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.
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It’s the 1948 Alta 2 litre of Peter Moores and
a note in the programme of the event says: ‘Peter Moores, of immaculate
single-seater Austin fame, has now acquired Hugh Clifford’s Alta.’ It seems to
be the car that was subsequently part of the Donington Museum Collection, and the
book ‘Great Racing Cars of the Donington Collection’ says this about it:
'The Alta
Geoffrey Taylor's 'Special'
Geoffrey Taylor was an arch motoring
enthusiast. He built his first Alta car in a small workshop behind his home in
Kingstone-upon-Thames between 1928 and 30, painstakingly fashioning vital
engine parts out of the solid. This was followed by a line of sports and
independently-suspended racing cars until he outbreak of the war.
He outlined a design for a 1½ litre
supercharged Grand Prix car towards the end of the war, and announced his plans
with a flourish in November 1945. But post-war shortages delayed the car's
debut until 1948, when 'GP No. 1' appeared in the British Empire Trophy race in
Douglas, Isle of Man.
The new Alta used an updated version of
Taylor's well-proven twin overhead-camshaft four-cylinder engine, supercharged
by a Roots-Alta blower driven from the crankshaft nose. He used a special
four-speed all-synchromesh gearbox of his own construction with a low
drive-line, allowing the driver's seat to be very low-mounted within a rakish
and sleek bodyshell, reminiscent of the pre-war Mercedes also copied by ERA in
their unsuccessful E-Type.
George Abecassis raced the car throughout 1948
and 1949, while his HW Motors partner John Heath also drove on occasions. Its
best performance was in the 1949 British GP, when Abecassis ran fifth before a
broken float chamber forced him to stop. He then fought his way back through
the field to finish seventh.
For 1950 this duo concentrated on their own
Alta-engined HWMs, while the same engine became standard in 2½ litre form in
Connaught cars. Tony Brooks won the 1955 Syracuse Grand Prix in one of these
Connaughts to score the first all-British Continental GP victory since 1924!
Three of the rubber-block suspended GP Altas
were built; the others went to Geoffrey Crossle and Joe Kelly, and the
Collection's car includes parts from all three.’
