Group A BMW M3 E30 - General info and history

[JimmyPet]

Hey Guys,
I found a good pic of the Ian Flux 1992 entry, which could easily be my car, in fact its not far off what it looked like when I got it.


I have a single picture of the Arquati / Mahoney car from 1990 on my hard drive, and looking at the Jerry Mahoney / Arquati 1990 version and the Ian Flux 1992 version they are pretty similar under the livery.

It even came with a set of those silver Ronal wheels in the wheels / spares package.

What I am looking for are photos of the Llewellyn car in 1989 and the Flux entry of 1991 to fill in the gaps, but I think this is probably the chain of events that my chassis (M3 1 068) underwent.

Huge thanks to Ian Beckett for that little thread of information.
In that single posting it made more sense to me what happened to my car than in the last 7 years of asking people around the world.

I have Googled to death Llewellyn in 1989 and Flux in 1991 and come up with nothing.
Anyone have any photos of the Ronic car from 1989, or the Burke-Ratcliff / Flux car in 1991 to help me fill in the blanks?

Thanks in advance guys.
Cheers
jimmy

[ian beckett]

Hi Jimmy,have just sent you a private message,Ian.

[brown dog]

Hi Jimmy,
have you seen this? Lots of good pics of BTCC from 1990 to 2000.
cheers Conrad

http://www.supertouring.co.uk/galler...ntrants_5.html

[JimmyPet]

Originally Posted by brown dog

Hi Jimmy,
have you seen this? Lots of good pics of BTCC from 1990 to 2000.
cheers Conrad

http://www.supertouring.co.uk/galler...ntrants_5.html

Fantastic page.
I had lost the link to that page and was looking for it for ages.
For some reason it didnt come up in all my Googling of BTCC pictures.

On that page I can see the 1991 Flux car,,, which was very obviously a blacked out version of the 1990 Mahoney / Arquati car.
Almost like it was a last minute decision to run it and they quickly removed the Arquati logo,,, and just put black over the Arquati red & green.

Then you can see the car transition to a plain white livery for Flux / Kennedy in 1992.

I really do now believe thats my car.
Just need to see the Llewellyn version in 1989.

Thanks Conrad!!!

Ian PM replied via email and PM.

[David Towe]

Does anyone have any info re Frank Gardner's Team JPS BMW obtaining 2 cars from Europe during the 1987 season?

[ian beckett]

Hi David,I believe Schnitzer supplied chassis' M3/1-161 and 166 to Frank Gardners team but at the end of 1990.I do not know of earlier dealings between the two.Ian.

[David Towe]

Thanks Ian, they would have been the Benson and Hedges cars. Have you got any info re chassis numbers for the art cars of Ken Done and Michael Jagamara Nelson? They were ex JPS cars too.

[ian beckett]

Odd that you should pose that question David because I have been reading a German M3 book over the last couple of days and it suggests the following:the Michael Jagamara Nelson car is that used by Tony Longhurst to win the '87 Amscar series in JPS colours and then was in white/Mobil 1 colours in '88 for Brock or Crompton.The Ken Done painted car was an '89 version.No chassis numbers however.Ian.

[JimmyPet]

Originally Posted by ian beckett

No chassis numbers however.Ian.

I thought that I had read in one of the E30 M3 specific forums that the Australia JPS chassis cars (JPS then Brock Mobil) were non-BMW Motorsport shells and didnt carry the more common BMW chassis numbering (M3 1 XXX).

These cars possibly predating the Motorsport chassis "kits".

There are (were) some beautiful photos of one of the JPS cars as it sits now down under on S14.net and a thread about it by its owner.
It was a beautiful car. Great piece of history to own.

David is that your car?

Cheers
jimmy

[rallyford]

I now own Prodrive Rally 029 and I m searching for complet history, it was BMW French Tarmac car
Thanks

[davyboy]

An interesting ex-Bigazzi M3 for sale here.

[Adrian B]

Has anyone noticed that the Demon Tweeks M3 is now right hand drive (as shown in the shot from Silverstone a few posts back), but was left hand drive when it raced in the 1980's. Anyone got any ideas?

[KA]

Originally Posted by Adrian B

Has anyone noticed that the Demon Tweeks M3 is now right hand drive (as shown in the shot from Silverstone a few posts back), but was left hand drive when it raced in the 1980's. Anyone got any ideas?

Yes, this came up in the Silverstone Festival thread as well
http://tentenths.com/forum/showthrea...114226&page=29

Either Ian Beckett or Jason Minshaw confirmed somewhere back in this thread that the Demon Tweeks car started life as the original Prodrive Frank Sytner BTCC car from 1987, then bought by Alan Minshaw for 1988.
It did have a major shunt early in the '88 BTCC season- at Oulton park from memory- AM got taken out by Sytner and the M3 ended up on it's roof- and was rebuilt into a new Schnitzer shell. I'd assumed it changed from LHD to RHD then, but hadn't looked closely at the 'period' pics

[KA]

Definitely LHD here as well- (Donington 1989)
http://tentenths.com/forum/showthread.php?t=113351

I don't think the car was ever converted to BTCC 2-litre spec for 1990, was I'm fairly sure Alan Minshaw and the Demon Tweeks team didn't appear in the BTCC after '89. So when was it converted....?

[ian beckett]

In 1989 the car only did 4 BTCC races,1 for James Kaye,1 for Barrie Williams and 2 for Alan Minshaw(he failed to qualify at Birmingham which would have made it 3!)Over the winter of '89/'90 the car was converted to RHD and the team hoped to run it in the 2 litre class of the BTCC but funds did not appear and the car only appeared in 2 rounds of the BMW Car Challenge driven by Minshaw Senior.The car has since been in the Demon Tweeks warehouse(the Minshaw family business before appearing this year driven by son Jason. As an aside I talked at some length to Alan Minshaw in '88 and he was still furious at the incident which lead to him having to reshell the car.He believed Frank Sytner had deliberately pushed him off at Oulton Park when the car cleared the barriers and nearly ended up in the lake! I also talked for some time to Roland Ratzenberger who also drove the car and he showed why he was such a popular guy.Good times and not something that sadly seems as common in todays pressured world?

[SLR]

Originally Posted by brown dog

Ian is right, the John Sax car in "that" incident was a Group N, I still remember that crash quite well. Poor John got s%#t from longhurst about it, but anyone who saw the incident usually agrees that Longhurst was being very hopeful in trying to pull of that passing move! I was told that John Sax has only just sold the car within the last 12 months, it had been repaired, but it had quite a few hits in its life.I also heard a rumour that the wrecked Longhurst car was taken back to Australia and stripped, and somebody acquired the shell, straightened it out and built it into a car again! Cannot confirm if this is true, or just an urban myth..............

Hi Brown dog, I have heard this rumour too. I even heard that the car was road registered and for sale at one point. I think this car, if it exists might be the re-shelled car wearing racing number 25.
The facts on the shell damaged at Wellington in 1991 (chassis M3-1-161 Matter 1-90) are that it was sold by Tony Longhurst to Mario Cavalo. I then bought from Mario with the view to rebuilding it. This was many years ago 1993 if I remember correctly. The shell came with various mechanical bits and pieces most of wich were damaged. I think longhurst just cleared out his scrap bin.
I sourced quite a few parts for the rebuild from Paul Morris via Bob Holden who I met at a Super Tourers event.
I hit the project with great enthusiasm for about 6 months, and then life got in the way. I haven’t touched it since.
I still say I’m gunna do it one day.
I hope this is of some interest to you, and I would certainly be very interested to learn more of this cars history.

[brown dog]

Originally Posted by SLR

Hi Brown dog, I have heard this rumour too. I even heard that the car was road registered and for sale at one point. I think this car, if it exists might be the re-shelled car wearing racing number 25.
The facts on the shell damaged at Wellington in 1991 (chassis M3-1-161 Matter 1-90) are that it was sold by Tony Longhurst to Mario Cavalo. I then bought from Mario with the view to rebuilding it. This was many years ago 1993 if I remember correctly. The shell came with various mechanical bits and pieces most of wich were damaged. I think longhurst just cleared out his scrap bin.
I sourced quite a few parts for the rebuild from Paul Morris via Bob Holden who I met at a Super Tourers event.
I hit the project with great enthusiasm for about 6 months, and then life got in the way. I haven’t touched it since.
I still say I’m gunna do it one day.
I hope this is of some interest to you, and I would certainly be very interested to learn more of this cars history.

Wow - very interesting to hear! The history of your car prior is relatively easy, it was a 1990 Schnitzer car, which I am reasonably sure was run in the DTM, and then came to NZ for the Wellington street race. Not sure if your car was the winning Pirro/Cecotto car, or the 4th placed Winkelhock/Soper car, but both of these cars were bought by Frank Gardner after Wellington and I believe shipped straight from NZ to Australia in preparation for the 1991 ATCC. They were the first two B&H M3's. Your car was destroyed at Wellington 1991, I am sure you have seen the event (I was there when it happened) Its on You Tube if you haven't seen it.
The "sister" car to yours was Alan Jones' B&H car for 1991 and 1992, and then became the Diet Coke car for Geoff Full for 1993, and was then sold to a private buyer in NZ,this car is still in New Zealand, in its original livery. (I recently bought the other Diet Coke car, that which Paul Morris raced in 1993, this I believe was a new car when it went to Australia.)

The #25 car you refer to is owned by Rick Allen in Sydney, and was (I believe) built in Australia from all new parts in late 1992, in time for Bathurst. this is the car Cecotto nudged the wall/cliff face in practice.

cheers BD

[brown dog]

Originally Posted by brown dog

Wow - very interesting to hear! The history of your car prior is relatively easy, it was a 1990 Schnitzer car, which I am reasonably sure was run in the DTM, and then came to NZ for the Wellington street race. Not sure if your car was the winning Pirro/Cecotto car, or the 4th placed Winkelhock/Soper car, but both of these cars were bought by Frank Gardner after Wellington and I believe shipped straight from NZ to Australia in preparation for the 1991 ATCC. They were the first two B&H M3's. Your car was destroyed at Wellington 1991, I am sure you have seen the event (I was there when it happened) Its on You Tube if you haven't seen it.
The "sister" car to yours was Alan Jones' B&H car for 1991 and 1992, and then became the Diet Coke car for Geoff Full for 1993, and was then sold to a private buyer in NZ,this car is still in New Zealand, in its original livery. (I recently bought the other Diet Coke car, that which Paul Morris raced in 1993, this I believe was a new car when it went to Australia.)

The #25 car you refer to is owned by Rick Allen in Sydney, and was (I believe) built in Australia from all new parts in late 1992, in time for Bathurst. this is the car Cecotto nudged the wall/cliff face in practice.

cheers BD

P.S. just watched the crash clip again, according to the commentator the crashed car was the winning car from 1990, but I wouldn't take that as gospel.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcQvywQ3VQM

[malscar]

Does anyone have any photos of the 1990 Nissan 500 (Wellington) winner? Lots of references on the web, but no photos.

[brown dog]

just this small pic from a 1991 programme of the 1990 winner in its Sony livery.

[E36ST]

While we're on photos here are some great shots of the M3's in the 1992 race.

http://www.kiwirallyfan.com/Motorspo...66622056_7SLmU

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by E36ST

While we're on photos here are some great shots of the M3's in the 1992 race.

http://www.kiwirallyfan.com/Motorspo...66622056_7SLmU

Some great pics there...

[David Towe]

Just to keep you fellow E30 M3 fans up to date I now own #44 Bathurst JPS Richards/Longhurst M3 1987 which is also the #56 Bathurst Mobil Brock/Richards 1988 car. It's in JPS colours at the moment and I'll restore it to Brock/Richards Mobil colours when I get the time and money to do it right.

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by David Towe

Just to keep you fellow E30 M3 fans up to date I now own #44 Bathurst JPS Richards/Longhurst M3 1987 which is also the #56 Bathurst Mobil Brock/Richards 1988 car. It's in JPS colours at the moment and I'll restore it to Brock/Richards Mobil colours when I get the time and money to do it right.

Or you could have 2 car team of JPS cars!!

Was it a Gardner car from new or purchased elsewhere David, maybe that will help you decide what livery it should be in ultimately?

[David Towe]

Yes it's a Gardner car from new. I'm in no doubt of which livery to restore it to, It has to be a brock/Mobil livery as he was the king of motor racing here, even though I have always thought Richards to be a far better driver. The JPS livery is trhe stuff dreams are made of but I've got one of those so Mobil for this one.
I'd post a pic but for the lack of computer talent I suffer.