Works Spitfires
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Posts posted by Works Spitfires
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I like this picture of my mate, and his then girlfriend stood next to my TR5. The print got water damaged when our garage roof leaked, and as a result it makes the picture look ancient (it was actually taken in the early 80's).
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We have done thousands of motorway miles in our Atlas's (Atlas'i?). Our van was 'uprated' sometime earlier in its life with a 1147 engine, and I changed the diff ratio for a 4.11. It was this van that we nearly managed to complete a RBRR a few years ago (knackered halfshaft bearing 100 miles before the finish). It pulls 60mph on the motorway no problem.
We built a 1660 engine for our camper (offset ground crank, TR6 pistons, federal head), changed the diff ratio to 4.11, and added overdrive. That cruises at 65-70mph on the motorway. We go away in it at least a couple of times a year, and it has been to Cornwall several times, Northumberland, Wales, etc.
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On 13/03/2022 at 13:28, MK2 Ed said:
I think you're right Mike, whoever took it on had continued the transformation. Hope it's still around.
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18 hours ago, clive said:
Thread drift...
I have been disappointed with driving stags. Feels like you have to trash them to get them to move fairl quick (same experience with a 5 litre Mustang, that had to be revved to 7k, and nevre felt rapid. Spoiler alert, 0-60 well under 5 seconds..... 0-100 about 10, all in Death Valley)
However, if I didn't have my spitfire and Dolomite, I would look to a stag as a good all rounder. It would need a bit more power/torque though...
And yes, my mag arrived today. It has a life expectancy of days before hitting the recycling.....
Clive. I am surprised at your experience with driving Stags. I have found that a well tuned bog standard Stag should pull like a train. I remember reading the Motor magazine back in the early 80's (even though the Stag out of production by then) when they still listed the Stags performance figures in the back alongside all the other cars available then. The overtaking figures were simply amazing, and beating all sorts of current (1980's) exotica.
My experience based on owning them, and driving customers examples since they were nearly new is a lot of things conspire to dull there performance, including diff ratio changes, poorly tuned carbs, and dodgy 'modifications', amongst others.
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23 hours ago, Mike Costigan said:
Leaving the rally stage for a bit of circuit racing in this post.
Here's ADU 2B and its 2000 tow-car in the square at Chatres-sur-le-Loire prior to the 1965 Le Mans race:
ADU 4B in the pits during the 1965 Sebring 24-hour Race:
and ADU 2B again, lifting a wheel during the 1966 Nurburgring 1000km Race:
No tuck under on 2B's lifted rear wheel. I'll ask Bill (Bill Bradley)when he next pops in to see progress, but I think by this time (1966 Nurburgring) it had its Chapman strut type rear suspension.
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1 hour ago, Colin Lindsay said:
Thanks! much appreciated, even if I never take it any further than idle curiosity. I just like the look.
Here you go. Bracket welded to top side of tube, which is normally hidden when valance fitted (which it isn't here as you can see). I think if you simply bolted the spots through the tube they would poke through the valance too much, The brackets bring the spots back about a 1 1/2".
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1 hour ago, Colin Lindsay said:
Lovely. How are the spotlamps attached in behind the valence? Am I correct that they're just upside down and the stem is attached to the front cross tube?
Colin. Its been a few years since I last looked. I'll take a picture for you later.
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13 minutes ago, RogerH said:
Is the Herald Coupe being brought back to life?
Please say yes.
Roger
I got most of the way there a few years ago, but a dodgy repro front wing halted my progress (I have found an original OE one since), and it's sat waiting in the restoration queue since. Most recent picture here;
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On 20/02/2022 at 09:46, Mike Costigan said:
Spitfires for you today, all from the 1964 Tour de France when Rob Slotemaker and Terry Hunter won the 1300cc GT Class in ADU 7B, much to the joy of the French Distributors, and the dismay of the French Alpine team who thought they had their name on the trophy!
So first of all, one of the Alpine team driven by Cheinesse and le Blond leading Jean-Jacques Thunier and John Gretener in ADU 5B, both about to be gobbled up by the Ferrari 250GT Lusso of Muller and Walter:
Thuner and Gretener would retire with a blown engine towards the end of the event:
Although suffering from a split fuel tank on the last day, Slotemaker and Hunter survived to win the class, finishing tenth overall in the GT Category behind Ferraris, Porsches and an Alfa Romeo:
Mike. Nice. I took this picture of 5B next to TL5 (8166DU) a few years ago.
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On 18/02/2022 at 17:52, Mike Costigan said:
As promised, the next selection all show the Tiny Lewis entry in the 1960 RAC Rally.
The photographic evidence shows the car carrying the TL 5 registration number, but when I spoke to Ian Lewis back in the early 1990s he was insistent that there was only ever one Herald that carried that number, his coffee and white early 1959 car. Ken Richardson's notes identified a car registered 8166 DU as being prepared by the Competition Department for that RAC Rally but that number does not appear in any photograph of the event. My conclusion was that the Lewis car must have developed a major fault just before the rally, and 8166 DU - a ribbed-roof white car - was hastily substituted using the TL 5 identity. 8166 DU is a registration in the middle of a batch of Canley-registered cars which were sold to Americans with these temporary UK numbers so that the new owners could enjoy a European holiday whilst collecting their new car. These registration records survive - I now forget which organisation holds them - but significantly 8166 is missing...
The first shot shows the car at the Wolvey Skid Pan:
Next, in the paddock at Brands Hatch:
and lastly on an unidentified test:
Mike Many thanks for the above. I have attached a picture of the car after I reinstated the through the valance 576's, and the RMS576 on the roof.
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16 hours ago, Mike Costigan said:
There's lots more, this has only scratched the surface!
Any of the car I bought from you?
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On 14/01/2022 at 17:11, Josef said:
I’ve read somewhere that the bonnet catches were coated in a wax before fitting, painted over and then the wax and paint was scraped off. By the final Spitfires they’d stopped bothering with the scraping off part. Can’t remember the source of this though… But it would fit with the appearance of the photo.
It was a green plastic film that was easily pealed off after painting. We still have some NOS bonnet catches somewhere with it on.
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Our 59 Herald as far as I can tell has all its original ignition components apart from spark plugs.
However for last years RBRR we fitted all NOS ignition components to our GT6 apart from one of those fancy red rotor arms, and a set of new off the shelf Champions. The NOS condenser, contact set, and the rotor arm all failed one after the other.
If it aint broke don't fix it!
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They were pressed in one of the workshops on site so there was never a problem with monitoring fit, especially as we were probably using more than most back when we were supplying complete overdrive conversions.
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We have sourced our clutches from the same supplier now for over ten years, never a problem.
However we did occasionally have issues with well known branded types back in the day. All resolved by the manufacture, but problems never the less.
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2 hours ago, Pete Lewis said:
brilliant when a long plan comes to roost
Pete
I have been racking my brain trying to remember what else we sold him thirty years ago that we should be thinking of buying back off him.
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This is Richard Symonds (ex Classic Components)
We sold him some of that stuff back in the 90's. That stilage full of green SD1 steering wheels came from a deal JK did with BL (or Unipart) when they were clearing Canley. JK bought about four lorry loads of stuff, some of which later ended up with Richard.
Amongst some stuff I sold Richard were half a dozen cardinal red l/h 2000 MKII early pattern half cloth seats. Thinking who's ever going to need those I let him have them cheap to get rid. Scroll forward some decades to last year, and I'm restoring an important saloon that needs guess what? On the off chance I give Dicky a call, and he still has them, and better still he sells them back to me for what he paid me for them all those years ago on the condition that I buy them all back!
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On 06/12/2020 at 15:46, Bfg said:
, nor was there any other external access to the behind-the-seats interior of the car - That being unnecessary because these cars were not used for rallying ..and so carrying a spare was unnecessary. All that was within the fastback space would have been the roll cage and the fuel tank.
Cheers.
No there was always access to a spare wheel, and they were always carried. The circuit cars had a hinged flap in the rear valance, and the rally cars had a hinged flap in the roof below the rear windoiw.
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On 06/12/2020 at 10:53, Bfg said:
So they were actually racing 1256cc Spitfires with a fastback (by Harrington perhaps ? ) at Le Mans, rather than GT6's (no bonnet bulge / six cylinder) ?
No the factory circuit cars were only ever 1147cc.
However Bill Bradley did go on to race some of these ex factory cars with 1296cc engine's, and in one case a prototype 1493cc.
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On 06/12/2020 at 10:20, Colin Lindsay said:
Those wheels (magnesium?) would be worth a fortune today, or at least the modern versions as the originals would probably be beyond use due to corrosion and ageing.
We (Bill Bradley and myself) regularly have these original magnesium wheels professionally inspected (X ray), and to date only two have failed, but still deemed safe as spares.
Not bad from five sets (4 x 4 1/2" sets, and one set of 5 1/2").
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On 09/10/2020 at 18:59, thescrapman said:
20 odd years ago when I was shifting lots of spares on Ebay I sold quite a few bits to Japan.
One buyer had the same name as an F1 driver, Nakajima possibly, always wondered if it was one and the same.
He had a Spitfire.
There are quite a few Triumphs in Japan, jus tvonly owned by proper enthusiasts who are willing to pay the price of having a proper car!
Kozo is it? He had some bits for his Spitfire MKIII recently from us.
Period Photos of Triumphs
in General
Posted
Mike is this the same Register that is now maintained by Bill Davies?