Trawling the Archives.

[wombat666]

Decided to try running the massive number of ancient B&W negatives I've had stashed away for decades, as well as several boxes of 35MM Colour slides discovered in my parents house through an elderly scanner.
Some of slides are less than good, and most of the B&W negs are scruffy, but there are enough interesting shots to persist.

This must have been just a little bit of a handful to keep between the lines, a Lotus 24 with a neat installation of a 289ci Ford replacing the 91ci Climax!

Not a great scan but interesting to re-discover this Lotus 40 at the same British 'Club Event'.
This must have been between 1980 and 1982 when I did exchange duty in the UK and on occasions with NATO.
My 'English Rose' GF was a Porsche Club 'Racer' and dragged (not really!) me along to several events, including this one at some dreary former airfield.
Flat as a biscuit and primitive it might have been, but the variety of machinery was huge.
More to follow if interested.

 

[wombat666]

The label says it all!
A Mini Cooper loaded with a B-O-P Buick V8, not a really big engine but fierce in such a small package.
And IIRC it was rear engined!
I think (only think) the front bay carried a lot of cooling along with the drive train, as it remained front wheel drive.
It must have under-steered like a greased pig.



Correction, after finding a few scruffy images it had ALL the radiators and ancillaries in the rear, with the engine shoehorned into the front bay and part of the passenger space!

 

[noddy]

Holy cow, surprised it didn't up on its back wheels!!

Look forward to seeing more

 

[wombat666]

The legendary Peter Brock driving the equally legendary HDT Torana LJ202.
Shame his venture into open wheel racing was abandoned under orders from the HDT management, 'Peter Perfect' was arguably the very best Australian driver of all.

I owned an XU-1 LJ202 and loved it, the original Holden Torana started life as a rebadged Vauhall Viva and evolved over several years .......... the XU-1 LJ202 was a 'Bathurst Special', sold off the showroom floor virtually ready to race, 202ci straight six with triple carbs, heavy duty gearbox, big discs, race suspension, the whole 9 yards! Just over A$3000.00 in 1972, as the ATCC required a minimum of 1000 cars built and sold through dealerships to be eligible for the series, including Bathurst, with the retail price dictating the class.
And it looked good as well, I avoided the standard colors (I think they were 'Plum Dinger' - 'Burple Purple' - 'Lime Green' - 'Banana Yellow'-all very 1970s Acid Trips) and paid extra for Pearl White with no go-faster stripes.
I still managed to get busted for speeding on a regular basis just the same!

Small cars like Corollas were Class A, Cortinas and Escorts were Class B, the XU-1 and E49 Charger came in as class C while more expensive vehicles like the Alfa GTV 2000 and Falcon GT HO Phase 3 filled Class D.
A slightly unusual method of sorting out the field but it worked, that aside, the XU-1 and E49 Charger were a steal at A$3000.00 plus loose change, as the Charger was fitted with triple DCOE Webers which were worth almost the same as the complete car!

 

[wombat666]

Another 'Peter Perfect' classic, aboard his own creation 'The Beast', used for Rallycross and Sports Sedan events.
The original XU-1 LC186 appeared in 1970, powered by the GMH 186ci six and not quite as raw a race car as the later LJ202, but a very horsey little car and very competitive.
'The Beast' was turbocharged and carried its cooling system in the boot, and set 'Brockie' on his winning career path.
Equally at home as seen here in Calder Raceways 'Mud Patch' or around Sandown Parks very fast bitumen, this was typical Peter Brock 'engineering', his first serious and successful effort being an Austen A35 with an earlier GMH 6 stuffed into the engine bay.
IIRC the shot dates from early 1970.