1966 Janspeed Unipower GT

[Flygirl]

Pete,

What a great read that article is! Thanks for posting.

[Pete]

My car on the Unipower stand at 00.35 (top right corner) in this video :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVIv_uOw1-s

I suspect the Motoring News GT Championship race it took part in would have been filmed along with the rest of the races in the later Castle Combe clip on this video but didn't make the final cut evidently. Wonder if any such film still exists?

Found a few more race programmes, I'll scan them in soon, and hopefully post some new pictures of the car, now in Tartan Red.

[cookie1071]

Found a few more race programmes, I'll scan them in soon, and hopefully post some new pictures of the car, now in Tartan Red.

look forward to see those Pete

[rpb203]

Pete,

Excellent find for the films, doesn't the car also appear on the part 2 of the film at about 6.08-6.10? Pretty blurred I would admit but have a look and see what you think?
Regards
Gary

[Pete]

You are of course correct Gary!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgYBzWW4SV4

I've watched that several times and never spotted it, I suspect because I think that little clip is spliced inbetween two other clips of a different race (the Marque Sportscar race where Gabriel Konig rolled her Sebring Sprite), it looks like a different race to me and you can clearly see the Unipower is not on the grid at the start anyway.

Great spot Gary, just need to pin down the date, it's not one I already have on record, either in the form of a published report nor a race programme but as the car is still in white I think it may be July '67. It would help greatly if I had dated photos from Ted Walker but that's proving to be very difficult to achieve!

More digging to do then!

[rpb203]

I have a photo from Ted dated June '67 with the credit of being the Janspeed Unipower for June '67 at Castle Combe. It has the wheel arches cut back to clear the wheels and is still in white. I don't have a shot of the car racing in white though.

I like you think that they have spliced together a number of clips of films in the video and had to look at them quite a few times to get my head round what was there.

[Pete]

I have the photo Gary, (on this thread some pages back) pictured on the grass at Combe with no door numbers on sitting on Minilites. If the race on the BRSCC film was on the same day as the Marque Sportscar race with the Konig crash then it's a new race to my list, and I don't have anything on it as yet.

Most of the paint is done, just the roundels to paint on and maybe the black sections as per original, though not decided for definate.

[AndyB72]

Looks fantastic Pete!! Keep it up!

[surfblue63]

That looks a nice shade of red. Only 3 weeks to the Gold Cup

[InimiaD]

Looks fantastic.

[rpb203]

Pete,

It's certainly looking good alright, well done!
I am sure that it will look spot on with the doors and bonnet in place. Can't wait to see it.

Keep me posted.

Cheers.
Gary

[Pete]

I put a request for information about the fourth owner Gideon Lloyd (who I can now confirm did buy the car from Piers Weld Forrester) on the Autosport Forum six months ago to no avail, but luckily he's just popped up and posted this :

"I am the said Gideon Lloyd (with no motor racing brother, maybe you were thinking of Richard Lloyd). We (Graham Goodman & I) acquired the triple CCC car from Piers Weld Forrester who sensibly used the fact that it held the up to 1150cc standing 1/4 mile record for Santa Pod to demonstrate and for us to try the car at that very straight venue.

When we discovered that it was considerably happier in a straight line, we took what we thought was the simple solution and stuck a pair of F3 Brabham wheels on the back. Not only did it not improve cornering, it did nothing for the car's poise. Anyway the two of us did a season of club racing (I think) sharing the driving. The intention was to do some long distance racing in Europe in the following season (71). Sadly that never transpired.

Easter '71 Oulton Park was our last outing. The brilliantly crisp, cold, sunny Easter Sunday was topped and tailed by incredibly dense fog. On our journey back down South, visibility was zero - at one point I was leaning out of the passenger side door feeling for the kerbside. Eventually fog clearing, we made the motorway and Graham opened up the Jag. I seem to recall 100mph being indicated on the MI.

Needless to say, trailer tyres blew (melted) and I was 'volunteered' to be 'driven' in the Unipower behind the Jag. The primitive handbrake had iced up and with no way of communicating with the Jag I became aware of flickering flames behind my shoulders. Sure enough the discs were alight.

I promise you the next bit is true! A car overtook and flagged down the Jag. Then a guy came round to the Unipower, lifted the engine cover and fire extinguished both discs which were merrily aflame being fed by brake fluid. Somehow the magnesium wheels didn't ignite. He then disappeared into the night (were you that man?)

That was the rather sad end to our relationship with the red devil. It was sold. Graham raced Formula 3 in Europe for 2 seasons and I got a job!!"


So the history of the car looks a little clearer today, being :

Dec '66 - Built at Perrivale as Unipower's first lightweight competition car. (Chassis number 9)
Jan '67 - Displayed at the Racing Car Show at Olympia with Stirling Moss and a raving nympho, 1275 S Downton engine fitted.
May '67 - Bought by Janspeed, raced by Geoff Mabbs until the end of the season.
November(?) '67 - Bought by Cars and Car Conversions, hillclimbed and sprinted by their ads manager Brian Harvey
June ' 68 - Sold to Piers Weld Forrester (just before he bought the Unipower GT company I think) with his intention of racing it at Le Mans, which never happened.
June '68 - Sold to Graham Goodman and Gideon Lloyd , who raced the car from late June '68 until their last race ,being Oulton Park in 1971 (??), though I suspect Gideon's got his dates wrong if he only raced it for one season as he definately started in June '68 according to the race programmes. I suspect he last raced it at Oulton Park, Easter 1969?

I'm amazed it's raced up here, a pleasant surprise to me and gives me a whole lot more research to do in terms of photos, race programmes and trawling through even more bloody copies of Motoring News!! I'll also makes sure the fire extinguisher's plumbed in and working!

I've contacted Gideon today, I'll ask him to contribute to this thread if he will.

[Pete]

For those curious about the Unipower GT bodies, they were originally moulded from this aluminium prototype at Roy Pierpoint's garage in 1965 :



..and the production bodies were then made by Specialised Mouldings,who made many of the bodies for top race car constuctors of the era, also having strong ties with Arch Motors who manufactured the Unipower tubular frames. Arch Motors also made many of the top race car frames of the day. A brief background on Specialised Mouldings here :

[rpb203]

Pete,
Another fantastic part of the Jigsaw, and really interesting!
Well done.

Cheers
Gary

[northern monkey]

Awesome Pete !!....That really is one very nice motor,it will need to be drool proof though when you display it...

Mick

[Flygirl]

Great research Pete!

Fascinating information indeed. The pieces of the puzzle are coming together!

[rich@minispares.com]

"I am the said Gideon Lloyd.

that's a great story, its even funnier if you read it in the style of the fast shows Rowley birkin...........

it sounds like some of the road trips my dad and his mates had in the early 1970's when they where dragging old rotten 1930's cars home on ropes behind other cars

[Pete]

"I am the said Gideon Lloyd.

that's a great story, its even funnier if you read it in the style of the fast shows Rowley birkin...........

it sounds like some of the road trips my dad and his mates had in the early 1970's when they where dragging old rotten 1930's cars home on ropes behind other cars

Gideon's partner in crime during that 1968 season Graham Goodman also got in touch (through the forum!) and confirmed that story, plus added the fact that due to the flaming brakes Gideon also ran the car into the back of his Jag. He also added :
"we used to alternate driving and the original plan had been to qualify for 2 driver long distance racing . I did see a picture [ black and white ] that was me at the wheel – I had a black helmet with white peak like my hero Jim Clark ! Before this we had shared a Mini 7 , that was equally unreliable!
Cannot remember who we sold the Unipower to . I then bought the ex works Tecno F3 from Chris Craft and spent all the next season dragging it round Europe - with few results , I think 4th at GP de Chimay was the 'peak' but , boy did we have fun!!! It was a great year with Petersen , Schekter and Weisell amongst others"

[Pete]

A few more titbits, about Janspeed. I've posted this before but it's a pic of Jan's new Southampton Road premises in June 1967, only slightly later than when he bought the car but the exact time Mabbs started racing it, so it'll have been stabled here at this point.


Jan's earlier premises at Park Street :


The SCA Mini (that Janspeed are currently restoring) was rolled out for the press day to open the new workshops :


..which was then sold off , the same time my car was (they didn't keep 'em long)....



I suspect that engine either didn't fit in the Unipower or wasn't permitted.

[Pete]

On this press release for the '67 Racing Car Show :



..it states that Richard Miles (Downton of London) supplied the original engine. Unipower actually used to get their engines from Stewart & Ardern, and maybe it was the case here and they sent it to Miles but either way Unipower sales boss Andrew Hedges was very well connected generally and from other paperwork I've seen (on a Downton racer) he was well aquainted with Miles.
Keith Cundell was Downton's sales manager in London and Mike Pigneguy built the engines with parts supplied from Downton Wilts in late '66, I presume this was the case with my car and got me wondering who Pigneguy was. I know he raced his own Downton car in Europe etc.
Barry Hawkins did tell me that Miles' customer cars rarely visited Wiltshire, that includes W&P cars, Radfords, racers etc and that parts were sent up to London for them to be fitted (though occassionally he did see the odd one down there).
All a little academic I suppose as Jan Odor is reported to have bought my car sans it's Downton engine , to put his own 1275 race engine in, which is understandable considering the rivalry between the two firms at this time! It would have also brought the price down and perhaps the 'for sale' ad (on a previous page) of my car (without engine) indicates he had no choice anyway and that Unipower had robbed it for something else?? Odd really, but then when you consider my car was £1550 to purchase, it's no surprise there were no takers ...until Jan came along.

More updates on build/exhaust progress soon.