1930 Riley Brooklands

This car took part in two scratch races at the Vintage Sports Car Club’s Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting at Oulton Park in July 1987 and is here seen at Lodge Corner during one of those races.

It's Neville Farquhar in his 1930 Riley Brooklands with a tuned version of the Riley Nine's 1,087cc 4-cylinder inline engine. The Riley Nine was designed by two of the Riley brothers, Percy and Stanley, and the Brooklands was the work of John G Parry Thomas and Reid Railton who shortened the chassis by some 15 inches and fitted an undershield the full length of the car. The engine had high compression pistons, special camshafts and 2 carburettors, increasing its output to 50bhp.

1963 Cooper T59

This was one of the competitors in the HGPCA Race for Pre-66 Grand Prix Cars at the Silverstone Classic meeting in July 2010.

It's Erwin van Gelder's 1963 Cooper T59, a car that was designed as a  Formula Junior car (with a 1,100cc capacity limit) but according to the programme of the event has a 1,475cc engine, presumably a Coventry Climax unit.

1931 Jowett Long Two

This was one of the cars that took part in a vintage car run from Stockport to Matlock in July 1985 organised by car dealers Gordon Ford of Stockport.

It’s a 1931 Jowett Long Two – the ‘Two’ referring to the number of seats not engine cylinders – though it had a 907cc flat twin engine. The DVLA record says that it has not been taxed since April 2006.

1959 Lister Jaguar

I took this photograph at Lodge Corner during the HSCC Pre ’60 Historic Sports Car Championship race at the HSCC Spring Historic Race Meeting at Oulton Park in May 1987.

It's a 3.8 litre Lister Jaguar driven by Aidan Mills-Thomas and has the 'knobbly' body which featured on the early Lister Jaguars. The car was apparently severely damaged at one point, to the extent that it's registration number (WTM 446) and chassis number (BHL126) were transferred to another Lister Jaguar. This change of identity was subsequently disputed, and the result was an extremely expensive court case in which the judge finally decided that it was not his place to decide such a matter.

1904 Cadillac Model A

I photographed this car just after it had left the start line on the Manchester to Blackpool Veteran and Vintage Car Run in June 1983.

It's a 1904 Cadillac Model A, and the programme of the event had this note about the car:

 

6        1904 Cadillac Model A

          Reg: BJ 208  1-Cylinder  6.5 hp

          (Mr. A.W. Hutt, Lytham St. Annes)

One of only three Model A Cadillacs in the UK, this car was first owned by Mr Pratt of Pratt's Petroleum, and then by Esso, being used a great deal in the 1930s for promoting Esso products. It has been in the Veteran Car Club since 1955, and completed several London to Brighton and Manchester to Blackpool runs since coming into Mr Hutt’s possession in 1976. Last year’s best effort was the VCC’s North West main event from Altrincham to Llandudno, a trip which was completed in one day via Denbigh and Betws-y-Coed, necessitating 1½ hours continuously in bottom gear.

Friday's Ferrari

This is a photograph that I took at the Ferrari Racing Days meeting at Silverstone in September 2017.

It's a Ferrari 488 GTB with the 3,902cc twin turbocharged 32 valve F154 V8 engine which has two overhead camshafts per bank. Manufacture of the 488 started in 2015 and ended in February 2019. Its successor was an updated version of the 488, the Ferrari F8 Tributo.

1965 Brabham BT14

The H.SCC Spring Historic Race meeting at Oulton Park in May 1986 included a race which included a class for Formula 1 Cars (1961 – 1965).

This car competed in that race and it's John Jarvis's 1965 Brabham BT14 with a 1,500cc engine according to the programme of the event. The BT14 was designed for the then popular Formula Libre racing but was raced in period, and since, with a variety of mainly Ford engines in different racing categories, even with a 1½ litre engine in Formula One races during 1965.

1951 AEC Regal IV

This is one of the vehicles that took part in the Greater Manchester Transport Society's Trans Lancs Historic Vehicle Rally in Heaton Park, Manchester in September 1990.

It's a 1951 AEC Regal IV with a Burlingham body but it's not listed in the programme of the event. It was apparently provided new to a company in Worcester and the 'FK' in the registration number shows that it was registered in Dudley. 

1923/17 Bequet Delage

This car competed in the Maserati UK Race for Pre 1952 Grand Prix Cars at the Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 2000.

It's the 1923/17 Bequet Delage of Alexander Boswell which Maurice Bequet and his business partner Roland Coty, with the assistance of the Hispano Suiza factory, constructed in 1926. They started with the chassis of a 1923 Delage 2LCV into which they installed the 11,959cc Hispanio Suiza V8 engine from a 1917 World War Two Spad fighter plane. It raced in the Grand Prix de la Baule where it finished in third place, but did not contest any more Grand Prix races as it didn't comply with the regulations then in place. After competing in minor events with some success for several years the partners sold the car in 1936. It was eventually acquired by Nigel Arnold-Forster who restored the car in 1980 and he drove it for several years at vintage racing events.

 

A note in the programme of the event said this:

 

‘The most spectacular car in the field is Alexander Boswell’s wonderful Bequet Delage, a delicious concoction that marries the Hispano-Suiza aero engine from a World War 1 Spad fighter with a good handling French chassis of 1923.’

1955 HWM Jaguar

This car competed in the Pre and Post War Single Seater and Post War Sports Cars Handicap Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club’s Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting at Oulton Park in June 1985.

It's the 1955 HWM Jaguar of Kirk Rylands, one of a handful of sports cars produced by the Hersham and Walton Motors company of  John Heath and George Abecassis.  

 

1974 Rover 3500

This was one of the cars on display at the Footman James Classic Car Show Manchester at EventCity in September 2018.

It's a 1974 Rover P6 3500, a car which was produced by British Leyland from 1968 to 1977 based on the Rover P6 2000 that was introduced by the Rover Company in 1963 and is powered by a 3,528cc V8 engine.

1961 Maserati Tipo 63

This was one of the competitors in the Shell Historic Ferrari Maserati Challenge race at the Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1999.

It's Byron Sanborn’s 1961 Maserati Tipo 63 which was a rear-engined car based on the Tipo 60 and 61 'Birdcage' Maseratis and fitted with a V12 3-litre engine developed from the 250F V12 2½ litre unit.

Friday's Ferrari

I took this photograph at the RAC International Tourist Trophy race at Oulton Park in May 1965.

It’s Mike Salmon in the John Danway Racing’s 1963 Ferrari 250 GTO approaching Lodge Corner. The car is chassis 4399GT and it was rebodied in the 1964 style by Scaglietti  at the end of 1963. It finished the race in 12^th position on aggregate over two heats.

1959 Aston Martin DBR4

I took this photograph at the Donington Park Museum in October 1989.

It's a 1959 Aston Martin DBR4, originally called the DBR4-250, which has a 6-cylinder inline 2,493cc engine. The book ‘Great Racing Cars of the Donington Collection’ has this note about the car.

In 1958 the rear-engined, or more accurately ‘mid-engined’, Cooper-Climaxes had proved themselves capable of winning Grand Prix races. They were smaller, lighter and more nimble than the classic front-engined cars, and several designs were overtaken by this fundamental revolution in thinking. Aston Martin had built a single-seater version of their successful DB3S sports car as early as 1955, racing it New Zealand, and from this project grew Formula 1 ambitions. But development was slow with most of the racing department’s time taken up by sports car programmes. A car was designed contemporary with the later Maserati 250F’s and the Vanwalls, but when it appeared in 1959 it was too late. On its debut at Silverstone in the 1959 non-Championship meeting, Roy Salvadori put the 280bhp six-cylinder, De Dion rear axled car on pole position and finished second, and that was to prove its best performance. Failure with the Formula 1 car took some of the prestige away from Aston’s World Sports Car Championship victory that year, and although lighter cars were built for 1960 they were totally out-moded and were withdrawn before the season’s end. The Collection’s car is believed to be the first 1959 chassis, but it was acquired in disassembled and drearful condition, and has been totally restored in the Collection’s Leicester workshops.

1939 Maserati 4CL

This is a photograph I took in the paddock at the Vintage Sports Car Club's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies race meeting at Oulton Park in June 1984.

It's Rodney Felton’s 1939 Maserati 4CL, chassis 1567, and has a supercharged 4-cylinder inline 1,492cc engine. The 1939 racing season was curtailed by the outbreak of the Second World War but when racing recommenced in 1946 it proved to be the most successful of the cars taking part, and even more so in the 1947 season.

1954 Lancia D50

The Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1998 included a commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the opening meeting at the circuit in 1948. There was a display in the paddock that weekend of representative vehicles for each of those 50 years which included this Lancia D50 of 1954.

The programme had this to say about the car:

 

'The Lancia Ferrari D50

 

Silverstone is proud to display a Grand Prix car that has not been seen in Britain for over 40 years. The Lancia D50 was not only a winner, giving Fangio his fourth world title, but the project itself was so costly that it was instrumental in bringing the company to its financial knees and forcing a takeover by Fiat.

Vincenzo Lancia, while one of Italy's leading racing drivers in his day, kept the car company he founded out of serious competition, fearing the cost and diversion from the main task of building road cars. However, his son Gianni had a rather different approach and thus Lancia successfully raced sportscars in the 1950s.

For the 1954 season he decided the company should take in the might of Mercedes Benz and Maserati at the highest level of the sport: Grand Prix racing. Designer Vittorio Jano produced an innovative design with a high-revving 2.5 litre 90-degree V8, and the engine was utilised as a stressed member with the front suspension assembly bolted to it.

The engine was also mounted at an angle in the chassis to allow for an offset propshaft that assisted with a low cockpit. But the most obvious innovation was the outrigger pannier tanks between the wheels which improved the airflow and the balance of the car as the fuel load lightened.

The suspension incorporated a De Dion tube at the rear with a tubular front wishbone and leaf spring set-up at the front. The chassis was largely constructed from small diameter tube and overall the car was beautifully detailed and also very light.

After two wins in minor Formula 1 races in Italy, the D50-mounted Alberto Ascari qualified second at Monaco and was set to take the lead when he crashed spectacularly into the harbour, amazingly sustaining only a broken nose. Tragically, he was killed four days later in an accident at Monza while testing a sportscar.

By then Lancia was in financial trouble, and Fiat struck a deal whereby the D50 project, including six cars, were handed over to Ferrari. Engineers Jano and Luigi Bazzi moved over to their former rivals at Maranello to further develop  the cars and the following year they were developed into true winners. Using a car, now known as the Lancia Ferrari, in 1956 Fangio took the machine to victories in Buenos Aires, Silverstone and the Nürburgring on the way to his fourth World title. Peter Collins won with the car at Spa-Francorchamps and Reims.

The car was further modified in 1957 and re-designated the 801 but no major victories followed. Two of the ten D50s have survived, one at the Biscaretti Museum and one retained by Fiat which is the car Silverstone proudly displays today.

 

by Andrew Marriott'

2023 Audi R8

This is a car that I saw in the Manchester United car park in April 2023.

It's a 2023 Audi R8, a Second Generation model.

 It has a 5,204cc V10 engine.

1950 Talbot Lago T26 GS

I took this photograph at Lodge Corner during the Cheshire Building Society Allcomers Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club’s Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting at Oulton Park in June 1981.

It’s Richard Pilkington in his 1950 4,482cc 6-cylinder inline Talbot Lago T26 GS with the offset driving position which meant it could compete in Grand Prix or Sports Car races. It's chassis #110057 and is the car with which Louis Rosier and Juan Manuel Fangio took part in the 1951 Le Mans 24 Hour race, retiring after 9 hours. It was then given an all-enveloping sports car body and ended up in the hands of Georges Grignard in 1953, but after an accident at Montlhéry in 1954 in which his co-driver Guy Mairesse was killed, Grignard locked the wrecked car away in his garage. Richard Pilkington bought the wreckage in 1958 and after racing the car in its sports car form for some years he eventually restored it to its original cycle-wing body form, racing it at historic race meetings in both sports car and vintage GP races.

1925 Lancia Lambda

This is a photograph I took at the Lancashire Automobile Club's Manchester to Blackpool Veteran and Vintage Car Run in June 1980 with the vehicles lining up to be flagged off one by one to start the Run.

This is a 1925 Lancia Lambda and the programme of the event has this note about the car:

107     J.V. Muschamp, Cowling, Nr. Keighley, W. Yorks.

            1925 Lancia Lambda, 4-cylinder, 2570 c.c.

This is a fifth series Lambda Torpedo Tourer. It was completely rebuilt four years ago. Interesting features on the Lambda are the sliding pillar independent front suspension, monocoque chassis and V4 engine.

Friday's Ferrari

This car competed in the Coys of Kensington Ferrari GT Race at the Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1993.

It's the 1960 Ferrari 250 GT SWB of Scuderia Campidoglio, chassis #2025GT, which has the Gioacchino Colombo designed 2,953cc V12 engine that powered most of the Ferrari 250 series of cars. The 250 GT SWB was introduced by Ferrari at the Paris Motor Show in 1959. It was driven in the two-part race by Lindsay Owen Jones and Peter Hannen.

1939 Delage

This car competed in two handicap races at the Vintage Sports Car Club's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies race meeting at Oulton Park in June 1973.

The only information about the car in the programme of the event is that it is a 1939 Delage with a 2,995cc engine and was driven by P. Graham. It looks like a Delage D6, though that car had a 2,798cc engine - the DVLA record says that it can't find any details for FGJ 809.

1953 Foden FG6/12

This was one of the vehicles that took part in the Greater Manchester Transport Society’s Trans Lancs Historic Vehicle Rally in Heaton Park, Manchester in September 1988.

As is often the case it's not listed in the programme of the event, but it's a 1953 Foden FG6/12 and the DVLA record says currently has a SORN.

1930 Bugatti Type 35B

This is a photograph I took in the paddock at the Vintage Sports Car Club's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting at Oulton Park in June 1969.

It's Neil Corner in his 1930 Bugatti Type 35B which he drove in the Vintage Trophy Memorial Race that day. Poking its nose out behind the Bugatti is a 1967 Maserati Mistral Spyder.

1950's Grand Prix Cars

I took this photograph at Luffield corner during the HGPCA Pre ’60 GP Car Race at the Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in August 1996.

Leading is Brian McCaw’s 1958 BRM P25 closely followed by what appears to be a Connaught B-Type. To the right is the Lotus 16 of either Philip Walker or Jeremy Agace and the red car on the left seems to be the Maserati 250F of Ludovic Lindsay.

1966 Triumph Herald

This is a photograph I took at the Footman James Classic Car Show Manchester at EventCity in September 2018.

It's a 1966 Triumph Herald, a car that was produced from 1959 to 1961 undergoing several updates and 4-cylinder inline engines ranging from 948cc to 1,296cc. The DVLA record for this car shows that it has a 1,998cc engine, presumably the 6-cylinder inline unit that powered the later Triumph Vitesse.

Lotus Eleven Stanguellini

This is a photograph I took in the paddock at the British Empire Trophy meeting at Oulton Park in April 1957.

It's the Ecurie White Rose team's Lotus Eleven Le Mans of Alex McMillan which had a 1,096cc Stanguellini engine (the programme of the event says that it's a 'Lotus-Stranguellini'!). There were three heats based on engine sizes and he finished in 22nd place in the overall standings.

 

Friday's Ferrari

This is one of the many Ferraris present at the Ferrari Racing Days meeting at Silverstone in September 2017.

It's a 2015 Ferrari California T which was an updated version of the Ferrari California with an improved chassis and a 3,855cc twin-turbo V8 Ferrari F154 BB engine replacing the 4,297cc V8 Ferrari F136 I engine of the earlier car.

1990 McLaren MP4/5B

This is one of the cars that I photographed at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It's a 1990 McLaren MP4/5B, a redesigned version of the MP4/5, which was powered by a 3,493cc Honda V10 engine and was driven that season by Ayrton Senna and Gerhard Berger. Ayrton Senna won six of the thirteen races, and with two second place and three third place finishes won the World Drivers' Championship with 78 points. Gerhard Berger had two second place and five third place finishes to earn 43 points and ended up in fourth position in that Championship. McLaren won the World Constructors' Championship with 121 points, ahead Ferrari with 110 points.

1929 Lea Francis

I took this photograph at a classic car show organised by car dealers Gordon Ford of Stockport in July 1987.

It’s a 1929 Lea Francis with what the DVLA record says is a 1,479cc engine. A search of Lea Francis models doesn’t show any with that size engine, so it’s probably a Lea Francis 12 which had a 1,496cc engine. There's a Lea-Francis Owners' Club for owners and enthusiasts.

1955 Vanwall

This is a photograph that my brother took in the paddock at the Gold Cup meeting at Oulton Park in September 1955.

It's the 1955 Vanwall (#VW2) that was driven in the race by Harry Schell. He qualified in fifth place on the grid, but retired after 16 laps with a broken universal joint. The race was won by Stirling Moss in a Maserati 250F.