GpA Toyotas--anyone know where they got to?

[terryobeirne]

I'm trying to trace where all the GpA Toyotas went, especially the later TOMS Supras. I have got 3 of the small Corollas and looking for an "upgrade". I know 2 Supras exist here in Australia, but there were quite a few in late 80's. that raced in UK/Europe. anyone help???? even clues will be greatfully received

[chunterer]

Iteresting question and despite there being quite a lot of Grp A Corollas and Supra sbuilt I can't believe your're having such a struggle getting info on them!!

One of the MIL Shell supra Turbo's that ran in 1988 BTCC ended up in Thundersaloons with a Cosworth RS500 engine in it.

Not sure where it went after that though, or what happened to the sister car?

There must have been 6-7 Corollas running between 1986-89. Chris Hodgetts flogged most of his BTCC examples to your part of the world but I wonder what happened to Tony Crudgington's or Stig Gruen's?

[terryobeirne]

thanks, getting any sort of touring car info out of UK seems quite hard unless it is for a british built car, eg Rover, Ford. Unlike here in Australia, it seems there was no big following with lots of published promo material where historical data can now be found. We are spoiled here.
Anyhow, several blue coloured Supras raced in ETCC races in late 80's. These were MA70 models, mostly TOMS built and with various sponsors, Fujitsu & Minolta being prominent for a while. 2 of these came here after the Spa race of 1989. 1 survives and the other was reportedly stripped & crushed to avoid paying import duties. Supposedly 8 were built. Bill Hewland has confirmed that they built 10 or 12 special gearboxes for 7 or 8 cars, so that data sort of matches. I have seen fleeting glimpses of a red MA70 Supra in 1988 BTCC video, so maybe that is the Shell car you refer to.
I believe 1 of the Hodgetts cars went to Hong Kong and 2 TOMS/Dowsett cars came here, 1 of which I have.
There were heaps of these cars over a 8 year period so its amazing they have just disappeared.

[KA]

Originally Posted by terryobeirne

I have seen fleeting glimpses of a red MA70 Supra in 1988 BTCC video, so maybe that is the Shell car you refer to.

The red Supra in the video would definitely be one of the MIL/Shell cars. They were driven by Chris Hodgetts and Vic Lee- Hodgetts jumped ship for a Brooklyn Motorpsort RS500 towards the end of the season, and the no1 car was taken over by Mark Hales and Ian Flux. MIL also had a Corolla which appeared from time to time, for John Llewellyn amongst others. I suspect this was an ex-Hodgetts car.

I definitely remember one of the Supras in Thundersaloons- I ought to have a photo or two somewhere.

There's an interesting footnote in the story- on the 1988 Manx International Rally, Graham Middleton appeared in a red Group A MA70 Supra turbo- As I remember, it was described in Autosport's report as being one of the MIL cars modified into a rallycar- I think the report suggested it was a bit of a handful, having suspension settings that were more suited to Silverstone than the Manx lanes.

I don't remember the date of the 88 Manx, (it's usually run in late August/September from memory?), but from the BTCC results I've got to hand, MIL only ran a single car in the last 2/3 BTCC rounds. If one of the BTCC cars was converted to rally-spec for the Manx, did it get converted back to a race car, or did MIL have a spare car? I certainly don't remember it making another rally appearance that year.

Apart from the blue TOM'S cars, there were two other teams of MA30 Supras that appeared in Europe. RAS Sport in Belgium ran a pair of Bastos-liveried cars intermittently in ETCC/WTCC races in 1987, in both normally-aspirated and non-turbo form- they were usually both slow and unreliable
http://www.racingsportscars.com/etcc...-08-02-014.jpg
they appeared again at Spa in 88, in Fina colours
http://www.racingsportscars.com/etcc...-07-31-029.jpg

The other regular ETCC Supras came from the Swiss Bemani team, who ran one, sometimes two cars in the 88 ETCC
http://www.racingsportscars.com/etcc...-07-31-016.jpg

I've got a feeling that at least one of the Bemani cars was still being campigned in Switzerland in the early/mid 90's- I'm sure I've seen a photo of one racing against Supertouring cars around that time

[terryobeirne]

thanks, trying to follow-up these leads. so far, not much luck

[VIVA GT]

Originally Posted by KA

I don't remember the date of the 88 Manx, (it's usually run in late August/September from memory?), but from the BTCC results I've got to hand, MIL only ran a single car in the last 2/3 BTCC rounds. If one of the BTCC cars was converted to rally-spec for the Manx, did it get converted back to a race car, or did MIL have a spare car? I certainly don't remember it making another rally appearance that year.

I seem to remember that MIL actually tried to run two Shell Supra's (with numerous drivers), plus I'm sure they had a spare too (making three in total according to my calculator).
I think this team was (originally) very well funded, but the problems they had soon ate into the budget!

[davyboy]

Why were the Supras so uncompetitive and why did they switch from turbo to non-turbo ?

[KA]

The Japanese TOM'S cars were always turbos, as were the MIL cars in Britain

When the RAS cars appeared in Europe in 87, I think at some point they ran one of each, a turbo and a 3-litre n/a- they certainly seemed to at Spa in 87

car 14- Joosen/Heyer/Jelinski- (turbo)
http://www.racingsportscars.com/etcc...-08-02-014.jpg

car 15- Olofsson/Thibault/Bachelart (3.0i)
http://www.racingsportscars.com/etcc...-08-02-015.jpg

Think the main visual difference is the rear spoiler, was this only homologated on the turbo?

I've got a vague feeling that the non-turbo might have been homologated slightly before the turbo, but I'd have to look back through old Autosports etc to be sure.

I don't know why Bemani ran the non-turbo version in 88, but wouldn't be surprised if after seeing the trouble RAS had with the turbo, they figured the 3-litre was the safer route....

[KA]

Originally Posted by VIVA GT

I seem to remember that MIL actually tried to run two Shell Supra's (with numerous drivers), plus I'm sure they had a spare too (making three in total according to my calculator).
I think this team was (originally) very well funded, but the problems they had soon ate into the budget!

That's certainly what I seem to remember- two cars for most of the season, but cut back to a single car some time in the last couple of rounds or so. The lead car was initially Hodgetts, later replaced by Hales, then Fluxie right at the end of the season, and the second for Vic Lee- didn't that carry his sponsorship fairly prominently (something like Mulcahy & Hirst?) as well as the Shell backing of the lead car?

[VIVA GT]

Originally Posted by KA

That's certainly what I seem to remember- two cars for most of the season, but cut back to a single car some time in the last couple of rounds or so. The lead car was initially Hodgetts, later replaced by Hales, then Fluxie right at the end of the season, and the second for Vic Lee- didn't that carry his sponsorship fairly prominently (something like Mulcahy & Hirst?) as well as the Shell backing of the lead car?

Thanks for backing up my theories, you're right, Vic Lee's car did have seperate sponsorship. As I remember they were a construction company, and appeared to be just two young petrol heads splashing money around. Arrived out of nowhere and disappeared in a similar fashion...

[Jesper OH]

http://www.supra-garage.de/ai0388b.htm

According to this article Bemani decided that the excessive weight of the Turbo-model, was reason enough to go for the normally aspirated version for '88. It has to be mentioned that Bemani actually debuted their first Supra during 1987. Check out the article too for the "war paint", as it's different from the white/red colour scheme of '88.

Jesper

[chunterer]

Yeas the 3.0 V6 was still a heavy car but there might have been some justification in thinking it would be a competitive Class 2 or B car against the Alfa 75's and BMW M3. However, history tells us that that notion (if it ever was a realisitc one) was quickly checked by the performance if the M3, a road car built for racing, which left it's class rivals which were not as highly developed for dead immediately.

[terryobeirne]

they were never a V6. all straight 6, and absurdly heavy. we recently rebuilt an old a GpA Supra motor, and we had all forgotten how heavy there were to move about the shop. The mid 80's non-turbo MA61 engine/car combo was just acceptable, but once the heavier MA70 cam along, the non-turbo was just a slug. why anyone would have thought they could compete with lighter BMW 3 litre amazes me.

[collector]

I've got a feeling that at least one of the Bemani cars was still being campigned in Switzerland in the early/mid 90's- I'm sure I've seen a photo of one racing against Supertouring cars around that time

That's right. In 1993 one Supra was equipped with a two-litre engine for the new Swiss Touringcar Championship. The car was faster than with the larger engine. In the next season the car was replaced by the Toyota Carina.

Some years later, 1999, a bemani Supra appeared for one or two seasons in the Divinol-Tourenwagen-Cup. Driver was Rüdiger Näf.

[DAVID PATERSON]

I was chatting with John Smith, last weekend and he still has his TTA Supra turbo.

[GBRM]

IIRC my late father (Gerry Marshall) raced a Corolla a few times, I think with John L and also with Geoff Kimber-Smith. I'll have to look through my programmes tonight, as I definitely remember him testing a pearlescent one and I have some pictures of a yellow and black one.

[DAVID PATERSON]

Does anyone have any pics of Bob Holden's AE86 Sprinter racing in Australia?

[KA]

Originally Posted by GBRM

IIRC my late father (Gerry Marshall) raced a Corolla a few times, I think with John L and also with Geoff Kimber-Smith. I'll have to look through my programmes tonight, as I definitely remember him testing a pearlescent one and I have some pictures of a yellow and black one.

I definitely remember him in Geoff Kimber-Smith's AGK Corolla- probably at either a Donington ETCC round, the TT or one of the BTCC 1 hour/2-driver races around 1987-89.. Barbara Cowell is another name that comes to mind as sharing GK-S's car on occasion

[KA]

Originally Posted by terryobeirne

they were never a V6. all straight 6, and absurdly heavy. we recently rebuilt an old a GpA Supra motor, and we had all forgotten how heavy there were to move about the shop. The mid 80's non-turbo MA61 engine/car combo was just acceptable, but once the heavier MA70 cam along, the non-turbo was just a slug. why anyone would have thought they could compete with lighter BMW 3 litre amazes me.

Thinking about it, it was worse than that- the class split in Europe was at 2.5 litres, so the non-turbo MA61 wasn't competing against M3s, but in the 'big' class against the Cosworths....Bemani did get some reasonable midfield performances from theirs in 88- from memory it was usually roughly on a par with the privateer M3s, although totally outgunned by the RS500s in it's own class and by the factory M3s

[chunterer]

Think the A-B class split was changed to 3.0 litres in 1987 with advent of WTCC etc??

[KA]

Originally Posted by chunterer

Think the A-B class split was changed to 3.0 litres in 1987 with advent of WTCC etc??

The ETCC and Britain originally split the classes at 2500cc+, 1601-2500cc and up to 1600

Australia had used 2.0-3.0 litres for class B, but with the WTCC coming in 1987 adopted the European 1.6-2.5 litre standard for the class- the 87 Bathurst yearbook refers to several cars, such as some of the turbos and the Peter Williamson Supra (2.8 litres) being pushed up into the top class.

The turbo equivalency factor had originally been 1.4, which combined with running an up to 3-litre Class B had enabled most of the 2-litre turbo cars (Starions, Skylines etc) to run in class B in Australia before 1987.

The FIA increased the equivalency factor to 1.7 in 1988, but the class split stayed at 3-litres, keeping the Bemani Supras and a 3-litre Alfa 75 V6 fielded by CiBiEmme at Spa in the top class....

http://homepage.mac.com/frank_de_jong/Pages/part5.html

The BTCC altered the class A-B split to 3-litres in 1988 IIRC

[Tim Wilkinson]

Originally Posted by KA

I definitely remember him in Geoff Kimber-Smith's AGK Corolla- probably at either a Donington ETCC round, the TT or one of the BTCC 1 hour/2-driver races around 1987-89.. Barbara Cowell is another name that comes to mind as sharing GK-S's car on occasion

BTCC 1987 Round 10 at Oulton Park, Gerry shared GKS's Corolla to 3rd in Class D behind Hodgetts/Needell and Needell/Hodgetts.

[racer69]

Originally Posted by KA

Australia had used 2.0-3.0 litres for class B, but with the WTCC coming in 1987 adopted the European 1.6-2.5 litre standard for the class- the 87 Bathurst yearbook refers to several cars, such as some of the turbos and the Peter Williamson Supra (2.8 litres) being pushed up into the top class.

When Australia started with Group A properly in 1985, we basically kept the Group C classes.

In 1987 for the ATCC they simplified it (perhaps too much) into simply two classes, Over 2.5L and Under 2.5L. Hence the manufacturers championship was split between Nissan and BMW, as each make won their respective class on the same amount of occasions.

In addition to this we had a seperate 2 Litre ATCC (started some said as a way of keeping Toyota Australia interested in Australian Touring Car racing, which they had competed in since 1984 in Group A with an array of FWD & RWD Group A cars), which consisted mostly of Toyota Corolla's, but also of the 2 litre works Nissan Gazelle of Mark Skaife, who dominated the series.

As mentioned when Bathurst came around the classes were based on the FISA WTCC rulebook, hence the Gazelle went into the same class as the BMW M3's, and Corolla's had a battle to themselves.

[GBRM]

I found this yesterday http://www.racingsportscars.com/etcc...-06-photo.html

Scroll down a bit and there's a picture of the Corolla.

there's also some other results for Dad and also some great pictures of the Toyota Supras on the main site.

[DAVID PATERSON]

Originally Posted by DAVID PATERSON

Does anyone have any pics of Bob Holden's AE86 Sprinter racing in Australia?

bump