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Tizer
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16/01/2008
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16:27
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I've opened this thread to make a place for some pictures of motor vehicles - interesting or attractive or just simply curious. I've started it below with three pictures taken at a steam rally a few years ago. I've got a few more but please feel free to contribute pictures.
Tizer
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karlelden
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Posted - 23/01/2008 : 05:18
On our way to a show--newly restored 1941 Minneapolis Moline GTS
Karl Elden |
Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 23/01/2008 : 05:49
I'd forgotten the hot tube. It was rather like the hot tube ignition once used on gas engines. The idea was to create a hot spot in the cylinder to help it fire the first time round. On gas engines you warmed them with a blow lamp and subsequent explosions kept them red hot so they acted as the equivalent of a spark plug.
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
karlelden
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Posted - 23/01/2008 : 06:14
And some engines started with a match. Set the piston at just past top center, prime the cylinder with a shot of gasoline, insert an old type match in the special little hole, screw the cap on, and hit the little pin on the outside to strike the match in the cylinder to ignite the charge. And pray that the engine would take off. I've seen old Fairbanks Morse engines like that.
Karl Elden |
Tizer
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Posted - 23/01/2008 : 10:08
Earlier in this thread Stanley admitted to having been "into Lancia cars". Likewise, I was into Alfa Romeos in the 1980s so I've posted pictures (taken in 1980s) of two cars to remind him of the joys of Italian car design. The top one is an open top car of the 1950s with a 2.5 litre engine. The last two photos are of one car although the colours look different (camera/film problem). I love that sloping back! Once I would have known the identity and details of both cars - but not now!
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softsuvner
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Posted - 23/01/2008 : 19:54
I had an Alfa in the 1980's, a 2 litre Guilietta with the twin overhead cam engine. The motor was superb, the rest of it, bodywork and electrics was typical Italian, total tosh.
The gearbox was on the back axle and the remote change was an "all corners of the compass" affair. The number of times I made a fast get away only to miss a gear! At the time, I used to do a lot of towing racing bikes around. Something about the gear ratios meant that the Alfa, for all its power, wasn't happy towing a bike trailer.
I admire Italian engineering, i've had two Italian bikes as well, a Morini and a MotoGuzzi, but when it comes to detail finishing they are all show and no substance.
After the Alfa, I had a well-worn 2 litre injection Cavalier that was twice the car that the Alfa was. Later on we had an indentical Cav at work which had been "chipped" for use by our Investigation Branch, nothing could live with it. The engine from my Cav was still running strong in another body at 200,000 miles, and not burning oil, must have been a good'un!
Malcolm
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Tizer
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Posted - 24/01/2008 : 11:08
Malcolm, Like you I went from Alfa to Cavaliers - and then to Mondeo, then Focus. These modern Vauxhalls and Fords just seem to go on and on and don't give much trouble at all. My first Cavalier did over 100,000 miles and then my dad took it on and did even more mileage in it. Other than wear and tear, the only thing I had to replace was a solenoid under the bonnet!
I never had the Guilletta like yours but I had two AlfaSuds and one of the last Guilia coupes, a 1976 GT Junior which had a fantastic racing gear change with the lever up near the steering wheel. The engine was fantastic too. I'll look to see if I can find a picture. Like all Alfas then, the rust had to be kept at bay. The Italian car firms were obliged to use only steel from Italy's own factories - and it was poor quality. The second Sud we eventually sold to another Alfa enthusiast. Then later we bought it back from him. When eventually we had to get a more practicable car again, we sold it to him a second time!
Edit: Here is a picture of the GT Junior
Edited by - Tizer on 24/01/2008 15:13:04
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 24/01/2008 : 15:04
Sentinal books arrived so if anyone is interested I have a mint copy in dust jacket of 'The Sentinel' volume I for sale. £30 and postage. I've just paid £90 for the two volumes so it's cheap......
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
softsuvner
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Posted - 24/01/2008 : 17:35
Tizer
Perhaps I was a bit hard on the poor old Alfa, like all my cars, she came well-worn and did a lot of hard miles with me. She went back, via my garage man, to the chap she came from, who specialised in Austin 7 racers. He put the motor in another body. and used it as a tow car for some time. I shall never have another motor with a wooden steering wheel rim again, that's for sure.
Been looking through some uncatalogued slides (for a photo of a Skoda Sentinel - which I still haven't found!) and discovered some hill-climb photos that I had forgotten about. Watch this space!
Malcolm
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softsuvner
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Posted - 24/01/2008 : 20:12
Four years ago, while in Ireland for a Vintage Bike Rally, we managed to get a chance of "demonstration runs" at a Hill Climb near Carrick On Suir. Over there they don't mess about with their motorsport. If you want to close a road for an event, the law allows it by prior application. As the locals saw it: "sure its only once a year, and they spend good money in the town". There was a mixed entry, but one of the stars was this monster sprint car. According to a friend, it is a well-known car in the UK, but I forget the details:
I also can't remember the size of the engine, but it was a big lump and I seem to think that it was based on an American Liberty aero engine. Anybody got any ideas?
It was a two day event held over a weekend on two different hills. We could only make the Sunday but, apparently, the Saturday night barbecue saw most of the competing cars, including this one, heading out to a local Stately home, and returning much later in convoy, because most of them had no lights. Of course the Garda knew all about it, but had urgent business elsewhere. What a different attitude over there, wished I'd have seen that!
Malcolm
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 25/01/2008 : 06:31
The car rings a bell. A lot of the early Brooklands cars had Liberty engines. It's in the back of my head somewhere......
Spent the afternoon reading the second Sentinel book....... Real eye-opener. Did you know Sentinel built units for the French to test in steam driven tanks? Good read..... might even finish it today. Crammed with pics and drawings as well. Doble steam cars and buses and all the work he did with Sentinel. Cars that did over 95mph and wagons that did 70mph.......
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Tizer
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Posted - 25/01/2008 : 12:35
This car is in the news at the moment. It is Benito Mussolini's 1935 Alfa Romeo 6C 2300 Pescara Spyder which will be auctioned by H&H auctions at Cheltenham on 27 February 2008. The H&H web site says the following about the car.
"On the sales front, a 1935 Alfa Romeo 6C 2300 Pescara Spyder that competed in the Mille Miglia and was once owned by Benito Mussolini will be auctioned by H&H at The Centaur, Cheltenham Racecourse on February 27, 2008. Of huge historical importance, the stunning dark red Two-Seater carries an estimate of £600,000-800,000. Chassis 700635, clothed in striking coachwork by Carozzeria Touring, was built to the special order of Benito Mussolini. Before delivery he had it modified with a dickey seat and the engine was specially tuned to deliver 95bhp rather than the 68bhp of the standard model. The car was driven in the 1936 Mille Miglia by Ercole Boratto – an ex-Alfa Romeo test driver who was Mussolini’s chauffeur at the time. The car finished 13th overall and 3rd in class. Mussolini retained the car until 1939, since when it has only had three owners, the latest of which had it restored by Dino Cognolato to a standard good enough to achieve second in class in the 2005 Pebble Beach Concours and victory in the New York Concours meeting of the same year. This ‘matching numbers’ car even retains traces of the partial alcohol fuelling system it is believed to have operated during the Mille Miglia, when the fascist regime was promoting the use of alternative fuels in the face of stringent petrol sanctions!"
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Doc
Keeper of the Scrolls
2010 Posts
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Posted - 25/01/2008 : 18:49
I've just seen SoftSuvener's pictures of Hill climb cars. I use to participate in hill climbs, me and my mate had a suped up Hillman Imp fitted out with a 3 Litre Ford Essex V6 bored out to 3.6 stage 3, lightend flywheel, balanced cranketc, Big set of Holly's, Nitro Kit, Slicks, Wheely Bar on the back end, went like snot of a shiny shovel.
To be honest it went great in a straight line but was a bit hairy on the cornering, One weekend when I wasn't present my mate blow the engine giving it to much Nitro and it never got repaired after that, shame it was a fun car to get behind the wheel, and a good social life surrounding the race meets.
TTFN - Doc
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softsuvner
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Posted - 25/01/2008 : 23:00
A Ford V 6 in a Hillman Imp, I'm not surprised that you had some handling problems! Mind you, if I remember right, there was a problem on the original engine proposed for the Imp, and the engine used in production was a design bought from Coventry Climax. It was effectively half of their V 6 "Godiva" engine designed for a fire pump. You could do quite a bit of tuning to the original Imp engine. The same engine was fitted to the Bond 875 three-wheeler.
A couple more pictures from the Irish Hill Climb:
This projectile used a pair of vintage "knucklehead" Harley Davidson motors built onto a Citroen chassis. This would give it a capacity of just over 2 litres. Notice that it uses British SU carburettors, much easier to set than the original Harley Schebler devices.
GN were a famous British cyclecar (a light car with a bike type engine) from the 1920's. This one, which is called "Thunderbug", has been fitted with an early V twin Riley engine, intended for a pioneer aircraft.
This has been fitted with a top end from a later aircraft engine. The result is to give this thing a 4 litre V twin motor!
Incidentally, I did some searching, and I think the big V 8 aircraft engine in the earlier picture is a First War Curtis aircraft engine.
Malcolm
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 26/01/2008 : 09:42
If I remember rightly the CC Godiva engine was used as a very successful basis for a high performance engine, was it the Cosworth?
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
pluggy
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Posted - 26/01/2008 : 11:17
I'm wondering how half a V6 makes a straight 4...
Used to have an old wreck of an imp we drove up and down a farm lane in my early teens. In my opinion it was right up there with some of the dross turned out by BMC/BL in the 60's and 70's with the added attraction that you needed pecularly shaped mechanics to work on it..... 
Not quite in Allegro territory, but not far away.
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Motor vehicle pictures
