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Old 29 Sep 2003, 15:48 (Ref:734238)   #1
rkshanahan
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Crossle 12F

Hi Everyone,
The thread about my Lola T60 generated so much information I thought I would see what I could find out another one of my cars, a 1967 Crossle 12F. This car has a chassis tag, C12/F67/32, but I don't know a lot about these cars. I have only run across one other here in the States, but I know they were sold here for Formula B with a Lotus Twincam. In fact, a 12F won the SCCA National championship in Formula B for 1967.
My car is complete except it does not have its original wheels, and though Crossle is still in business, they no longer have the patterns to produce new wheels. I would be very interested in any photos showing the original wheels so I can at least buy something that looks close.

Rob
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Old 30 Sep 2003, 01:07 (Ref:734722)   #2
DashCaptain
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Dear sir,

The wheel that were used on the 1967 12F that Roger Barr won the 1967 national campionship in were march 8 spoke magneseum wheels. I have a 1968 14F crossle that was my fathers that I am going to restore. I will attempt to get photos of the 12F from Roger Barr whom I am in contact with. I would like to talk, call me 518-569-0682 or email me at strflt@hotmail.com

Sincerely,
Hamilton Donaldson

Sincerely,
Hamilton Donaldson
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Old 30 Sep 2003, 07:06 (Ref:734941)   #3
cirrus
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I don't think that they could have been March wheels. The "classic" March wheel first appeared in 1970, although it was very similar to the Cosworth 4WD wheel from 1969. The March wheels were also a six spoke design, not eight.
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Old 30 Sep 2003, 09:05 (Ref:735053)   #4
Richard Young
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They were Crossles own wheels, and similar in appearance to those used by Lotus on the 41F3 and (I think) the 47 GT car.
They - the Lotus ones - were six-stud however. Crossle used four.
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Old 1 Oct 2003, 06:06 (Ref:736249)   #5
rkshanahan
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Interesting about the March wheels. I would like to see the pictures of Roger Barr's 1967 car to see what it had. Richard, your comment about Lotus 47 wheels makes sense, as I recieved a photo of a restored car with similar looking wheels. I used to own a Lotus 47, too bad I didn't keep a set of wheels when I sold it.

Rob
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Old 1 Oct 2003, 08:22 (Ref:736326)   #6
tony griffiths
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lotus 47 were knock on ......
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Old 1 Oct 2003, 10:32 (Ref:736463)   #7
Séamas M.
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The pictures in this thread might be useful.

http://tentenths.com/forum/showthrea...threadid=40675

Richard had reckoned these might be 12F/14F wheels.
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Old 5 Oct 2003, 03:57 (Ref:740742)   #8
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Dear Rob,
Sorry about the error on the March wheels. After talking with Roger Barr the origonal wheels were in fact made by John Crossle. Fronts being 8" and rears being 10 ". They were forger at Shorts Brothers Aircraft manufacturing in Ireland and then finished at Johns's Shop. Roger gave me a picture of the shop with the lathe that he used. The later wheels were 10". The origonal wheels were origonallly made for the formula libre that John made that had eight spokes. Roger said that John had told him to cut four spokes out so if you have a wheels that have four shopes cut out that was a natural progession. All of the wheel I have for my 14F are fout spoke wheels origonally eight. i have one eight spoke wheel. and will email you pictures of both. The later set up was 10" in the front Crossle wheels and Brabam 12" in the rear or at least that is what is on my 14F.
Ham Donaldson
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Old 5 Oct 2003, 20:56 (Ref:741304)   #9
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My car came with a mixed bag of old wheels, and based on this info I now realize that one of the wheels must be an original one--I could never figure out why it appeared that 4 of the spokes were removed. Now I just have to find three more. I have put in another request for info to Arnie Black with Crossle.
According to Crossle's website the 12F was built to SCCA Formula B specs for the US, but of the six built, two stayed in Europe. Would these cars have been eligible for Formula 2, or would they have had to race as Formula Libre?A 12F was purchased out of the UK by Tom Claridge around 5 years ago, and I am guessing it was one of those two cars.

Rob
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Old 5 Oct 2003, 21:06 (Ref:741312)   #10
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My records also list six cars racing in 1967, but the Europe/America mix is different from your one.
I have two cars going to the US, one with Ford engine (the car Roger Barr raced in 1968) and one with an Alfa Romeo.
I then have Gerry Birrell racing one in British libre events with a twincam engine, and three others racing in Ireland, namely the works car driven by John Pollock and the examples of David Baird and Joe McArdle.
I have no information as to whether any of these cars were shared: just because I have names of six drivers doesn't mean there were becessarily six cars
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Old 5 Oct 2003, 21:24 (Ref:741330)   #11
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Thanks for the info, David. I am a big Alfa Romeo fan and would love to build my car with an Alfa engine, if it turns out that is what it originally had. When I bought the car it had no engine, though I think the Hewland gearbox had a Ford adaptor on it. I am sure I could find a buyer for the Lotus Twincam I now have. Ham Donaldson is in contact with Roger Barr, who was the East coast agent here for Crossle, and maybe he can shed some light.
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Old 7 Oct 2003, 03:37 (Ref:742529)   #12
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I thought of one more clue about my car, and that is the SCCA number that was on the roll hoop. The number is 11-043, which means it is car #043 from region 11. Region 11 is Florida, so I contacted the SCCA there and inquired if there were any records dating back to the 60's and 70's. I was told there were no records, but they would try to find someone who remembered cars from that period and get back to me. That was the last I heard from them. But at least it confirms that my car was there sometime prior to 1977, which is when it came to San Diego.

Rob
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Old 7 Oct 2003, 09:28 (Ref:742749)   #13
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Rob

That number is likely to have been applied the first time the car appeared in SCCA competition. This means we're either talking about a national-level race that happened to be in Florida (Sebring?) or it was something at local club level which suggests the owner was from Florida. The Formula B championship in 1967/68 did not include any visits to Florida so that suggests we're looking for a Florida owner.

As I know from my F5000 research, relatively few "formula car" drivers were from Florida. This could be a very useful lead.

Do we know who raced 12Fs? I can only find Ned Owen (from Bridgehampton 67), Bruce Klussman (from War Bonnet 67; seen again in 68), Roger Barr (from St Jovite 67; seen again in 68) and Jacques Couture (68 onwards). I think Klussman and Barr were from the US north-east and Couture was Canadian. Ned Owen was from Malvern, PA. OK - so that didn't get me very far!

Am I helping at all?

Allen
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Old 7 Oct 2003, 09:32 (Ref:742752)   #14
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Or maybe Daytona for the 1967 Run-offs?

None of the 11 FB starters had a Crossle but could one have non-started? Does anyone have an entry list?

Allen
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Old 8 Oct 2003, 04:30 (Ref:743629)   #15
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Thanks for the great info, Allen. I am certain the roll hoop that was on the car when I bought it was not the original one, but I have no idea when it was replaced. I do know that the car was not raced or modified after arriving in San Diego about 1977, so that gives a 10 year window when the bar could have been stamped. I will check with SCCA and see when they started with the roll bar number stamping. I am also curious whether a car would be assigned a new number if it changed regions and roll hoops?
I was focused on finding an owner in Florida and it never occured to me that it could have been stamped while visiting for a national event.
Rob
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Old 8 Oct 2003, 04:33 (Ref:743631)   #16
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Allen- Were the '68 and later Run-offs in Daytona as well? That could certainly explain the Florida stamp.

Rob
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Old 8 Oct 2003, 14:56 (Ref:744158)   #17
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Rob,

The origonal roll bar was a small hoop that you can see on the picture of Dad's 14F in Crossles in 30 years of racing history on the crossle web site. In 1969 the SCCA required a roll bar that was taller than the driver. This rill bar on Dad's 14F was still 1.00 or 1.25 inch diameter tubing. SCCA again changed at some point the rules and increased the diameter to 1.5 inch diameter. I have the one that was cut off the frame of my 14F after dad crashed the car. I will ask Roger Barr when the rules required the change on both roll bars so you can get an idea of the age of the car. Question, does the roll bar at the top have a two triangulating mounting points, for the cross brace that has approximately 3/4 of an inch of material all the way around the roll bar? What diameter is it?

Ham Donaldson
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Old 8 Oct 2003, 21:01 (Ref:744522)   #18
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68 was at Riverside, 69 at Daytona, 70 and thereafter at Road Atlanta.

In 69 "J. Mederer" from Southern Pacific Div, had a Crossle.

Allen
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Old 9 Oct 2003, 04:49 (Ref:744771)   #19
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Allen, thanks for the info. Does it seem plausible that my car could be the ex-Mederer car(I did find it in the Southern Pacific area) and that its new roll hoop was first stamped at Daytona in '69? I will see what I can find out about Mr. Mederer.
Ham, I am pretty certain that the roll hoop that came on my car is 1.5" tubing, but I don't recall the reinforcing that you asked about. I will get the old bar out of storage this weekend and post a photo of it for you. The area where the roll bar attached to the chassis showed evidence of a lot of brazing, so there may have been several roll bar changes. The chassis had a lot of additional bracing added on when I got it, which I have since removed. No way to tell when that was done.

Rob
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Old 9 Oct 2003, 08:44 (Ref:744914)   #20
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Rob

Anything's possible!

Logically, the Crossle would have run in SP Nationals and would have got a 19-series number or maybe a 33-series number. I've seen plenty of those. I wonder if he could have qualified early in the season and then needed to rebuild the car prior to Daytona. Or maybe he qualified in an older car and bought the Crossle for Daytona?

Allen
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Old 10 Oct 2003, 04:37 (Ref:745878)   #21
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It appears that my roll bar matches the one on Roger Barr's car, as described to me by Ham Donaldson. I will try to post a photo of it.

Rob
Attached Thumbnails
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Old 10 Oct 2003, 04:39 (Ref:745879)   #22
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Ham, does this look like the the old photo you have?

Rob
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Old 10 Oct 2003, 05:35 (Ref:745907)   #23
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A Jim Mederer owns Racing Beat a Mazda shop in California.He was a mechanic on Don Nicholls AVS Shadow. Could he be the same J.Mederer as mentioned.
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Old 10 Oct 2003, 13:36 (Ref:746309)   #24
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Thanks, Mick. I know where Racing Beat is and will call them. I have always heard good things about Racing Beat, but was not aware of the owners last name. I will let you kow what I find out.

Rob
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Old 10 Oct 2003, 18:13 (Ref:746592)   #25
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Rob,

That does appear to be the same roll bar that I saw in a late picture of Roger's Car. The one that was on my car is identical. Roger did everything in pairs one for his car and one for mine. All the extra tubing may also be stuff Ropger put in for strenghthening.

Ham
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