Grp C/Grp A/V8SC 'Where are they now?' continued...

[David Towe]

Originally Posted by jd yort

Now this is a car with significant history that I am sure we are all dieing to know the where abouts of. Mark Picketts Ford Cortina from the 1981 ATCC Rd4 at Sandown.

Judging by the photo, I'm guessing it's just a little further up the road on its' roof
But seriously where is it?

[mtpanorama]

I think someone took a wrong turn on the way to the shops, thats some great body roll going on

[Camaroz]

[QUOTE=drbob]

Originally Posted by Camaroz

Not sure if these have been covered since the post racer69 but here goes.
The Cooke/Brown "Citizen" Commodore was owned by Citizen. From Cooke it went to Charlie O'Brien for 1981, crashed at Bathurst and CO'B purchased the spare Roadways car for the weekend. Greg Toepfer then repaired the crashed car and ran it as "Citizen" again in 1982 with Ken Mathews. Mathews then purchased the car from Citizen and ran it through 1983 (Mathews/Toepfer - Bathurst 83 Ignis Fridges?) and into 1984 when mid-year Mathews crashed it at Amaroo. Mathews then purchased "Elvis" from Roadways and ran Bathurst 84 again with Toepfer. The original (Cooke/Brown) car may have surfaced recently in southern Qld.
.............
The 1980 Wingston/O'Brien Roadways Commodore could have been the one sold to CO'B (see above) for 1981. This car then went to Terry Finnigan.

Falcadore quote:
"The Terry Finnigan Group C Commodore was up here for a long while as Terry Skene's Commodore Sports Sedan. Skene today is best known locally as a failed Ipswich Council aspirant and proprietor of Kingston Park Raceway kart centre, but known nationally as one of the guys who rolled a Peter Hills Mondeo backwards down Mountain Straight. Lost track of that Commie since..."

That's interesting Camaroz and Falcadore. I was trolling through some old Auto Action magazines(5 July 1995) a couple of weeks ago and came across this advertisement:


Falcadore I guess that is the car you are referring to.

So I called him last week to find out about its history.
What he could remember didn't make a lot of sense to me at the time.
He said it was a Les Small built car and was driven by either Charlie O'Brien or Geg Hansford and that Brock may have driven it once. He didn't mention Finnegan. It was sponsored by Tall Trees (as he recalls) I asked if Ignis was on the car and he said no.
He sold it to a guy in Victoria but doesn't remember who
So someone track it down

The Finnegan car is with a (well known) collector in Benalla.

[dazza027]

Originally Posted by mtpanorama

I think someone took a wrong turn on the way to the shops, thats some great body roll going on

Cortinas were famous for their 'holy crap where have my wing mirrors gone?' body roll...

[mildura1963]

Cortina looks more like a production car that a Group C ATCC car.

[avors]

Originally Posted by Carter-Nelson

You guys are dam good!

Cavvy, Henry, Ovars, MtPanorana, in a few entries you have surmised the whole cars history.....Dam good!

On eBay some years ago, one of the DJR Hollinger Getrags was for sale for about $1500, I thought it was too rich as a spare for my Mustang and dismissed it. Wish I hadn't as it cost 4-5 times that to build another one after mine disintegrated at Sandown.....live and learn.

When you say "not quite legal" what are you referring to?

Keep up the great work....

Nev.

Here's an artical from Modern motor April 85 on the ex Zacspeed Mustang prior to its 85 Homologation upgrade, this is the car now owned by Ross Donnerly

[avors]

And the same car in JPS colours at the Wellington Street race in 86


And when it returned to Aust, Amaroo Park, car was for sale, the second Mustang (Bowden car) is parked behind.


And its big hit at Wellington 87 care of Robbie Kerr

[GTRMagic]

Interesting pit garage uniform... If Motor had any sense they would get Mr B.Lake back writing for them as soon as possible

[Rob Bailey]

Originally Posted by GTRMagic

Interesting pit garage uniform... If Motor had any sense they would get Mr B.Lake back writing for them as soon as possible

well said.

[KineticEnergy]

Was thinking the same thing GTRMagic. OH&S obviously not a priority back then.

And it's running Avon's too I notice.

[Camaroz]

Originally Posted by KineticEnergy

Was thinking the same thing GTRMagic. OH&S obviously not a priority back then.

And it's running Avon's too I notice.

Good tyre the AVON. Still is!

[dougcharli]

i remember being a flaggie when dick and many others crashed at our point in 85 at surfers - all he could do was whinge about his broken momo wheel - quite the lair was dick

[billy bigtime]

A young Dick to.

[Arney]

Does any one know of the history of Dick's Mustangs before they arived in OZ?
They are always refered to as the "Zakspeed" Grp. A Mustangs. But surfing through the net it is hard to locate info or pictures of such a vehicle.
There is reference to 2 mustangs competing in the local German Championships in 1984 (but they weren't under the Zakspeed name) and there are also references to a lone mustang competing in the 1983 and 84 Spa 24 hours without the Zakspeed title.



1983 Spa Mustang

1984 Spa Mustang

[DAVID PATERSON]

Originally Posted by Falcadore

The Heffernan Commodore last I saw was unrestored in the silver/yellow/red paint it finished its Sports Sedan career in, I missed it at HRCCQ's big Morgan Park meet last year sadly so don't know what's happened to it in historic trim.

Kev Heffernan's Commodore is still in the 1984 Bathurst livery of silver with red and yellow stripes, though looking a bit dog eared now. All Kevin had to do to get it back to 1984 in appearance was remove the later signwriting.

[Carter-Nelson]

Kevin Heffernan raced at historic Sandown last year...I think he had a problem with a wheel. We did 2 or 3 sighting laps as the picked the car up and then re-gridded us for the Saturday race.

http://www.natsoft.com.au/cgi-bin/re.../2008.SAND.R16
Here is the link.

[David Towe]

Hey Nev, Mustangs look good in Black and Gold!!

[Adrian B]

Originally Posted by cavvy

It will be racing at Philip Island in March.

& a lovely peice of work it is too ...[/QUOTE]

Thanks Cavvy, most of the hard work was done by a chap called Peter Bouts. Any chance of the "Bob Jane Schnitzer 635" coming out to play?

A question for DrBob. Good to see that you have Glenn Seton in the M3. What year does the car represent for CAMS? Cheers Adrian.

[KA]

Originally Posted by Arney

Does any one know of the history of Dick's Mustangs before they arived in OZ?
They are always refered to as the "Zakspeed" Grp. A Mustangs. But surfing through the net it is hard to locate info or pictures of such a vehicle.
There is reference to 2 mustangs competing in the local German Championships in 1984 (but they weren't under the Zakspeed name) and there are also references to a lone mustang competing in the 1983 and 84 Spa 24 hours without the Zakspeed title.

From memory they were definitely built by Zakspeed in Germany, but were very little-used before going to Australia- they certainly didn't appear at Spa, the Belga car in the pics came from CC Motorsport in the UK.

There's a Group A Mustang thread over in 'Motorsport History' which might be worth a look- according to a post in that, one of the Johnson cars was a chassis used by Klaus Niedzwiedz in a (non-championship I think) Group A race supporting the 1983 German GP at Hockenheim- I don't think they saw much other use until DJ bought them.

http://tentenths.com/forum/showthread.php?t=65100

There were maybe 3 or 4 other Group A Mustangs raced in Germany, but I don't think Ford ever took much interest in them, as it wasn't a car marketed in Europe, and by 1985 Ford saw the Sierra as their future in touring cars.

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by KA

There's a Group A Mustang thread over in 'Motorsport History' which might be worth a look- according to a post in that, one of the Johnson cars was a chassis used by Klaus Niedzwiedz in a (non-championship I think) Group A race supporting the 1983 German GP at Hockenheim- I don't think they saw much other use until DJ bought them.

Yes staying loosely off topic for a mo, that's a race i'd like to learn a lot more about as I think a TWR Jag and a couple of Schnitzer 635's were entered as well? Seems to be a dearth of pics available of that event so far though.

[drbob]

Originally Posted by Adrian B

& a lovely peice of work it is too ...

Thanks Cavvy, most of the hard work was done by a chap called Peter Bouts. Any chance of the "Bob Jane Schnitzer 635" coming out to play?

A question for DrBob. Good to see that you have Glenn Seton in the M3. What year does the car represent for CAMS? Cheers Adrian.[/QUOTE]


Adrian I will let you know when CAMS tells me.

[brendonwood1]

Originally Posted by avors

Heres a photo of the Morton Grp A Falcon, think its Puke 84

Many thanks for posting that photo. Fist I've seen of this car since the newspapers of the day. Unfortunately I don't have any NZ magazines or papers prior to 1986 - so this was only stuck in my memory.

That is definitely at Pukekohe. At the end of the front straight turning into the elbow that led to the loop on the long circuit that hasn't been used for over 20 years. The event would be the 1984 Benson & Hedges 6 hour endurance race - won by the Neal Lowe/Kent Baigent BMW 635CSi.

Do you have any more photos of this event or other NZ touring car events pre 1985? If so, it would make a great thread in the Motorsport History part of ten-tenths.

[dazza027]

I maybe getting old and losing my marbles, but I juast cannot help but see history repeating itself here with the way people talk about the v8supercars and its probable demise and seeing the comparison with when probably many of the same people were begging for the end of group C in australia. Personally, I would love to see group C revived, using present day cars. Even group A was more interesting than the V8's are now, albeit with smaller grids. My question is, if the V8's did suddenly be wound up and a new category replace it as australias premier tin top category, would people look back on it anywhere near as fondly as we all do of the golden years between 71 and 84?

[Sultan]

I have to agree with you dazza, I think the difference was that both Gp C & Gp A used real production cars as a base (loosely speaking of course), 7 therefore had alot of their own quirks.

Today they're more silhouette style with bugger all relevance to what is bought off the yard.

Either class would be great, just learn from their mistakes!

Oh, and more manufacturers & classes!

[avors]

Originally Posted by Sultan

I have to agree with you dazza, I think the difference was that both Gp C & Gp A used real production cars as a base (loosely speaking of course), 7 therefore had alot of their own quirks.

Today they're more silhouette style with bugger all relevance to what is bought off the yard.

Either class would be great, just learn from their mistakes!

Oh, and more manufacturers & classes!

Group A was cetainly a great formula, watched the entire 85 Bathurst race over xmas, the race was entertaining from start to finish, shame the evo upgrades spoiled the class and the cars slowly became hybrids.