Looking for history on a '70 camaro used in thunder saloons

[kai.scott]

Hey, im wondering if anyone has any info or knows anything about a car ive recently purchased.

From what i know it was purposely built to run in the thundersaloons and the BTCC in the 1970's to 1980's. It was purchased and maybe built buy a guy called Brian Rice, i believe he also raced it for a time.

The car is a pretty heavily modified 1970 camaro Z28, its not been changed or modified since it stopped racing in the early 80's where it was put up for sale and then i believe just parked and passed along with people doing bits of work to it. I have 2 sets of front wings for it, one set is orange and silver rather than blue and silver and i was told it had a sister car, so believe these are from that car. If anyone knows about the sister car, id love to know about that too.

My plan for the car is to repair and rebuild it and turn it into a road/race car so i can still drive it around on the streets.

Ive been told that the car was bought from the dealer in the states and built over there, all the aero on the car was apparently tested in a wind tunnel owned by mercedes. The car was then shipped over here with its sister car by Brian Rice . Unfortunately i have no proof on these claims, this is just what i was told by a couple different people, someone also told me it was a penske camaro but i really doubt it is.

Below is some older photos of the car as it was racing etc:



And below are photos of how it is now:




If anyone recognises the car or knows anything about it id love to know as i think this car has a lot of history. Even if you dont know anything but might have ideas of where to look or who to contact, id also love to know that too.

[chunterer]

Thanks for coming on and posting.

The driver and car rings a bell actually.

Rice ran this car in ASCAR, a shortlived but decent anglo american heavy metal series in the UK in the late 70's to early 80's.

There were Camaros Mustangs up against Aston Martin V8's etc.

I recall seeing Rice's car, silver or silvery blue with quite outlandish arches and spoilers!

I wouldn't be at all surprised if it was built by Penske or something like that perhaps for IMSA or SCCA racing?

Other entrants were Brian Sheridan, Roy Yates, Brian Powles, Jon Woolf, John Brindley, Jon Fletcher etc.
Some of the cars were very heavily modified, some of the cars were ex BSCC Group 1 cars if I recall.

[Mike Bell]

Sadly the photos don’t show on my browser. Is it me or the OP?

[morninggents]

Nor me either.

[kai.scott]

Ah thanks for the info, will see what I can dig up through imsa etc.

Yeah the pgoronlinls dont seem to have appeared for some reason, maybe this forum doesn't like Flickr link.

Here's a link to my flickr with pics of the car on. https://www.flickr.com/photos/185894431@N04/

[kai.scott]

Sorry guys, the photos dont seem to have shown up, not even the links... for now until i can figure out how to edit my posts here a link to my flickr which has all the photos i have of the car on. https://www.flickr.com/gp/185894431@N04/tH84j8

[Mike Bell]

Thanks, those work!

Wow, what a car......

[kai.scott]

awesome, glad that link works, haha. Thanks, hoping the car will look a lot better once its finished.

[Dan Rear]

Brian Rice raced an 'ordinary' ProdSaloon Camaro in 1974-75. Was the car pictured based on that I wonder

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by Dan Rear

Brian Rice raced an 'ordinary' ProdSaloon Camaro in 1974-75. Was the car pictured based on that I wonder

Good question, I hadn't realised he did prodsaloons back then?

There was certainly a few examples of those cars at the time in standard and homologated racing series.

[snowen250]

Wow! What a cool car!

If it was used in Thundersaloons the CSCC modsports/Thundersaloons group is a goldmine of info, maybe try posting there?

https://www.facebook.com/groups/2548...77031/?fref=nf

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by snowen250

Wow! What a cool car!

If it was used in Thundersaloons the CSCC modsports/Thundersaloons group is a goldmine of info, maybe try posting there?

https://www.facebook.com/groups/2548...77031/?fref=nf

There's plenty of info about those series on here too if you use the search tool

[kai.scott]

Thanks for the posts guys, i managed to find some info on an american forum, turns out there was a few cars with the same body style as mine that ran in the AAGT and IMSA. the style was designed and first raced by a guy called carl shafer. Ive found about 6 or 7 other cars from the 70's that had the same/ similar style but no car that was exactly the same, most are later 70's style camaros. so id imagine the car was built and possibly raced in the states before brial got it and raced it here. I know brian had imported another camaro which was aparently the sister car to this one, whatever that means, and i also know theres a guy on here called al who owns an orange camaro that was imported by brian so it may have been at the same time.

[Mike Bell]

Al (Allan) Weyman, most likely. He has a Camaro and races with the Classic Touring Car Racing Club. Think he may have had an IROC car as well. Not active on the forum for a while, but could likely be found via Facebook if you wanted to ask him anything.

[Al Weyman]

Originally Posted by Mike Bell

Al (Allan) Weyman, most likely. He has a Camaro and races with the Classic Touring Car Racing Club. Think he may have had an IROC car as well. Not active on the forum for a while, but could likely be found via Facebook if you wanted to ask him anything.

Hi guys. I do indeed own a genuine Penske Tube frame IROC but sadly the car you have there is not the sister car to mine. On my car the only original GM parts are the roof, rear quarters, rear panel and bumper. The rest is entirely fabricated by Banjo Matthews the NASCAR Stock Car builders and finished off and ran by Penske and is chassis number Penske IROC 11 and raced as car number 5 and is documented to have won at the hands of Mario Andretti, and raced by Gunnar Neilson, Richard Petty and Buddy Baker and others. I have an American friend who owns the pink one. I told the chap you bought that off Mr. Cohen (?) it wasn't a Penske IROC as it wouldn't have the stock shell and front subframe that yours has. If your own Facebook there's a page on there about Historic Oulton Park ran by a photographer Mr Higginbotham who recently put a great set of pictures up of all the ASCAR cars at what must have been a pretty packed meeting. Both your car is on there and mine bit also with similar rear aero grafted on which I have now ripped off and replaced with the proper GM panels. It's driven by Anthony Wolfe. Hope this helps and excuse spelling mistakes as posted via phone.

[kai.scott]

thanks alan for the info, yeah i bough the car of mr cohen a little over a year ago, he said he wasnt sure about the penske thing. I know the car wasnt an iroc, it doesnt fit the specs of those, but im fairly certain in the early 70s penske dabbled in AAGT and chevrolet commissioned the penske company to make a few more camaros for chevrolets new drivers once penske change to racing the amc javelin. i have links to some of the cars that ran state side that looked like mine.
https://www.racingsportscars.com/dri...hafer-USA.html
https://www.racingsportscars.com/pho...-01-31-051.jpg
https://alex62.typepad.com/imsablog/...he_altern.html

I cant find the facebook page alan, tried looking around, is it a closed group that requires an invite or something, would love to see the photos.

[KA]

Was looking for 70's/80's touring car shots and found a collection of pics from the 'Sun Free Race Day' at Brands 31/7/83.

After all the pics of Mansell's F1 demo and Linda Lusardi, we've got shots of what I'm guessing from the mix of American V8s and Astons, was an ASCAR race?

...and a pic of what looks like Kai's Camaro

[midgetman]

Al asked me to post this picture of how it should look. Hope it helps.

[Dan Rear]

Ascar (American Saloon Car Auto Racing) started May 79. 1st race on the Mallory Oval as above. It p---ed it down so the American Cheerleaders/Dancing Girls got soaked. It wasn't quite the Good Old Boys at Darlington South Carolina as Webby had hoped ! Poor fields in that year and the next, so they let in sundry other non-US V8s to pad the grids out.