60s/70s Prodsports-Modsports pics

[zefarelly]

a bit like some historic racing now with all the V8's !

[SidewaysFeltham]

Jon Britton in his fraud Midget, helped by Gabby Koenig running interference, used to regularly see off E Type Jags; around GP ciruits like Brands GP and Snetterton!

Britton's type cars were banned later on. He used injection and a Cooper s 1275 taken to 1293 (from memory) with either an Alan Woods crank or one of his own. What the lads used to do was take a steel s crank, cut off the mini transverse type flywheel boss, turn up a steel "In Line" boss and weld it to the crank. Voila! One steel forged crank for a Midget!

Britton also used to build his cars mainly from ally and glass. Later banned.

Etc.

Off topic, my other favourite 1970s Giant Killer, was John Fitzpatrick in Ralph Broad's 1600 c.c. Broadspeed BDA Escort, chasing and often beating Brian "Yogi" Muir, in the Wiggins Teape 7 litre Camaro! In the rain it was invariably Fitz!

[COLIN STUBBS]

Ok.Back on topic then and heres 3 modsports cars having slight problems.







Recognise em?

[chrisks]

The Ginetta was John Evans??

[davyboy]

Originally Posted by Michael C Felth

Jon Britton in his fraud Midget, helped by Gabby Koenig running interference, used to regularly see off E Type Jags; around GP ciruits like Brands GP and Snetterton!

Britton's type cars were banned later on. He used injection and a Cooper s 1275 taken to 1293 (from memory) with either an Alan Woods crank or one of his own. What the lads used to do was take a steel s crank, cut off the mini transverse type flywheel boss, turn up a steel "In Line" boss and weld it to the crank. Voila! One steel forged crank for a Midget!

Britton also used to build his cars mainly from ally and glass. Later banned.

The 3 bearing crank in the A-series was a weak point for sure and some people went to lengths to deal with it. I heard of people having cranks turned from solid billets of steel where they'd specify the hardness... I think GA Farndon may have done it... but I could be wrong. In fact, lots of Midget components had to be 'remade' from EN40 steel. My modsports Midget had an appetite for drive shafts which kept snapping because of the super-sticky F3 slicks I was using.

[zefarelly]

I think most race engines today in historics are made from EN40 as a minimum grade

just listen to the revs most engines pull these days, and reliably ( some of them!)

[SidewaysFeltham]

In fact a steel billet crank, whilst obviously far cheaper to make than a forged crank, has inherrent weaknesses too.

Steel is like wood: it has grain. Carving a crank from the solid means the grain is "End Grain" at the end of each web.

With a forged steel crank, the metal is forced to "flow" around corners, since the forging process uses a number of die and repeated stampings to arrive at the final part, prior to fettling and grinding and machining.

Once heat treated and etc, the forged steel crank is far tougher.

The other A series weakness of course, was the centre main cap. Line boring and solid steel caps helped to cure this.

I broke a FJ Red crank in my Midget on the top straight at Brands (my "Home" circuit!) as I was accelerating oput of Clearways. Exciting at the time, since I was doing probably 100 and it just locked everything up!

Who needs handbrake turns!

[davyboy]

I was told at the time that the billets were better, but more brittle. I never had the opportunity to run one, so I can't comment. I did lunch a few A-series cranks in my time though. That motor did break my heart for sure.

[SidewaysFeltham]

With A series, back in the 60s and 70s, the best ever engine (In Line) was the XSP, which was the experimental lump built for Formula Three.

Forged pistons, steel rods forged steel crank duplex timing gear, dry sump; and a different head with an extra bolt at the front near the thermostat cover/top hose take off.

This was the basic concept for the original Cooper s too. However the XSP was only 998 c.c. The Cooper s, of course, came in three flavours: 998; 1041; and 1275.

In order to increase capacity, to 1300 c.c. (Class limit) it was necessary to both bore and stroke the motor. And the XSP crank would not serve!

However, by the simple expedient of converting the boss of a Cooper 1275 c.c. crank it worked and the end result (if one used an early and original s crank) was a steel forged crank for an inline car, like a Midget.

The main weakness as I said before was of course the middle centre cap. Fitting steel main caps and line boring solved this trouble. A middle fix was to mill off the top of the middle cap and strap it with a flat steel bar.

For realiability it was also essential to open up the oil galleries in the block.

If all was completed properly, then the A series was a realiable and safe engine. Obviously not as "unburstable" as a five bearing Ford eight port, but pretty robust if built correctly, maintained and bearings and oil pumps were changed regularly, as the oil pumps were quick to wear. As were the early phosphor valve guides in an s head!

There are many ex F3 XSP engines being run in historic F3 single seaters: I was chatting to Woody, the Chairman (Think he still is??), of the Cooper Car Club about his totally re-fettled Cooper F3 and his XSP last year and he has re-built using the right bits and has achieved excellent realiability: and power!

[Farbrooke]

I thought the mini cooper came in 997 then 998cc form, whilst the Cooper S came 970, 1071 and 1275cc as standard.

[SidewaysFeltham]

Yes I do agree: the Cooper s was 970 in its smallest iteration. The 1071 s came firstly, of course.

I discount the plain Cooper as they were re-worked standard A series components and owed not much to the Abingdon developments and XSP, were pretty gutless in standard form and both the original drum braked and disk braked versions didn't stop much!

All properly tweaked 850 c.c. versions were in fact far quicker! (e.g. Speedwell; Alexander; etc).

At a distance of some 45 years and relying purely on memory, it is easy to make the odd error. Plus, of course, one tends to think in terms of the standard capacity in which they competed. Thus 970 becomes 998 or 999 c.c. etc. Which took the engine up to the normal class limit of 1,000 c.c.

[PeteC]

Originally Posted by COLIN STUBBS

Hey up lads heres a couple you might like.
Chevron Oils Modsports start at Cadwell July 72



Pole: Jon Fletcher,John Absalom,Richard Jenvey.
Max Payne.David Harrison
Terry Carpenter [MGB]

Northern sports car championship



Pole; John Cotton/ MGB, Max Payne,Pete Cresswell
Abbott/ Alpine,Roy Mccarthey/MGA
Clewley,Brownlee/Elite,Nick Taylor/MGTC.
Terry Carpenter/MGB, Knowles/Marcos

Colin, a couple of great pictures, particularly the second one. I don't remember this race, so seeing the picture was a complete surprise. Any chance of a higher resolution copy? I've sent you a PM and an email with contact details.

A race I do remember was the first time Dave Clewley and myself went to Cadwell, a combined Sports Car and Modsports race. On the short circuit Dave was 6 seconds under the current modsports lap record and I was 5 secs under. Dave was 3rd fastest (on pole was Frank Aston's Chevron B16, the Rob Nettletons Frogeye), but blew his engine in practice. I was 5th on the grid and took advantage of the hole on the front row to lead the race for the first half a lap. If I have done it right there should be a picture attached. Another great memory of great racing years!

Pete Cresswell