1938 ERA E-Type

This is a photograph I took in the paddock at the Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1998.

It's the 1938 ERA E-Type, chassis GP1, here with a 1,980cc supercharged engine but originally with a 1½ litre unit. This and its sister car, chassis GP2 were the only two E-Type ERAs built. Only one other ERA was built later and that was the  G-Type, designed after the Second World War to compete with a Bristol 2 litre engine as a Formula 2 car, but actually competed in the Formula 1 World Championship races in 1952 when they were run under Formula 2 rules. That car later became the basis for the Bristol 450 sports car that competed at Le Mans in 1953, 1954 and 1955.

 

It was owned by Duncan Ricketts but didn’t take part in this meeting, though Duncan drove Julian Mazjub’s 1938 Alfa Romeo 308C in the HGPCA Pre-1952 Grand Prix Car Race.