[KA]

Originally Posted by terryobeirne

Yes, the John Smith car was built by TOMS Japan . I believe the Minolta/Fuxitsu sponsored cars were part of the same "family" of 7 cars, 1 of which was crushed here to avoid duties.
I understood from my brief correspondence with hewland, that the special gearboxes were built for Toyota Japan and their GpA racers , so I assume these are the cars built by TOMS. The 2 TOMS cars here, had these special boxes.

Thanks- I had a look on Google last night and turned up some pics of the Smith/TTA car and the Willmington car

Originally Posted by terryobeirne

As far as I know, at that time, TOMS GB was concentrating on Formula cars and the BTCC front drive corolla (which I own), and they dont seem to have had much, if any, role in the Supras. Whilst TOMS GB may have been a bit of staging post for other european events, from what little I know, it never got anywhere near the depth of TOMS Japan.

It always puzzled me that with TOM'S GB already active, Toyota went the route of backing a separate team in the form of MIL for the BTCC Supra project- although they'd run separate projects with two teams in '87 when they set up the TOM'S GB fwd Corolla programme alongside the existing CHMS outfit...

I'd have thought it would have made more sense to farm the fwd Corolla out to another team and set up the Supra programm through TOM'S GB, sourcing full factory cars from Japan rather than set up a new operation to develop the car locally.

I guess with TOM'S GB already committed in F3, (and sportscars on the horizon- Toyota ran a full Group C season for the firsttime in '89, and TOM'S GB would be heavily involved in this as I recall) maybe there were capacity or 'political' issues.

I wonder if it was a case of Toyota GB being approached to back a BTCC Supra project by MIL, rather than Toyota instigating the programme and cotracting MIL & Specfab to build and run the cars....

Originally Posted by terryobeirne

I dont have any definite proof yet, but I'm sure the Bemani cars were ex TOMS. I have not yet had a reply from bermani. I have some contacts in Germany chasing leads at that end, so maybe something will eventually surface.

Toyota team Australia was disbanded when GpA finished in 1993 and the parts/cars scattered. John Smith, their lead driver, managed to hang onto the Supra and a pile of parts for this and his AE92 corolla. His AE92 corolla was sold many years ago and still competes in historic events.

The Gary Wilmington Supra that raced here was definitely not an ex-TOMS car. I have tried to trace the car , but the leads have gone cold. Whislt there is some anecdotal evidence it got converted back to a road car, it more likely was exported around 1999 when it appears it's then owner "did a runner" from creditors.

These were all expensively and professionally built cars, and given there was no new model to transfer parts to, I'll be surprised if they were all scrapped.
The search continues!!

That's interesting.... I'd originally guessed the Bemani cars were built in-house, given that they went the n/a 3-litre route. They were backed by Toyota Switzerland as I recall, so maybe that helped them to secure ex-TOM'S cars or shells...?

Wonder where the Belgian RAS cars fit into the story....and where they are now?

It's also interesting that TTE in Germany never seem to have been involved, although their background was purely rallying and with a WRC project to run maybe it was a question of capacity- the ST165 Celica GT-Four appeared for the first time in 1988.

I think there was a rumour at one time early in '88 of Juha Kankkunen having an outing in one of the MIL cars at either the Donington ETCC round or the TT though...