1963 1071 Cooper S - info wanted

[Pete]

There is a situation where people raced their road cars, especially up to the mid 60s. That had virtually disappeared by 1970 .

Funnily enough that's where my interest wanes, most of the cars look the same and are characterless and bastardised versions of their former selves. Yes race outfits like Janspeed used their own reg's with Jan 123 + 4, quite a few privateers used their engine capacity on the plate, Bill Borrowman used to call his cars BOX 1, BOX 2 etc, Michelle Burns Grieg used SEX1, some used cherished plates with their initials on like Mac Ross ,Christabel Carlisle ,Mick Clare etc. Alot of the works teams just used local reg's which they swapped around from rally car to race car etc but the prettiest cars in my book were those early racers with their own (usually) local reg's on the bonnet like Neal's.

[ivor badger]

There is a situation where people raced their road cars, especially up to the mid 60s. That had virtually disappeared by 1970 .

Funnily enough that's where my interest wanes, most of the cars look the same and are characterless and bastardised versions of their former selves. Yes race outfits like Janspeed used their own reg's with Jan 123 + 4, quite a few privateers used their engine capacity on the plate, Bill Borrowman used to call his cars BOX 1, BOX 2 etc, Michelle Burns Grieg used SEX1, some used cherished plates with their initials on like Mac Ross ,Christabel Carlisle ,Mick Clare etc. Alot of the works teams just used local reg's which they swapped around from rally car to race car etc but the prettiest cars in my book were those early racers with their own (usually) local reg's on the bonnet like Neal's.

Bill Borrowman drove BOX1. The other Jim Clark, a garage owner from Edinburgh not the more famous sheep farmer, drove BOX2

[KA2S4]

Hopefully you have hit the nail on the head Pete.

More Arden porn...

[Pete]

The evidence is certainly stacking up though could still all be a total coincidence.
1. Steve Neal's 1071 racer 129 LNP was a Surf Blue Austin
2. Steve lived near Stourbridge where Rachel's car came from
3. 129 LNP (reshelled ?) was rallied in '65 with a roof light, hole evident on Rachel's car.
4.The blue colour on Rachel's car looks very much like Arden.
5.Paddy Hopkirk is supposed to have driven Rachel's car at Sebring in '66. Paddy did indeed race a non Abingdon Mini at Sebring in '66 with Peter Manton and retired the car after 33 laps.This was also at a time when Neal was absent from the BSCC with LNP until he got a new car (LBF 595D) so the timing is spot on for it to be his old car. Sebring racers were often left in the U.S (as GRX 309D was).

All I need to do is get the evidence off Paddy, Seeney and Neil himself and stick it all together. Will keep you all posted.

[Austin Costin]

Very interesting, the colour certanly looks like the arden blue.

Surly the origional number plate should be on the heritage cert ?

Also were the rose petals 10" ?

Any more pictures of it's early days in USA.

[Pete]

Surly the origional number plate should be on the heritage cert ?

Gaydon don't keep registration records Paul, if you see a Heritage Cert with a reg number on then it was supplied by the applicant. For my money Heritage shouldn't use supplied numbers on the certificates because they can appear to mislead

[Pete]

Well Paddy doesn't remember his '66 Sebring car at all. He raced a Cooper Car Co Mini at Sebring in 1965 (GPH 1C which miraculously returned to the UK) and Abingdon's GRX 309D in 1967 which stayed stateside. As for '66 neither Paddy nor Bill Price can remember which car he drove with Manton and Manton's not around to ask is he ? I wonder if the Manton family have a photo of the car ?

Nice article on Manton in my favourite glossy here :


http://www.miniexperience.com.au/filead ... Manton.pdf

Does anyone have the full copy of that article and does it mention Sebring ?

[coopersean]

http://www.ohiominiowners.org/uploads/O ... r_2012.pdf

The website above has some info...is this the same car you are referring to?

[Flygirl]

Coopersean, yes same car. That article was written by OMO newsletter editor Charlie Pollet, who is also responsible for helping us to locate and purchase the car.

Pete, not surprised that Paddy cannot recall his car for the 1966 Sebring event, that would be like asking Playboy owner Hugh Hefner which was his favorite bunny? Did you know Hugh has a son oddly enough named Cooper? OK I digress!
The 4 hour Sedan race was held on a weekday, before the main event, and not many spectators were there to capture any pictures. The big boys were all running in the 12 hour race, which got all the press. And, the race results are not much help, in this example they did not even have the correct displacement or car owner: http://www.touringcarracing.net/Races/1 ... bring.html
Another confusion is GPH 1C, which ran in 1965, is also mentioned in literature as being the car Paddy raced in 1966. For example the book "Trans-Am: The Pony Car Wars, there is a picture of GPH 1C with the caption mentioning Paddy and Peter Manton as the co-driver. It seems unlikely that the car would be there two years in a row?

I also stand corrected: in an earlier post I said the car had the Rose petal wheels, those in fact came from one of Bob's other cars.
Here is an early photo of the car, from one of the race log books:

The car still had the steel front end on it, and was in the C-Sedan livery. I don't have any pictures of the car before Bob painted it his favorite colour, which he probably did right away after buying it. Even his house was painted the same blue.....

[Pete]

Another confusion is GPH 1C, which ran in 1965, is also mentioned in literature as being the car Paddy raced in 1966. For example the book "Trans-Am: The Pony Car Wars, there is a picture of GPH 1C with the caption mentioning Paddy and Peter Manton as the co-driver. It seems unlikely that the car would be there two years in a row?

Yes that is confusing. GPH 1C is pictured at Sebring in Browning's Works Minis book (2nd edition) in 1965 so the story in that link of it being there in '66 looks to be incorrect. In the photo it has the typical Sebring features of the period - huge door roundels to take the much bigger Sebring spec competition numbers. roll cage (mandatory at Sebring years before we got them), wheel arch extensions (not allowed in the UK in '65), no bumpers and steel rims (we were on alloys by '65). A unique looking car then for '65. We have to bare in mind that the number plate could have been stuck on anything for that race but I do have evidence that it came back as I have a photo of a near identical car driven by Hopkirk at Snetterton as late as mid 1966, a Don Moore run car in the European Touring Car Championship. I'll post the photos later to compare. Judging by other UK photos taken in 1965 it would seem possible then that there was more than one GPH but that's another story I think.

So could "GPH" have returned to Sebring for '66 ? I don't think it did but am going to ask Warwick Banks if he remembers anything about that '65 Sebring car specifically. I still think GPH is a red herring and am sticking to my theory, just need to prove it !

More to come.....

[AustinSuperSeven]

What an amazing thread... keep going guys!

[mniwagn]

Now if you have the chassis number/heritage cert. for the gray shell why would you call it a 1071? Sounds like you have a 850 race car that came with a spare 1071 tag. You realise how many cars have been painted blue over the years, to even think that this makes it Arden-ish is ridiculous.
Now Pete, sounds like such a stretch to say its anything famous off a couple details. Kind of like building a genuine 1071 off an engine block and number..... its all in the story!

[Pete]

Now if you have the chassis number/heritage cert. for the gray shell why would you call it a 1071? Sounds like you have a gray 850 race car that came with a spare 1071 tag. You realise how many cars have been painted blue over the years?
Now Pete, sounds like such a stretch to say its anything famous off a couple details. Kind of like building a genuine 1071 off an engine block and number..... its all in the story!

Oh yee of little faith...

This car certainly seems to be a lot more than just a story to me, there's plenty of physical evidence there on that car of what has gone before that is nigh on impossible to fake.

The car was reshelled in period, that's why it's got it's 1071 chassis number complete with it's original trim, brackets etc that were all swapped over from the 'S' and the 850 body number is from the new shell. That was/is common practice in motorsport, expensive cars didn't just get scrapped because they rolled during a race/ rally. Abingdon were the most well known for utilising donor 850 shells on their rally cars and OK yes this means that these types of car (if they survive) are not standard production original but they often have a time line, a paper trail and a documented history from manufacture to the present day. Yes there plenty of 'flat pack' race and rally cars in the UK, and Japan especially, that have just been built from somebody's imagination and a pile of period shots but what you won't find with those cars is any solid visible history or provenance, just period photos and a restored car. Two very different types of car in my book.

"a couple of details" you say but when you add up the number of coincidences that tie in with Steve Neal's car (not that we know anything for sure yet) it adds up to rather more than "a couple" I'd say and definately worth persuing. You suggest other race Minis were painted this distinct Electric Blue with a silver roof like the Arden cars of the mid 60's, I certainly haven't seen any evidence of that.

[Flygirl]

Mniwagn, I understand your scepticism. The world is full of re-creations, not limited to cars! I would like to be proven wrong almost as much as proven right, which is why I posted this information. The debate is healthy and proper.

Now this car is interesting since it came over to the US very early on, when arguably better cars were available on the showroom floors. Why send it to the US, other than for a race? And, if that was the case, why send a low-value car or an unknown one? The average racer probably would not have enough funds to pay for the shipping, race support abroad, etc. for a personal car, so it makes little sense that the car had no team type connections or support of some kind.

The shell only ever had three paint jobs: the original Tweed Grey, the Blue/Silver, and the Wedgewood Blue with blue/white stripes. Other than a few exterior touch ups for the usual racing dings, there is only the one coat of Wedgewood blue on the car over the other paint. It really is just that - a 1964 850 shell with 1963 1071 VIN number, and two SCCA log books with the same 1071 VIN number going back to the early 1970's. Since arriving in the US in 1966, the car had two documented owners before we got it, and it raced extensively in the Eastern US where it was quite successful. Bob Kimes (first US owner) was a very respected racer and had a number of Minis as well as other cars. I don't think Bob would have had any reason to "recreate" a old rally/race car from the UK. The second owner I purchased the car from did not even mention anything about UK history, so it obviously was not an important selling feature at the time he got the car from Bob.

So that is what started us thinking the car had more history to it than a beat up old SCCA racer, and the obvious rally bits on the car which survived the SCCA era. Whatever information turns up on the car is interesting, and like Pete says worth investigating due to the number of coincidences overall. Regardless, the car will be racing again in 2014!

Cheers,
Rachel

[RS6]

This car certainly seems to be a lot more than just a story to me, there's plenty of physical evidence there on that car of what has gone before that is nigh on impossible to fake...when you add up the number of coincidences that tie in with Steve Neal's car it adds up to rather more than "a couple" I'd say and definitely worth pursuing.

I agree. Keep going Pete...we're all watching this one.

[mniwagn]

I'm just saying without proof your kinda shooting in the dark. Is there a way to get the cars original reg from the UK?

[Pete]

Talking of "GPH 1C" , here's the car at Sebring , 1965 as far as we know....





So as you can see, it looks white underneath , big square white block of paint on the boot for the huge numbers,hence huge roundels, GB sticker on boot, steels , roll cage.

Then look at these pics from Snetterton 31/07/66 run by Don Moore, driven by Paddy again..







Same car I reckon so not only did that car race here after Sebring '65 it also looks like there might have been more than one GPH 1C because there's photos of it racing here in '65 looking nothing like this. UNLESS these pics of GPH 1C racing at Sebring are actually from 1966.... Either way the original GPH wasn't supposed to be a white car to start with, it was Surf Blue , December '65 1275 S.

To confirm, we need the race numbers from the '65 and '66 entry list Rachel if you have either. We'll get to the bottom of this yet...

[Pete]

I'm just saying without proof your kinda shooting in the dark. Is there a way to get the cars original reg from the UK?

Which is why I'm looking for proof. You can tie a UK reg from a chassis number by checking the council records where the car was registered. Worcestershire records (Rachel's car came from Stourbridge) are still available and this can be looked into.

Here's some super weird coincidences that struck me today. Rachel's car is the same age almost to the day (ie 50 ) as Barrie Williams' 1071 120 MNP which was also registered at the same council offices as Steve Neal's 129 LNP. I'm seeing Barrie on Sunday because he's hillclimbing his car at Shelsley with me not far from where his car came from, a stone's throw from where Rachel's came from and Steve Neal's also, that's if the latter two aren't one and the same car (which I believe may well be the case). Spooky or what ? I'll ask Barrie about Neal's car and a pound to a penny he'll remember it very well.

Here's Steve Neal's Surf Blue Austin 1071 at Mallory early '64..



Here's Neal again on the '65 Monte, now sporting what could easily be blue/silver colours to me (that's not a white roof I don't think) and roof light as found on Rachel's car. I don't think the Monte entry list will help with the colour either sadly.

[mniwagn]

What I'm saying is there has to be more proof other than a color, a hole in the roof and a switch panel. Quite a few cars came over with the military too, they would use them abroad and then ship them home.

[Pete]

Maybe you're right . Maybe there were several Surf Blue 1963 1071 Austin Cooper S race cars closely connected with the works in Worcestershire that were fitted with 1275 engines, rallied later with roof lights fitted and painted Arden's Chrysler Electric Blue. Seriously ! I am prepared to be wrong ! Even if my theory gets blown out of the weeds and lands all over my egg splattered mush it'll have been fun finding out won't it ?