Will Gollop's First Metro?

[USRallycross]

A little nostalgic this morning and watching some 80's rallycross with Will in the purple and blue 6R4. I never knew where this color scheme came from but then came across this car from 1987 and wondered if this is Will's car in rally trim.

I am sure this audience will know the facts!

Mark
http://www.6r4.net/site/index.php?op...&id=2&Itemid=3

[bigdick1977]

The first event(s) Will ran the car in plain white, the purple/ blue came with Mobil sponsorship I think

[rx-guru]

Yep, 1986 Rallycross GP at Brands Hatch Will's 6R4 was white.

[USRallycross]

ok, well that blow my theory......i have since seen other pics of the Metro in all white just was a coincidence I guess.

Mark

[chunder]

86 GP was a hugely important event for rallycross history as a lot of RS200's were bought by Holm, Schanche, Rantanen, Nilsson, Nordstrom and used at that event after being picked up from Boreham at no doubt cut down prices! If you think Hathaway, Hopkins, Ottosen, Andersson, Bratlie, Renny and others all bought these at similar times!.

Gollop I think debuted the Metro at a Lydden Winterseries event earlier.

And ran in blue and red for Mobil for a year before Silkolene got involved, he had few sponsors befiore that IN Saab's mainly his own stuff!

[USRallycross]

Incredible to imagine all of those cars going through Boreham village. Wonder if anyone realized what they were taking away.

Did BL do the same thing with Metro's?

[rx-guru]

Renny had his RS200 some months earlier than all others. Dunno when he drove it first time in the UK, but in the Dutch (August 17) and British (September 20) 1986 ERC rounds he was the first driver ever with one of these "new" Group B cars in the ERC.

[rx-guru]

Originally Posted by USRallycross

Incredible to imagine all of those cars going through Boreham village. Wonder if anyone realized what they were taking away.

Did BL do the same thing with Metro's?

I remember that I was asked by then if I would be interested in a 6R4 Clubman right out of BL for 13,500 Pound Sterling.

[chunder]

My God Eddie, can you imagine how much that would be worth now!!

I bet you wish, I know I do!

[Stephen H]

Originally Posted by rx-guru

Yep, 1986 Rallycross GP at Brands Hatch Will's 6R4 was white.

Will debut the 6R4 at Lydden before the Grand Prix at a winter series event, before the grand prix and it was the standard white, so guess it was straight from Austin Rover.

Steve Palmers was in Rothmans livery when that appeared and read somewhere it was an ex Jimmy McCrae show car.

Renny debut the RS200 at Brands 9th March 1986, before Henri's accident in the S4 and the backlash against group B in rallying, and the rumoured price drops. So I guess DSRM had deep pockets.

Renny's RS200 looked pretty much like a road car, and sadly ended its debut against the pit wall after a start line accident.

Can't remember how Will did on his Group B debut, just remember being very impressed with the sight and sound. But unlike Renny he wasn't starting with a road car, as Austin Rover built their 200 as rally cars, rather than road cars.

[Westysprinter]

yep Mark Rennison was the first in Rallycross with an RS200.
Not sure if DSRM had deep pockets or the pension fund......

[rs 200]

He has still got the bug ,not sure who owns the car as it keeps being run by other people .
now mdv se the ex chaps from boreham who did pats first fiesta
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtbooKXsF4I

[Hampton Caught]

Originally Posted by USRallycross

A little nostalgic this morning and watching some 80's rallycross with Will in the purple and blue 6R4. I never knew where this color scheme came from but then came across this car from 1987 and wondered if this is Will's car in rally trim.

I am sure this audience will know the facts!

Mark
http://www.6r4.net/site/index.php?op...&id=2&Itemid=3

Hi Mark,

I was at Brands for the Grand prix in 1986 when Will got his white 6R4 on the A final grid. He was doing OK until a puncture took him out of the running.

It wasn't until 1987 that he started to get the car running better for rallycross, lightening it and also introducing the blue and red colour scheme. This came from the red and blue colours of his main sponsor, Mobil, as confirmed to me 'from the horse's mouth' a couple of years ago at Lydden.

Later, Steve Palmer did run a 6R4 with purple, blue and various other colours for his then-sponsor, Practica Cameras.

Hope that helps and maybe see some of you at Lydden Hill this weekend for Round 2 of the FIA Global Rallycross Championship. I'll be there displaying some of my model rallycross and rally cars.

Cheers, Steve

[Stephen H]

Originally Posted by Hampton Caught

Later, Steve Palmer did run a 6R4 with purple, blue and various other colours for his then-sponsor, Practica Cameras.

Hope that helps and maybe see some of you at Lydden Hill this weekend for Round 2 of the FIA Global Rallycross Championship. I'll be there displaying some of my model rallycross and rally cars.

Cheers, Steve

Steve Palmer was not sponsored by the camera manufacturer. It was a computer firm, who also stepped up to sponsor the Internations Cup team.

My memory is terrible at the mo, and too late to go digging, but wasn't it Derek Lightfoot who run in the Nova Challenge?

The original colours were blue and white. The bright "pink/yellow" came later. seem to remember someone telling me that Terry Briggs, did the paint job on the Nova.

The "Palmer" 6R4 went on to carry the red and white carglass colours, and then Black and Yellow of Panasonic Batteries. The panasonic sponsorship carried on to the Escort following the group B ban in Europe. And scalextric made a model of the car.

Palmer first run the 6R4 in Rothmans colours, but without the rothmans wording.

[chunder]

Derek Lightfoot was the bos of Practica Computers yes, and aswell as his own car a Nova, he sponsored Steve heavily, and lent support to some other drivers too, Mark Flaherty, John Welch among others, but only small support.

The Carglass coilours were because the car was owned by Paul Kumpen. he mainly bought the 3.8 Goodmans engine, so Steve had to run a 3.0 then a 2.8 in his other car, then bought the car back and ran it in the same colours for years, until the end of the year when he signed a deal a Panasonic batteries, hence the yellow and black colours at the GP.Kumpen also had a car for Ludo Steukers that ran similar colours.

Steve ran that sponsor in the ill fated Escort and disappeared. The came back rallying and was embroiled in something ddgy too i recall.

As for Will, he was the first to run a Metro, ran Mobil colours in 87 after the initial white basic colours. Then ran it blue and red with Silkolene briefly, before going to the familiar Black based colours.

I believe he had at least three cars. He built two N/A cars, one that went to Tom Bissett, another he kept the car used in GP's etc. Then built at least two Biturbos, and a car for Hans Te Pas, one for Flaherty. Also has the car Cor Euser used in the GP, that might ahve been an older Te Pas car, cant remmeber.

But I think Will built at least 5 Metro's at some time or another. 2 N/A cars, 2 Biturbo and 1 for te Pas.

[Stephen H]

Originally Posted by chunder

I believe he had at least three cars. He built two N/A cars, one that went to Tom Bissett, another he kept the car used in GP's etc. Then built at least two Biturbos, and a car for Hans Te Pas, one for Flaherty. Also has the car Cor Euser used in the GP, that might ahve been an older Te Pas car, cant remmeber.

But I think Will built at least 5 Metro's at some time or another. 2 N/A cars, 2 Biturbo and 1 for te Pas.

Two biturbo's? Was the second a replacement after the ERC accident coming onto Dover Slope, with Gary Baker?

Don't ever remember there being 2 GTech Bi Turbo's around at the same time?

So did Steve Palmer drive 2 different 6R4's, the ex Jimmy McCrae Rothmans show car and then later a Paul Kumpen car?

[KA]

Originally Posted by Stephen H

Steve Palmer was not sponsored by the camera manufacturer. It was a computer firm, who also stepped up to sponsor the Internations Cup team.

My memory is terrible at the mo, and too late to go digging, but wasn't it Derek Lightfoot who run in the Nova Challenge?

The original colours were blue and white. The bright "pink/yellow" came later. seem to remember someone telling me that Terry Briggs, did the paint job on the Nova.

The "Palmer" 6R4 went on to carry the red and white carglass colours, and then Black and Yellow of Panasonic Batteries. The panasonic sponsorship carried on to the Escort following the group B ban in Europe. And scalextric made a model of the car.

Palmer first run the 6R4 in Rothmans colours, but without the rothmans wording.

After the Practica money ended, the Palmer car ran for a while in a blue/white/green colourscheme, sometimes with 'Dianetics' stickers.

The small Practica deals on Mark Flaherty's car, and the Welch Astra were generally for just sunstrips and maybe a couple of logos- as chunder said, they were just small-scale deals.

Photos of quite a few Palmer 6R4 colourschemes (and Flaherty's car with a Practica sunstrip) can be found in the 6R4 history thread
http://tentenths.com/forum/showpost....&postcount=187

[chunder]

the second Biturbo was inded a new car that Will had laying around as he said on the BBC, it was the one debuted at the rallycross GP at the end of 91 yes.

Presume the first was probably scavenged to get parts for this car. So there were never two Will built cars, but obviously there were the Dagfin Larsen cars of Dagfin and Arne Rasmushaugen, later Jorma Kovanen and Bengt Wiklund. Not as developed but the Larsen car I feel could have been very quick in someones hands, Dagfin got some good results in his odd appearances.

Steves car was the Rothmans one yes, he sold the engine in 1990 to Kumpen, the 3.8 engine. He then used a 2.8 briefly and later a 3.0. Not sure if he had two cars. He may have bought his engine and car from Kumpen meaning he would have then had two? don't know if he ever actually sold a complete car to anyone.

He had Rothmans, Practica colours, green white and blue. He was deffo using the 3.8 again at INter Nations Cup in 1990.

Then it was Carglass colours again for some reason, maybe he bought a car from Kumpen? Maybe Paul sponsored him, not sure. Then it was Panasonic batteries.

So, I don't know what the real history of Steve's car was. He always seemed to have one, with different engines, but not sure why he ran Carglass colours. Maybe he did have two cars, there were a few around in the UK back then.

[andyterry16]

I thought the scalextrix car was the Barry Squibb Escort he ran with their sponsorship? I might be wrong as the meory is going a bit.

[Stephen H]

Originally Posted by andyterry16

I thought the scalextrix car was the Barry Squibb Escort he ran with their sponsorship? I might be wrong as the meory is going a bit.

They did both, but the Steve Palmer car wasn't "billed" as Steve Palmers Rallycross Escort, bit like the earlier XR3i they did in the spirit of "John Welch STP Xtrac" colours.

Anyway here's a link I found on the internet to the "Panasonic Escort"

http://www.scalextric-car.co.uk/Cars..._Panasonic.htm

[rs 200]

I spoke to steve few weeks ago ,he had the 3.8 when he finished rallycross and went rallying in Europe then sold engine to 2 brothers who bought the last few shells from rover ,and got a 2.8 engine from them in a deal ,then put that engine in another 6r4 he had and sold on then bought another 3.8 put in his metro and sold to biggerstaff in the end .

[spoton]

Originally Posted by rs 200

I spoke to steve few weeks ago ,he had the 3.8 when he finished rallycross and went rallying in Europe then sold engine to 2 brothers who bought the last few shells from rover ,and got a 2.8 engine from them in a deal ,then put that engine in another 6r4 he had and sold on then bought another 3.8 put in his metro and sold to biggerstaff in the end .

Whats Steve Palmer up to these days? I know he went rallying for a while after rallycross....

[Hampton Caught]

Originally Posted by Stephen H

Steve Palmer was not sponsored by the camera manufacturer. It was a computer firm, who also stepped up to sponsor the Internations Cup team.


Palmer first run the 6R4 in Rothmans colours, but without the rothmans wording.

Stephen, thanks for correcting that for me. I didn't know until earlier today that Practica was a computer company.

I've made a 1/43 scale model of Steve Palmer's 6R4 in its original Rothmans-esque colour scheme as he was using it at Brands Hatch. I'll make the other liveries too, which will make quite a collection just for the one driver, which will be neat!

Getting back on subject, I can confirm that Will's first rallycross 6R4 bodyshell is still in active rallycross service in the hands of Mr Rob Gibson.

Which bodyshell did Mauno Jokinen rallycross in Europe? It's definitely one of Will's, but who else raced it?

Great thread, interesting info coming out. Cheers, Steve

[chunder]

The Joine car was probably bought from Tom Bissett.

Are you sure Gollops car is the one Rob Gibson is using? Sounds a little wild to m considering Rob had his own car or cars

[bigdick1977]

Rob had/ has 2 cars, one an ex Malcolm Wilson rally car and the second a G tech built rallycross version. He used both for rallycross and always told me that he would keep the Wilson car as it would be worth more!