Great pics Graeme..again thanks for sharing.
I am confused with the history of RJB 327F......the ex works car that I understand is owned by Paul Sulma...whom it took ten years to prove the identity of his car. I haven't spoken to Paul for a while, and am not sure if he frequents the mk1 forum, but it would be great if some more info. regarding the history of RJB 327F could be shared....
Can anyone elaborate ??
Many thanks
Dave
Great pics Graeme..again thanks for sharing.
I am confused with the history of RJB 327F......the ex works car that I understand is owned by Paul Sulma...whom it took ten years to prove the identity of his car. I haven't spoken to Paul for a while, and am not sure if he frequents the mk1 forum, but it would be great if some more info. regarding the history of RJB 327F could be shared....
Can anyone elaborate ??
Many thanks
Dave
I'm also very confused about RJB 327F. My understanding is RJB 327F was sent to Oz and rallied as a UK Abingdon built car which was wrecked straight away. It was reshelled twice and ended up an Oz built Mk1 shell. The question is what now is RJB 327F? It can't be the Oz Mk1 and it can't be the UK Mk2 because it was wrecked?
Paul Sulma's car is definitely RJB327F. It went to Aust and was crashed and re-shelled into an Aussie shell - after doing various rallies in Aust and NZ. Then Andy Foord bought it and brought it to NZ - but customs never released it because he didnt pay the duty. Andy McKewan bought it and sold it to Brian Houston from the Mini Centre in Dunedin. Either Brian, or someone he lent it to, crashed it on a hillclimb and Brian took the opportunity to reshell it back to the English type shell and return it to red works colours - but with all the orig works stuff in it. It has continuous history and retains all or a lot of the orig stuff. I saw it in Dunedin when Brian had it and it was great.
Here is a rubbish copy of a centrefold from a local car mag here in NZ. This is the 1971 Heatway Rally with Evan Green in YMO881H as BLA523 and Andrew Cowan in RJB327F as BLA532
The main reason I kept it as it has my old 65 Cooper S which ran in the same rally - DW2296 with NZBC sponsorship which was the main radio network back then.
BLA523 (YMO881H) and BLA532 (RJB327F) and DW2296 in 71 Heatway Rally sf.jpg
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This whole thing about ex works cars is now a complete joke. Will someone from the (MCR) Mini Cooper Replica Club stand up and answer our questions? Seen them two weeks ago, old men in fairyland is what they are
Turbo88 wrote:This whole thing about ex works cars is now a complete joke. Will someone from the (MCR) Mini Cooper Replica Club stand up and answer our questions? Seen them two weeks ago, old men in fairyland is what they are
I'm 62 years old but support what you have said. You will never get a reply from the Mini Cooper Replica Club because they are all in the game
In New Zealand we have a different system of title - where the physical number plate is issued by the Govt and can't be replicated. So if you have the plates and ownership papers (log book) then you have the "car". If the plate gets damaged or lost then a new plate with a current number on it is issued and the records are changed. So a car might have several changes of number plate over the years. (when the sequence got to MG as a prefix - then half the MG's in the country "lost/damaged" their plates and got a shiny MG**** one!)
With the UK system (probably handed down from horse drawn carriages) the number is everything and the car becomes known by the number - if you can apply to have a dormant number re-issued to you then the opportunity to make a works car out of thin air is pretty easy. I think in the old days there was a race to get the famous numbers like a lottery. But when the real car turns up later (like RJB327F) then the replica/fake is exposed.
Amusingly RJB327F/BLA532 was also replicated in Australia - probably by someone who didnt know it had been exported to NZ. They found some parts from the UK shell (alloy doors perhaps?) and built a very nice car up and put it up for auction I think. There are some photos somewhere. When it was found out the complete car still existed it sold quite cheaply - perhaps even Paul Sulma who owns the real car bought it for parts?
So at one time I think there were three RJB327F's competing for the identity - as I believe there was one built up in the UK from perhaps an earlier shell or parts.
I can see why Mark F avoids Works cars! (but they are still kinda cool..)
That's a great read Graeme...thanks for explaining your understanding of the situation. At the end of the day, there's a true, and interesting history to every car and registration.
Austin Costin wrote:Graeme, I have the minilite wheels from the Cowan car.
From RJB327F or the later NZMC 1275GT he ran in 72? I have 4.5 Minilites off the GT on my road Cooper S - we bought over a dozen of them back in the day as a job lot off a mate who bought them off NZMC after the 73 rally.
The ones in the photo of RJB I posted above did not stay with the car - the car in the UK has aluminium "Morspeed" NZ replica Minilites on it - they have a different curve shape to the inner part of the rim and have no magnesium in them.
So if you have RJB's wheels - then they are indeed "missing" and I would guess they would be original to the car from when it was imported by BMC Australia.
Yes, they are from RJB327F, Bruce Miles bought them many years ago.
Bruce even mentioned that they came off the Cowan car in the receipt when he sold the 3 cooper Ss to my boss.
My boss was not interested in them so I bought them off him, Bruce later told me that he had had them crack tested at Air New Zealand before having them painted, never been on a car since.
Talking of RJB 327F, I've just been sent a "new" photo of the eight port works race car that wore that number at the 1969 Spa 24 Hrs. The colour pic shows mechanic Bob Whittington with it in the workshop either just prior to or just after the race. John Rhodes and Geoff Mabbs raced the car but the valve seats collapsed early in the race apparently. There's also other black and white pics about of it at Spa and a great colour one in the Bill price book in the pits with RBL 450F, another racer that wore a rally car number plate. I'll post it once I've sorted a Flikr account out but for now I've popped it up on Faceache...
Thanks for the pic Pete. The other car in the Bill Price book would have been RBL 450F? Number 78. I also have RJB doing Oulton Park and Thruxton in August oF 1969. In fact I am pretty sure I was there at Thruxton. Pity I didn't keep the programme. Actually I probably couldn't afford one! Glad to see a later works mini thread rekindled! Cheers. Brian
