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Old 11 Mar 2006, 07:14 (Ref:1543379)   #1
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Group A Toyota Celica Supras - History trace (super merge!!)

Hi. I have a Group A car which raced in England during its 'early' life, 1983 and 84. I am trying to determine which races the car competed in by looking at the logbook application dates of it and similar cars, as I believe there was only one racing at any time. I was wondering if someone who has already researched a car through the system there could give me some tips on who to contact - is it the MSA? If so, is the historic technical email the best one to use, or do I need to write/ring? Or is there another body who maintains these older records?

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Old 11 Mar 2006, 09:35 (Ref:1543514)   #2
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Might help if you tell us what it is ART :-)
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Old 11 Mar 2006, 12:21 (Ref:1543625)   #3
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Group A car

It is only one of the old Hughes of Beaconsfield Supras. Hughes was not interested in providing information when we contacted them a few years ago, and the people who worked on them had gone. They did not seem to have any documents. CAMS in Australia have no record of the car having a logbook issued, even though it raced here for 4 years, 1984 to 1987. Same with New Zealand, it raced there for 2 years, yet again the NZ authorities have no records. I believe I know where the Australian logbook is, but the person will not provide it to me. I am basically trying to confirm some of the races it did in Britain, as part of getting the historic logbook issued in Australia - the car did the Spa 24 hour race in 1984 with Gordon Spice, and I believe it was the car Win Percy and Tony Dron drove in the 1983 TT, but can't really confirm. I believe there were either 3 or 4 of the Hughes cars built for circuit racing, and I did hear of another still in Scotland many years ago, but have not been able to find who owns it. The press in Australia at the time described the car as the Hughes 'development car', by which I assume it was the first one built. The car Win Percy drives in late 1984 is clearly a different car, and I believe this was later written off by Barry Sheene, which means there were at least 3. Any more accurate history would also be appreciated. Car is in 1987 spec so is quite different to its 1983 English form, updated engine, suspension, brakes, instruments etc, and it had a couple of very bad accidents in Aust so body is also mostly replaced.

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Old 11 Mar 2006, 13:51 (Ref:1543699)   #4
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History of Touring Cars is a bit vague. I've often wondered why. Have you tried the MSA? I'm not sure but they must have log book copies and entry details. This might give you a start.
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Old 11 Mar 2006, 14:36 (Ref:1543716)   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter Mallett
History of Touring Cars is a bit vague. I've often wondered why. Have you tried the MSA? I'm not sure but they must have log book copies and entry details. This might give you a start.
When I asked the MSA for a list of all the British Sprint Championship rounds that had taken place the best they could do was tell me who the champions were!

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Old 11 Mar 2006, 16:24 (Ref:1543762)   #6
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I'm amazed they knew that much!

If the RAC MSA kept records, much of what we do on 10 Tenths wouldn't be necessary.

Allen
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Old 11 Mar 2006, 16:26 (Ref:1543763)   #7
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OK clever dicks!

At least I had a positive comment! What do our experts know then?
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Old 11 Mar 2006, 16:33 (Ref:1543766)   #8
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Well there's no point in setting the poor lad off on a wild goose chase.

I'd suggest asking Frank de Jong for ideas. I wouldn't have a clue.
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Old 11 Mar 2006, 16:37 (Ref:1543769)   #9
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I did look there but if you google it, Frank's site comes up with an '86 car. Too late for our friend here.

But as I said, we can trace single seaters but touring cars do present a challenge.
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Old 11 Mar 2006, 20:06 (Ref:1543909)   #10
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John,

I am surprised that C.A.M.S. is not able to supply any details .
Did you try the Brisbane office or National office in Melbourne, the logbook would have been issued by the state in which the applicant resided , no good trying Brisbane office if logbook issued out of , say, Melb. state office , if you know who the owner was , as opposed to the driver , maybe give Graham Hoinville a call at Melb. Nat. office for his suggestion.

Bryan Miller.
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Old 11 Mar 2006, 23:16 (Ref:1544017)   #11
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Race Car History

Bryan, I have tried the NSW office (Peter lived in Liverpool) and the National/Vic office. I even got the details from his previous Celica logbooks and gave CAMS the owner details from those, and they have looked through Peter's file - nothing. I have the details of all owners the car has had, and gave those to CAMS, still nothing. In fact, one of the owners has had a number of cars, yet CAMS don't have a record of him ever asking for a logbook for any car. The car was well photographed so proof of events here is no problem.

I have some good photos of the car at Spa 84 from Frank and others, and we know that is definately the car as it came to Australia straight from Belgium. What I am really trying to do is determine which races it did before that, ie which photos of the various Hughes cars that I have in England prior to Jun 1984 are of my car, and which races did it attend. This is to complete the race history I need to supply with the Certificate of Description application. Everyone concerned here in Australia (including the original owner, and CAMS) agree it is the correct car, but sorting the history out is important for me so that I only put facts down on the application, not what I have been told and what the contemporary reports state. I am also trying to work out if my car is the one in the homologation paper photographs, as that would give me some build photos. Presumable the Hughes group at one of the their Beaconsfield dealerships would have old photos etc, and records, but who knows where.

Sounds like I should try the MSA though, so will start there.

Regards, John
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Old 12 Mar 2006, 07:44 (Ref:1544182)   #12
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I seem to remember seeing ex-works Supra(s) advertised for a long time in Motoring news as I recollect they were not particially successful on the track. I also believe one of these cars was purchased by one of our competitors for use in the BARC Modified Production Saloons which I was running at the time and as I recollect it was a bit of a disappointment, looked the part but just did not seem to deliver, I think as I recollect it was extremelly heavy, as heavy or heavier than my Camaro but with less BHP.
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Old 12 Mar 2006, 09:02 (Ref:1544310)   #13
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Originally Posted by Al Weyman
I seem to remember seeing ex-works Supra(s) advertised for a long time in Motoring news as I recollect they were not particially successful on the track. I also believe one of these cars was purchased by one of our competitors for use in the BARC Modified Production Saloons which I was running at the time and as I recollect it was a bit of a disappointment, looked the part but just did not seem to deliver, I think as I recollect it was extremelly heavy, as heavy or heavier than my Camaro but with less BHP.
Hi, I think you're thinking of the later Supra, the 3.0 litre Turbo that raced (or tried to!) 1988/89.
They sounded wonderful for the short time they ran, but just didn't run very long.
These cars also looked fantastic, bright red and sponsored by Shell. Chris Hodgetts was the lead driver, and had numerous team mates.
One other point. I don't think that BTCC Cars had RAC Log Books in 1984...
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Old 12 Mar 2006, 09:06 (Ref:1544312)   #14
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Yes thats the one Viva, it was red as I recollect, looked great (did you or your car race with us? I remember a Viva GT coming out).
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Old 13 Mar 2006, 06:45 (Ref:1545742)   #15
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Group A Logbooks

Question I should have asked first then was, what did Group A cars in Britain have to identify them? Did they have some sort of logbook, or a set of papers? Perhaps I am looking for the wrong thing. Australian cars simply had a CAMS logbook, no different to any other category of race car. I had just assumed that overseas car had similar logbooks.

Regards,

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Old 13 Mar 2006, 10:44 (Ref:1546992)   #16
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Originally Posted by ART Racing
Question I should have asked first then was, what did Group A cars in Britain have to identify them? Did they have some sort of logbook, or a set of papers? Perhaps I am looking for the wrong thing. Australian cars simply had a CAMS logbook, no different to any other category of race car. I had just assumed that overseas car had similar logbooks.

Regards,

John
Can't answer for race cars but stage rally cars in UK first had logbooks 1988/9. Hill climb and sprint cars mid 1990s (and not for road-legal ones even now). The only reason was to prompt scrutineers at the next event that some observation had been recorded by a different scrutineer at the previous event. Pretty sure race cars in general didn't need them when first introduced for stage rally cars. Never needed anything other than the general homologation papers for the car model (not specific to the car) when competing in Europe in 1980s under the then new Appendix J.
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Old 13 Mar 2006, 13:26 (Ref:1547128)   #17
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All I can add is that whatever the car is, it won't be the Barry Sheene one. That one was left bent banana-shaped after an incident at Thruxton which Barry was frankly lucky to get out of. There was very, very little left of it after it took (I think) an RS1600i Escort hard in the door.
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Old 13 Mar 2006, 13:46 (Ref:1547143)   #18
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Presumable the Hughes group at one of the their Beaconsfield dealerships would have old photos etc, and records, but who knows where.
Hughes haven't been a Toyota dealer since maybe the late 1980's. As far as I known they've had no motorsport involvemen since then. They've been a Mercedes dealer for as long as I can remember, and now Smart, Chrysler and Jeep as well. It's not much help I know but I'm not surprised if they know nothing about the car.
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Old 13 Mar 2006, 20:43 (Ref:1547486)   #19
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Barry Sheene's Car

"All I can add is that whatever the car is, it won't be the Barry Sheene one. That one was left bent banana-shaped after an incident at Thruxton which Barry was frankly lucky to get out of. There was very, very little left of it after it took (I think) an RS1600i Escort hard in the door."

No, my car was never driven by Barry. As far as I am aware, my car is the first one. It was raced by Win Percy, Tony Dron and Gordon Spice at various times in England from early 83 till about Jun 84. It was then replaced by the second car, which is the one that Win Percy did well in during the latter half of 84, and which became Barry's car for 85. This is the car you are refering to I believe. This car was written off, and was replaced by another which Barry, in his biography, states they never sorted out, and he lost interest in it. I believe this car may still exist, I heard rumours of it being up in Scotland many years ago. So at least 3 circuit racing cars from Hughes, but without proper documentation it is all hard to verify. And I don't know if the last car ended up as one of the rally cars either. I wouldn't have thought they would have built any more that the 3 for circuit racing, as 1985/6 and the advent of the turbo cars made them redundant.

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Old 14 Mar 2006, 16:54 (Ref:1548126)   #20
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Right then ART Group A one of my favourite subjects!!! YIPPEE

This won't be specific but it may help you here and there.

Bloke called Jim Whitehouse and (Dave Lampitt?) of firm called Arden Conversions had something to do with building either all of the cars or just the engines of the 2.8i Celica Supra's as they were called (no idea where these guys are these days). Hughes was just the sponsor and entrant i think?

As you say ART, the car debuted in 1983 with Win Percy at the wheel, this car continued into '84 but I think it was shunted at Thruxton Easter Monday and rebuilt - whatever the case when it returned it was much stronger and quicker and was a true front runner late in the season, often harrassing Rouse's Vitesse for the win. Gordon Spice ran it at Silverstone in June and quite liked it despite no testing (would have been good if they'd got him out in a second car). The later in season version of the car had flared wheel arches.

The Martin brothers, Jean-Michel and Phillipe ran one in Belgium (this may have been the early one rebuilt and perhaps looked after by Dave Cook Racing?) at Spa where they were joined by Spice, perhaps explaining why he was racing one the previous month? This could be your car ART?

Dave Cook definitely ran one or other of the Martin's in Belgium in Group N cars but he may also have run a Group A car as well - their relationship as in the case of Spice went back to Grp 1 Capri days as the Martin's shared Capri's with Spice and were a customer of CC Racing racing in the Belgian Touring Car series.

The Supra entered the '84 TT but Percy was in a Jag so it may have been Dron and someone else down to drive it, but i don't think it actually competed at the event anyway?

If Win had continued with the car into '85 with some continued development, they could well have won the title with it don't know why they didn't run him alongside Sheene (I guess Win had a full time Rover ETC deal and perhaps Toyota didn't fancy taking on the Sierra and improving 'Brode' Starion much?)

The only other info I know about such cars is their time in Australia (which was the one that poor Peter Williamson pranged on Bathust start line in '85 (was that the '83/early '84 Celica Supra?)

Funnily enough, mentioning errant Escort RS1600's Tim, John Morris a former Golf pedalled who ran an RS1600 in '85 entered a Supra in the 1986 TT to be partnered by his buddy Bob Meacham, but i don't think it qualified. It was in a garage along the pitlane though, I remember looking at the back of it. That may have been one of the '85 Sheene cars.

Unfortunately I can't pin point exactly which car is yours, but as it came from Belgium then the Martin's may well have pedalled it for a while because they definitely had one in 1984.
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Old 14 Mar 2006, 17:34 (Ref:1548173)   #21
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Arden were doing engines for the Toyota UK Celica GT4 rally car later on. So an earlier racing engine link fits. Wasn't Cliff Humphries (ex BMC Comps) there?
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Old 15 Mar 2006, 13:40 (Ref:1549471)   #22
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Yes thats the one Viva, it was red as I recollect, looked great (did you or your car race with us? I remember a Viva GT coming out).
Hi Al. No that wasn't me. I did race a Mini Se7en in the early 80's CCC Modsaloon races though. (It was painted Vauxhall Silver, had a Vauxhall Griffin badge on the bonnet and was towed by a matching silver Viva GT, but that's another story...)
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Old 26 Oct 2006, 18:31 (Ref:1750309)   #23
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Barry Sheene's Toyota Supra Photo research (merged)

hello
just wondering if anyone has any pictures of the 1985 british touring car championship of Barry sheene in the toyota supra. if anyone cn help with any pictures of the car it would be most appriciated

thanks
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Old 26 Oct 2006, 18:46 (Ref:1750330)   #24
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Barry Sheene Toyota Supra Photo research (merged)

hello
i am in desperate need of some pictures of when barry sheene was driving the toyota supra i now own this car an currently restoring it so i need to get the paint and sticker work sorted..
Any information on the car will be welcomed

thanks very much
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Old 26 Oct 2006, 19:06 (Ref:1750347)   #25
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Have you seen page 110 of this week's Autosprout (dated October 26)?

Best of luck with the restoration.
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