend time with a Dino 246GT and learn its unusual ways is to fall in love, and that’s all the easier with an example so perfectly finished, so deserving of a top-quality restoration. Putting aside value and kudos, I’d have this over a 275GTB or Daytona because it’s so much more nimble and usable.

Smitten? You bet.

Thanks to all the staff at Bell Sport & Classic, www.bellsportandclassic.co.uk.

HILL ENGINEERING

FATHERS OF THE GULLWING

The reputation of the iconic Mercedes-Benz 300SL remains unsurpassed in all its guises, but where did the story begin? We take a rare drive in two of its most unique W194 progenitors to discover more

Words Massimo Delbò

Photography Jensen Larson and Zach Stovall

Mercedes-Benz 300SL

Mercedes-Benz 300SL

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BELOW As the ultimate road and race cars, W194 no. 5 and no. 11 demonstrate the early development trajectory of what

would become the 300SL W198. The trademark gullwing doors were a requisite by-product of the lightweight tubular chassis.

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FROM TOP Comparing the two cars back-toback reveals subtle differences in their controls, styling and performance.

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BUT FOR FEW, SELECTED RACING circles, the name 300SL brings to memory the famous tourer created in 1954 with project no. W198, by Mercedes-Benz. In total, 1396 coupés (with the trademark gullwing doors) and 1858 roadsters, plus three gullwing chassis-numbered roadsters and five prototypes, were manufactured.

The reality is that the 300SL racing sports car originated some years earlier, in 1951, under the project name W194. Only 11 cars would be manufactured until 1953. It is opined that you need a village to raise a child, and the same could be said to create a brand-new, successful racing car. When, on May 7, 1945, Germany signed the surrender, little was left of the powerful country of only few years before. In Stuttgart, the company – formally DaimlerBenz – was flattened, and most of its buildings were destroyed, but it was left with the most invaluable assets; a group of very talented managers willing to return to success, and racing, as soon as possible.

At the helm, ‘Herr Director’ Dr Fritz Nallinger. He had been with Daimler-Benz since 1922, and was a superb technician (in 1940 he was appointed leader of the R&D department) who had risen, in 1941, to board level. It was a position in which he remained even in the post-war years. At his side were the most talented technicians of the period, including Anglo-German Rudolf Uhlenhaut, the technical father of the pre-war Silver Arrows. Uhlenhaut had joined Daimler-Benz in 1931, again in the R&D department just under Nallinger, and by 1936 he had been promoted to head up the Racing Department.

Uhlenhaut was not only a prominent technician, he was a very fast race-car driver, too. All the works drivers of the period – personalities such as Juan Manuel Fangio, Stirling Moss, Hans Hermann, Karl Kling and Hermann Lang – said that during test days the time to beat was always the one set, as a

LEFT Four-spoke steering wheel frames the pump control for the windscreen washer – essential on the dusty roads of the Carrera Panamericana.

ABOVE Sparsely appointed no. 5 sports the Prat Motors SA colours. The body stripe – blue, red or green – made the cars easy to recognise at a distance.

ABOVE The wideopen Pacific vistas of California’s Highway 1 provide a most perfect backdrop for this brace of unique racing cars.

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Mercedes-Benz 300SL

RIGHT Out on the open road with two of the world’s most historically precious racing sports cars.

reference, by their technical director. They admitted that, on most occasions, it was very difficult to beat such times.

The only thing that prevented Uhlenhaut competing were his capabilities as a technician.

Indeed, the Daimler-Benz board considered him to be too valuable as an engineer to be risked in the heat of a race. After the turmoil of the war, he returned to Mercedes in 1948, and subsequently created the W194 300SL. To mix the different forces, the legendary Alfred Neubauer – a racing driver for Daimler from 1923, and Daimler-Benz from 1926 – followed his mentor Ferdinand Porsche to Stuttgart, and was later appointed racing team manager.

The most visible name of the pre- and post-war Silver Arrows project, Neubauer is credited with inventing pitlane-to-driver communication, at the 1926 Solitude GP. In the beginning he wasn’t a fervent supporter of the W194 project – as he clearly stated in an internal memo dated November 19, 1951 when, after the first road test of the brand-new car, he wrote his concern to both Nallinger and Uhlenhaut. In his message, he said that the new car wouldn’t have been capable of winning against Ferrari and Jaguar, because of its weight, the limited power offered by the 3.0-litre engine, and the small drum brakes.

He asked to create something more in every respect (and this request would later develop into the 300SLR), but in the meantime he had to step back. On November 25, he made some apologies. “Even before Dr Nallinger had read my findings, at 9am on November 21 I received a telephone call from Herr Uhlenhaut, who gave me his comment on the matter.

He disagreed with me... and was convinced that my requests and comments would only result in the Racing Department closing down immediately, because the programme I 108

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requested would be impossible to realise.

“As a result of this ‘to be or not to be’ question relating to our Racing Department, I’ve decided to withdraw my observation on W194, which I still believe is incapable of winning overall. The facts will now show whose opinion was right.”

As history was to prove, Neubauer was wrong, but it is understandable that he expressed some degree of concern about a racing car developed from the newly presented (in April 1951) Mercedes 300 ‘Adenauer’. Today we would consider this to be an S-Class, and its sedate six-cylinder 3.0-litre unit was capable of 150bhp in its most sporty form.

Mercedes’ decision to return to racing was formally taken on June 15, 1951, and shortly afterwards technicians met with drivers Karl Kling and Hermann Lang to establish the main parameters. Together they created the first draught for a rounded coupé shape, equipped with small, upswinging doors. To keep the bonnet line as low as possible the tall sixcylinder was tilted 50 degrees to the left, and it was equipped with a new sump casting and a dry-sump lubrication system.

To save weight, the chassis became a tubular structure made of welded steel tubes in a triangulated set-up capable of offering maximum resistance while being limited to

‘I still believe W194 is incapable of winning overall. The facts will now show whose opinion was right’

50kg (110lb). To provide the required strength, this tubular frame needed to have big ‘shoulders’ – hence the inability to feature normal-opening doors. Such a technical requirement led to the idea of the doors opening upward, as with the wings of a gull.

At 265kg (585lb) the engine was not light, but with a special camshaft and three Solex carburettors it was capable of 171bhp at 5200rpm. It proved so bulletproof that it was often used at 5800rpm and even up to 6000rpm for short periods of time without damage.

Suspension remained the same as that of the 300; a coil-sprung system with unequal-length parallel wishbones mounted on vertical pillars, with a front track of 1381mm (54.4in) and a rear track of 1445mm (56.9in). The wheelbase was 2400mm (94.5in). The real cherry on the cake, though, was the 300SL’s aerodynamic capacity, with its fully aluminium alloy body offering a drag coefficient of 0.25Cd. This was a real record for the period, allowing the model to be very fast indeed on the long straights.

The car’s official launch came on March 12, 1952, while its racing debut was at the Mille Miglia, which started in Brescia on May 4. Here, Kling finished second in car no. 4, just after Giovanni Bracco/Alfonso Rolfo’s Ferrari 250S. In training for the race, another 300SL, no. 6, sported an enlarged version of the gullwing doors, which for the first time partially included the side of the car rather than stopping just below the side window. It was a solution that would soon be used by the other examples, too.

Mercedes contested four 300SLs in the subsequent Bern GP. Kling brought home the first 300SL victory, in car no. 4, while the legendary Caracciola finished the race – and his racing career – by crashing 300SL no. 5, painted red for the occasion, into a tree when a rear brake locked. The damage to the car was

Mercedes-Benz 300SL

substantial, as was that to his left leg, and he would never compete again.

In time for the Le Mans 24 Hours on June 14, Mercedes manufactured three brand-new 300SLs, chassis nos. 7, 8 and 9, and shifted its body-building facility from Untertürkheim to Sindelfingen. At the same time it enlarged the doors on all cars. Those three new examples were easy to spot thanks to the fuel filler, which was no longer hidden in the boot but instead protruded through the rear window.

Hermann Lang/Fritz Riess brought home the victory, in car no. 7, with Theodor ‘Theo’ Helfrich/Helmut Niedermayr finishing second in car no. 9. For the August 2 Nürburgring race, the open version of the W194 300SL – created by chopping the roof off the Le Mans cars, thus saving 40kg – made its debut. No. 10 had also been equipped with a shorter, 2200mm wheelbase, supercharger and narrower front grille, but despite its 230bhp it proved no faster than the ‘normal’ 300SL and thus was not used in the race. Lang won, using the same no. 7 chassis he used at Le Mans.

Pressurised by Daimler-Benz’s Mexico City representative, Prat Motors SA, Mercedes decided to add the Carrera Panamericana to the season’s race programme. It shipped to Mexico four slightly revised cars, equipped with a 3.1-litre powerplant, producing a conservative 177bhp at 5200rpm, and with the fuel filler hidden, once again, in the boot. The team would end up winning the 1946-mile race with Karl Kling/Hans Klenk in car no. 4, followed by Hermann Lang/Erwin Grupp in the repaired car no. 5. It was, at least so far, Mercedes’ most epic North American victory.

These successes exceeded every possible forecast, and as a result the board took the important decision to pause the racing programme in order to develop its plans to race the W196 in Formula 1 and the W196S in the Sports Car Championship, following Alfred Neubauer’s original desire to do so with a dedicated car.

Taking a lot from the W194 experience, the 300SLR would be ready at the end of 1954. It would dominate, again, the long-distance race until the full season of 1955. Meanwhile, in early 1953, the last of the W194 300SL models, chassis no. 11, was completed. It represented the evolution of the 1952 cars, sporting a direct fuelinjection system supplying the 3.0-litre unit, bringing total output to 214bhp at 5960rpm.

To cope with the extra power, it was equipped with bigger wheels and 16in tyres – long since requested by Neubauer to allow for bigger brakes – more refined aerodynamics and sportier solutions that would later be used 110

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‘No. 5 represents the state of the art for these postwar machines; no. 11, the ‘what could have been’ development car’ on the 300SLR. It also had a shorter wheelbase and tracks, and was 70kg (1543lb) lighter than the 1952 version. Further highlights included the single-joint swing axle, used for the first time, and the transmission flange mounted on the differential in a transaxle configuration.

This prototype – nicknamed ‘Hobel’, a carpenter’s plane, due to its flat shape – would never race, but it would show amazing speed in testing. During a private training session at Monza, from September 30-October 1, 1953, Mercedes did a comparative test with 300SL no. 8 and the no. 11 Hobel. On a single lap, Lang went from 2m 14s to 2m 9.5s; Fangio from 2m 15s to 2m 7.5s; Hermann from 2m 14.5s to 2m 9s; and Uhlenhaut from 2m 15s to 2m 10s.

During that same September in 1953, racers and spectators at America’s Bridgehampton, Long Island track experienced the 300SL in person. It was chassis no. 4, shown and driven

by US Mercedes-Benz importer Max Hoffman.

So spectacular was his success that he would persuade a very hesitant Mercedes to make the model in series. In doing so, he placed an order, backed by a substantial cheque, for 1000 units.

Fast-forward 68 years, and I’m in the US myself, taking part in a very unusual convoy heading to Big Sur, on California’s Highway 1.

I’m in car no. 5, while reflected in the rear-view mirror is the no. 11 Hobel. The soundtrack is glorious and, wearing a polo inside the cockpit, I can’t feel the chilling 16-degree temperature of this misty and windy stretch of coastal road.

Indeed I’m engulfed by history, because after the accident no. 5 suffered at Bern in 1952, and having been repaired and used to finish second at the Carrera Panamericana, the car remains quite original to this day. What most impresses me is the engine’s torque and smooth revving, even when accelerating from very low rpm.

I am still more puzzled because the Solex carburettors are not usually famed for their perfection. On this I can detect no differences from the fuel-injected Hobel that I had the opportunity to drive during the Solitude

Revival some time ago. On both occasions I’ve experienced a real piece of history; the last thing on my mind is to explore the rev counter’s red line or push the limit in the corners, meaning I have been unable to appreciate the extra power or the renewed rear suspension.

Nevertheless, no. 5’s handling is less precise than that of car no. 11, and even at lower speed it is possible to perceive a difference. The most important evolution to me is the gearstick and ’box. The older version’s long, twisty lever forces the driver to work harder, and changing ratios definitely takes more time, while the Hobel’s short, more central shifter is more immediate, precise and quick. If I have to summarise, I’d say that the Hobel is almost a W198 in being more refined and well mannered, while no. 5 is more of a racing car, with a more temperamental reaction from the clutch and gearbox only when mistreated.

As for comfort the Hobel is better, with car no. 5 featuring rather enveloping alloy seats covered only with a thin layer of unpadded upholstery. In fact, they end up being more comfortable than they would appear at first glance, but I can’t help wondering how they would have felt after 12 hours of Carrera Panamericana driving on mostly extremely bumpy Mexican roads.

We hit traffic while heading back to base, but the racing 300SL continues to behave in the same way as a ‘normal’ Mercedes, and water temperature is never an issue. The most lasting memory of my Hobel drive at the Solitude Revival was Hans Hermann’s suggestion of sliding the tail more through the corners, after he saw me while flying by in his 1970 Le Mans-winning Porsche 917 KH no. 917-023 that he was exercising that day.

Yet with car no. 5 my abiding impression will be of the sound reverberating inside the cockpit, a tone deeper than the one emanating from the injected car.

I sadly return the keys, knowing I would have been happy to drive up and down Highway 1 all night long. I can only feel and enjoy the emotion instilled by this amazing opportunity to be out, on the open road, with two of the world’s most historically precious racing sports cars. No. 5 represents the state of the art for these machines in the immediate post-war years, while no. 11 epitomises the ‘what could have been’ development car, setting a new, never-surpassed standard. After these, road models would definitely take a different path from that of racing machinery, making it quite difficult, if not impossible, for the latter – even wearing a number plate – to undertake a normal drive on an open highway.

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There is perhaps no greater crossover between Art Deco collectables and the motoring world than the stunning glass mascots of René Lalique. During the golden age of motoring, his work adorned the radiators of the finest automobiles.

It’s appropriate, then, that one of the best collections of Lalique’s work is kept at the UK’s National Motor Museum, with its close links to early motoring and mascots

The art of glass

Words David Lillywhite

Photography Rick Guest

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113

BELOW Longchamp B, the horse. PREVIOUS SPREAD Tete d’Epervier, the sparrowhawk; Lalique on a Delage D8, the height of fashion in period.

Xxxxxxxxx Lalique at the Xxxxxx National Motor Museum

CLOCKWISE FROM OPPOSITE Sensuous Vitesse, one of the most sought-after of the Lalique mascots, inspired by René’s interest in Greek mythology; the 1920 Sirène (mermaid) was Lalique’s first mascot.

It wasn’t intended for car use, but was likely first adapted by Breves Galleries; and then we have dear old Grenouille, the frog.

RIGHT Victoire – or Spirit of the Wind as it’s sometimes called – is the best known of the Lalique mascots, made in 1928. It epitomises the Art Deco style of the era.

ABOVE AND RIGHT Cinq Chevaux, which was suggested by André Citroën to mark the display of his company’s 5CV at the 1925 Paris Exposition, thus introducing Lalique to the masses and to the motoring world; the exquisite Grande Libellule, or large dragonfly – a favourite motif of René Lalique.

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Lalique at the National Motor Museum

WHEN A 16-FOOT-LONG COACHBUILT motor car still wasn’t quite enough of a statement for the wealthiest motorists of the 1920s and ’30s, an imposing radiator mascot added that extra touch of opulence and style to their grand and noble steeds.

Now when we think of radiator mascots of the period, two spring to mind as the most important: Rolls-Royce’s Spirit of Ecstasy and the beautiful creations of René Lalique.

Frenchman Lalique started out in the late 1800s as a jeweller but by the early 1900s had expanded into glass-making, later creating the glass mascots for which he became famous. It became fashionable to mount these mascots, often illuminated, on radiators and car roofs.

Thirty designs were created, mostly between 1925 and ’31. It’s thought that there are around six full collections in the world, including one assembled by the UK’s Pullman Gallery and another in Japan’s Toyota Automobile Museum.

In 2014, a keen UK fisherman came across a Lalique Perche (Perch) mascot, which piqued his interest. Over the following years he bought other Lalique mascots, until he had 28 – only the rare Hibou (owl), Epsom (horse’s head), Comète (comet) and Renard (fox) have eluded him – including two Perche and a Pullman Express piece that’s not strictly a mascot.

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The collector generously chose to lend the collection to the UK’s National Motor Museum in Beaulieu, Hampshire, where they’ve been on display since 2016 in the Luxury of Motoring Gallery. It is the only significant Lalique car mascot collection on show in a public museum.

It’s a particularly satisfying location for these most famous of car mascots; the museum was founded by Edward, 3rd Baron Montagu of Beaulieu, whose father John, 2nd Baron Montagu of Beaulieu, was an influential pioneer motorist. John commissioned sculptor Charles Sykes to create The Whisper as a mascot for his Silver Ghost, and Sykes also created the similar Spirit of Ecstasy around the same time – account vary on which came first. Completing the circle, Rolls-Royce commissioned a glass Spirit of Ecstasy from Lalique for its centenary.

The Whisper and several Spirit of Ecstasy figures are also displayed at the museum. They are just part of an eclectic collection of motoring ephemera alongside the cars themselves, from circa-1910 motoring-themed Royal Doulton plates to plastic wall plaques of the 1970s – and plenty in between to illustrate how motoring has touched all our lives over the years.

Thanks to senior curator Gail Stewart-Bye at the National Motor Museum, Beaulieu. For more, see www.nationalmotormuseum.co.uk.

ABOVE Isn’t he a beauty! This is Sanglier, the boar, unusual for Lalique in this dark glass.

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92 FEAR AND LOATHING IN HIGH WYCOMBE

XX

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The tale of the

Group C-bred

Schuppan 962CR road car

is one of betrayal,

Words Nathan Chadwick

broken dreams and High Court battles...

Photography Greg White

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...but also one of ingenuity,

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perseverance and passion.

Here’s the real story,

from the people who were there

Schuppan 962CR

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129

RIGHT Thanks to its carbonfibre bodywork and monocoque construction, the 962CR weighs a mere 1050kg.

Schuppan 962CR

“PEOPLE OFTEN ASK ME IF I WANT ONE now – no, I bloody don’t!”

A supercar with your own name on it – for every Ferrari, Lamborghini or Pagani, there are countless numbers of ‘one man, one vision’ passion projects that have started with dreams as lofty as the projected performance figures, only to turn into a waking nightmare for which the PR bumpf has had more mileage than the prototypes.

For Vern Schuppan, however, the prospects of self-named supercar success looked better than most. Although his career spanned Formula 1, USAC, IndyCar and touring cars, he’s best known for his exploits in sports car racing, particularly for Porsche. His 1983 triumph at Le Mans alongside Hurley Haywood and Al Holbert in a Rothmans 956 made him the first Australian to take victory in the event since Bernard Rubin in 1928.

He also won the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship the same year, making him a celebrity during the peak of Japan’s boom years, when conspicuous consumption was king. So when one of his race team’s sponsors knocked on the door in 1988 wanting a roadgoing Group C car for each of its 50 Japanese hotels… well, why not?

“Kosho, a part of the Nomura company, was building golf courses and hotels across Japan, and the man in charge of that division was a real racing buff, and came to all our sports car races,” remembers Vern. “He approached me about doing a street-legal, pure Le Mans car – to be called the Schuppan 962LM.” By this point, Vern had already set up Team Schuppan in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, UK to compete in the World, Japanese and IMSA sports car championships. Alongside this effort, Vern Schuppan Limited supplied services to other race teams and manufacturers.

With Vern’s connection to Porsche and his contacts book filled with the cream of motor sport engineering talent, the omens were good.

The project began with the Porsche 962 driven

by Brian Redman, Eje Elgh and Jean-Pierre

ABOVE Rear-view issues? Note the TV screen on the passenger side.

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92

ABOVE Mike Simcoe was brought in from General Motors to develop the 962CR’s shape.

Jarier to tenth place at Le Mans in 1988, which would be the mule car. The operation was being run out of the former Tiga factories owned by Howden Ganley. “I used to pop by to see how their project was progressing,” Howden recalls. “Vern asked whether I could help him out. I was burned out after selling out of Tiga, but my wife said, ‘you can’t play golf every day’. I thought, ‘why not?’ – but pretty soon I was doing two days a week.”

Having got the car through emissions standards, and the production moulds ready, disaster struck – the Japanese economic miracle shuddered to a halt and the demand for supercars began to contract. Kosho’s confidence in selling 25 to 50 cars was shattered. It was on the brink of pulling out, but what looked like a saviour appeared. A contact within Kosho, who had brokered several sponsorship deals for Vern’s team, had already got Art Sports (AS) colours on the car via Toshio Terada. “Terada

had an elaborate showroom in Osaka, dealing in supercars,” Vern remembers. “It was a big deal to get the first of anything into Japan, so AS had in mind to take over what was initially supposed to be a pure road-going Le Mans-bodied 962.”

AS bought into the project in 1989, but there was a problem. “There was never any talk of changing the design – AS was quite willing to take over the 25-car order [from Kosho],” says Vern. “It was only when we were ready to start producing cars that it said that the longtail LM wasn’t very practical – it wanted to have a more GT-looking car.”

Because the prototyping and pre-production had already been done for the 962LM, AS’s list of changes meant starting all over again. It also wanted more interior space. This meant a brand-new, two-inch-wider chassis and a body to sit atop it; the 962CR was born, with the plan being to develop the 962LM alongside it.

Enthusiasm was still high, and Vern had Magneto

135

Schuppan 962CR

established a crack team. He’d already brought Ray Borrett to the UK from Holden, General Motors’ Australian outpost, for his long experience in prototyping cars. At Borrett’s suggestion, Vern garnered more Australian talent for the 962CR’s design. Alongside proposals from Ken Greenley and IAD’s Martin Read, Aussie Mike Simcoe would also put his hat into the ring. “Mike was the head designer for GM at Saturn in the US – when we looked at the three proposals, his was head and shoulders above the others,” says Vern. “He ended up flying backwards and forwards from the States working on the buck. He’d spend a week just rubbing down the buck, changing a radius here or there. He was fully hands-on.”

It was a frantic time that required plenty of on-the-hoof ingenuity. Recalls Howden Ganley: “Vern said we needed to get the master and the moulds done to get the prototype up and running, and asked me if anyone could do it. The only bloke I knew who would get on it right away was my old mate Bill Stone. [Vern would eventually take over Stone’s company to manufacture the bodywork.] It was an 136

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around-the-clock job up at Bill’s Bicester factory.

Mike Simcoe came up for a long weekend and didn’t sleep the whole time he was there.”

Trevor Crisp, who worked on the project for two years as a mechanic, recalls it taking a lot of work to get the body to fit. “It was not that symmetrical to start with – I think one guy did the left side and another guy did the right. There was no thought gone into how all the panels were going to be fixed on the car or hinged. I basically got a scribble on a cigarette packet from Howden: ‘We need something this kind of shape, that’ll bolt on like that, we’ll draw it up later.’

“I just went off and made the rear beam, which to Howden’s disgust was a welded-together fabrication. He asked why it wasn’t folded and riveted like a chassis, but I said I’d only had two days to do it. Unlike the prototype, the production cars were nicely riveted, a bit like a sheet monocoque chassis. That’s generally how a lot of parts on the car were developed – you would find a solution, and then it’d go to the drawing department to be sketched and refined.”

Howden picks up the story: “I designed the

‘A frantic time that required plenty of ingenuity’ large structure, which is very light, to be a feature and make it look as though somebody had really thought it through. I was delighted with the result, and it is still on the car.”

The team was already under great pressure, but it didn’t stop persistent meddling from AS and Terada himself. “They’d fly over or send us drawings with changes, such as the shape of the exhaust – more oval or a little more square,” Vern recalls. “It was a host of little things like that; each change would set us back.”

The 962CR prototype was finished within 18 months, but then things started to go wrong.

“Car Graphic had been following the project,

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Schuppan 962CR

and when we finished the prototype AS brought the magazine over to the UK,” Vern remembers.

“We had a big launch in the factory in 1991, and ran the car on the banking at MIRA, more for photographs than anything.”

The day after the MIRA shoot, the car was packed up and sent to Japan. “Unbeknown to us, AS had taken our Schuppan badge off and put a Porsche badge on,” says Vern. “When it showed the car in Japan, and in the Car Graphic article, AS claimed it had worldwide rights on this ‘Porsche’ supercar. Porsche was livid. We had a contract for 25 water/air engines, and had received five, but after the article it wouldn’t supply us with any more parts.”

Vern then turned to Andial, who’d prepared Porsche’s cars for the IMSA series, to provide the engines. The aircooled, twin-turbocharged 3.4-litre flat-six produced between 500bhp and 600bhp. Thanks to a carbon-composite body and a Reynard-built carbon monocoque (for the production cars) that in all weighed 1050kg, performance was brisk, with a projected top speed in excess of 215mph. Unfortunately, the project was about to go pear shaped as quickly as the 962CR could accelerate.

“In 1992 I was passing through Japan on the way to Daytona, and I had a meeting with AS just before boarding the plane. The bombshell was just dropped,” says Vern. “Terada wasn’t in the meeting; it was the head of finance.

They had decided to can the project because they hadn’t sold the 25 cars.”

A shell-shocked Vern managed to negotiate

‘Undeterred, Vern chose to fight AS at the High Court’

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ABOVE Andial-prepared 3.4-litre twin-turbo flat-six produces between 500bhp and 600bhp.

ten cars, the minimum needed to keep the project going, to which AS agreed. “Then AS decided to take just three – it was almost impossible for us to remain in business and build those cars, but we did it,” Vern recalls.

“We did it on the condition that AS issue letters of credit for the three cars, which it did.”

Howden adds: “When I was given the responsibility of building that last car [CR04, the one you see before you], we just got on with fixing any problems. It was a killer effort – I was 95 percent happy with what we’d achieved.

We put it together in less than a month.”

“I don’t think AS thought we could do it, so when the cars were finished it came over to the UK to inspect them,” says Vern.

“If AS cancelled the contract there was a £6 million clause – so its people brought their lawyers over with them, and started picking out faults with the car.”

“They claimed that the car would overheat if they ran it for more than five minutes,” recalls Howden. “We started it up, and it ran for 25 minutes and didn’t overheat.”

Cars CR04 and CR06 (the ADA-built LM with the CR rear bodywork) were due to go on a British Airways flight to Japan that night, but the AS lawyers called an emergency High Court session. That was postponed until the morning after, yet the cars had already been loaded. The judge gave AS the right to make further inspections, and ordered the cars to be unloaded, but by this point the aeroplane was full of passengers and heading out onto the runway – British Airways declined to bring it back in.

“As soon as the ’plane took off, AS’s lawyer was straight on the phone to Barclays, saying it couldn’t cash the letters of credit because I was in breach of a court order – something that was impossible for me to fulfil,” Vern remembers.

While CR06 and CR04 were en route to Japan, AS got another court order preventing Japan’s border agency from offloading them.

They sat in storage at Narita airport for months before Vern Schuppan Limited managed to fly CR04 back home.

Matters soon got worse. Vern had taken out a personal loan to buy the 60,000sq ft factory necessary for the project and part funded by AS. If Vern Schuppan Limited failed, AS could call that loan in within 14 days. “We had a huge number of suppliers, and we simply couldn’t pay the bills,” explains Vern. “The hardest thing to face was telling the many people working on the project they didn’t have jobs anymore – I was getting hate phone calls.”

Undeterred, Vern chose to fight AS at the High Court. Work on converting the factory stopped, and production returned to Howden’s buildings. “The first big law firm we talked to told us to sell everything and see if AS would settle,” Vern recalls. “I said I’d rather sell everything and fight it.”

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Schuppan 962CR

The court case was set for two weeks, but the AS lawyers applied for two months. “The judge settled on five weeks, and I had to find £260,000 extra as security against court costs,” Vern says.

“I had to put up my Martini Lancia as collateral, which was accepted as enough to cover it.”

This was only the beginning of the pain.

“These lawyers were putting people outside our house, phoning at 2am in the morning, waiting till Friday night to send 30-page faxes of what they were going to use against us the next week. They had someone sat outside my gate at all times, ready to serve me papers.”

Suspicions were strong that there was a mole inside the factory, or at least close by. “It seemed they knew an awful lot about what was being said in the office,” Howden recalls. “I’d noticed a different car parked across the road from the factory every day – I said to Vern, maybe there was a radio-listening device in it.”

The breaking point came when they came for Vern’s house in Berkshire. “We had completely rebuilt it, and the kids had ‘designed’ their own rooms – it’s unbelievable how they and my wife Jennifer managed to cope,” says Vern. “One day we were walking the dogs, and my son turned to me and said that at least we had each other.”

Although Howden Ganley wasn’t part of the

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management team, he did sit in on some of the High Court sessions. “I was once told by a barrister that even the best case in the world has only a 70 percent chance of winning,” he muses. “Vern had a 100 percent watertight case – I couldn’t believe he lost it.”

At the time, Vern had been offered a job running Stefan Johansson’s Indy Lights team in the US. “We’d run out of cash, and Jennifer and I both thought we really needed a complete change, so we’d decided to move,” says Vern. “I went over pretty quickly, while Jennifer had to stay back and go to court every day while the house was being snatched. Even the judge apologised for the way she was being treated.

“They waited five days until Christmas Day to serve bankruptcy papers on us,” he recalls.

“An old pal phoned and said, ‘look, you have to come to some kind of settlement, or it’s going to wreck your marriage or kill you’.”

The opposing side’s barrister intimated that AS was looking to settle, and Vern’s house in Portugal was the prize. “We had to pass all the deeds over unless we could come up with the settlement AS was looking for. If I could make this payment to the creditors, my bankruptcy would be annulled – and that’s what happened.”

With the court case wrapped up, Vern focused on his new life in America. The factory and its equipment were sold, and eventually a UK buyer bought chassis CR04. It has never left the UK since then, but it did appear in Alain de Cadenet’s Victory by Design TV programme.

It was then bought by a windscreen firm boss, BELOW At the behest of the Japanese investors, the 962CR’s chassis was two inches wider than that of the 962LM. It’s still rather snug, though...

‘It’s going to wreck your marriage or kill you’ who commissioned Group C Ltd to undertake modifications to make it more usable. In 2006 Group C Ltd under Trevor Crisp’s direction performed a host of changes to meet UK singlevehicle type approval. It’s covered just 35 road miles and is now up for sale with Maxted-Page.

The factory was bought by an automotive PSV glass distributor. In 1997 former ADA director Chris Crawford set up Group C Ltd with Trevor and two other ADA employees in a portion of the same factory to restore 956s and 962s. Following the closure of Group C Ltd in 2012 and with all the assets sold off, Trevor set up Katana Ltd, and has restored seven of the works Rothmans chassis. In the end, just four 962CRs were built.

Understandably, Vern was happy to wash his hands of the project. “They broke me. Going to the US was the clean break that saved us.

However, I’m still sad that, as well as our own staff, our suppliers and creditors suffered terribly from our inability to repay them.”

Howden’s still a fan of the car. “The steering was light, the gearchange was good – the ’box had synchromesh, which was perfect for a road car, unlike some other supercars of the era that used straight-cut racing gears. The engine would pull from nothing, too. I took LMs to the supermarket to demonstrate you could go shopping with them, and you really could. It’s so usable, that’s what makes it. It’s very tractable and very quick – it’s just a magical car.”

Thanks to Lee Maxted-Page (www.maxtedpage.com), Trevor Crisp (www.katanaltd.com), Vern Schuppan and Howden Ganley.

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Captain Eyston and Thunderbolt

Captain thunder

by Karl Ludvigsen

144

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Eyston and Cobb closed out the 1930s with a real Bonneville battle. First on the salt in 1937, Eyston’s Thunderbolt was the most impressive landspeed contender yet

ABOVE The record contender under construction at Beans Industries, in a photograph giving just an inkling of its size.

CAPTAIN GEORGE EDWARD THOMAS Eyston was a towering figure in the motor sports of the inter-war years and afterward.

Bespectacled, a big man like his speed rival John Cobb, Eyston was born on June 28, 1897 at Bampton in Oxfordshire. He studied engineering at Trinity College, Cambridge before and after service with the Royal Field Artillery in the Great War that brought him the Military Cross.

“Unlike many of the best brains in the race and records business,” wrote Dennis May, “Eyston wasn’t self-taught. He had a formal education in mechanical engineering at Cambridge. But nature equipped him with something that perhaps served him better than whole libraries of book learning ever could: a receptive mind, a venturesome angle of attack on technical problems and a readiness to heed and profit by the experience of others.

“In the company of people with even modest pretensions to engineering authority, or authority on any subject on earth for that matter, he had a characteristic way of listening Magneto

145

Captain Eyston and Thunderbolt

absorbedly with his head tilted slightly to one side…and ‘not saying much’.”

After a start on motorcycles, Eyston began car racing seriously in the early 1920s with Bugattis and Aston Martins. He was active in performance engineering, having 30 patents to his name, chiefly in the field of compressors and supercharging for which he established the Powerplus company. In the late 1920s Eyston teamed up with Ernest Eldridge, whose own driving career suffered after he lost an eye in a crash at Montlhéry. Eldridge was a brilliant engineer who designed his own racing and record-breaking cars.

It was Eldridge who pointed out to Eyston the financial benefits of record-breaking over racing. The latter brought better publicity, he maintained, because records lasted longer and could be promoted over a longer period of time.

This, he added, was more attractive financially

to makers of cars and components than were successes in racing. As well, said Eldridge, record-breaking failures were less conspicuous.

Thereafter Eyston engaged much more intensely in record attacks, with Eldridge acting as his engineer-manager.

“Ernest was the last man to break the world Land Speed Record on an ordinary road,” said Eyston. “This was in France in 1924 with his 300bhp Fiat, aptly named Mephistopheles.

His passenger on the attempt was named Gedge who, it was alleged, carried a bottle of whisky with him in the car. If the story is true, one could hardly blame him!

“Ernest used to tell me,” added Eyston, “how the French laid on about 1000 gendarmes to keep the road clear for his attempt, and how his first record was nullified after a protest from a rival that Mephistopheles had no reverse gear. Always a man of enterprise and

ingenuity, Ernest promptly equipped the car with additional driving sprockets to the rear wheels and a figure-of-eight chain, thus proving that the vehicle could be driven backwards if it had to.”

Eldridge was an important partner in the creation of Eyston’s Speed of the Wind, a highly ingenious and successful long-distance recordbreaker. He acted as manager of Eyston’s campaigns at Bonneville, the second of which was in 1936. On his return to the UK Eldridge contracted pneumonia, which bedevilled him until his death in October 1937 at the age of 40.

Eldridge doubtless contributed ideas to the Land Speed Record-breaker that became Thunderbolt, but he was not its principal architect.

Although backed by Castrol, George Eyston was no John Cobb or Malcolm Campbell in the wealth stakes. But he was resourceful. As the builder of his car he negotiated favourable terms with Beans Industries at Tipton in the West Midlands. Set up in 1933, this was the successor to the companies that made Bean automobiles from 1919 to 1929. Now making castings and forgings for the motor industry, Beans saw this job as a potential source of excellent publicity for its new mission.

Eyston admitted that his funds didn’t extend to the use of costly “aeronautical engineering methods”. His car would be heavy. This was a

LEFT Rolls-Royce engines sat side-byside. Transverse leaf springs used in this 1937 version gave way to coils in ’38.

‘It was an ugly monster, severely purposeful from its blunt nose to its finned tail’ 146

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OF FE R E D F OR S ALE

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Captain Eyston and Thunderbolt

‘Other onlookers opined, with some justification, that Thunderbolt was not a car at all’ forgone conclusion from his decision to use a brace of Rolls-Royce R-type engines – one of which had sufficed for Campbell to top 300mph in 1935. Together these weighed 3300lb and offered in the region of 5000bhp.

Electing to drive the rear wheels only, Eyston placed his big V12s side-by-side. Each engine had its own clutch, which was specially designed to engage a set of dogs to give a solid drive when relative speeds were fully equalised.

A train of gears joined the two power units together. From these a central take-off drove a contiguous three-speed transmission from which the drive went directly to the final-drive gears, with no differential. To cope with the available power and torque, this machinery was of massive proportions.

As the weight promised to be high – in 1937 form it was seven tonnes – Dunlop had to be consulted on the number of wheels and tyres required. This came to a total of eight.

Four of the 7.00 x 31 tyres were at the two rear wheels, doubled up to give traction in the manner of Campbell’s last Blue Birds. At the front Eyston placed two pairs, the foremost being on a narrower track to suit the inwardtapering nose. Massive longerons from front to rear carried the engines, drivetrain and parallel-wishbone independent suspension for all three pairs of wheels, complete with transverse multi-leaf springs. The four front wheels all steered.

A novel feature was braking by large clutchtype discs. One was at the extreme rear, driven by an extension of the pinion shaft, while the other was inboard at the front and turned by shafts and bevels from the rearmost set of wheels. Patented by Eyston and the Borg & 148

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ABOVE Not having planned to use a push start, Eyston sought help from a passenger car and ultimately a motor coach to get up to speed.

Beck Company, each brake had eight hydraulic cylinders behind its pressure plate, retarding a single Ferodo-lined disc. As well, the car’s flanks, at the extreme rear, carried two outward-swinging air brakes.

Nestling behind the rear pair of front wheels was the cockpit, with its four-spoke wheel and twin tachometers. Behind it were the inboard exhausts of the two Rolls-Royces, which were manifolded to outlets above the rear deck. The outer banks were exhausted to the sides as in the Supermarine aircraft that used one of them to win the Schneider Trophy. Air scoops athwart the cockpit collected the induction air the engines needed. In the nose was a conventional radiator, whose warm air was ducted up and outward behind the nose piece.

In its 1937 form, Thunderbolt’s air entry matched the octagonal shape of its radiator.

The cockpit was open with an aviation-style windscreen, and a substantial triangular fin embellished its tail. Petrol and oil were carried in tanks of 40 gallons and 18 gallons capacity respectively, the fuel being from BP with a dash of Ethyl to suppress pre-ignition.

Fashioned from Birmabright, a corrosionresistant aluminium alloy, Thunderbolt’s body had a full belly pan and offered removable panels for service access.

When Thunderbolt was turned loose at Bonneville in November 1937 it soon showed that its two engines were unhappy with being geared together. Heavy powertrain resonance was hard on the clutches, as the first test

runs indicated. The car’s initial trip through the clocks showed potential to beat Campbell’s existing record of 301.129mph with a speed of 309.6mph. On the return run, however, clutch trouble developed before the measured mile could even be reached.

The car went back to its base at Wendover for a week of rectification. Returning to the Salt Lake, and in order to relieve the clutches of the strain imposed by getting the car under way, Eyston adopted what was then a novel idea. He deployed a motor coach to push Thunderbolt up to better than 40mph. This worked for the northbound run, timed at 310.685mph, but the return brought a recurrence of the clutch trouble. The repairs were too hasty, said the Captain, so this time they would be done properly.

Doubtless with the guidance of locals who knew the scene, the clutches were sent to the Los Angeles workshop of Fred Offenhauser, inheritor of the legend of the great Harry Miller.

Still on site was designer Leo Goossen, who had been at Miller’s elbow for decades. Goossen devised modifications to the clutches that were fashioned by Offenhauser’s skilled workmen.

Back at Bonneville, Thunderbolt was readied for another attempt. “It was an ugly monster,” said one onlooker, “severely purposeful from its blunt nose to its finned tail. Its 35 feet of length gave it somehow an unwieldy appearance.

Indeed, some people openly declared that it was too heavy to be controlled at full speed.

Others opined, with some justification, that it was not a car at all. Its seven tonnes, two engines and eight wheels certainly removed it far from the sphere of ordinary motoring.”

Finally on November 19, 1937, with the salt

1930 Lea Francis Hyper Registration # VC 4578 | Chassis # 14171 | Engine # 9758 Driven by Sammy Davis passenger Tom Delaney | Extensive known history | Matching numbers Offered for sale publicly for the first time since 1950’s

Also Avaliable Pre war : 1908 Brasier | 1925 Bentley 3 - 4/12 VDP | 1926 & 1928 Alvis 12/50 Tourer | 1931 Alvis 12/60 TK Beetle back Post War: 1948 HRG 1500cc | 1949 Bristol 400 and 1957 AC Aceca Bristol both Mille Migila eligible | 1952 Tojeiro Bristol | 1968 Aston Martin DB6 Vantage

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Captain Eyston and Thunderbolt

in mediocre condition, the clutches worked well as Eyston shifted up into second gear at 100mph and into top at 200mph. His two-way average of 311.42mph was an improvement on Campbell’s record speed that justified the effort. However, said George: “The car is still in its experimental stage. We have learned a mighty lot, but we hope to learn a lot more about the many novel ideas incorporated in its design. Such knowledge can only be obtained at high speed.”

Into 1938 Eyston captained a substantial overhaul of Thunderbolt. At all six corners lighter coil springs replaced the transverse leaf units. This was one of the steps that slashed nearly a tonne of weight from the big machine – at a cost, said Eyston, of a dollar a pound. Its body was cleaned up with a more shapely nose and enclosed cockpit followed by a fairing, replacing the open original. Substantially larger air scoops for the engines enabled their 73 litres to swallow 200,000 litres of air per minute at maximum power. Adjusting the phasing of the two powerplants to change their combined firing order addressed the clutch and geartrain problems suffered in 1937.

His 1937 experience led Eyston to fit a Lockheed power booster to his braking system.

Another novelty was a respirator mask and tank giving an air supply, a device he had used when setting records at Montlhéry in tiny, claustrophobic MG Midgets. At Bonneville in 1938, wrote Dennis May: “The gas mask undoubtedly saved his life. First time out at around 260mph, the new brake servo did a square job on pedal-push multiplication and burned the linings to powder in half a mile.

“Located as they were,” added May, “approximately alongside Eyston’s shins, the brakes burped the resulting smoke and fumes directly into the cockpit through the pedal slots. Completely blinded but at least able to breathe, George steered by guess for

interminable seconds. Thunderbolt veered right, into the clear. If it had gone the other way, chances are it would have collected one of its own replenishment depots where a score of mechanics stood frozen to their footprints in fear for the Captain’s life.”

Eyston and his team arrived at Bonneville in mid-July of 1938, but were stymied by poor salt conditions. Only on August 24 was the Captain able to make a fast run against the clocks.

While his northward drive netted an excellent 347.155mph, his return was nullified by a mysterious timing-clock failure.

On August 27, in a partly black-painted Thunderbolt to be more obvious to the electric eyes, Eyston had another go. His times were 347.49mph northward and 343.51mph on the return for an average of 345.49mph for the flying mile – a fraction faster than his flying kilometre and thus the new world Land Speed Record.

With John Cobb now taking the stage, Team Eyston was aware that it faced tough opposition from the new Railton-designed streamliner.

Members of the crew set about making such changes as they could in the facilities available at Wendover. One was easy enough, namely to remove the tail fin in emulation of the Railton to reduce drag. The other was more complex, removing the radiator and substituting a large water tank behind a nose that was now completely covered by curved panelling.

In three weeks Thunderbolt was made ready to respond when Cobb topped Eyston with a new record of 350.20mph. On the next day, September 16, Eyston replied. “In the short time available,” Dennis May related, “it wasn’t possible to rig up ice tanks for the coolant to circulate through (a la Railton) – an omission that led to George being almost casseroled alive.”

“We had not reached the measured distance,” wrote Eyston, “before the heat flow from the hot water in the nose became almost

‘The heat flow became almost intolerable. Each second it intensified, like a furnace blast’ 150

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intolerable. I knew I would have to stick it out for quite a while, but each second the heat intensified, roaring up like a blast from a furnace. I knew that there was little margin, so that perhaps a couple of dozen joints in the water piping might spring a leak under the strain and a mass of boiling water pour out.”

“He used a slightly shorter route than on his previous bid,” said ‘Dunlop Mac’ McDonald, “in order to place the least possible strain on his tyres. His caution was praiseworthy but not necessary. In the wonderful weather and perfect conditions he flashed across the salt at more than 356mph. He came close to disaster, however, by over-running the safety mark and ploughing into the soggy salt well beyond the far depot. A truck was at hand to push him safely back to the starting line, and George started again, after my inevitable wheelchanging chore. The mighty machine this time roared across the salt faster than ever at almost 359mph. This gave Eyston a mean time of 357.50mph over the measured mile.”

Following this successful new record sally, said Dennis May: “Eyston and his technicians had reason to believe, as a result of on-the-spot mods and George’s improving familiarity with the brute, that the car was already capable of considerably higher speeds than those officially clocked. These private tests, conducted after the departure of the timekeepers and other hitherto interested parties, were for the purpose of confirming paper calculations with a view to new attempts at a future date.

“Sure enough,” May added, “theory and practice were right in step. According to Bert Denly, who was first on the scene after the lamed monster had reeled and gyrated to a lopsided halt, Thunderbolt was making close to 400mph when the anchorage of one of its rear-suspension wishbones broke, clenching the wheel against the chassis girder and locking it solid. Denly’s recollection of Eyston’s reaction is that ‘he didn’t say much’. In crises, of which Eyston had his fair share in 17 years of speed on land and water, he never did say much.”

This was the end of the line for Thunderbolt.

Restored to rolling but not racing condition, it was unable to respond to John Cobb’s August 23, 1939 average of 368.85mph in the Gilmoresponsored Railton. On a tour of the Antipodes during the war it caught fire in New Zealand and was burned beyond salvation.

George Eyston would go on to play an active role in record-breaking, including his support for Cobb’s 1952 attempt on the world Water Speed Record and his organisation of MG records at Bonneville. He died in 1979 just short of his 82nd birthday.

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Top 50 brutalist cars

Wide arches, creased lines, huge spoilers and as many grilles and ducts as you could get away with... the motor sport-inspired brutalist aesthetic led to some of the most hardcore automotive designs ever created

TOP 50

Words Nathan Chadwick

CARS

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SUBARU IMPREZA 22B (1998)

F I AT PA N D A (1980-2003)

MAGIC CAR PICS, PREVIOUS SPREAD RM SOTHEBY’S

GIORGETTO Giugiaro kicks us off with one of the starkest shapes ever. He designed the Panda (above) to emulate the Renault 4’s egalitarian aims through light weight, low cost and simplicity of ownership.

Giugiaro claimed it was a simple, practical article of clothing without pretence, but the plastic lower section, half-ventilated grille and pared-back trim became a fashion statement. More than 4.9 million were built.

M I T S U B I S H I E VO V/V I (1998-2001) AS Group A morphed into WRC rules, the need for 5000 road-going cars to homologate the rally models disappeared.

As the last of that breed, the Lancer Evolution VI went out in style with the rally-spec Tommi Makinen Edition.

However, much of the styling upgrades had been done with the Evo V. Although previous Evos had hardly been subtle, the V boasted flared front arches, a massive adjustable rear wing and a brutal bodykit. Huge intakes set the V/VI off over the earlier cars.

IN 1997 the Prodrive rally team had switched to a two-door coupé shell for lightness and stiffness in its bid to take the World Rally Championship. It duly won its third manufacturers’ title in a row, and to celebrate it built 400 22Bs. These models featured wide-arched bodywork to mimic the Peter Stevens-designed rally cars, a larger 2.2-litre engine, Bilstein suspension and a suitably mammoth adjustable rear wing. Just 16 officially came to the UK, although many more have come over as grey imports.

PORSCHE 924 CARRERA GT (1980) BY rights, the 924 Carrera GT is a homologation special for Group 4 regulations, which counts against it as a pure road car in this list. Its large polyurethane front and rear wings, deep front spoiler, intercooler air scoop, NACA duct and big rubber rear spoiler were all designed to get the 924 further up the grid, but so popular were the 400 built that Porsche took much of this extreme car’s styling into the 944. While the racing 935 had inspired several wide-arched conversions inside and out of Porsche, the 944 would be the company’s mainstream lifeblood. Brutalism was beginning to be normalised.

RIGHT Nissan’s Skyline GT-R went on to become a star of Gran Turismo.

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NISSAN SKYLINE G T- R R 3 2 ( 1 9 8 9 -1 9 9 4 )

LEFT The Evo was all about flared arches, huge rear wing, brutal bodykit and massive intakes. Subtle? No.

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NISSAN dusted off the GT-R nameplate after 16 years with one aim only – to dominate Group A touring car racing.

As such, the Naganori Itodesigned shape is suitably wide-arched to allow for 11in-wide tyres. It was notably more aggressive than its smoothed-out R33 successor, but others in the same family retrospectively made the R32 ‘quiet’ in comparison. However, it did the most to spread the cult of JDM prior to Gran Turismo, thanks to its propensity for big power gains.

Top 50 brutalist cars

NISSAN 300ZX Z32 (1989-2000) NISSAN’S Z cars had clearly been developments of the Coke-bottle sports coupé, even if it had morphed into a comfortable GT by the late 1980s. When the Z32 appeared in 1989 it was a bolt from the blue – physically higher, broader and more aggressive. Isao Sono and Toshio Yamashita’s shape was formed with the aid of CAD – it was one of the first cars to use this technology – and the car was aimed squarely at the US market with a 300bhp twin-turbo V6. It was so accomplished, Toyota shelved its nearly finished MkIV Supra and started all over again.

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CHEVROLET CAMARO ( 1 9 8 2 -1 9 9 2 )

BMW 8-SERIES E31 ( 1 9 9 0 -1 9 9 9 )

T OYO TA S U P R A M K I V (1993-2002)

THE Camaro (below) had been the everyman coupe of choice for GM fans who could not bring themselves to buy a Mustang. When the third-gen model rocked up in ’82, its angular Jerry Palmer design was bang on trend. However, its underpinnings dated back much further, and in the face of increasing emissions regs and more efficient Japanese rivals, it looked distinctly off the pace. The nadir had to be the Iron Duke four-cylinder, a 2.5-litre 110bhp misery. It’s become a bit of a joke in US automotive circles, but for UK fans it’ll always be cool, largely due to ITV’s MASK kids’ show, with its flying gullwing Thunderhawk.

EVEN BMW wasn’t sure of the market for a hyper-GT like the Porsche 928 when development started in the early 1980s. Based on a new platform, it was a huge gamble – and one that didn’t pay off. When Klaus Kapitza’s design was revealed in 1989, 5000 orders flew in. Then the recession struck, making the conspicuous consumption evident in such a big twodoor hard to justify. That meant we never got the M8 supercar, as sales tailed off through the decade. They’re very collectable now, however.

THE fourth-gen Supra had a difficult birth – it was tantalisingly close to production, but then Nissan delivered the exemplary Z32 300ZX and it was back to square one. What emerged was a GT car for which form follows function, and although noticeably curvier than most of the cars on our list, it was unmistakably brutal in the way that it went for the performance jugular.

However, its engorged wings, huge headlamp clusters and massive rear spoiler would alienate its conservative GT-owning target market, although its silhouette would become legendary among an entirely different audience…

PORSCHE 930 TURBO (1975) THE 911 Turbo is an icon of wide-hipped motoring, and we have motor sport to thank. To homologate production-based GT cars, the 911 needed wider tyres and track. It looked outrageous on the road, and soon inspired many copycats who inflated their Carrera 3.2s as an homage.

Later on, the racing successes of the 935 would influence road cars with similarly extravagant bodywork and tuned engines from the likes of DP Motorsport and Kremer – and eventually Porsche itself in the 1980s.

ABOVE Nissan’s 300ZX was one of the first cars to be formed with the aid of CAD.

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LOTUS ESPRIT V8 (1996-2004)

ABOVE Lotus Esprit V8 juxtaposes the curvaceous and the outrageous.

PETER Stevens’ Esprit was much curvier than any that went before it – and while those cars exhibited the big bodykit and dished wheels that came to define brutalist motifs, they belonged to the wedge epoch. No, for true brutalist maximalism, look to the X180/S4 models for the juxtaposition between the curvaceous and the outrageous – the sportier models scream performance.

The Esprit V8 is perhaps the most extreme, with its twinturbo producing 350bhp and, in Sport 350 form, all manner of weight-saving and aircleaving devices.

Lotus saved the most extreme makeover ’til last, with Russell Carr’s 2002 restyle. Its rear spoiler could catch jumbo jets. Alongside the Corvette C5, it was among the last cars produced with pop-up headlamps.

I TA L D E S I G N A Z T E C ( 1 9 8 8 -1 9 9 2 ) WE’RE used to outlandish prototypes making a stir and then vanishing. Often they’re so bonkers they don’t stand a chance, and Giugiaro’s Aztec seemed to fit the bill. While its Audi/Lancia underpinnings were fairly straightforward, the steel ladder-frame chassis coated in aluminium, Kevlar and carbonfibre wasn’t. Then there was the complicated technical detailing... That would have been it, but a Japanese industrialist bought the design rights and got Audi tuner MTM to homologate the car. It was ready in time for the 1992 Monaco GP, and 18 chassis are believed to have been built.

RM SOTHEBY’S

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M A S E R AT I B I T U R B O / G H I B L I I I ( 1 9 8 2 -1 9 9 8 )

F I AT R I T M O / S T R A D A ( 1 9 7 8 -1 9 8 8 )

WITHOUT the Biturbo – which celebrated its 40th birthday last year – we’d no longer have Maserati at all.

Its inspiration came from the BMW sports saloons popular among surfers in Southern California, whom Alejandro de Tomaso had met while in the US dealing with the fallout of his Pantera/Ford deal. While a small-capacity V6 with the world’s first production twin-turbo made sense in a post-fuelcrisis era, the Biturbo’s controversially restrained looks reflected straitened times, particularly in Italy.

It began life as a BMWstyle two-door coupé, but eventually a mind-boggling numbering system replaced the Biturbo name, while Gandini had done much to beef up the aggression. 1992’s Ghibli II used the same base but improved the formula, with flared hips and simpler lines. There was also a spoiler at the base of the screen, allegedly to stop the wipers ripping off at speed...

ALTHOUGH the Ritmo followed a similar styling path to the 126 and 127, it eschewed stark minimalism for a sci-fi vision of what a family hatchback could be, certainly in the detailing.

Look at the half-headlight wraparounds, the kinked C-pillar, the bonnet grille...

Sergio Sartorelli and Pierangelo Andreani created a car that managed to be cute but aggressive – a bit like a four-wheeled pug.

It was good to drive, too, with the highlight being the 130TC, the last mainstream road-car project developed by the ‘old’ Abarth before it was tasked with the Fiat Group’s motor sport endeavours. As a result it was a riot to drive, memorably besting the Mk2 Golf GTI in CAR magazine.

Despite this, the Strada became better known for its propensity for rusting away – and this means very few are left, even in Italy.

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BUICK GNX (1987)

THE Buick GNX – Grand National Experimental (below) – was a coproduction with McLaren to create the “Grand Nationals to end all Grand Nationals”.

McLaren fitted a Garrett T3 turbo and a larger intercooler, resulting in a 300bhp monster that could out-accelerate a Ferrari F40 over the quarter mile and to 60mph. However, it’s the look that really earns the GNX its place in this list – released during Star Wars fever, it was noted for its resemblance to the biggest bad guy in the universe; Car and Driver’s headline memorably said: “Lord Vader, your car is ready.”

R E N A U LT 5 T U R B O 2 ( 1 9 8 0 -1 9 8 6 ) THE original 5 Turbo was a Lancia Stratos-inspired, mid-engined rally fighter, with the first 400 being Group 4 homologation specials. Alpine’s Turbo 2 then ditched the Bertone cabin for more run-of-the-mill parts.

Meanwhile, the light-alloy exterior panels were replaced with standard 5 items. While the Turbo 2 might not have been as exotic as the rally rep, the ingredients are still eye opening – that widebody shape, 970kg and c.160bhp mid-mounted turbo made it good enough for 0-60mph in just under seven seconds.

L O T U S C A R LT O N / O M E G A ( 1 9 9 0 -1 9 9 2 )

M I T S U B I S H I S TA R I O N WIDEBODY ( 1 9 8 6 -1 9 8 9 ) US readers might recognise this with Chrysler, Dodge or Plymouth name badges, as well as Mitsubishi ones.

However, the Starion was by far the most extrovert in the sports coupé class compared with its German rivals – and even the big-hipped Porsche 944 Turbo – particularly in widebody form. With its suitably pumped-up arches, the car proved effective in motor sport, in both circuit racing and rallying. Power came from 2.0- or 2.6-litre turbocharged four-pots.

THE Lotus Carlton isn’t so much a car as a cultural folk hero. While a 177mph four-door saloon is hardly news these days, 30-odd years ago it was enough to get this tie-up between Opel and GM product catalogue new boy Lotus mentioned in British Parliament and severe criticism from police chiefs (who might have been sore that their fleet of new Vauxhall Senators couldn’t keep up), and make it the subject of a Jasper Carrott comedy sketch. In retrospect the bodykit was fairly tame, even if the 377bhp twinturbo inline-six wasn’t, but the Imperial Green paint did much to make the ultimate Carlton seem like a four-wheeled Darth Vader.

MAGIC CAR PICS

35 34 33 32 31 FORD ESCORT RS C O S W O R T H ( 1 9 9 2 -1 9 9 6 )

N I S S A N S K Y L I N E G T- R R 34 (1999-2002)

BUILT to put Ford back at the top of the WRC tree, there’s very little Escort about the Cossie (left) – underneath it’s a truncated Sapphire Cosworth 4x4, and only the roof and doors fit a vanilla MkV Escort. Designed by Stephen Harper, with input from Frank Stephenson and Ian Callum, this Karmannbuilt car would never deliver its promised success on the world stage, thanks to Ford budget cuts and the loss of François Delecour to injury.

While it would take many national and European titles, its relative lack of big-league success didn’t really matter.

It had serious road presence, and was arguably a much more comfortable and usable homologation special than the likes of the Delta and M3. It ended up becoming the ultimate target for car thieves and vandals, and the aftermarket modification scene served up ever-more power. As with the Lotus Carlton it became a cult machine, even in the US.

THE shape that launched a thousand adolescent dreams. When this model (above) becomes US legal, you’ll witness a bunfight for cars the likes of which we’ve never seen before. Kozo Watanabe’s design was much more aggressive than that of the R32 and R33, even if its impact was less felt on the motor sport world stage than its predecessors’. Its appearances in motoring’s biggest cinematic and gaming franchises have made it a legend, spurred on by an almost bomb-proof twin-turbo inline-six capable of four-digit power outputs.

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Top 50 brutalist cars

LEFT Mercedes-Benz 190E Evo 2; a total assault on the senses.

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T OYO TA M R 2 ( 1 9 8 4 -1 9 8 9 )

A U D I U R - Q U AT T R O ( 1 9 8 0 -1 9 9 1 )

MERCEDES-BENZ 190E E V O 2 ( 1 9 8 2 -1 9 9 3 )

BMW M3 E30 ( 1 9 8 6 -1 9 9 1 )

THIS little sports car has often been described as a miniature Ferrari, although in brutalism terms it more than carries its own weight.

Seiichi Yamauchi used flared bodywork, straight edges and pop-up headlamps, but it’s the detailing that elevates this to brutalist heights. The cooling ducts in the rear three-quarter and above the engine offer function over form, but that form makes the overall more exotic.

The interior continues that theme, with a dished wheel, a chunky gear selector and a wraparound binnacle with big, chunky switches.

It really gets to the heart of how brutalism morphed with a science-fiction aesthetic to create a vision of the future we didn’t quite get.

THE standard Audi Coupé B2, especially in facelifted form, exhibited many of the motifs that make up the brutalist aesthetic, including exposed cooling ducts, straight lines and squaredoff proportions. Then Giorgetto Giugiaro’s original design was elevated into another realm via the pen of Martin Smith, who added wider wheelarches to accommodate changes for the rallying version, which would revolutionise the sport with its success.

However, even if you cared little for motor sport, the Ur-Quattro’s taut lines and brooding presence, allied to all-weather performance, made it a legendary road car.

WHILE it could be argued that the W123 was MercedesBenz’s first populist model, the 190E took it further by aiming at a younger audience.

Its Bruno Sacco-penned lines certainly showed dominance on the road, but it also made form and function a design motif. Despite the seemingly square proportions, the 190E was among the first cohort of aerodynamically efficient mainstream cars – it boasts a drag co-efficient of 0.32.

However, one version truly rules the roost for brutality – the Evo 2. Designed to defeat all comers in DTM, it was an assault on the senses, and far removed from predecessors.

Legend has it that BMW’s Wolfgang Reitzle said: “The laws of aerodynamics must be different between Munich and Stuttgart; if that rear wing works, we’ll have to redesign our wind tunnel.”

Guess who had to budget for a new wind tunnel…

DESIGNED to take on Group A touring car and DTM regulations, the M3 E30 has been described as a Formula 3 racing car with a boot. Form follows function throughout – aside from the more obvious side skirts, splitters and rear wing, the tailgate was made out of glass-reinforced plastic and raised by 40mm to aid the passage of air, the rear window was flattened and the windscreen was glued in.

Its drag co-efficient was 0.05 better than that of a normal E30. It would go on to be one of the most successful touring car racers ever, but it also proved effective in Tarmac rallying.

The road car has become a fêted hero of BMW M, with the highlight being the Sport Evolution 2 model. This took the engine from 2.3 litres to 2.5, and power up to 235bhp.

All 600 had bigger ducts in the front bumper and an adjustable front splitter.

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NISSAN SKYLINE GTS-R R 3 0 / 3 1 ( 1 9 8 1 -1 9 9 0 ) THE GT-Rs might be better known, but few cars encapsulate the brooding cyberpunk presence of the 1980s Japanese styling scene more than the R30 and R31.

Using the C32 Laurel platform sixth and seventh-generation models were fairly humdrumlooking three-box saloons.

However, the 2000 RS (DR30) introduced a much more aggressive look to the front of the car, nicknamed the Iron Mask. It was designed to go touring car racing, and had some success in Australia.

It was followed by the R31 GTS-R, which further upped the aggression stakes. While it did still struggle to keep up with the dominant Ford Sierras on the European stage, it did much of the winning in the 1990 Australian Touring Car Championship. The R32 would go on to be even more successful, but both the R30 and R31 represent Japanese performance at its most square cut.

F E R R A R I T E S TA R O S S A / 5 1 2 T R / 5 1 2 M ( 1 9 8 4 -1 9 9 6 )

MAGIC CAR PICS

THE car that inspired a legion of imitators, the Testarossa (above) was a full-blooded deviation from the wedge-shaped 512BB that preceded it. Gone were the delicate edges – this stamps

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C I T R O Ë N B X ( 1 9 8 2 -1 9 9 3 ) THE BX is all the things the DS isn’t, despite sharing the same philosophy – hydropneumatic family motoring with styling that reflected the age. But while the DS is deemed the world’s most beautiful car, and has appeared in more sci-fi films

than most cars from the 1950s, the BX has largely been forgotten. That’s despite it coming from the same pen that crafted the Lamborghini Countach – that of Marcello Gandini. The mixture of sharp lines, wide body mouldings and, in the case of the sportier models, extended haunches made the BX a stark riposte to the curvy Sierra and Cavalier of the time.

The interior is a feast for those with a retro-futuristic fetish, thanks to its drum speedo, digital tacho and dash-mounted control pods.

It used plastic to save weight, adding to its futuristic intent – there was even a version with a fully digital dash.

A mid-life refresh returned it to analogue dials. Boo!

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its authority on your vision the moment you clasp eyes on it. The signature feature, the enormous side strakes, are actually form following function. They house radiators for the 180-degree V12, and very nearly didn’t make the final model.

Pininfarina high-ups didn’t like them, and wanted them to be smaller; there were fears that the US authorities would ban the car altogether. Instead, the styling team made them a design highlight of the car, and thus birthed a legend.

Further brutalism can be found inside, with red-onblack binnacle lettering in an italicised digital style.

The Testarossa wasn’t a car, it was a statement.

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PORSCHE 964 TURBO ( 1 9 9 0 -1 9 9 4 ) ANY aircooled 911 Turbo could feature in this list, but we’ve gone for the 964 Turbo as the most brutal of the lot; it also deserves to be here because it wasn’t supposed to exist at all. Porsche had been developing a more mainstream 959-style range-topper, but money was short and plans were dropped. The 964 Turbo was rushed into service with the old car’s 3.3-litre engine, and then tweaked for ease of use.

It certainly looked the part, with wide wheelarches, split-rim alloy wheels and a thick front bumper. It of course went on to wider prominence in the Bad Boys movie, but by then displacement had grown to 3.6 and power to 355bhp.

So why is it much further up the list than the 930? The painted bumpers mean the 964 Turbo storms into battle with a fat-lip aesthetic you would expect to see on a heavyweight boxer.

LEFT Porsche 964 Turbo is the most brutal of all the aircooled 911 Turbo models.

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M I T S U B I S H I 3 0 0 0 G T/ G T O (1990-2000) JAPAN was rife with twinturbo six-cylinder sports/GT cars in the 1990s, and getting yours to stand out was a real challenge. Masaru Suzuki went fully maximalist with the 3000GT/GTO, deploying all manner of scoops, skirting and splitters; it was among the first production cars to utilise active

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aerodynamics. For all of its supercar-aping visual theatrics, the 3000GT was certainly a GT car, with a plush interior, four-wheel drive and electronically controlled suspension.

It also had four-wheel steering, which means driving it often feels like you’re on the verge of a big spin – something to think about in a car weighing nearly 1700kg. A lighter MR version, which deleted the 4WS, suspension, active aero and even the ABS, might just be the supercar experience its exterior promised…

ASTON MARTIN VA N Q U I S H (2001-2007) AS Aston Martin waved goodbye to its Newport Pagnell days and entered a new era with fresh Lotusderived architecture, the Vanquish combined the brutality of the Vantage era with the smoother style

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developed out of the DB7 and which would form the DB9.

It was a stark contrast to the Ferrari 550/575, which had reverted to a smooth, classic GT shape that reimagined the Daytona for the millennium.

The Ian Callum body was said to be inspired by the DB4 GT Zagato, although the Vanquish is far more extreme with is wide track and taut lines. Its DBS replacement would be far more restrained.

This was arguably the last of the brutalists…

THE 959’s existence is often attributed to Group B regulations, but the car owes its life to an ultimately aborted attempt at replacing the 911, or at least making an entirely new version. Hence the 959 (below) was signed off, as a way of developing how far the rear-engined philosophy could go and exploring how four-wheel drive could be integrated into Stuttgart’s future.

Group B came around at just the right time, to act as a development time enhancer. In the end, the 993 and 996 Turbos would be the ultimate fruits of this labour, with the 959’s fourwheel drive and watercooled engine developments (respectively) finding a more mainstream home.

The 959 had motor sport pretensions, and thus the need for a wider track and cooling ducts led to the car’s squat physique. However, this design language was intended for the planned replacement for the 964 Turbo, a car with which Porsche had one eye on competition.

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BELOW Aston Martin Vanquish was arguably the last of the brutalists.

PORSCHE 959 ( 1 9 8 6 -1 9 9 3 )

L A N C I A D E LT A H F I N T E G R A L E ( 1 9 8 8 -1 9 9 5 )

A L FA R O M E O 75/M I L A N O ( 1 9 8 5 -1 9 9 2 ) BY the early 1980s, Italian Government-owned Alfa Romeo was in dire straits.

The money wasn’t there to develop a new platform, so it carried over much of the Giulietta’s underpinnings, which in turn were derived from the 1972 Alfetta.

They say triumph comes from adversity, and what would be not only the last independent Alfa but also the company’s last RWD saloon for decades turned out to be a bit of a peach, with nearperfect weight distribution thanks to its transaxle layout. Ermanno Cressoni was said to be inspired by wedgy supercars, and the results were controversial, if rather fascinating.

Note how the tapered headlights fall away to the edges, and the way the plastic moulding rises along the side of the car to a flicked-up rear.

Many saw the 75 as plain ugly, which is why so few are left – and that’s a shame, because the car is developing a cult following across Europe due to its mixture of RWD, 50/50 weight distribution and firecracker four-pot and six-cylinder engines.

THE original Delta was a Giorgetto Giugiaro creation that didn’t fall far from the same hatchback sapling as the Golf. As Group A took off in the aftermath of Group B, the road models had to become as visually steroidal as the rally cars to get the latter certified to compete.

The Integrale rally car took over from the HF 4WD part-way through 1988, with swollen arches to accommodate bigger tyres.

However, that was nothing compared with the Evolution models (right), introduced in late 1991. By this point Lancia had withdrawn from rallying in an official capacity, instead lending its support to the Jolly Club outfit. The body mods were ever bigger, to accommodate wider front and rear tracks, while the bonnet gained a wider and taller hump, as well as a plethora of slats, to aid suspension travel and cooling respectively.

It was enough for Lancia to win its sixth straight WRC manufacturers’ title – not bad for a car whose now-iconic body add-ons were designed, allegedly, one morning with cardboard offcuts. The road models have developed into one of the big auction-world stories over the past few years, with limited-edition cars regularly into six figures.

PORSCHE 993 CARRERA RS C L U B S P O R T/ 9 9 3 G T 2 ( 1 9 9 3 -1 9 9 8 ) PORSCHE smoothed out the 911 for its 993 version, with even the Turbo model taking a more discreet approach.

There were no holds barred for the extreme versions of the naturally aspirated cars. The N/A RS Clubsport combined the wide-arched look of the Turbo with a big front splitter, gorgeous Speedline split-rims and a ludicrously large rear spoiler with cooling ducts in the base that looked like grenade launchers. The GT2, which was developed for FIA GT racing, took this a step further by cutting back the front wings and installing bolt-on plastic covers to fit the wider tyres for racing.

DE TOMASO PANTER A 9 0 S I ( 1 9 9 0 -1 9 9 3 ) THE Pantera had been fiddled with to the point where the purity of the Tjaarda wedge had been rather obscured.

For its final fling, however, it was blown into another orbit with a Marcello Gandini restyle. Aping design themes seen on Maseratis, the nose was reworked, and deep-set rear wheels and a massive spoiler added. A 5.0-litre Ford V8 completed a package that saw significant chassis and suspension changes.

Just 38 saw private hands.

L A M B O R G H I N I C O U N TA C H LP400S/25TH ANNIVERSARY ( 1 9 7 8 -1 9 9 2 ) THE Countach was a key part of the wedge decade, but its wider legend came in the 1980s, the decade of excess.

Few things are as excessive as the body adornments on this machine, beginning with the LP400S in 1978. Inspired

by Walter Wolf’s bespoke Countach, it engorged its arches to swallow the widest road-car tyres in the world at the time. By the end of the car’s life, a certain Horacio Pagani had beefed up the visuals considerably with the 25th Anniversary Edition (below), although a good part of his liberal approach to ducting was for practical reasons. Then, of course, there’s the huge rear spoiler…

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LISTER JAGUAR XJS (1986-2012)

THINK Jaguar XJS, think Art Deco-influenced grand tourer with an interior the size of a budget airline toilet decked out like Winston Churchill’s office. The fashion for motor sportinspired brutality didn’t seem fitting – after all, Tom Walkinshaw’s winning touring cars at least looked like they could be standard.

However, there was an opportunity to scald the Big Cat into more performance, at least on the road side, which is where Lister came in. The name was revised in the mid-1980s, and its first job was to take the V12 XJS to more than 200mph in a process that cost in excess of £100,000. Around 90 cars were converted, some with engines ramped up to 7.0 litres, some with manual gearboxes. Such muscle was mirrored in the exterior design, reflecting how you’d imagine Hugh Grant would look after a steroid binge.

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FERRARI 288GTO ( 1 9 8 4 -1 9 8 7 ) THE 288GTO might be associated with a doomed attempt on Group B, but it didn’t start that way. Back in the early ’80s Enzo had realised his cars lacked their exclusive edge; that there wasn’t a truly special icon.

The 288GTO would be that car, taking its inspiration from F1 turbocharging.

Although based on a 308, the final car would be much different, with a longer chassis that was required to accommodate the transverse twin-turbo V8 powerplant.

To avoid the car looking like a novelty Las Vegas limousine, the rear haunches were widened spectacularly

by Leonardo Fioravanti, with one eye on a possible return to GT racing and thus the need for bigger tyres. In the end that didn’t happen, and instead the 288GTO developed its own legend as the first true Ferrari hypercar of the modern age.

Job jobbed for Enzo, then.

B E N T L E Y C O N T I N E N TA L T/ R M U L L I N E R (1996-2002)

ASTON MARTIN VIRAGE 6.3/ VA N TA G E V 600 (1992-2000)

YOU may have noticed a lack of Bentleys in this list – Mercedes-Benz, too, for that matter. Cars such as the Turbo R and any number of Mercs are imposing, but they don’t shout about it – and if they are a bit more aggressive, then it’s subtle; wider front wheelarches on the 500E, for example.

The original Continental R was designed along similar lines; after all, it’s a simply enormous two-door coupé, and it has presence merely by being present for almost as far as you can see. However, by the late 1990s tastes were changing and, noting Aston’s uncompromising approach to body modifications, Bentley chopped four inches out of the wheelbase and extended the rear arches.

Power was boosted by an extra 15bhp over the standard car’s, although this would continue to grow over the years. The body-styling package was so popular, it was offered as an option on the standard Continental R under the Mulliner branding.

In doing so, this became the most expensive car for sale in the UK for some time.

VICTOR Gauntlett had grown tired of the late V8 Vantage’s extrovert bodykits, and asked John Heffernan and Ken Greenley to craft a more sober-suited successor, the Virage. Although initially finding favour with owners, its 330bhp 5.3-litre V8 didn’t have enough punch for a near-1800kg car; as a result, sales were dismal.

The fightback began in 1992 with the Works Service

LEFT Bentley Continental R was bestowed with extra muscle.

6.3 conversion, which used know-how from the AMR1 race car to develop up to 500bhp and 480lb ft of torque. Suitable new styling included a deep chin spoiler, widened and hand-finished rear haunches and huge splitrim OZ alloys that housed the largest ventilated disc brakes yet seen on a road car.

Aston was developing its own hot-rod version; this kept the original displacement but added two superchargers to develop 550bhp. It also had an entirely redesigned front end but slightly smaller hips.

The most extreme cars came late in the game – 40 Le Mans models with a blanked-off grille that looked like a particularly aggrieved bull.

One with 600bhp on tap…

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10 9 LISTER STORM ( 1 9 9 3 -1 9 9 4 )

LAMBORGHINI DIABLO GT (1998)

BOASTING the largest V12 in a road car since the war, the Storm used Jaguar XJR-9 know-how to win the 2000 FIA GT Championship during a decade-long racing life. Yet of the four road cars built, just three are extant. Despite the lure of a 546bhp 7.0-litre V12, its £220,000 tag (£458,000 in today’s money) proved a big stumbling block – even if the owner could proclaim to have the fastest four-seat grand tourer of the age.

WHEN it was launched, the Diablo was criticised for being a little on the soft side – but then it was competing with the outgoing Countach.

Gandini’s original design had been softened by General Motors’ design team, prompting him to leave in disgust and set up the Cizeta project. Over time, the Lamborghini ‘more is more’ approach returned.

The most extreme roadgoing version had to be the

ABOVE Diablo never fails to disappoint in the ‘more is more’ body-styling stakes.

Diablo GT. It may have lost the pop-up headlamps, but this 567bhp, 1460kg track-oriented machine ramped up the aggression, with bigger wings for a wider track, a mammoth carbonfibre rear diffuser and three-piece OZ wheels.

The additions were largely functional, all in the name of cooling – the luggage compartment gave up space for an air extractor, NACA ducting was liberally spread across most surfaces and there was even a ram-air scoop on the roof.

BELOW Iconic Ferrari F40 is recognisable the world over.

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FERRARI F40 ( 1 9 8 7 -1 9 9 1 )

THE 288GTO had whetted the appetite for Ferrari supercars, with the entire production run selling out almost as quickly as it hit 0-60mph. For the F40, the firm went even further; the 288GTO’s GT pretensions were forgotten – this was a car so hardcore you could see the welds, and it could be as skittish as any racing model.

However, it was always meant as a road car, although it was later used in GT racing.

As such, the traditional ideas of what a Ferrari should look like were forgotten; instead, it took its stylistic inspiration and mechanical focus from the Stratos Group 4 and 5 cars, as well as Osella’s F2 and F1 cars. The result is a shape recognisable the world over; its F50 follow-up somewhat trails in its wake.

A U T E C H Z A G AT O S T E LV I O Z L 1 ( 1 9 8 9 -1 9 9 1 ) ZAGATO has come up with many challenging designs over the years, but few are quite as out there as the Stelvio. A tie-up between Nissan tuner Autech and Zagato, the car was based on Nissan’s Leopard and tuned to what’s believed to be in excess of 280bhp. But the firecracker turbocharged 3.0-litre V6 is nothing compared to the exterior.

Normally you’d notice the traditional Zagato bubble roof, but that’s a mere side thought. The massive bonnet extensions grow like an infected wound, and house mirrors in the flared arches.

A downturned front grille gives the car the face of a man who has discovered half a caterpillar in his expensive Waldorf salad. Although more than 200 were planned, only half that number were produced as the Japanese market crisis bit home.

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ASTON MARTIN V8 Z A G A T O ( 1 9 8 6 -1 9 8 8 )

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AFTER years spent in the doldrums, the 1980s saw a big turnaround for Zagato.

The Aston Martin V8 Zagato is probably its highest-profile project. Based on the X-Pack power kit, which provided a healthy 410bhp, the car was lightened, shortened and relieved of its rear seats, which helped it to a 185mph top speed recorded by a French magazine.

As per Zagato at the time Giuseppe Mittino’s design was short and stubby – although compared with

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some of the other cars in this list, the arches are somewhat restrained. However, the blunt nose plus NACA ducts and controversial hump in the bonnet – necessary to accommodate the airbox for the 50mm Weber IDA carbs – more than made up for it. Just 50 coupés were built, plus 37 roadsters.

Victor Gauntlett was so enthusiastic about the Zagato Volante project (below), he let the engineers cut up his own coupé to use as a development hack. Fuel injection meant that the Volantes have flat bonnets, but most cars have roll-down headlamp covers and a blanked-off radiator.

MAGIC CAR PICS

MARCELLO Gandini beat Paolo Martin, Nuccio Bertone and Giorgetto Giugiaro to the punch for the EB110 (below), a supercar that quadrupled down on the ‘more is always more’ philosophy. This fourwheel-drive mid-engined V12 had no fewer than four

turbos. However, Gandini’s design was too much for Bugatti boss Romano Artioli, and after a second, smoothedout attempt was turned down, he left the project.

It was then handed over to Giampaolo Benedini, who took away the pop-up lights and reorganised the ducting.

Despite the sharpness of Gandini’s original vision ebbing away, there is no mistaking the EB110.

RM SOTHEBY’S

6 5 4 B U G AT T I E B 110 ( 1 9 9 1 -1 9 9 5 )

C I Z E TA V 16 T ( 1 9 9 1 -1 9 9 4 ) THIS project took everything to extremes – a V16 based on two Lamborghini Uracco V8s, quad pop-up headlamps and side strakes you could lose children in. It was everything the Lamborghini Diablo wasn’t – a project Gandini had left in disgust due to the impositions of GM’s Lee Iacocca. He set up with engineer Claudio Zampolli and, armed with investment from record producer Giorgio Moroder, created the V16T using the rejected Diablo designs as a starting point.

The dramatic results are a culmination of every brutalist design touchpoint – turned up to, well, 16. Because... why not? Sadly just eight cars were built before the firm was shut down in 1994, although three more were made between 1999 and 2003. Moroder had disappeared from the project around the time the first car was built, and as the early1990s recession bit clients’ appetite evaporated.

ASTON MARTIN

1971 DBS V8 PROJECT One of only 140 original RHD manual ZF gearbox examples. This matching numbers 1971 DBS V8 benefits from already having extensive chassis & body repairs carried out. This car is ready to be painted in the colour of the new owners choice and finished to their desired specification. £POA

ASTON MARTIN

1965 DB5

One of only 898 DB5 coupe examples. Presented in Rolls Royce Balmoral Green with Dark Green leather. The car benefits from an extensive mechanical rebuild by Aston Engineering in 2009, including a fully dyno tested 4.0L engine. £POA

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S C H U P PA N 962C R (1992)

THERE were several attempts to bring Porsche’s all-conquering Group C endurance racer to the road, although this was one that made the best fist of being a ‘usable’ car, rather than a 962 with numberplates.

As you’ll read in our feature on the model elsewhere in this issue of Magneto, these changes to Vern Schuppan’s original plan were one step on the path to the project’s eventual demise.

While the newcomer was originally supposed to be a 962 for the road, as new investors came on board they wanted the car to be more of a grand tourer. Cue months

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of redevelopment as it was re-engineered to be wider for better cabin access. In the end the investors pulled out acrimoniously, and only a handful of 962CRs were built.

In the process of becoming more of a GT, the 962CR ended up as a brutalist icon. The battle between track-biased pragmatism and the requirements for a practicable road car resulted in something truly wild.

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A L FA R O M E O S Z (1989) PERHAPS the most controversial automotive design of all time? The Alfa Romeo SZ is certainly a polarising shape. In the mid-1980s there were fears that the off-kilter verve that had served the manufacturer so well despite a lack of investment would be crushed under the weight of Fiat Group rationalisation.

Within Fiat itself, it was felt that a ‘halo’ car would do much to bring some interest back to the marque.

The result was the SZ, the product of a design battle between Robert Opron and Antonio Castellana, and Walter de Silva and Centro Stile team. The latter chose to take a more conventional route; some initial sketches look remarkably like the Subaru SVX. Opron was rather more daring – this was, after all, the man who penned the Citroën SM. His vision was stubbier, and much more squared off – although look closely and you’ll see only curves.

While de Silva’s team used traditional pen, paper and hand-crafted models, Opron’s team worked out the maths of each sketch and fed them into a CAD programme (Carplast, incidentally run

by Giotto Bizzarrini’s son Giuseppe) to build a 1:1 scale model out of polystyrene.

Opron’s design won the day, and the project went from blank sheet of paper to working Geneva Motor Show prototype in just 19 months, with further adaptations and final build by Zagato.

Underneath it all is the highest-output 12v Busso V6 (the 24v didn’t arrive in time) allied to the suspension of the 75 IMSA Tarmac rally car that had dominated the Giro d’Italia for two years running. It’s a design that is still dividing opinions today, but market values have been rising for some time.

ABOVE The SZ’s design is divisive but undeniably eye catching.

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MMAASSEERRAATTII SSHHAAMMAALL ((11998899)) THE THElate late1980s 1980swas was aatumultuous tumultuoustime timefor for Maserati.

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What Whatplaces placesthis thismodel model further furtherup upthe thelist listthan thanthe the supercars supercarsand andhypercars hypercarsisis that thatyou youwould wouldexpect expectthose those to tobe beso soovert. overt.The TheShamal Shamalisis aacomfortable comfortableGT GTcar, car,albeit albeit with withaatwin-turbocharged twin-turbocharged dark darkside, side,pitched pitchedinto into battle battlein inaaconservative conservativeclass class alongside alongsidethe theJaguar JaguarXJS, XJS, Porsche Porsche928 928and andMercedesMercedesBenz BenzSEC. SEC.This Thiswas wasbrutalism brutalism parking parkingits itstanks tanksin inperhaps perhaps the themost mostheritage-focused heritage-focused market marketsegment segmentof ofthe thelot. lot.

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Market Watch: Our Lamborghini Miura buyer’s guide

Watches and art: $9.6m Patek, and Ernest Montaut

Automobilia: Master model maker Michele Conti

Collecting: A passion for vinyl records old and new

Books and products: From 1960s concepts to Enzo Ferrari pen

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M A R K E T WAT C H

Lamborghini Miura Looking to buy an example of the first real supercar, the sensual, wickedly glamorous, engagingly rapid and technically advanced Miura? Here’s what you need to know Words John Simister Photography Magic Car Pics

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THE SUPERCAR STARTED here, even if the term itself took a couple more years to enter the automotive lexicon. That is ‘supercar’ as in low, powered by an engine of eight or more cylinders mounted immediately behind the cabin’s occupants, and wearing a strong aura of having recently escaped from the racetrack.

Very fast and exotic road cars invariably had, pre-Lamborghini Miura, a front-mounted engine under a long bonnet. But from the early 1960s, as with Formula 1 single-seaters, the best sportsracing cars boasted mid-mounted engines. Various Ferraris, the Ford GT40 and others set the race pace – but it took Lamborghini to take the idea to the road. The Miura was not the first mid-engined roadgoing sports car (the Matra Djet has that honour) but it was undeniably the first supercar as we understand the genre today.

Just 762 production cars (of which around 60 were right-hand drive) were built from 1966 to 1973, in three distinct evolutions. There was an element of skunkworks about the way the Miura came into being, because company founder Ferruccio Lamborghini – a tractor magnate who had no interest in racing – favoured his existing front-engined grand tourers over some upstart, highly strung, wouldbe racer. But engineers Giampaolo Dallara and Paolo Stanzani, plus New Zealand’s ace development driver Bob Wallace, went ahead anyway and produced a powered rolling chassis to demonstrate their concept. Its reception at the 1965 Turin Motor Show showed they were onto a good thing; keen buyers placed orders even though they hadn’t seen what the finished car would look like.

That it had a 3.9-litre 350bhp version of Lamborghini’s V12 helped, the engine designed by Giotto Bizzarrini. Or was it? In ’86, erudite, maverick, engineeringobsessed journalist LJK Setright expounded in Supercar Classics magazine his theory that Ferruccio had secretly commissioned Honda to design the V12, based on what the Japanese company had learned

OPPOSITE AND ABOVE Miura exudes performance both on the outside and from within the cabin. in its F1 campaign. This notion of the late, great Leonard, always a fan of Honda’s precise engineering, gained no traction among marque experts, but it was certainly an intriguing idea – and one we should probably leave right there.

For the Miura, the quad-cam V12 needed a few changes to suit its new transverse, mid-mounted location. It gained downdraught Webers – four triple-choke 40 IDL 3Cs – instead of sidedraught units, and an idler-gear system at the clutch end to take drive to the transverse gearbox sited just aft of the sump, whose oil it shared. The chassis in which the engine sat was constructed of sheet steel, its box sections mostly lightened with large round holes that had, it later transpired, the advantage of keeping those sections free of corrosionencouraging condensation.

At the 1966 Geneva show, those brave pre-orderers got to see just what it was they had committed to. Bertone’s Marcello Gandini had clothed the Miura chassis with

‘At Turin, buyers placed orders even though they hadn’t seen the finished car’

arguably the most breathtaking bodywork for a very fast car up to that point. It was GT40-low (production cars got a little more headroom), simultaneously taut and sensuous, and it invented the notion of satin-black detailing as a mark of glitter-abhorring raciness.

Most striking were the straked eyelashes framing headlights that lay back, staring at the sky ahead, unless electrically motored into functional verticality. More strakes guarded the vent in the bonnet via which the air that had passed through the radiator escaped; yet more lurked behind the side windows at the entrance to the engine bay’s intakes. The bottom strake doubled as the door handle.

And behind the cabin, where you expected a large, fast-angled rear window to be, were six stepped slats, also painted black and setting the template for myriad imitators over the next few years (including Ford’s early-1970s Capri Special in Vista Orange). The gaps between the slats allowed a stripy view aft while also venting the heat of the engine bay.

Sales of the inaugural Miura, dubbed P400, began later in 1966.

Twitchy on-limit handling and a propensity to self-immolate merely added to the model’s other-worldly aura, as did an orange example’s apparent destruction at the start of The Italian Job. Fortunately the ‘pretty car’ is still very much alive; its crumpled alter ego was acquired from Lamborghini’s own store of already-crashed cars.

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VA LU E S F R O M HAGERTY PRICE GUIDE

VA LU E P E R FO R M A N C E

As you’d expect, Miura values have risen substantially in the past decade, while in terms of owner demographics we’ve seen a shift to younger drivers.

Back in 2012, 72.5 percent of all owners insured with Hagerty were in the Baby Boomer generation, with 20 percent older and 7.5 percent in Generation X. Boomers now account for 58.5 percent, and Gen X 25.6 percent. Around four percent are even younger than that.

The Miura was literally the Gen X poster car, and as this group reaches its peak earning (and spending) potential, it’s no surprise that values have gone up. Unlike with certain supercars there hasn’t been a sudden spike – more a gradual increase over the years. This shows that the Miura maintains a deep attraction for collectors, suggesting a more resilient price that is likely to continue on a similar trajectory.

History and originality are critical to a car’s value, while those that were adapted by the factory may add value.

The SV remains the most desirable model for those with deep pockets.

Gooding & Co’s superb SV ‘Speciale’ with Jota adaptations that sold at Hampton Court in September 2020 for £3,207,000 still sets the benchmark.

T H E VA L U E P R O P O S I T I O N Nowadays any Miura is expensive, and becoming more so. “Values went up at least ten percent during 2021,” says Iain Tyrrell, based just east of Chester and probably Britain’s foremost Miura expert. At the time of writing his team of experts had just finished restoring a 1968 P400 in pale blue, and he has two others in the bodyshop.

Some, however, are yet more valuable. “A perfectly restored P400 – you won’t find a perfect unrestored one – is around £1.1m.

A Miura S is £1.4m, an SV £2.2m – twice the value of a P400.” So, what are the differences, and why is a late Miura worth two early P400s?

The S, launched at the 1968 Turin show, gained an extra 20bhp (making 370bhp) thanks to revised camshafts and freer-flowing intake tracts, plus altered switchgear and powered windows. A total of 338 were built, which makes the S the

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£1,800,000

LAMBORGHINI MIURA P400 LAMBORGHINI MIURA P400 S

£1,600,000 LAMBORGHINI MIURA P400 SV

£1,400,000

£1,200,000

£1,000,000

£800,000

£600,000

£400,000

£200,000 2012

2013

most numerous Miura. The tally for the P400 was 274; for the SV, launched in 1971, it was just 150.

It’s not just scarcity that boosts the SV’s value, though. It’s the fact that it is much the best Miura, even if it did lose the eyelashes around the headlights. An extra 15bhp, for a total of 385bhp, arose from further cam and carb changes, and wider rear wheels sat on widertrack suspension within subtly flared-out arches. That aided the handling – but what helped it much more was a change to the rear suspension to make it into a

‘It is hard to imagine a car that better defines “desirable”. It is raw and visceral’

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proper double-wishbone system with a wide-based lower wishbone.

It replaced a design that used a much smaller lower arm, A-shaped but with the apex of the A on the chassis. A long tie-rod linked the forward of the two hub-end pivots to another chassis point ahead of the rear wheel, which resulted in some undesirable bump-steer.

Hence the earlier cars’ reputation for twitchy behaviour near the limit, something from which the SV does not suffer. SVs featured several strengthening gussets in the structure, too, most usefully between the front upper chassis rails and the front bulkhead.

The last 96 SVs boasted another overdue refinement: separate oil for the engine and the gearbox, easily engineered and better for both. Now able to run with proper gear oil, the ’box could finally be offered with a limited-slip diff. It’s fairly straightforward to convert

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earlier cars to separate oil supplies.

If the prospect of spending over £1m on a Miura is just too dispiriting, a glance at the Hagerty UK valuation tool reveals that a less-perfect example might be had for £500,000-600,000, if it’s an early P400 in only ‘fair’ condition.

Encouragingly, an ‘excellent’ P400 requires just a few hundred thousand more, a total outlay that might still go only halfway to securing a ‘fair’ SV. At the top end of the condition scale, Hagerty’s figures reflect Iain’s estimates but lag a little behind his assessment of the latest rise in values.

T H E D E S I R A B I L I T Y FA C T O R It’s hard to imagine a car that better defines ‘desirable’. Sensual, wickedly glamorous, engagingly rapid even today (around 170mph, 0-60mph in seven seconds or less), technically advanced for its time and bombastically, upliftingly

TIMELINE

1965

Complete running chassis revealed at November’s Turin show.

1966

Bertone’s Marcello Gandini has designed the body, creating the prototype Miura P400 displayed at the Geneva show in March. It lacks an engine because there has been no time to check this fits within the bodywork. Production starts later this year.

1968

Miura S, with more power and equipment updates, launched at November’s Turin show.

1969

The Italian Job goes on general release, featuring an ill-fated orange Miura in its opening scene.

1970

sonorous: the Miura is all of these.

The noise is central to the Lamborghini’s being. “It is very stirring,” says Iain, “and it’s right behind you. The whole car is raw and visceral. Nothing about it is soft or comfortable, except the remarkably supple ride.

“The controls are all heavy. The brakes have no servo, and the steering has no real castor action, which can make it feel precarious at first. Certainly the SV is the best one to drive, and its extra power is noticeable. But you can’t drive any Miura without stirring your soul.”

Just to sit in a Miura’s driving seat is to feel the start of that process. Ahead of the too-distant and far-from-vertical wheel are the speedometer and tachometer in separate pods. The low facia-top then passes through a centre stack of six minor dials, in two rows, and emerges on the passenger side.

On the high centre tunnel is an

ABOVE Striking straked ‘lashes’ frame sky-facing headlights that motor into place when required. open-gate gearlever similar to a Ferrari’s; next to the rear-view mirror is a row of unlabelled toggle switches (revised to rockers for the S and beyond). Behind your seat are a minimally insulated bulkhead and a window tilted far enough from the vertical to prevent troubling reflections from other cars’ headlights. The actions of the floor-hinged clutch and accelerator are indeed heavy, which matches that of those un-servoed brakes.

Original trim was often vinyl or cloth, but leather was an option complete with Bertone semiperforations, which Tyrrell’s trim people have uniquely reproduced.

Some other surfaces were not of brilliant quality, but SVs were more sumptuously trimmed and many Miuras have gained more pleasing

coverings in later years. Tall drivers might feel a touch constricted as they drive with knees akimbo, but Bob Wallace was 6ft 2in and he managed. The view forward is magnificent, aft is fragmented, over the shoulder almost non-existent.

As for storage opportunities, there’s minimal space in the dash, none under the front clamshell, which is full of cooling and spare wheel, but a decent-size boot in the rear clamshell. Luggage will get hot, though, given the exhaust system beneath, and it’s likely to smell rather fumy. But given the fun you’ve had howling through the mountain passes before you unload at your hotel, you might be willing to forgive those snags.

T H E N U T S A N D B O LT S Rust, as hinted at earlier, isn’t a major problem in the Miura’s structure. It will most likely strike in the curved and narrow box

Lamborghini officially avoids motor sport, but development engineer Bob Wallace creates a racing Miura dubbed the Jota. It uses much weight-saving aluminium and produces well over 400bhp. It will never race, instead meeting its end in a fiery road accident after its sale to a private buyer.

1971

Miura SV is launched at Geneva, with more power, heavily revised rear suspension, wider rear wheels and bodywork, and no headlamp eyelashes.

Over the next few years five cars will be modified to a specification similar to the prototype Jota’s, and designated SV/J.

1973

Production officially ends, but a one-off SV is built in 1975 for Canadian businessman and F1 team owner Walter Wolf. It’s now in Lamborghini’s museum at the Sant’Agata Bolognese factory.

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section that links the base of the front bulkhead and the front of the sill to the lower front chassis rails, but repair or replacement are quite straightforward. The same is true for the floor sections.

The outer sill panels are cosmetic only, and the outer skins of the front-hinged bonnet assembly and the rear-hinged section aft of the cabin are skinned in aluminium. Everything else is steel, but even where those aluminium skins meet the multiholed inner framework there’s rarely any electrolytic corrosion.

All this does not, however, necessarily mean that a Miura will be free of structural woes. In early cars especially, thanks to the rush to get it into production, the structure isn’t really quite strong enough. There’s a strong possibility that suspension pick-up points – there are no separate subframes – won’t be exactly where they should be, following accident damage or even a particularly savage pothole.

“Up to no. 125 the sheet steel in the chassis was 0.9mm thick, which was only just adequate,” Iain says.

“If you jacked the car up at a front corner, the chassis would twist.

From no. 125 it went to 1mm, and from no. 200 there was some extra stiffening. The SV had those gusset plates between the bulkhead and the upper chassis rail, and a lot of people fit them when restoring pre-SV cars. It’s all rigid enough if the structure is strengthened.”

And if the suspension mounts are misaligned? “The car won’t feel well planted, and undoing that damage is far more common than doing rust repairs. It’ll need to be stripped and put on a jig. Actually, very few Miuras drive properly.

They need to be set up accurately, not just the suspension including the rear bump-steer, which can be adjusted with shims, but also the gearchange and the engine.”

Especially, Iain emphasises, the carbs, which are known to set the engine bay on fire after a spit-back.

“It’s vital to have the right fuel pump, and the wrong one can look identical. With too much pressure the carbs can overfill, and it’s not immediately apparent that fuel

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ABOVE Stepped slats are as iconic as they are practical, spawning many lesser imitators in period. builds up in the bottom of the airfilter housing. Then, if there’s a backfire, boom… Setting and tuning everything correctly is a black art, built up over decades of experience.”

Other points worth delving into when assessing a car for sale include the crystallisation- and porosity-prone Campagnolo mags.

Aluminium replicas are available.

Also check the brake master cylinder, made of aluminium and prone to corrosion at the pedal end, which can lead to the piston popping out. It’s visible in the footwell and so is easy to inspect.

And then there are the numbers.

“People are getting fussy,” Tyrrell says. “Matching engine and chassis numbers add maybe ten percent to the value. Having the original colour is important, too, as is being to the

‘Finding an example in need of work is harder than finding one already restored’

correct and original specification.

“As well as the chassis number there’s the Bertone body number, which is 100 units higher. For example, chassis 443 should have body 543. You’ll find the Bertone number on the front of the doors, on the front bulkhead, on all the rear slats and on the inner lips of both clamshells, by the windscreen and roof respectively. But they might have disappeared if the car’s been unsympathetically repainted.”

Finally, Iain recommends study of two key, information-packed books: Lamborghini Miura by Peter Coltrin and Jean-Francois Marchet, and The Lamborghini Miura Bible by Joe Sackey.

THE FINAL DECISION Any car, but especially an Italian supercar half a century old, needs to be used regularly and sometimes vigorously to keep it fit and feeling good, but the prospect of doing so with a million-pound Miura might be daunting. If you can overcome that hurdle, then owning this car must rank as one of the greatest thrills in motoring – even if you merely look at it most of the time.

So, having decided to go for it, do you aim for one in the very best condition or risk a cheaper, needier example? Inevitably the saving on

T H E D E TA I L S 1966-73 LAMBORGHINI MIURA P400, S AND SV ENGINE

3929CC 60º V12

POWER

350-385BHP

TOP SPEED

170-180MPH

0-60MPH

7.0-6.0 SECONDS

price will be offset by the cost of the remedial work you will surely be obliged to commission at some stage, but at least you would have your Miura and could enjoy the process of improvement. Finding an example in need of work is harder than finding one already restored, however, so the quality of the renovation is the key factor.

And there’s the matter of model.

The ultra-expensive SV is the fastest and handles the best, but the earlier cars look more special and are still a thrill to drive. There’s also an argument for the purity of a car type’s first incarnation, which in this case isn’t yet reflected in market value. That makes the original P400 the ‘bargain’ Miura, relatively speaking, and our tip for best buy.

Now you just need to find one.

Thanks to Iain Tyrrell, who will be happy to vet any potential Miura purchase. Visit www.iaintyrrell.co.uk or call +44 (0)1244 535000.

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A C Q U I R E

M A R K E T A N A LY S I S

Collector car crystal ball?

The coming year will witness sea changes across the auction, event, concours and storage spheres, as well as in buying trends. Mark our words...

Words Dave Kinney Photography Mike Maez/Gooding, Mercedes

I’M NOT IN THE PREDICTIONS business; that’s usually the kind of stuff I leave to people who are much smarter than me, or perhaps someone with a fresh set of tarot cards. However, having reviewed a few dozen years of predictions about the collector car market, it appears I do not have an impressively high bar to hop over.

So here are a handful of observations about the immediate future of the world of exotic, special-interest, expensive and classic automobiles, and their surroundings. Let’s start with an easy one. This way, if I get others wrong, at least this will increase my average.

There will be changes in the classic car auction landscape, and it will have an effect on all auction houses, along with many buyers

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and sellers. This is not the end of small or large live auctions, yet we can expect to see more of a hybrid style develop. Will it be all online?

No, but it might be an online ramp-up with both a live and an online auction close. What exactly will change in the centuries-old auction world is still a matter of debate, but there is a certainty of massive adjustment ahead.

Remember, as with sales of all types, trust is a requisite. Trust can only be built up over a very long period of time, and trust is needed now more than ever when buying very expensive and increasingly complicated automobiles. ‘Fix it with a spanner’ is a thing of the past for an increasing number of auction cars.

While we’re speaking about online-only auctions, in North

America there is currently Bring a Trailer and then there is everyone else. Put another way, there is no Pepsi to BaT’s Coke. This is also destined to change, as dozens of contenders are already eyeing the top of the online marketplace. At the same time, expect a large number of the lesser known, and all of the lesser funded, online auction sites to either fail or be absorbed into other houses. You can expect a good proportion of the above to happen in 2022.

Barn finds have been popular for two decades. Although they remain sought after (often against all reason, in my opinion, while many are what we used to refer to as parts cars), it appears that the ‘buy at any cost’ trend will continue to fade on anything less than the most rare and expensive models. In other words, 300SL yes, 190SL not so much.

To bring huge multiples of their condition-rated values, the trend is top tier only. One recent example worth mentioning was the Bugatti Type 57 Galibier that Gooding & Co sold at Pebble Beach in August 2021. Its pillarless fourdoor Vanvooren coachwork might not have been the first choice of many, but it did have its own special appeal. This barn find, with history as a Bugatti demonstrator later owned by both the Schlumpf and Mullin Collections, went for a touch below estimate at $179,200, including auction fees. With

ABOVE AND LEFT C63 AMG Black Series targets a very exclusive sector; barn-find Bugatti.

‘Could this be a chance for some old coachbuilding firms to stage a revival? Count on it’

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tonnes of restoration needs, this sold at a fair price for a fair car.

We can also expect further consolidation in the worlds of classic car events, concours and storage. Hagerty has shown that there is an economy of scale here.

With some aging owners, as well as financial commitments that few owners can continue to make, expect this trend to continue in the near future.

The next trend that I am watching with keen interest is the ‘Black series’ of cars that have emerged in the marketplace in the past decade. They are increasingly hot sellers in the used marketplace,

and the thirst for more, better, newer seems unquenchable. I’m using the word Black as a generic here, because it has become the most descriptive term for Porsche, Mercedes, Ferrari, Bentley, even Cadillac and others, that have produced a limited run of new cars, often unobtainable by the general public, which have performance, styling and handling enhancements not found on their better-known catalogued models.

Some history here. Before there was a Black series of cars, some brands made ‘collector series’ models, often with only paint packages, tape overlays and stripes

to differentiate them from the production models. That dog don’t hunt no more, as we say in the American south, and the manufacturers have learned how to do it right.

What does this have to do with the marketplace for older cars? In a single word, everything. Although the coachbuilder era has yet to have a post-war revival, the desire to own something just a bit different is a phenomenon older than the automobile itself. This itch, once scratched by custom and hot-rod builders, is now satiated by factory-built customs and factory-built hot rods. I’m not

anticipating Kia going this route anytime soon, but I would not be surprised to see it.

Staying with coachbuilt cars, in these times of electric platforms you can expect to see a revival of truly bespoke automobiles. An almost totally self-contained drivetrain can be used as a large, partially contained cassette to build upon, now that the coachbuilder’s art is open to select, talented newcomers – including those without a Jeff Bezos-level budget. Could this also be a chance for some of the older well known coachbuilding firms (or at least their names) to stage a revival? Count on it.

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WAT C H E S

Why one-owner Patek is in the pink $9.6m million sale of Ref 1518 ‘pink on pink’ rounded off 2021 in style, and tells us a lot about the market’s current state of play Words Jonathon Burford

AFTER AN ALMOST 11-MINUTE battle by 15 bidders at Sotheby’s New York in early December, the hammer final fell at $8.1 million ($9.6m including all fees) on what proved to be 2021’s most significant and important wristwatch sale. On any number of levels, this Patek Philippe Ref 1518 ‘pink on pink’ was unique, but as the third most expensive vintage wristwatch ever at auction, it tells us a lot about the market’s current state of play.

I first set eyes on it in the bank vault of a recently passed professor in Palm Desert in May. Invited by the family, my initial shock on seeing it was compounded by its history. The professor was in fact a Prince Anmed Mohammed Tewfik A Toussoun of Egypt, first cousin to King Farouk, the last king Egypt, and a descendant of Muhammed Ali Pasha. Having purchased the watch in Switzerland in 1951, he subsequently moved to the US to study agriculture. After the 1952 Egyptian revolution precluded his return home, he moved to California in pursuit of academia and a quiet life. He placed his watch, with its original Certificate of Origin, in a safety-deposit box in the desert. Its discovery and extraordinary sale speak to the current market for the very best collectable vintage wristwatches.

It represented the pinnacle of qualities the modern collector is looking for. Firstly is condition. In this instance, unseen for 70 years, the dial was perfect and unaffected

by UV light, cleaning or damage of

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any description. The case retained its original factory-brushed finish, with all hallmarks crisp and clear, and its movement appeared to have never received a service. The condition was unlike anything we had seen before, reflecting what any example should have looked like on delivery in 1951.

Next is rarity. It is thought that only 281 Ref 1518s were ever made across all metal types, and this was only the 14th known to be cased in 18k pink gold coupled with its pink dial. Next, freshness to market. The watch came direct from the safetydeposit box, making the buyer only the second owner. And finally, royal provenance. Watches that tick all these boxes have no upper limit to their desirability – or the lengths to which collectors will go to acquire them. To put this into context, the next highest price paid for a pink on pink 1518 was $3.38m CHF in 2020, at the time considered an excellent price for such a watch.

We saw exceptional prices for exceptional watches throughout 2021. An original 18k yellow gold Cartier London Crash from 1970 sold in Geneva in November for €800,000-plus, with a platinum 1991 reissue exceeding even that, at €860k. Equally, there were some head-scratchers, such as an Omega Speedmaster 2915-1 ‘tropical’ that sold for a barely credible CHF 3.1m, or a Patek Philippe Ref 3448 from 1973 originally made in yellow gold but re-cased 25 years later in platinum, which exceeded $2.2m.

We also saw the continued

interest in modern watches from mainly independent brands and low-volume manufactures. FP Journe has been at the forefront, with early subscription examples selling for multiple millions and regular Resonance models fetching $250k-plus. Other brands to see this price explosion include A Lange and Söhne, De Bethune, MB&F and Kari Voutilainen at the higher end, and a number of newer brands producing watches at a much lower price point such as MING (designed in Kuala Lumpur but made in Switzerland), Furlan Marri (Swiss) and Kurono Tokyo

‘It represented the pinnacle of qualities the modern collector is looking for’

(from Japan), all of which have recently been selling at three or four times their retail price.

There are multiple factors at play, many relating specifically to the watch market, and others more macroeconomic. Leaving that latter category aside, watch collecting has been somewhat undervalued when viewed against the likes of contemporary art, classic cars or even wine. This continues to change, however, with all auction houses seeing an exponential growth in new, specifically young and affluent entrants into the sector.

These collectors from all corners of the world are as well informed and educated in their buying as they are well capitalised and aggressive in their pursuit of the right watches.

The acute lack of good vintage pieces coming to market results in excited bidding for those being offered, and the ongoing restricted supply of modern desirable watches from AP, Patek and Rolex is driving

MOTORING ART

LEFT Patek Philippe Ref 1518 ‘pink on pink’ was the third most expensive vintage watch at auction.

these models to unthought-of levels. In addition, considerable institutional money is flowing in for mainly pre-owned watches, such as Watchbox’s recent $165m capital raise ($100m of which is earmarked for inventory purchase), Watchfinder’s acquisition by luxury conglomerate Richemont SA, and Hodinkee’s $40m fundraise prior to its Crown & Caliber purchase.

So, is the rising tide raising all ships? In many ways, yes, because we are seeing some previously unappreciated models and brands get some love. We have seen Breguet prices tick up slightly, for example, complicated Jules Audemars regain some of their value, and a return for rare and good vintage Heuers. A quirk here is the vintage Rolex market, which has had a rather underwhelming year. Some of this is relative to other market trends (an FPJourne Chronomètre Bleu is now similar in value to a decent four-digit Daytona), but more generally it can be ascribed to an evident lack of original and excellent-condition examples coming to market this year across any model.

Can the market continue these trends in 2022? Collectors’ laser focus on rarity, original condition and provenance will surely continue, and we remain bullish on the long-term health of the collectable watch market.

Writer Jonathon Burford is SVP and specialist at Sotheby’s watch department. For its ongoing Watches sales see www.sothebys.com.

French trailblazer Capturing the exhilaration and speed of early motor races, Ernest Montaut was a pioneer of automotive art Words Rupert Whyte

IN THE EARLY 20TH CENTURY, the car was very much in its infancy. The French dominated both the industry and motor racing, so it was no surprise that Paris witnessed the birth of automotive art.

Born in 1879, Ernest Montaut is regarded as the pioneer of the genre. He embraced the challenge of capturing the exhilaration and speed of the early races. He innovated the necessary artistic techniques, which are still widely used today. They include distortion of perspective by bending and foreshortening the image, as well as the use of speed lines – whereby streaks or lines of paint are applied across an image, giving the impression of movement. Montaut also portrayed smoke and dust to great effect, along with the concentrated expressions of the crouched drivers, with scarves blowing behind them. Blurred backgrounds and swaying trees all accentuated the drama and speed of the new-fangled motor car.

Early on, Montaut set up partnership with Paris publisher Mabileau. Mabileau worked with artists to celebrate locomotion, incorporating automobiles,

motorcycles, airships, motorboats and eventually aeroplanes. The company took commissions from manufacturers and component suppliers for advertising and promotional posters, and Ernest was in high demand. However, it is his landscape ‘pochoir’ handcoloured lithographs for which he is most well remembered.

These were produced in two sizes, the larger measuring 17.75in x 35.5in, although there were one or two variants. The smaller ones were bound into 1908’s 10 Ans de Courses – Les Marques Victorieuses 1897-1907.

This Montaut-Mabileau book contained 31 lithographs of 13.25in x 8.25in, which were possibly used to promote the larger-format prints.

Print production involved drawing the image onto a lithographic stone, which was then used to produce a handpulled lithograph of the outline.

Most of the printed outlines for the larger images included the year of publication, along with the artist’s and the printmaker’s names. The smaller prints were normally numbered, but they lacked any description because this information was printed

on the protective pages bound in between each of the images.

These outlines were then hand-watercoloured. It’s widely accepted that, for the smaller images, Montaut used stencils and unskilled labour. However, for the larger ones he used skilled artisans, and the difference in artistic ability and quality is very noticeable. These prints can truly be classified as works of art. The use of different artists to colour the same outline explains why some colour variations can occur between identical images.

It is generally understood that Montaut produced around 200 different images, although no complete catalogue exists. It is also accepted that up to 100 prints of each were produced. Ernest died in 1909 at the young age of 31, and his wife Marguerite continued to produce lithographs after his death. These were occasionally signed as ‘M Montaut’, but for most of her prints she used the name ‘Gamy’, an anagram of her nickname ‘Magy’.

Possibly Montaut’s finest legacy are the 34 ceramic tile panels that adorn the walls of London’s fabulous Art Nouveau Michelin House. Commissioned by André and Édouard Michelin, who had used him for promotional material since they started the company, the images depict the brand’s early motoring successes. They now constitute one of the world’s best collections of early motoring art.

Rupert Whyte runs Historic Car Art, www.historiccarart.net, selling original works and posters.

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AUTOMOBILIA

Michele Conti – a master model maker Italian craftsman dedicated his life to creating scratch-built scale model cars. Keenly priced at the time, they’re now worth thousands Words and photography Marshall Buck

THE LATE MICHELE CONTI was one of the best of the old guard of model makers, and he singlehandedly produced more scratchbuilt model cars than some of the boutique-type real automotive manufacturers. He also received more publicity in automobile books and magazines worldwide than some specialty car brands.

Countless articles have been written about him and his model making, from when he first started in the 1950s to long after he passed away in 1996 at the age of 65.

The words ‘single-handedly’ perfectly apply to the way in which Conti brought attention to, and influenced, the high-end portion of the collectable model car field. He was not the first master model maker, nor was he ultimately the best, but he certainly was the most prolific. He influenced many – including me from the time I first saw some of his models in a magazine. I was ten years old.

Conti spent his entire life in Turin, Italy, and his work was carried out in his family’s apartment, where two rooms were dedicated to creating the models that made him so well known among the top tier in international automotive circles. He built all types, from Skodas and Opels to numerous Ferraris and race cars.

His model making started in earnest at about age 12. He was so influenced by the American military Jeeps during the Allies’ occupation of Turin, that he carved a scale model of the vehicle. After

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graduating from high school in around 1950, Conti was apprenticed at renowned body manufacturer Stabilimenti Farina, training under craftsmen who created shapes principally by hand. He joined the model mock-up staff, and developed his skills working in wood, clay and metal. His father was also employed there, as a specialist in assembling doors, bonnets and bootlids.

Upon the closure of Stabilimenti Farina’s doors in 1953, Pinin Farina immediately hired both Michele and his father. It was at this point, during Conti’s free time and evenings, that he started what would eventually become his fulltime career of making completely scratch-built scale models.

Demand for a ‘Conti’ model became high and constant, making it easy for him to leap from working for a company to working for himself in his new career. Griff Borgeson wrote in Road & Track: “Conti’s clientele consists of an international and intercontinental elite...” I’ll add to that Giovanni Agnelli, Enzo Ferrari, Chuck Jordan, Ferdinand Porsche, Henry Ford II, Pierre Bardinon, famous BELOW Vanwall was one of Conti’s incredibly detailed scratch-built models.

ABOVE SSKL was one of only a few models the master craftsman built with a detailed chassis. race drivers, industrialists and numerous well heeled collectors. If you’re not impressed, check to see if you still have a pulse.

Conti’s model-making career is a prime example of being in the right place at the right time, with the ability to make unique and desirable items. It also helps to do what you love, which he truly did.

Due to Michele’s reputation, craftsmanship and dedication to realism, many auto manufacturers entrusted him with actual factory drawings from which to build his creations. In the 1950s and ’60s, makers worldwide were almost always willing to help craftsmen such as Conti, and they would kindly reply and help with his requests, sending him photos and drawings of the vehicles he asked for information on. Today, you’ll most likely get a legal letter telling you not to make the model at all.

Michele’s first works were made from wood, which evolved into aluminium, and eventually copper and brass. Some models were

kerbside only (no opening panels), while others were fully detailed.

Typically all had flat bottoms with no chassis detail; however, there were just a few with detailed chassis, one such rarity being his Mercedes-Benz SSKL. Conti built in three different scales – 1:12, 1:11, and 1:10. There is no explanation as to why. Many of his creations were one-offs, although he also built two to four each of certain cars. There was also a brace of low-volume production runs of 1:43 and 1:32 scale models, made in the mid- to late 1980s.

Although collectable scratchbuilts fall into the ‘luxury goods’ category, and the cost might be considered high by some, Conti’s work was always ridiculously underpriced. In 1958, his prices ran from $60 for a Formula 1 car to $125 for a kerbside sports car such as a 300SL Gullwing. In today’s dollars, that’s only $566-$1180.

And these models would each take around 1000-1200 hours to make – and longer for something very elaborate. Do the maths, and you will see the amazing value his work represented back in the day.

Even as his prices rose over the years into the $1000s, the value was still very substantial.

Conti was not a wealthy man – he was not even well off – but he did solid enough business to support his family and have model making as his full time career. The hobby is all the richer for it.

Thanks to AutoMobilia Resource, www.automobiliaresource.com.

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COLLECTING

A taste for liquorice pizza Not all plastic is bad – which, as we found out, is great news for the revitalised world of collecting vinyl records old and new Words Nathan Chadwick

“I FEEL THAT IF SOMEONE thumbed through my records, they would know me better than my friends – and that feels like a reason to have records in the house,” says Jeffrey Smith of worldwide music community and vinyl-sales hub Discogs. “For someone outside it’s a picture of you, but for you personally it’s a picture of where you’ve been.”

Now that everything can be shared online you’d think Spotify might do the same job, yet that hasn’t stopped vinyl’s rebirth. In 2021, sales were the highest in 30 years, with more than five million units sold. Record labels have been repressing their back catalogues for several years, but brand-new albums are being pressed up on wax, too – often with collectability baked in from the start.

“Anything that escalates the product up to something special, so that it’s not just a simple repressing, builds hype about it,” says Jeffrey.

“Take Adele’s latest album, 30 – with vinyl being a format for listening and something tangible her fans can hold on to, there’s a part of that fanbase which might buy it and never listen to it.”

Jeffrey is seeing a trend, in which different colour variants, extended packaging and special versions are key parts of an album’s marketing push. “That fanbase is going to come back and acquire these variants because they are special,” he explains.

“Making something limited drives deep down into that collector

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psychology we all have inside.”

You might also think that the secondhand market might be under threat, but no. “Fifteen years ago you could pick up pre-owned vinyl for a few bucks, if it was not a first pressing,” says Jeffrey.

“Sought-after, pre-owned stuff has caught up with new vinyl; with labels re-issuing at an astounding rate, allowing records to be more accessible, you’d expect prices to plateau – but they haven’t.

“It’s about specificity – a certain pressing of Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon, for example.

They’re more distinguished buyers, willing to pay a premium for a first pressing or territory pressing.”

In 2021 Discogs saw a 51-52 percent increase in sales numbers over 2020, spurred on by multiple lockdowns around the world. “In the pandemic’s first three months, the adding of titles to people’s collections and want-lists spiked – as did the buying of records,” Jeffrey explains. “From March 2020 to March 2021 it was a straight line.

People were sitting bored at home, and purchasing records they meant to but never got around to.”

Which records, though? “There

‘A huge increase in sales was spurred on by lockdowns; people were sitting bored at home’

ABOVE Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon is a perennial collectors’ favourite, especially in limited, added-value formats. are certain styles that collectors gravitate to: classical and jazz,” says Jeffrey. “For both, getting pristine copies of original pressings of important records has exponentially increased the value of that record.

A pristine original pressing of Kind of Blue by Miles Davis will be more valuable than the repress, which sounds a million percent better.”

However, the nature of what’s collectable is changing, says Sean Jackson of Reckless Records in London’s Soho. “The average age of my clientele has really gone down. In the past a lot of people were interested in records from the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, and while there is still a market for that, younger people are more interested in the classic hip hop re-issues.

However, they are quite willing to spend money on an originalpressing hip hop LP, and the prices of 1990s drum and bass records have gone through the roof.”

Sean cites Illmatic by Nas as a perennial seller, but any big US hip hop album from the 1990s is in demand. Other genres are also picking up interest. “Punk, psych,

prog and classic indie from the ’80s and ’90s – all are good sellers.”

However, there are certain classic bands with universal appeal, Sean adds: “The Beatles are perennial favourites across all generations.”

But what does the future hold?

As in the car market, COVID has done much to cloud the issue.

“Tourism doesn’t really exist at the moment – 35 percent of our inshop client base was European or American pre-pandemic,” Sean says. “We used to see certain overseas regulars each month. We haven’t seen them for two years.”

Could vinyl just be a fad? Both Sean and Jeffrey believe not. “We have seen an explosion of younger demographics engaging in the culture around vinyl,” Jeffrey says.

“Brands such as Urban Outfitters have played a huge part in turning the novelty of these formats into a lifestyle. A lot of the 18-to-24 demographic didn’t grow up with physical music at all. It is all new for them, an expansion of their fandom. It’s a physical connection to show their support for artists.”

Sean agrees. “They know what they want and are knowledgeable.

It is very encouraging for the future of record shops.”

Thanks to www.discogs.com and www.reckless.co.uk.

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DIVERSIONS

186

Compiled by Nathan Chadwick and Sophie Kochan

TATRA V855 AEROLUGE

GRAND SEIKO WHITE BIRCH

After the Germans occupied the Sudetenland in 1939, they had similar ambitions for Russia – only they didn’t have the kit to cross the huge frozen lakes to get there.

The military tasked Tatra to come up with a solution, resulting in the V855 Aeroluge. It was powered by a rearmounted Type 87 3.0-litre V8, while at the rear a spiked roller provided extra traction for steep inclines. While it could seat five, there was no room for spare guns and ammunition – quite an oversight considering the aim was to take down the Russian army. Just one prototype was built.

Autocult’s $149.95 1:43 scale model comes with a 184-page book that delves into the story. www.awesomediecast.com

Grand Seiko’s latest addition to the Evolution 9 Collection is the White Birch edition (SLGA009), inspired by the forests near the firm’s studio in Shinsu, where the Spring Drive watches are made.

The stainless-steel case contains a 9RA2 calibre with a 120-hour power reserve, and a precision of +0.5 seconds per day.

It costs £8100. www.seikoboutique.co.uk

Magneto

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DIVERSIONS

Compiled by Nathan Chadwick and Sophie Kochan

LANCIA DELTA HF INTEGRALE If our top 50 list of brutalist cars has ignited a passion for box arches, this 1:12 scale plastic kit is an extremely detailed representation of a Lancia Delta HF Integrale 16v. Officially licensed by Lancia and made

by Italeri, the £299.99 kit has fully functioning doors, suspension and steering, and a beautifully realised Lampredi twin-cam. It comes with a Martini livery decal kit, although the paint is available separately. www.italeri.com

MCKLEIN CLASSIC 2022 CALENDAR Given the heroics on this year’s Monte Carlo Rally, we suspect a few of you will be wanting some motor sport-inspired wall art. The 2022 edition of the McKlein calendar costs €45, measures 67cm x 48cm and features scenes as diverse as a VW Beetle taking on an African rally stage to the likes of Stirling Moss, Jim Clark, Jo Siffert and Jochen Rindt exercising the limits of physics in evocative black-and-white imagery. With two pictures to choose from each month, there’s something for everyone. www.rallyandracing.com

MONTBLANC ENZO FERRARI PEN This collaboration between Montblanc and Ferrari celebrates Enzo as part of the penmaker’s Great Characters series.

The metal structure is designed to evoke memories of Ferrari’s 125S engine, and further nods to the brand can be found in motifs featuring the Prancing Horse, the factory, Enzo’s mottos and his signature. The Montblanc logo is in quartz, framed by a metal grille inspired by vintage cars. This rollerball pen costs €2900 and is limited to 1898 pieces. www.store.ferrari.com

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BOOK REVIEWS

Yesterday’s Future: Concept Cars of the 1960s This digest of intriguing mid-century designs serves up a treat, from the mighthave-beens to the could-never-have-beens Reviews Nathan Chadwick

THE 1960S WAS A DECADE OF big, bold concepts that would have made The Jetsons seem backward thinking. Richard Heseltine’s book is similarly big and bold, and provides an engaging trip back to an imagined future we didn’t get.

While it is flamboyant models that never made it into production, such as the GM Firebird IV and the Bertone Lamborghini Marzal, which capture the imagination, this £45, 240-page book delves into the styling prospects that did eventually grace showrooms – albeit with a few changes.

Concepts such as the Ford Mustang II and Toyota’s Publica Sports Concept (which later became the S800, but with more conventional doors) show how useful poking the public with styling options could be, and it is interesting to note just how different things could have been.

We also learn how concepts inspired production cars, such as the Pininfarina Rondine, which impressed Fiat so much it got designer Tom Tjaarda to apply his thinking to the smaller 124 Spider.

‘Yesterday’s Future is as kaleidoscopic, entertaining and pleasing as its subject matter’

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Heseltine’s prose is insightful but entertaining and easy to follow – yes, there really was a car called a FART Break – and the stories behind some of the more peculiar cars is utterly intriguing. Take, for example, the Curtiss-Wright Model 2500, which looked a bit like a Virgil Exner restyling of a slug.

Two 180bhp Lycoming engines powered a fan in a plenum chamber that created a 15in cushion of air, and the car moved along via air bled from the chambers and out of side grilles with a distinct cheesegrater aesthetic.

Then there’s the Oldsmobile Mini-Toro – hardly a traditional concept, but still fascinating. Built to extract employees’ vehicles from snow-packed car parks in Michigan, a Toronado was shortened and adorned with a three-inch maple wood bumper wrapped in rubber. It also came with studded tyres and a jumper-cable plug in the front wing.

The stuff of bored engineers and designers actually had a use – it was still going strong as late as 1972.

While it’s great to be reacquainted with outstanding concepts from well known Italian design houses, each time you dip in you are confronted with a peculiar one-off.

With wonderfully evocative period imagery, along with a pleasingly bold use of colour, Yesterday’s Future: Concept Cars of the 1960s is as kaleidoscopic, entertaining and pleasing as its subject matter. www.porterpress.co.uk

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BOOK REVIEWS

Lola: The T70 & Can-Am Cars Painstaking research over several decades has produced an authoritative take on some of motor sport’s wildest creations Reviews Nathan Chadwick

FOR 54 YEARS, LOLA WAS ONE of the most successful racing car manufacturers in the world, let alone the UK. It produced 202 different models and more than 5000 individual cars, and its chassis could be found across the world in single-seater and GT racing.

However, it is arguably the T70 and Can-Am cars for which Lola is best known. Can-Am in particular was an era when seemingly the only rule was that there were no rules, and the unrestricted engine sizes and increasingly experimental prototypes wowed huge crowds.

Eric Broadley set about building a stable, easy-to-drive car for amateurs. The resultant T70 would be a strong force around the globe.

Gordon Jones’s 576-page, £95 book exhaustively tracks the development of the T70 over its variants and the subsequent cars Lola produced in order to take the fight to McLaren and Porsche. Yet this is no hagiography – the painful disaster of Lola’s Aston Martin tieup for an assault on the 1967 Le Mans is explained in detail. It was a horrendous year for Lola – FIA rule changes mandated that prototypes should be capped at 3.0 litres, and that 50 cars up to 5.0 litres should

‘Compelling for enthusiasts of this era; for Lola aficionados, it’s a must-have’

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be built for Group 4 homologation.

Lola took the FIA to court to prove its T70 chassis should count as one car, demonstrating that it had been designed so that owners could change back and forth between spyder and coupé bodies according to the races they entered.

In the end, the FIA allowed Lola to compete for a few more years, thus saving the company. This level of detail further illustrates the ingenuity of Broadley and his team as they battled regulators and rivals, often with scant resources – and how close Lola came to folding.

However, the best reading is in the race reports, which cover every event from 1963 to 1974. The story of the T70’s T160, T220, T260 and T310 successors is also delved into.

This book trades on detail rather than narrative firepower – it isn’t aimed at the casual motor sport fan.

That’s a good thing, and makes it all the more compelling for enthusiasts of this era of motor sport. For Lola aficionados, it’s a must-have. www.evropublishing.com

DRIVERS ON DRIVERS

PASSION FOR CARS

The controversial antics at the tail end of the 2021 Formula 1 season may have dampened your enthusiasm for motor sport, but Philip Porter’s anthology of interviews with some of the world’s finest racing drivers is a great tonic for all the toxicity.

This £30, 144-page book features drivers from across the spectrum, with the likes of Moss, Andretti, McNish and Hamilton discussing what makes them tick and their thoughts on their contemporaries. Featuring the work of Simon Taylor, David Tremayne and more, the words may not be new but having them all in one place is a good way to burnish your racing passion. www.porterpress.co.uk

Leading Citroën SM enthusiast Thierry Dehaeck’s extensive car collection goes far beyond France. This 352-page, €59 book chronicles everything from his 1939 Rolls-Royce Wraith to his 2012 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG Roadster. Add a brace of Shelby Mustang GT500KRs, a Willys Jeep and a Ferrari 365GTS/4 Daytona Spider to illustrate the breadth of Dehaeck’s passions.

It’s a quality production, with excellent studio photography and a brief history of each model.

Yet the SMs are undoubtedly the star, and for enthusiasts this book offers an in-depth look at the rare Chapron, Heuliez and Jerry Hathaway specials. www.lannoo.com

CLASSIC CAR AUCTION YEARBOOK 2020-2021 Now in its 26th year, this book is essential reading for buyers and sellers alike. Adolfo Orsi and Raffaele Gazzi’s €80, 400-page tome tracks the market trends over 5407 cars auctioned between September 2020 and August 2021.

Key performances are noted, and there’s a description of each car.

The multitude of graphs and statistics make it perhaps beyond casual readers, but this is for the better. For example, some auction houses hide pre-sale estimates, but this book has them all noted down. Something to bear in mind when you’re pitched estimates for the cars you’re buying or selling… www.classiccarauctionyearbook.com

FULL THROTTLE If the 24/7 news cycle of doom is getting you down, this new version of Sir Henry Ralph Stanley ‘Tim’ Birkin’s tales of pre-war racing exuberance will ignite the pioneer spirit. Written with the full-speedahead gusto, it was first published in 1932, and offers a fascinating first-hand impression of what it was like to be at the sharp end of motor sport in an era when safety was a laughed-at afterthought.

This new 255-page, £22.95 edition features reflections on Birkin’s life by Le Mans winner Derek Bell and a new foreword by former Brooklands Museum CEO Alan Winn. Magneto readers can get a 20 percent discount when entering promo code MAG20. www.daredevilbooks.co.uk

1975 Ferrari 365 GT4 Berlinetta Boxer London Motor Show Car

Ordered on 10th July 1975 by Maranello Concessionaires in Rosso Cordoba Metallizato for their stand at the London Motor Show to sit alongside Lauda’s F1 car.

One of 58 UK cars out of a total of 387 built. Only 1,500 miles since restoration and engine and transmission rebuild in 2016.

Comprehensive and complete history including period and more recent magazine articles on this stunning and rare car. A fantastic opportunity to acquire an immaculate and special Ferrari. Full details on my website.

SIMON DRABBLE CARS

£275,000

Tel:+44 (0)7584 243004 • Email: sd@simondrabblecars.co.uk • Visit: www.simondrabblecars.co.uk

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BOOK REVIEWS

Vanwall: The Story of Britain’s First Formula 1 Champions A classic tale of Tony Vandervell’s short but glorious foray into motor sport; a story of post-war British pluck, success and tragedy Reviews Nathan Chadwick

VANWALL MIGHT NOT BE THE first name that comes to mind when thinking of British F1 successes, with the likes of Lotus, Williams, McLaren, Cooper and BRM taking the limelight. However, it was the first British team to win the World Manufacturers’ Championship, just four years after the concern was founded.

In 1975 Denis Jenkinson and Cyril Posthumus published a deep history of Tony Vandervell’s mission to defeat the post-war Italian motor sport might of Ferrari, Maserati and Alfa, and bring British Racing Green to the forefront. This new edition is more than a reprint, however. It diligently keeps the text in its original form, with the only concessions to modernity being the welcome addition of extra paragraphs, making it easier to read.

As such, Jenkinson’s engaging prose can be felt, painting an evocative image of Vandervell’s nature. Victory at the British GP in 1957 preceded a championship win a year later, with Brooks and Moss driving; both penned forewords for this edition, in July 2021 and

‘Denis Jenkinson’s engaging prose paints an evocative image of Tony Vandervell’s nature’

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February 1975 respectively.

The insight into the team’s ascent is remarkable, but the grief following Stuart Lewis-Evans death at the 1958 Moroccan GP in a VW4 is palpably told. The loss of a driver was too much for Vandervell; little more than two months after the tragedy, the team was wound up.

As stated, this is far more than a mere reprint. Its large-scale size allows for beautiful reproduction of period images plus newly shot archive material. Doug Nye’s detailed captions provide a level of insight you’d be unlikely to find elsewhere. This 288-page book is available as a £90 classic edition limited to 1000 copies, each signed

by Nye, and as a 100-run edition signed by Nye and Tony Brooks, with a price yet to be confirmed.

For any enthusiast of this era of motor sport, it’s a must, but if you love Jenkinson’s illuminating prose, do get your order in, too. www.porterpress.co.uk

THE CONCOURS YEAR 2021 WITH HAGERTY

ED SWART: FROM ZANDVOORT TO DAYTONA

Produced by the same team who put together Magneto, this £65, 256-page hardback looks back on 2021’s leading concours and looks forward to the coming year. You’ll find the best in show and class winners from 50-plus events, and a lot more besides. There are also interviews with key players, such as Luigi Orlandini, Martin Button, Cici Muldoon and Don Williams.

There’s a reflection on the E-type in its 60th year, as well as a look at alternative events such as RADwood. An £85 Publisher’s edition with a cover printed on silk paper and a limited-edition slipcase is limited to 500 copies. www.magnetomagazine.com

Ed Swart is a legend in Historic racing, campaigning Chevrons since the mid-1970s. To European audiences he’s better known for his freewheeling antics in a works Abarth in the 1960s and early ’70s, before a brief foray in Can-Am. This beautiful book contains excellent pictures and stories as well as profiles of the tracks he drove on and the people he met.

We also learn about his work with the Bitter Automobile Co, and his experiences running three racing teams. Produced in association with Johnny Tipler, this £37.50 book is an engrossing read and an excellent package. www.coteriepress.com

INDY SPLIT

BRITAIN’S TOY CAR WARS

With F1’s interest in the US waning in the 1980s and CART attracting top international talent, it seemed possible that top-level American single-seater racing could battle F1 for supremacy. It didn’t work out that way; long story short, in 1996 the IRL was formed and a boycott of the Indy 500 saw the beginning of a long split that divided the audience during motor sport’s last great era.

With deep insider insight, John Oreovicz’s 432-page, $35 book reveals the deep acrimony and the desperate attempts to unify the sport. A fascinating read – and one F1 fans might want to read to see how bad things might get… www.octanepress.com

The battle for supremacy in the British toy market makes for a rollercoaster read that’s almost as thrilling as opening a Matchbox, Dinky or Corgi box back in the day.

Giles Chapman’s £12.99, 240-page book charts the good times and the bad with a pacey narrative.

You also get a sense of the sadness as the industry entered its late-1970s lean period; memorably Dinky employees were given one hour’s notice, and promptly refused to leave the site for four months. Chapman’s book isn’t perfect, but the shots of old box covers will surely bring back fond memories of carpet Grands Prix.

Its price only adds to the allure. www.thehistorypress.co.uk

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Legal advice

Words Clive Robertson, solicitor, Healys LLP

www.healys.com +44 (0)7768 997439

Watertight warranties Buying and selling classics can be fraught with pitfalls.

Whichever role you are playing, a specific contract will help protect you from potential problems

“MIURA, PRODUCTION NO. 24, P400 Thin Chassis, Rosso Miura.

Registered June 28, 1967… to trader Clive Robertson who registered RPE 976E.” So reads an extract from Kidston SA’s Lamborghini Miura Register. While I was never a trader, the intriguing tale remains to be told.

A US friend mailed to me a page cut from a hot rod magazine. “Miura for sale,” it said, with a Belgium address.

My curiosity piqued, I posted a short letter of enquiry. Two months later, my wife left a note with my office to the effect that I should call a Belgian number about a Lamborghini. The caller spoke almost no English, but with my schoolboy French we fixed an appointment. Sporting the requested suit, carnation, umbrella and a copy of The Times, and feeling not a little foolish, I was met in Arrivals by a slightly Falstaffian gentleman who appeared to be enjoying the product of his sartorial directions.

After introductions, we left for a restaurant; en route, I was informed that if I liked the car, then fine; if not we would, at least, have had a good lunch. Later we arrived at a remote property. As we entered a white-tiled garage my host, with a flourish, pulled off the dust cover, revealing the Miura in super-cool 1960s orange.

Then 22 years old, the car appeared to be new in every respect, as shown by the 9000km odometer reading.

After a brief inspection, it was time to fire up the engine. A glorious, angry, dramatic cacophony erupted.

My host turned out to be the executor of the first owner’s estate. A leading light of the Belgian wholesale

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meat industry, this owner decided to go directly from the abattoir to the Brussels Motor Show opening day to order a new 911. On approaching the Porsche stand, and before uttering a word, he was directed to VW’s stand.

Deeply insulted, he sought out the show’s most expensive exhibit; no.

24, on the Lamborghini stand. Upon being told it was one-off needed for publicity purposes and was not for sale, he proffered a blank cheque… and marched back to the Porsche stand armed with the receipt.

No. 24 was duly delivered, yet after a short drive the owner declared himself terrified of it. The Miura was hence fettled monthly by a local mechanic, and driven sufficient kilometres to bring the engine oil to its full temperature.

On agreeing the basic terms, I instructed my solicitor to prepare a comprehensive contract, paying particular attention to the further problems attendant upon a purchase in another jurisdiction... Actually, I did no such thing, relying instead upon a simple receipt. In my defence, I plead two mitigating factors: prices were then comparatively low, and I was all but buying from the first owner.

Whatever the price and ownership profile, how should collectors look after their best interests? A sale-andpurchase agreement is the clear starting point. Every contract will contain the terms agreed, so no two will ever be the same. That said, certain minimum requirements are needed to protect all parties’ interests.

First, the vehicle must be identified by make, model and year. The VIN,

ABOVE Clive’s Miura purchase was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but should he have secured a contract? or chassis and engine numbers matching or not, should be recorded, as well as the registration number.

The prudent will have commissioned an independent inspection with instructions to verify the declared description. While this may seem self-evident, I have witnessed many a transaction made more difficult whereby inspection has been by the seller or a connected party. The saleand-purchase agreement will set out the title of ownership, and delivery will pass upon payment of the agreed price. Many transactions proceed on the basis that a deposit – typically ten percent – will be paid, with the balance payable later, at which point title and so forth will pass.

There are also the warranties to be considered. The seller – individual or company – is obliged to declare that they are authorised to sell the vehicle and will comply with the seller’s obligations in the contract.

The buyer will be given clear title at completion, so that there can be no third-party claims arising from any

‘If either party can establish that a warranty has been breached, the miscreant will be deemed to be liable’

lending or tax obligations of the seller.

The seller must also state that the description of the vehicle is correct and not in any way misleading. Of paramount importance is the buyer’s acceptance that the car is sold ‘as seen’ and that the seller gives no assurances as to its condition. The burden of determining said condition passes to the buyer, who is therefore obliged to carry out all necessary investigations. Don’t underestimate the importance of a warranty; if either party can establish its breach, the miscreant will be deemed to be liable with little or no further enquiry.

On occasion, more often than not, when high-value or rare cars are the subject of a sale-and-purchase agreement, the parties will agree to keep the contract terms confidential.

Lastly, most agreements specify that in the event of a dispute, the English courts will have exclusive jurisdiction. Such a provision is beneficial for UK residents, because the stress of having to deal in another jurisdiction and probably in another language is avoided. Many non-UK residents and companies are often comfortable with the English courts, which are regarded as fair, competent and reliable.

I was recently consulted by one of the parties in connection with the sale of a Ferrari F40 for £1.1 millionplus. After a number of exchanges, it was decided that a contract was not necessary. Yes, most transactions successfully conclude without being evidenced in writing – but in the event of a dispute, the lawyers will have much more work to undertake.

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Words Robert Dean

Abu Dhabi adventure

think he might have been getting his own back for my joke), so I had to sleep on the fold-down seats or sit in the cockpit jump seat. Needless to say I got no sleep, and we arrived in the early hours to unload the cars. I had been assured that a covered transporter had been arranged – instead of which there were 12 ropey flat-bed recovery trucks lined up.

Oh well, at least we had a police escort – and I had been assured that one or two of the trucks wouldn’t disappear on route. Our bizarre convoy finally wound its way out of the airport and through the earlymorning streets to the wondrous Palace Hotel. So far, so good.

The trucks were not allowed up to the hotel entrance, so we unloaded them in a car park. I was then towed in each car up the driveway, where I positioned them out of the way against a wall. All was going well, until an imposing gentleman wafted over and told me I couldn’t park there because the area was reserved for the Royal cars. I replied that since His Highness had invited us, I was sure it would be okay just for a while.

The situation became 100 times worse when I went inside to see how the staging was going, only to see the carpenters sitting around the atrium drinking tea. They told me that during the day they’d been told to stop work because of the noise, and then when they started in the evening the night staff had also told them to stop, again because of the noise. By now the sun was starting to rise, along with the outside temperature, and my patience was on the ebb.

My contact was unavailable either on the phone or in person (probably sensibly in bed), but I found someone in charge who acknowledged my predicament. He was very apologetic and said we could continue building the staging – but no sooner had we started than someone else came and said we had to stop... Finally I just told the guys to keep going, but to be as quiet as possible and point in my direction anyone who asked.

I now had the problem of the cars sitting in the day’s blistering heat,

Organising a display of 12 priceless historic Formula 1 race cars in the United Arab Emirates – how hard can it be? Very...

IN 2009 I WAS ASKED BY MR Ecclestone to arrange for 12 classic Formula 1 race cars to be displayed for six weeks at Abu Dhabi’s Emirates Palace Hotel. I picked a dozen, ranging from the Bugatti T54 to the 1988 Ferrari 188, and started planning.

The first thing to work out was how to get millions of pounds’ worth of cars overseas without attracting too much attention. I decided that the safest, most expedient way was to fly everything out. Each car could go on a JAL pallet, which would all just about fit in the cargo plane. My preferred transport company was CARS Europe. It collected the cars and delivered them to Stansted, where they were strapped onto the pallets, plus also took care of all the paperwork. I arrived a few days later and watched the cars being loaded.

The terrifically nice load-master worked out where each pallet was to go in the hold to enable the best weight distribution. It was a long process, and he kept saying how we were only just going to get everything onto the plane. He and I watched the last pallet being slotted into place with inches to spare, and then I said: “Well, that’s great; just one more to get on!” “What do you mean one more?” he gasped, wearing a priceless look of horror as he realised the past four hours had been wasted. Ha ha – I was only kidding; there wasn’t another car! We had a laugh, after the customary barrage of industrial language. I think he might even have chased me round the plane, as only a consummate professional would do.

I’d elected to go with the cars. I found that travelling on an Etihad cargo plane is really uncomfortable; it was noisy and there were only two sleeping pallets. The engineer took one and the load-master the other (I

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RIGHT The heat is on; the GP cars lined up in the blistering sun while logistical issues were addressed.

and the paint on the Brabham BT44 did in fact start to blister. I was told they were not allowed inside because they’d get in the clients’ way, and at every turn the builders were being stopped from making the staging.

Finally I met up with my contact and demanded to see the hotel’s highest authority, who came out with three or four other people. By now I had been awake for 32 hours, I was filthy – really filthy – and I hadn’t eaten or been offered any refreshment in all the time I’d been there. I’m afraid I lost my temper.

I told them that if I didn’t get some help and co-operation, I was going to load the cars back onto the trucks and take them to the airport. From there, l’d phone Mr Ecclestone and ask him to tell His Highness why there would be no display of cars in his beautiful hotel, and the managers would have to answer to His Highness over that question. I then turned and left, to attempt to get cleaned up.

When I returned, my contact took me aside. He was laughing as he told me he’d never seen a reaction like it from the hotel managers. Everything was now in full swing, and I was welcome to bring in the cars… Even a small tray of tea arrived: luxury!

‘I was filthy, and I’d been offered no refreshment in all the time I’d been there. I’m afraid I lost my temper’

Cue the next issue; the hotel’s side doors were a standard double setup, and while the front-engined cars would just go through, the 1970s and ’80s examples would not. Luckily I’d brought my big trolley jack, and so each car had to have the rear (and sometimes the front) wheels removed before being manhandled, on the jack, into the atrium. However, after the first three cars it was discovered that my jack was marking the stunning marble floor. After that, once each car was through the doors, the jack was removed and it was pushed on its own wheels. Imagine manoeuvring a 1970s F1 car through a hotel with two-foot-wide tyres each side.

By about 9pm, all was in place and the final touches completed. I had been up for over 48 hours, had not eaten and was still filthy. The next day I went to check on everything before leaving for the airport, but this time I was clean and wearing a white linen suit. No one recognised me until I explained who I was.

The flight home was in the palatial luxury of Etihad Business Class, and I have to say if I had the money that’s how I’d always fly. The juxtaposition between arrival and departure was a bit extreme, though. Six weeks later I again flew Business Class back to Abu Dhabi, and my contact there had arranged everything so splendidly, I hardly had to lift a finger. Did I return home on the cargo plane? No, I didn’t – I’m not mad, you know.

Make the machinery part of your world, but don’t let it take over.

Former Ecclestone Collection manager Robert now runs Curated Vehicle Management. See www.c-v-m.co.uk.

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Historic racing

Words Sam Hancock

Learning the importance of race craft

A FREQUENTLY OVERLOOKED element of driver coaching in Historic racing is the development of race craft. You can spend countless test days pounding around in pursuit of faster lap times only to find that, during a race weekend, the proximity of other cars renders you unable to deploy your new-found speed.

Sometimes an entire event can be ruined by an inability to find a way past cars that may even be lapping a second or more slower than the times you know you can achieve if only the road ahead were clear. For some drivers the frustration of situations such as this can build pretty quickly and trigger late, desperate overtaking attempts that result in contact and possible retirement.

Surprisingly, aggressors in such conflicts are often convinced of their innocence. “I was so much faster than him and he just turned in on me!” is an oft-repeated explanation.

Unaware of the rules of combat, and ill-equipped with sufficient race craft, this is an understandable – if entirely incorrect – reading of events.

So just what are the rules of combat? Whatever the debate in Formula 1 these days, in the amateur environment of Historics you can simply assume that, when overtaking, your front wheels should be fully adjacent to those of your rival by the time she or he turns into the corner at their normal entry point. In short: you must be visible!

Expectations of the driver under attack to accommodate your inner

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BRANDS HATCH

It always pays to be polite, even when the red mist descends. Here’s how to hone your etiquette during the hardest of manoeuvres

Max Verstappen by leaving you a car’s width on the apex – or to even turn away from the corner when surprised by your sudden arrival – are by no means an entitlement you should rely on, and are entirely at the discretion of the leading driver.

We may frequently see such selfpreservation manoeuvres from Lewis Hamilton when under fire from Max, but these are the instincts of a savvy seven-time World Champion playing a long game, and cannot be expected of your average Historics competitor.

When it comes to defending, similar ethics are at play. Despite the example set by drivers at the pinnacle of motor sport, weaving is not ‘on’. Neither is forcing your rival off the road, nor deploying that most reprehensible of defensive tactics: moving within the braking zone.

This is when the defending driver makes a deliberately late ‘lane change’ to block the attacking driver’s move at the exact moment the latter commits to it. When you hear Martin Brundle mention the potential for “aeroplane crashes” in his Formula 1 commentary, these are usually the tactics he is referring to.

But the topic of race craft and racing etiquette is not so black and white as to be easily summarised in one brief column. It is far more nuanced and, as evidenced by one look at social media after a Grand Prix, quite subjective.

I believe that Stirling Moss detested all forms of defensive

driving and felt strongly that it should not be allowed. Given the perils faced by drivers of his era, I can understand the sentiment – and I think some people in Historics today would agree. After all, the cars are hardly safer now than they would have been in period, and while many circuits we compete on are certainly less dangerous than they once might have been, some, such as Goodwood, remain largely unchanged. “Oldfashioned cars,” the saying goes, “have old-fashioned accidents.”

My personal opinion is that it is perfectly acceptable to defend your position robustly by blocking the inside line, forcing your rival to either try around the outside, or simply wait for another opportunity. But you should make your intentions clear by picking a ‘lane’ early – well before the braking point – and stick to it.

Once ‘door handle to door handle’ it is important to give as much space as possible, but special consideration is required for those unique characteristics of older Historic race cars. Younger machinery, blessed with downforce and slicks, may have

‘The topic of race craft and racing etiquette is not black and white; it is nuanced and quite subjective’

ABOVE Practising good overtaking ethics keeps the field safer and more exciting for everyone concerned. the ability to hold a tighter line throughout the entirety of a turn in order to run parallel with a rival, but it is less likely that an earlier pre-’66 GT car, for example, will be able to.

Older cars will often require the full track width on the corner exit to simply remain pointing in the correct direction – especially if entering the corner from a defensive inside line. As the attacking driver coming from behind, it is your responsibility to factor in this significant ‘drift factor’ before drawing alongside.

So how best to practice these techniques and learn the nuances of acceptable racing etiquette without falling foul of the race director? Well, in addition to using onboard video to run detailed post-race analysis with your coach, the best advice I can offer is to get into a kart (for coaching, I can recommend the services of my brother Ollie Hancock at www.olliehancock.com/karting).

Even a few head-to-head track sessions, role-playing various battle scenarios, teaching you how to overtake and how to defend, will see your race craft improve substantially.

And if you’re inclined to take the next step and enter a few races, you can rest assured that members of the karting community will teach you everything they know within a few corners of the very first lap.

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Behind the legend

Words Nathan Chadwick

Daring dream that went up in smoke

THE PHRASE ‘RACE CAR FOR the road’ has been much abused over the years, often as an excuse as to why NVH was deemed less important during development than the blend of coffee in the factory canteen.

The Schuppan 962LM was a true racing car for the road, however. No, really; not only would it look, sound and go like an endurance racer, but the development mule had genuine racing pedigree. The only problem is that a race car for the road of this calibre is still a racing car, with a racing-car temperament.

Chassis 962-123 was originally intended for Henn, but it ended up being part of Holbert Racing’s sevenstrong line-up, and it used a Kevin Jeanette-built engine from Gunnar Racing. It competed in IMSA in 1987, with Elliott Forbes-Robinson and Chris Kneifel largely taking racing duties. The highlight was third place at the Sebring 12 Hours.

Vern Schuppan bought the car for the 1988 assault on the Japanese Sportscar Championship, where it competed in Takefuji livery with Derek Bell and Brian Redman at the wheel. It was also driven by Price Cobb and Kenny Acheson in Omron livery, and would finish third in the championship. In addition, it would sport Rothmans livery for Maurizio Sala and Eje Elgh for lease events, and compete at Le Mans in 1988 under the Takefuji Schuppan Racing

Team banner, with Redman, Elgh and Jean-Pierre Jarier steering it to tenth.

Chassis 962-123 would not have a quiet retirement, however. In 1991 it was pressed into service as the mule for the 962LM project. The sole issue was getting a test driver whom the insurers deemed worthy enough.

As you’ll have read in our 962CR article on page 124, Howden Ganley had been getting ever more involved in the project. Vern’s focus being pulled in the direction of the business at large, as well as campaigning the race team around the world, Howden’s experience as a racing driver, including stints in F1 at BRM, Williams and March, meant the insurance company deemed him to be a more-than-suitable driver.

However, it didn’t quite go to plan for the car, Howden or the insurer in what, retrospectively, could be seen as a portent of things to come for the entire project.

“When Vern wasn’t available for driving I’d get the odd call. I had to go up to MIRA or Bruntingthorpe to

‘Suddenly I was aware of flames burning my elbow.

I thought, I’d better get out of here’

MOTORSPORTIMAGES

Schuppan had big ideas for its 962LM supercar – but thanks to a broken fuel fitting, fate had other plans for this ultimate race car for the road

ABOVE Chassis 962-123’s racing glory years came to an ignominious end on a motorway near Coventry. test the car, or drive it there or back,” explains Howden. “When I wasn’t playing golf, I was happy to do it.”

He had been asked to drive the car back from MIRA to the factory.

“I’d just half-filled it with petrol, and was heading uphill on one of the motorways around Coventry – that’s when I felt a misfire,” Howden recalls. “I checked the dials, and then I looked in the mirror; all I could see were flames pouring out of the radiator exit duct – I thought, ah, I’ve got a problem.”

This would eventually be tracked down to the fitting at the end of the fuel line snapping, which then sent highly pressurised petrol all over the engine bay. It was common with 962s, and a hangover from the car’s racing past would present the next issue.

“Suddenly I was aware of flames burning my right elbow. I thought, I’d better get out of here,” says

Howden. “At the time the LM still had the cord that ran along the door [as in the racing cars]. I pulled this and the door wouldn’t open. Again I thought, I’ve got a problem here.”

He eventually got out “before my elbow got too badly singed”, but despite triggering the extinguishers he could only sit and watch while fire entirely destroyed the car.

“The insurance firm thought we’d set fire to it deliberately, so it sent around an investigator,” Howden recalls. “He went through it all and didn’t find anything wrong, so the company agreed to pay.”

Howden found himself roped in to go to the insurer’s head office and collect the cheque. “I got to the desk and they said: ‘Oh yes, you have to wait, the MD wants to talk to you.’

“I thought, uh-oh, we’re not going to get the money. Eventually a gent came down and gave me an envelope.

He said: ‘I just wanted to shake the hand of the man who burned down a £250,000 road car – it’s the most we’ve ever paid out for a car.’”

Magneto (ISSN No: 2631-9489, USPS number 22830) is published four times a year – in February, May, August and November – by Hothouse Publishing Ltd, UK. Magneto is distributed in the US by RRD/Spatial, 1250 Valley Brook Ave, Lyndhurst NJ 07071. Periodicals postage paid at South Hackensack NJ and other additional entry offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Magneto c/o RRD, 1250 Valley Brook Ave, Lyndhurst NJ 07071.

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CALIBER RM 67-01

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