Quote:
Originally Posted by Farbrooke
Des Donnelly – Viva 2.3 – “bore only a nominal resemblance to the marque …. It was said it had set him back five grand” (MN 3-5-73) – LV240 engine
I think you may be mixing two cars here - By the middle of 1973 Des had a new HC bodied Viva - using a brand new shell prepared in Ireland and then shipped to Bill Blydenstein - who built the car Gabriel Konig has today - fitted with the LV240 Lotus 904 engine TJ injection and dry sumped - one of the sister cars (ie same specification) as the famous Gerry Marshall Firenza (old Nail)
The Viva HC prior to this was using a single cam and from the MN 3-5-73 date must be his old car
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There is an article in the programme (greatly provided by Davyboy) for the major saloon car race at Mondello Park on 17 June about the car with a photo captioned “Lotus-Jensen Healey Vauxhall Viva, 249 bhp under the bonnet” The photo was taken at the Whit Monday meeting (4 June). The white, orange and purple car has an iron-block, twin cam, 16-valve Lotus-made engine with TJ injection. The intention was to convert it to a dry sump set-up with a 5-speed Hewland gearbox instead of the wet sump arrangement and standard GT gearbox. It was said that it would cost Des about “five thousand” by the time it was fully sorted. This supports my previous suggestion that Des Donnelly was using this car at the beginning of May.