Tuning firms

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by SidewaysFeltham

Zeff:

The Hon. Charlie Lucas was in partnership with a lovely guy called Tom (can't remember his surname): Tom was the clever man who made the first downdrafted inlets head for an MAE Cosworth 1,000 c.c. "Screamer" F3.

After Charlie left (last heard he was racing historics including a gorgeous Masser 250F! Drool, drool!), Tom continued as Titan Engineering.

Could Tom be Roy Thomas?
He was Titan's car designer and previously worked for Scirocco and Chequered Flag.

[SidewaysFeltham]

May have been, Peter.

All I can remember was that everyone called him "Tom"!

He was the guy who came up with the downdrafting wheeze, as I said before: he milled out a standard 105E head: took it home and much to his wife's horror, Araldited a solid block of mild steel into the hole and then baked it in her oven!

Took it back into the works, milled it out, flowed the new ports thus created: and then bandsawed an IDA in half and made a slide throttle.

When Charlie went out next time, he left the opposition standing!

By the time I knew him, he had built two big dyno sheds and was mainly converting big Leyland engines for a French coach tour operator, by turbocharging. The factory had refused to help and cancelled the warranties!

So, Tom got this rather nice contract! The diesel test shed was deafening! circa four big turbo-diesels being run in and power tested.

Very clever man: always had time to assist, too. Nice bloke.

[PeterMorley]

Just looked up the Titan website:
http://home.comcast.net/~a.antipas/History.htm

Roy Thomas was known as Tom the Weld or just Tom.

Titan (Motorsport & Automotive Engineering) is still owned by Diana Thomas - and to get back to rocker covers they still make them for Kent engines as wella s their well known steering racks, oil pumps etc.

With the Downdraught head, it would be interesting to know when he produced his head because Brian Hart ran a downdraught head on his front engined Terrier Formula Junior. That would have been around 1960.

[SidewaysFeltham]

Great webref, Peter.

Hmmm Brian Hart eh?

I would be most interested to know more about that one!

As your webref says, Charlie dominated the season and Tom's ingenuity produced loads of engine orders for whatwas then Charles Lucas Engineering!

I remember in those days how the leading contenders would pay fortunes for anything which gave them an edge.

Len Selby, who campaigned a Cooper-BMC, for a season's European F3 championship, long after they were competitive, living in a tent and towing the outfit behind an MGB tourer, converted to run a London cab FX diesel (which I helped to partially install!), whom I knew, regaled us with a wonderful story of Harry Stiller - a very wealthy individual - and how at the Monaco round, Harry waved loads of dosh under another driver's nose for his super-sticky Firestone tyres! And, of course, won.

One would have thought Brian Hart would have developed the downdraft F3 concept for his engine biz, which was already going great guns by then.

Perspective, I guess.

[PeterMorley]

The Titan website is great isn't it - better than some for much better known makes.

I've seen a photo somewhere of the downdraught Hart junior engine - it had two twin choke downdraft carbs.
I think Lawrence Suffryn's Terrier sportscar has a similar setup.

Meanwhile I've just been tidying the garage and found my rocker cover collection:

[SidewaysFeltham]

Interesting Peter.

If you look at the Titan site here:
http://home.comcast.net/~a.antipas/P...y-Historic.htm

Deerk Lawrence's car and bus.

I thought I remembered summat!

Here's me with the Huron FII also in 1972 at Silverstone, parked next to Derek's car and bus! I'm in the blue jersey polishing the rear wing!

Derek's car is to the left.

[GORDON STREETER]

Chris Fearon worked for Titan until he retired and raced a MK6 FF when they were new. I raced against him in an Anglia about 15 years ago, and then he turned up at Spa a couple of years back in a Firenza only to get it written of after hitting an oil slick.

[zefarelly]

Originally Posted by PeterMorley

Meanwhile I've just been tidying the garage and found my rocker cover collection:

nice, I have the plain Holbay one the sme as the lotus holbay

the MArtini casting looks similar to the Cosworth one, Gordon wants one like that with Larkins on top! (incidentally the same font as Aquaplane)

the Barwell cover looks like a plain one I have, so there can't have been too many different masters . . . .

[zefarelly]

Originally Posted by GORDON STREETER

Chris Fearon worked for Titan until he retired and raced a MK6 FF when they were new. I raced against him in an Anglia about 15 years ago, and then he turned up at Spa a couple of years back in a Firenza only to get it written of after hitting an oil slick.

was that the incident with the Dutch brothers and the yellow Anglia as well ?
caused by a twit in an Alfa deciding to do half a lap with no oil pressure whilst dumping it all over the track

I helped winch/jack/hammer the anglia out they borrowed a rad and had a great race. the Firenza was banana shaped, not good

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by zefarelly

nice, I have the plain Holbay one the sme as the lotus holbay

the MArtini casting looks similar to the Cosworth one, Gordon wants one like that with Larkins on top! (incidentally the same font as Aquaplane)

the Barwell cover looks like a plain one I have, so there can't have been too many different masters . . . .

I love the shape of the Holbay one - I assume they made these when they supplied Lotus with engines for something like Sevens.
Definitely their normal cover with revised lettering.

The Martini one is interesting, blatant Cosworth copy but the ribs don't run down the ends and the space for the lettering is much larger.
I assumed at first that they just took a copy of a Cossie one but they must have made some changes of their own first, or started from scratch.

I must admit I feel I'm a sad git for going out and buying a magazine just because it had an article on rocker covers............

[zefarelly]

Pete . . .safety in numbers, we'll support you

I also have a 'cosworth' one with a blank name patch

when talking to the owner of the foundry that cast mine, he said its quite common for 2nd or 3rd generation castings to be used as masters, then casting shrinkage and size becomes an issue, . . as an example I've just stripped an engine with what looks like a blank cosworth cover, the heads had the cover studs blanked and redrilled to fit the cover . . .1/4" inside the originals !

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by zefarelly

Pete . . .safety in numbers, we'll support you

I also have a 'cosworth' one with a blank name patch

when talking to the owner of the foundry that cast mine, he said its quite common for 2nd or 3rd generation castings to be used as masters, then casting shrinkage and size becomes an issue, . . as an example I've just stripped an engine with what looks like a blank cosworth cover, the heads had the cover studs blanked and redrilled to fit the cover . . .1/4" inside the originals !

I remember someone making repro Cosworth covers sometime ago, without the lettering to avoid legal trouble! (Of course for a bit more money you could have the ones with the lettering!).

I have vague memories from learning about casting that they use rulers where the measurements are further apart than indicated to allow for the shrinkage as the casting cools down.

And something about building up an original with something like plasticine so that it shrinks to the correct size.

But it seems there is just about enough space in straight copies of rocker covers that you can take a straight mould from them - but 1/4" shift sounds a bit excessive, presumably there could be clearance issues with valve gear as well as the sealing surfaces!

Having looked at your website I see that you merit honorary lifetime membership of Rocker Covers Anonymous!!

[SidewaysFeltham]

Peter:

Most of the older ally castings were made from wooden patterns. The pattern was made purposfully slightly larger than the finished article, to allow for shrinkage on cooling.

A pattern maker's ruler was indeed specially graduated; different materials shrink at a different rate when cooling.

All our castings were sandcast using various types of ally: the more basic stuff used what they used to call so delightfully, "Pot Metal", which was any old scrap ally, including old pistons, etc!

Indeed, my original foundry as its main business made ally pulleys for electric motors used on pumps, compressors etc! It's now a very upmarket eatery!

Since then, die-casting and low-pressure injection moulding have effectively superceeded sandcasting, which is still used for large components, of course.

Ho hum...................only seems like yesterday.

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by SidewaysFeltham

Hmmm Brian Hart eh?

I would be most interested to know more about that one!

One would have thought Brian Hart would have developed the downdraft F3 concept for his engine biz, which was already going great guns by then.

Perspective, I guess.

I just found the photo.
It is in The Motor's 1961 guide to Formula Junior Competition Cars.
Copyright Temple Press Limited, 1961
(I assume that covers its use legally - especially as its use is part of historical research rather than commerical)

[SidewaysFeltham]

How very interesting, Peter!

I am surprised that the carb set-up was legal in FJ??

Wouldn't have been in F3 screamers, of course, as it was limited to one single-choke.

Amazing that Hart didn't build an F3 mill with those heads!

If he had, he'd have probably got the Ford contract to build the 3 litre F1 engine!

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by SidewaysFeltham

How very interesting, Peter!

I am surprised that the carb set-up was legal in FJ??

Wouldn't have been in F3 screamers, of course, as it was limited to one single-choke.

Amazing that Hart didn't build an F3 mill with those heads!

If he had, he'd have probably got the Ford contract to build the 3 litre F1 engine!

Carbs were unrestricted in FJ - the main rules were block & head from a production car apart from that the components weren't restricted, but they had to retain the original stroke (& keep under 1100cc!).
These aren't really any different to a pair of DCOEs.

Hart didn't really attract much attention until he was producing BDA type engines - I wonder what he was doing in the mid-60s?

Hart never seemed to get a real break in F1, you have to wonder what would have happened if he'd had anything like the budget that others had.

[zefarelly]

the foundry I use have wonkey rulers I have a tool called solidworks, draw it as you want it, then scale it up automatically 1.5% to allow for shrinkage ( you can control scale in different planes if required) its a solid model, so I emailed the file to a company calle dFormaplaex who machiuned the master from billet, it was the blingiest piece of kit I've ever had, a shame to have had to get it dirty really !

re cosworth, C&G make them now, I wonder if they pay a royalty !!! I think mines a copy to be honest

[SidewaysFeltham]

Originally Posted by PeterMorley

Carbs were unrestricted in FJ - the main rules were block & head from a production car apart from that the components weren't restricted, but they had to retain the original stroke (& keep under 1100cc!).
These aren't really any different to a pair of DCOEs.

Hart didn't really attract much attention until he was producing BDA type engines - I wonder what he was doing in the mid-60s?

Hart never seemed to get a real break in F1, you have to wonder what would have happened if he'd had anything like the budget that others had.

I am not sure those carbs are in fact Webers, Peter: look more like Solex Twin Chokes?? The throttle pump housing for example?

The Renault rally cars and the Alpines and Gordinis used Solex twin chokes: I worked on one rally car back in 1971??

Agree about Hart: say perhaps Ford had have given him the £220,000 and instructions to build a 3 litre F1 engine..........................

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by SidewaysFeltham

I am not sure those carbs are in fact Webers, Peter: look more like Solex Twin Chokes?? The throttle pump housing for example?

The Renault rally cars and the Alpines and Gordinis used Solex twin chokes: I worked on one rally car back in 1971??

Agree about Hart: say perhaps Ford had have given him the £220,000 and instructions to build a 3 litre F1 engine..........................

I agree about the carbs not being Webers - it's possible the reason he ended up with a downdraught engine is those were the cheapest carbs he could find rather than a performance mod!

The carb make was free in FJ, only the operating principle had to be the smae as the road car engine.

I'm sure if Ford had given their money to him rather than Weslake he'd have done a better job, but Cosworth did the DFV for £100,000 which was spectacular value for money.

[SidewaysFeltham]

Yes, I do agree about Weslake: whilst the late Harry was ace on gasflow and head design etc, a whole engine was rather beyond him, it seems.

Perhaps he ought to have roped in Harry Munday, or Wally Hassan or Bill Heynes!

Hart's work on FVAs and FVCs speak legions for his abilities.

Of course, Duckworth and Costin had the experience of stuff like the SCA under their belt before the DFV came along.

Cosworth also had the whole of Ford's global engineering and foundry resource at their fingertips, too: very much as did Eric Broadley when he designed the GT40.

One wonders what Hart could have achieved with all those resources!

[Gungebucket]

Just a wee comment re Brian Hart and his Formula Junior. At the time Brian was racing the FJ he worked for Cosworth when they worked out of a railway arch in London. At the time Cosworth consisted of Costin, Duckworth, Brian Hart, John Lievesley and I think Jack Field was there as well amongst others. The downdraft head was run at the end of the season just to show what they could really do!

[Rikki Cann]

Originally Posted by GORDON STREETER

I may be wrong on this , but didn't some of the early tuning firms like "Speedwell" make a start around the Suez crisis. When trying to make the cars more fuel efficient, found they were in effect tuning them and getting more power. I was only 9 years old at the time so I cant remember, but seem to think I read about it in the 60s in one of the mags.

You was only Nine yeah right ohh,

[GORDON STREETER]

I'm afraid its Specsavers for you Rickki I was 9 in the Suez crisis

[ian.stewart]

I did my appreiticeship in a Big Foundry in Charlton, Thet used to cast all sorts of bits and pieces for F1 and CanAm teams, there were allways March and Surtees wheels out in the yard, lots of suspension and Gearbox casings too, Far too much to remember what it was for, we used to do all sorts of Non Ferrous casting including Magnesium and mag welding in an enclosed "saturation" room that had a totally inert atmosphere,
Also used to Cast Ships Propellors on the marine side, and the bigest I can remember being cast was for a super tanker which was in Manganese Bronze, this was a single cast single piece prop and weighed in at something like 118 tons un-fettled. and 110 tons finished
That was something to watch when they poured one of those.

[Fireblade]

Manganese Bronze as mentioned by last poster!
Coming round the circle, Manganese Bronze Holdings Ltd are the owners of LTI - London Taxis International - in Coventry that manufacture the famous London Taxi.

Meanwhile back to the topic.