1987 Bathurst

[jiminee]

Your right about Daytona, they actually have a few tracks like that, with an infield course, the ALMS use them I believe.
The difference with Calder was that the race track was on the outside of the circuit, not within the oval.

[Hazza]

Yes, GrandAm putter around alot of Rovals, like the Homestead roval (!!)

[Crash Test]

Pheonix, Loudon, used to be on at Michigan, Indianapolis, Pikes Peak etc too

[RWC]

That was indeed one of the best bathursts ever.Not because of the cheating of course!
It's a pity about all that.European touring car teams of the eighties certainly could cheat!I guess when one or two teams started getting away with stuff all the others felt they would have to do it too.I've heard of lots of stories about carbon fibre dashboards,aluminium roofs,the obvious 'panelbeaten' mudguards,etc.Man even DJ tried it with his home made turbo!(cut from a genuine factory blank,lol."It's a genuine 'part'-they don't say who can do the machining!")
It's all a pity because touring cars were on the way to becoming one of the biggest race series in the world for sure .it could well have even overtaken f1.Hell,which is better-a series that uses the latest technology in genuine road cars or one where cars are awsome but made to a purely synthetic set of rules.Man they don't even look like cars!!

[William Dale Jr]

Originally posted by RaceTime
You would be surprised how often I get asked about some of them...

If I didn't think it would be impolite, you'd be receiving at least one request from me per day for results from different meetings

[William Dale Jr]

Originally posted by RWC
It's all a pity because touring cars were on the way to becoming one of the biggest race series in the world for sure .it could well have even overtaken f1.

Of course!!! Why else did Bernie feel compelled to run Group A into the ground, just like he would eventually do to the World Sportscar Championship.

Conspiracy theory? Perhaps...

[Dingo]

Originally posted by William Dale Jr
Of course!!! Why else did Bernie feel compelled to run Group A into the ground, just like he would eventually do to the World Sportscar Championship.

Conspiracy theory? Perhaps...

You can throw the old DTM into that particular mix too...

[Amaroo Park]

Originally posted by MHDT
To make it 100% it would require a complete strip down - there is still Mr Lambden's Beaurepairs paint scheme underneath!

I have found the Bowdens somewhat arrogant, and in this case they weren't particularly interested in the original spec., just pleased to have acquired another rarity for their collection.

The 2nd 05 VL built (the 1987 Baturst winner is the first VL built in May 1987, and then became the #3 SPA car) has, as I understand it, been fully restored (by the same craftsman who restored the (real) 05 VK 'big banger'), and was 'raced' at the AGP last year against DJ's Sierra.

A couple of points here guys, The Brock car was the 05 VK from 86, according too Tuckey.

Secondly we can't forget ethier that at the time there some rumblings about the inner guards on the Brock Commodores. SO while not actually racing under a cloud there was some doubt about there ultimate legality

[A9X05]

Originally posted by rocket
what happened, it ended up as a brock suckfest cos they couldnt hack having an OS mob win "our" race, hence they found a reason to DQ the texaco serrias on a technicality, ie rolled front guards & a fuel irregularity, its weird that it took 2/3rds of the season to pick these things out, things that they has suposidly been running for the whole season prior, bad sportsmanship behaviour on the AUS officials maybe

Brocky won 1987 fair and square, no iffs, buts, or maybes,
Plus, he has won another Bathurst "endurance" since,
Please no conspiracy theorys!

[Mattracer]

There might be some theories about the last laps of the 2003 B24 though.

[racer69]

Originally posted by colinbond
A couple of points here guys, The Brock car was the 05 VK from 86, according too Tuckey.

Which of the Brock cars? I have been led to believe the #05 car from Bathurst that year was a new car, having been debuted at Surfers Paradise earlier that year.

Also i was under the impression the VK Gary Scott wrote off at Lakeside in 1987 was the #05 '86 car, with the mechanicals from that car going into the VL that ran at Spa, and the enduro's at Oran Park and Sandown prior to Baturst.


The only controversy i'd heard about 3rd place was that if the Seton/Bowe Nissan hadn't been caught at the end of the pits when the pace car came out, they would have been 3rd (at least when the green came back out). This was the same yellow flag period that cost the Klaus Ludwig/Klaus Neidzweidz Sierra another lap on the leader due to the same reason.

[chunterer]

Originally posted by William Dale Jr
Of course!!! Why else did Bernie feel compelled to run Group A into the ground, just like he would eventually do to the World Sportscar Championship.

Conspiracy theory? Perhaps...

Hi guys,

Hope you don't mind a British fan of touring cars to comment?

Used to follow ATCC in Grp A days as much as i could.

I'd have to agree with you mate. WTCC was headed for big time, then FIA ramped up entry fees and fines and everybody got scared off.

The '87 race was crazy, the rain storm didn't help but it shook the race up a bit.

Someone else did a 'rules interpretation' thread recently and there's some amusing passages on it. There certainly were a few Euro touring car teams tinkering with rules...allegedly! a certain ex F1 team owner and Oz GM touring car team boss had plenty of tricks up his sleeve for sure. These Ranged from destabilisng protests, entering extra cars as 'torpedoes' (Volvo's usually came a cropper as a result)to apparent non full scale versions of homologated cars to save weight and stuff?! Amazing

I was at TT in '88 when Dicko came over and slaughtered the ETCC Sierra for pace. Anyone know how he found so much time? It was originally thought he was running 'jungle juice' fuel but not the case?...

[William Dale Jr]

Originally posted by chunterer
I was at TT in '88 when Dicko came over and slaughtered the ETCC Sierra for pace. Anyone know how he found so much time? It was originally thought he was running 'jungle juice' fuel but not the case?...

Dick was still really miffed about how the previous Bathurst had went, how the Aussies (with the possible exceptions of Miedecke and JPS Team BMW) were made to look stupid by the Euros. So he put a lot of effort into getting his cars developed and sorted, a quick visit by a UK EMS-guru allowed Neal Lowe to program their own management system chips, Shell helped by providing a similar-spec fuel to what would be used at the TT; they did all their dyno work in the middle of the night during winter to simulate the atmospheric conditions of England during the summer...

Dick wanted to stick it to Andy Rouse and Ruedi Eggenberger and show them that us Aussies knew how to screw together a quick race car. A half a second gap to Steve Soper in qualifying, and running away from the pack in the early laps - at a track neither he nor Bowe had ever been to before - hammered the point home.

[Rowdy]

Their is a great chapter in Dicks book about this and his motivations for kicking some european backside. Must have been a very satisfying moment for him and team.

[MHDT]

Originally posted by colinbond
A couple of points here guys, The Brock car was the 05 VK from 86, according too Tuckey.

Secondly we can't forget either that at the time there some rumblings about the inner guards on the Brock Commodores. SO while not actually racing under a cloud there was some doubt about there ultimate legality

Mate, you're dead set wrong, again.

The 1987 Bathurst winner was in fact the second VL racer built by the HDT (the first being sold indirectly to Allan Moffat); and the first built in the 1987 calendar year.

It debuted at the Surfers Paradise round of the ATCC in 1987, served as the 05 car for the remainder of the ATTCC; and then was sent across to Belgium to run in the 1987 SPA 24 hour classic. It was running well within the top 7 when it holed a piston at 2.33 in the morning.

This car had the standard live axle rear end; and during & post SPA had extra wiring for the heater & drive lights required for the 24 hour race.

A new 05 VL (the 2nd for 1987) was built for PB for the endurance season, and this car featured the complex negative camber rear end (that Les Small was also using). This rear end enable negative camber to be run on the rear end whilst retaining the live end axle, and was something Brock himself designed for homologation with the 1986 (last proper) VL Group A road car.

A 3rd VL built in 1987 by the HDT was the one derived from an old VK. Whether or not it was the 1986 05 VK Bathurst car (that was destroyed by Gary Scott at the 1987 Lakeside ATCC race), or the number 6 ex-Harvey VK that Brock commandeered post Lakeside, is debateable (the Garry Sprague book claims the 05 VK was a 'throwaway' post Lakeside).

This 3rd VL was used in one or two endurance races, including Sandown (appeared as number 6), whilst the SPA car was being shipped back from overseas.

Upon returning from SPA, the original (May 1987) VL became the number 10 car for Bathurst. History shows this car to be the race winner.

Three VL’s sat in the HDT’s Bertie Street showroom in December 1987, all for sale. The prices varied significantly, with the lowest price being for the converted VK, and the highest price being for the 05 VL with the camber rear end. Chris Lambden bought the middle (may 1987) car for somewhere in between.

PS - there was nothing wrong with the guards on the Mobil VL's - they were all within Group A regulations (i.e. rolled or 'lipped' underneath, but production standard on the outer guard).

[GTRMagic]

Chris Lambden bought it, mortgaged the house to pick it up, and somehow managed to convince Bob Jones to take the ownership part off his hands, so the house wasnt at risk.

The car ended up at Roadways for transformation to Beaurepaires colours, to TWR body and engine spec. It was nowhere near as quick in its return to Bathurst as it was the previous season Drivers, preparation and tyres I presume were the bugbear here...

With the older VK/VL Commodore, 30-odd drivers were involved in a Brock test day, people like Neal Bates amongst others, all got to have a hitout in a Group A Commodore.... it went off song near the end of the day if I recall rightly.

[MHDT]

The TWR 'Plastic Pig' homologation for the VL did not prove to be substantially quicker than the previous year's 'HDT' VL at Bathurst in 1988; despite the 'wind tunnel' testing and EFI motor. Grice was complaining about the airflow of the TWR bodykit not allowing enough air underneath the car to cool the drivetrain effectively.

GTR - I think the Brock test day that resulted in a crash was during the Sierra years, when the late Barry Sheen crunched the #105 Mobil car. IIRC a young Mark Larkham was showing some form during that particular session.

[GTRMagic]

That would be correct about Mr Sheene's misadventures at Winton, but at Calder (?) the engine went west during the day, and the drivers got miles in the #10 Bathurst winner while PB took the M3 for a burn

[William Dale Jr]

Originally posted by GTRMagic
That would be correct about Mr Sheene's misadventures at Winton, but at Calder (?) the engine went west during the day, and the drivers got miles in the #10 Bathurst winner while PB took the M3 for a burn

From Auto Action, December 18, 1987:

Pic 1:

[William Dale Jr]

And Pic 2

[RaceTime]

Someone has a hidden stash at home

[GTRMagic]

See my memory is still good

And people think I have Old Timers disease

[GTRMagic]

Oh, and given the silliness about Mr Jarrett's Bathurst appearance with M.Skaife in another thread, the part about smoothness and pace seems a little odd

[Henry]

Had Mr Jarrett borrowed a helmet perhaps?

[GTRMagic]

Maybe it was M.Skaife's first drive of a Commodore?