The Super Hugger - AJ Rivers Simoniz Chevrolet Camaro Z28 Replica

While I was whizzing up to Castle Combe in the teaming rain a couple of weeks ago, I went flying past a rumbling cloud of spray that turned out to be this Chevrolet Camaro once owned by former saloon car driver and race team owner Richard Lloyd.



It turns out the wide tyres were having trouble cutting through the water lying on the motorway and the Chevy was aquaplaning at speeds far lower than those I was travelling at in my borrowed Kia Picante with skinny tyres.



This is an early second generation 1970 Camaro,



fitted with a 5700cc / 350 cui V8 rated at 360 hp as part of the



Z28 performance package, a peak in the story of muscle car performance which with the onset of the 1973 fuel crisis would never be matched in the remainder of the 20th century.



The Chevrolet Camaro Z28 had a successful career in British Saloon Car racing, Frank Gardner used one to win the 1973 British Saloon car championship outright.



For 1974 the British Saloon Car Championship was open to vehicles in a much lower state of tune known as Group 1 regulations and several Camaro's and one Plymouth Barracuda fought for top class honours, some of the Chevy's including one run by Richard Lloyd, if I remember correctly, ran with either a 7 litre / 427 cui or a 7.4 litre 451 cui motor.



Back in 1973 while Richard was still running his car with a 5.7 litre / 350 cui motor he was scheduled to run in an event called the Avon Tour of Britain, that went round the entire country taking in races at many of the best circuits, rally stages and even a drag strip.



Richard fell ill prior to the event so he drafted in his team mate from the Spa 24 hours, up and coming British Grand Prix driver, James Hunt into the Simoniz Camaro at the last minute, James promptly ended up walking away with the victors trophy.



The car seen here is a replica of Richard's AJ Rivers entered car that was built up for the 2005 Tour Britannia a mini Avon Tour of Britain for mostly historic vehicles.



Richard and his former entrant Alan Rivers competed in the Tour Britania from 2005 - 2007, but in 2008 Richard lost his life in a tragic plane crash that claimed the lives of several other well known figures from British Motorsport.



In memory of his friend Alan Rivers used the car one last time in the 2008 Tour Britania, before it was acquired by Stuart Scott and Steve Wood.



Stuart and Steve have entered this vehicle in every Tour Britannia since,



clocking class wins in 2010 and 2011.



Stuart hopes to take the Camaro to the Historic Festival at Lime Rock CT in September.

Thanks for joining me onto day's Z28 edition of 'Gettin' a lil psycho on tyres', I hope you'll join me again tomorrow when I'll be going Dutch. Don't forget to come back now !

'Fury' Returns - Ferrari 312 B3 #010

The first time I saw and heard a Ferrari racing in anger was on March 17th, 1974, in the Race of Champions at Brands Hatch. The day started out extremely wet and grey by the time a school friend, his parents and I had made it from the car park to the spectator enclosure we were all soaked through to the skin, with in minuets the cars filtered out of the pit lane opposite and there they were, two bright red Ferrari's almost luminescent in the rain drenched gloom with a delightful throaty musical noise emanating from their 3 litre / 183 cui 312 flat 12 motors.



A couple of weeks ago when I found myself in front of one of those very same Ferrari 312 B3's, at Goodwood, the contrast in the weather could not have been greater, but my absolute joy at the sight of it was not in the least diminished, even though this time the car made no sound as it was pushed into it's allotted spot in the Goodwood paddock.



The Ferrari 312 B3 was never going to win any awards for beauty if it looks like it was designed by committee, that is because it was.



In 1972 designer Mauro 'Fury' Forghieri built an experimental Grand Prix car in which he had tried to arrange all the cars ancillary components, oil tanks and coolers, as close to the centre of gravity of his new design as possible. The vehicle known as the 'Snow Plough' was extensively tested but the handling proved to be too nervous to ever be entered in a race.



Mid way through 1972 Mr Ferrari was not well and took some time off from the day to day running of his company and Mauro Forghieri, under pressure from FIAT executives in Turin found himself dropped from the team designing the 1973 Ferrari Grand Prix challenger which was eventually designed by Franco Rocchi Giacomo Caliri under the direction of FIAT's Stefano Colombo.



The 1973 Ferrari 312 B3 featured Ferrari's first ever aluminium monocoque chassis which, in another Ferrari first, was manufactured by Thompson in England. The engine was used as a stressed member of the chassis following a lead set by Colin Chapman in 1967 with the Lotus 49 which used the Ford Cosworth DFV as a stressed member of the chassis, thus saving the considerable weight otherwise necessitated by an engine subframe.



The long wide and low 1973 312 B3 including chassis #010 seen here were not a great success and upon his return to work in the summer of 1973 Mr Ferrari withdrew his cars from Grand Prix racing for several races and recalled Mauro Forghieri from his duties at the Fiorano test track and tasked him with making the 1973 car more competitive.



'Fury' as Forghieri was allegedly nick named applied all of the lessons learned from the 'snow plough' project to the large 1973 B3 chassis mounting long thin inclined radiators behind the front wheels and oil tank ahead of the rear wheel to reduce the polar moment of inertia in an effort to improve the cars handling.



Upon their return to the track the reconfigured cars were not any more competitive but over the winter of 1973/74 with the arrival of Niki Lauda the cars were extensively tested and refined into a much more competitive proposition for the 1974 season.



For 1974 the 312 B3's appeared with completely reworked interim bodies that featured tall air boxes as pioneered by future Ferrari designer Dr Harvey Postlethwaite on James Hunt's #27 Hesketh March 731.



With future Ferrari President Luca di Montezemolo now heading the racing team management the revamped cars showed an immediate and consistent improvement in qualifying and in the races.



Chassis #010 shown here was qualified 3rd in the hands of Niki Lauda at Brands Hatch for the non championship Race of Champions. Niki led during the early stages of the race but in a twist of irony he was over taken in a breath taking move on the outside of Paddock Bend by this chassis former incumbent Jacky Ickx who drove a Lotus 72 during the 1974 season.



A couple of races later in Spain Niki Lauda won his first Grand Prix in a newer 312 B3 chassis with the definitive bodywork of the type worn by chassis #010 at Goodwood.

Lauda finished 4th in the 1974 season World Drivers Championship while more experienced team mate
Clay Regazzoni was in contention for the championship right until the last race of the season when he was piped to the post by Emerson Fittipaldi in a McLaren.

My thanks to Aardy at Ferrari Chat for confirming the chassis number.

Thanks for joining me on this Fury edition of 'Gettin' a lil psycho on tyres', I hope you'll join me again tomorrow when I'll be looking at a Super Hugger. Don't forget to come back now !

Driver to Sponsor - Simon Lewis

During the early 1980's Simon Lewis was a regular spectator at Castle Combe where the biggest attraction used to be Formula Libre events run for any car built to known regulations.



At the top end of the entry would be vehicles that had run in Grand Prix like Alo Lawlers McLaren Cosworth DFV M30 resplendent in it's original colours and bearing the name of it's original driver Alain Prost,



or Formula 5000 vehicles like Tony Trimmers Lola Chevrolet T330,



and once in a while something extremely exotic like a Can Am 2 Lola Chevrolet T530 would appear.



A car with a large engine was not a pre requisite to be a contender to win as Eddie McLurg found out when he beat the big boys driving a 2 litre Formula 2 March BMW 822 Formula 2 car to victory in May 1989.



When he turned 18 Simon started on the long path to becoming a book mogul, surprisingly he specialised in automotive books with a business called Simon Lewis Transport Book Shop.



As and when resources allowed Simon turned to competing in rally events running against £50,000 Subaru's in an comparatively archaic gargantuan Rover SDI after three seasons the enlarged to 4.5 litre / 274 cui Rover V8 was put into a Ford Escort shell for a season.



When that project proved fruitless Simon moved to circuit racing at Castle Combe with a Rover Montego Turbo and then with some success he ran the Rover 220 Turbo seen above.



Simon has also tried his hand at Grass Track racing with an MG Maestro, that vibrated so bad in top gear that the bits of roll cage in Simon's eye line 'became almost invisible',



and at hill climbing with a Kawasaki powered Morrish built in Cornwall.



(# 6 Roger Orgee Van Diemen RF00 & #17 Alex Drabble Swift SC92)

Inspired by the reaction to a thread on The Nostalgia Forum Simon has taken a leap of faith and decided to sponsor a new Mono Libre series at Castle Combe in 2011.



(Winner of the first race #85 Peter Bragg Nemesis Mygale)

With a snappy title THE SIMON LEWIS TRANSPORT BOOKS FREE SINGLE-SEATER SERIES is open to any open wheeler that can pass the 108 db noise test.



(# 3 David Cox Ralt RT3)

An interesting array of single seaters took part in the first race was on July the 18th, I caught practice the day before and look forward to seeing the next races on July 24th.

If you have a single seater that can pass the 108 db noise test and is in need of exercise you could do worse than make enquiries at the Castle Combe website.

Hope you will join me in wishing Simon and his series all the best.

Thanks for joining me on this Simon Lewis Transports Books Free Single Seater edition of 'Gettin' a lil psycho on tyres', join me again tomorrow for a Grand Prix edition of Ferrari Friday. Don't forget to come back now !

Pole Sister - Nissan R90CK

Like the Lancia LC2 seen in Monday's post the Nissan R90CK seen here at Colin Bennett's CGA Engineering Workshop is scheduled to appear at the Silverstone Classic for the Group C race next weekend.



Three serious works teams gathered to contend the 24 hours of Le Mans in 1990, Jaguar with three cars were the eventual winners, Toyota with three cars did not really figure, but Nissan with 5 front line R90CK cars became the first Japanese manufacturer to sit on pole position at this endurance classic.



The Nissan R90CK's were built around Lola T90/10 chassis



and prepared for the World Endurance Championship by Nissan Motorsports Europe.



This particular vehicle has a rear facing camera connected to the screen seen here to aid reversing. Mark Blundell's pole winning 3m 27s Le Mans qualifying lap immortalised with cockpit cam can be seen on this mind boggling youtube clip.



It is said that Mark had over 1000 hp available during his qualification lap from his 3.5 litre / 213 cui Nissan VRH35 V8 motor,



thanks to a ceased turbo waste gate.



Mark recorded a top speed of 226.9 mph on the Mulsanne Straight speed strap between the two newly installed chicanes a record that apparently still stands.



Six months after the unlikely Mazda victory at Le Mans in 1991, a NISMO version of the Lola T90/10 the Nissan R91CP won the 1992 Daytona 24 hour race in the hands of Masahiro Hasemi, Kazuyoshi Hoshino and Toshio Suzuki.



At the end of the 1990 season Nissan withdrew from the World Prototype Sportscar Championship but continued to develop the RC90CK cars for the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship which the manufacturer won in 1990,'91 and '92.



This particular car is now owned by Katsu Kubota.



While there is still a good supply of parts for these vehicles



the cost of running one is expensive.



In 1990 the car driven by Kenny Acheson, Olivier Grouillard and Martin Donnelly



qualified in 5th place at Le Mans but was eliminated on the opening lap with a gearbox problem.



I shall look forward to seeing this car in action, 21 years after I first saw one, at the Silverstone Classic next weekend.

That concludes a series of three Group C blogs, my thanks to Colin Bennett for his hospitality and Tony Gallagher for organising the trip to Colin's workshop.

Hope you have enjoyed today's ceased wastegate edition of 'Gettin' a lil' psycho on tyres' and that you will join me again tomorrow. Don't forget to come back now !