Bruce McLaren

McLaren is tweeting pictures for the 44th anniversary of Bruce McLaren’s death testing the CanAm car at Goodwood. He was an engaging man, generous with his time from the moment I met him in 1964, ironically at Goodwood when I accompanied Jackie Stewart to one of the famous test sessions with Ken Tyrrell in the Cooper BMC. Car no 5 was at the 1968 Belgian Grand Prix at Spa, a practice picture just before La Source hairpin a short walk from the paddock. Race day was dry and the M7A doesn’t have the small spoiler used in the race. Bruce won the grand prix; a little luckily perhaps after Denny Hulme in the other McLaren went out battling for the lead with Jackie Stewart’s Matra-Ford. Stewart had led most of the way but ran out of fuel with a lap to go. Pedro Rodriguez (BRM) challenged

the McLaren on the last lap but it, too, was spluttering through empty tanks and finished second. Spa was a good result for McLaren, which had only just started using Ford-Cosworth DFV engines. On the grid at Silverstone (right) with the McLaren BRM, never very competitive, McLaren in the cockpit with Tyler Alexander. Car No 4 (below) looks like practice day for the BRDC International Trophy race on March 30, 1969. Wings were growing taller as their effect on cornering speeds was becoming apparent and engineers were sure that their downforce had to be exerted directly into the hub carriers on the wheels. The following week collapsing wings on Graham Hill’s and Jochen Rindt’s Lotuses at Montjuich led to accidents, which outlawed wings on stalks like this. McLaren was 6th in the International Trophy, a lap down on Brabham, who won with wings bearing down on both front and rear wheels.

Bentley Mulsanne

Friday Fact - According to Bentley Comms the flagship #Bentley #Mulsanne is named after the famous corner at the @LeMans24hour race - pic.twitter.com/RTVkWfJRPK. I thought it more likely it was named after the better-known Mulsanne Straight. I referred Bentley Comms to page 219’s reproduction of the famous Michael Turner painting of a Mulsanne Turbo on the famous Straight and presented to the Bentley Drivers’ Club on 17 June 1984 to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Bentley’s first win in the 24 Hours’ race. Went to Le Mans that year. Bentley Motors kindly presented me with a copy No 68/250 of a limited edition, signed by Michael, which hangs on my wall now. The Complete Bentley is £12.31 digitally on Amazon for Kindle.

Actively exhausting

Who now remembers basso profundo Triumph TR2s? At about 2,400rpm, as I recall, they made a deep crisp booming noise which, if you got it to coincide with a low bridge or a long retaining wall reverberated beautifully. You can scarcely imagine Canley engineers solemnly conspiring to provide it – maybe they did – but it was always tempting to accelerate in second or third gear to achieve the delightful crackle. This, you felt, was a sports car. Anybody overhearing must love it.
Well, they probably didn’t. They probably thought it was just a noisy car but aged 19 or 20 it didn’t occur to you that anybody could dislike it. They might as well not like Beethoven. Or the Beatles. TR2s weren’t very fast; 0 to 60 in 11sec and 105 or so mph, but they felt fast.One TR I knew well, (left) Ian Brown’s, OVD 888 on a Scottish Rally.
It’s different now. I don’t like noisy cars as much, but I have to make an exception for the F-type Jaguar. Engines nowadays are so muffled and de-toxed that crisp crackling exhausts are pretty well outlawed. The racket that thrills motor race spectators has been muted, so in an almost wholly successful effort to restore what was regarded as an essential feature of a sports car, Jaguar has what it calls an active exhaust system. Electronically controlled valves in it open to what Autocar described as their angry position, under hard acceleration or when the driver selects Dynamic on the touchscreen. A satanic roar, the testers said, at 4500rpm and a very lovely scream between 5000rpm and the red line.

Jaguar F-type. Silent when stopped.

Active Exhaust is reinventing what young “scorchers” had in the 1920s. Cut-outs enabled drivers to by-pass silencers at the touch of a switch or a lever, reducing back-pressure and squeezing out a few more precious horsepower for overtaking. Or simply making more noise. Jaguar doesn’t claim any extra bhp from “active” exhausts but it sounds magnificent. And you don’t need a low bridge to get the best out of it. TR2 rev counter on the right

100 BEST CARS

Mini, McLaren, Jaguar and Range Rover are easy leaders in Autocar’s list of Britain’s best-ever 100 cars. I’ve no problem endorsing the first couple of dozen but, notwithstanding Gordon Murray’s ingenious contribution, the Yamaha Motiv.e at 5 looks like lip-service to greenery-yallery. The Jaguar XJ220 also poses a question. It was neither a commercial nor technical success and needed a lot of fettling before it reached reality. Driving it was like looking at the world through a letterbox. The Aston Martins in the list are an odd bunch with no ground-breaking DB2, elegant DBS or Ian Callum DB7. Similarly it’s difficult to include a D-type Jaguar – OK on the Mulsanne straight but a bit of a handful on corners – and leave out the C-type which was more precise and exciting.
McLaren F1 (above): Collected daughter Joanna from school during my road test. She’s older now, still beautiful.
Austin-Healey Sprite. 71st. This was my second one at Turnberry. Wonderfully crisp, precise car.

Lotuses are questionable on grounds of quality and reliability but I’m surprised there is no Elan Plus2S. It was beautifully proportioned. I once did 300 miles in three hours with one. There you are the older I get the faster I was. I would not include any TVR; all I drove were just brute force and ignorance. Blower Bentleys were something of an aberration. I suppose they were glamorous but never won anything like the unsupercharged cars. Derby Bentleys are missing from the list. Surely the Silent Sports Car deserves better. Jensen-Healey – delete. Not well made, hastily modified and really quite dull. Same goes for the Daimler Dart SP250. The Edward Turner engine was ok but Daimler was so strapped for cash it had to cobble up a horrid plastic body that creaked and cracked.
One of my first drives in an E-type; Scottish Motor Show after introduction at Geneva in 1961 (below), with Jaguar apprentice Clive Martin.

No Bristols please. Except for the BMW-based 400 and the beautiful 404 they were heavy and lugubrious. I never went for the mystique so assiduously promoted by writers like the matchless Leonard Setright. Triumph Stag? I thought it was rubbish when I went on the press launch. Hillman Imp? I owned one and when it went it was OK; I drove it to Maranello where I had lunch with Enzo Ferrari, but it was not made very well. Same goes for any Avenger, even the Avenger Tiger. The press launch was on Malta where we couldn’t drive them far enough to grow suspicious of unreliability. The Morgan 3 wheeler or Plus 4 were fine, but the Plus 8 was where Morgan began to lose its way and power outstripped handling. I wouldn’t include a Delorean in any list except perhaps one on how not to develop a sports car. It was terrible. Reliant Scimitar? A definite maybe. Triumph TR5 - not bad until they put a wiggly independent back-end on making it pitch and curtsy. Triumph 1300 absolutely not. And why relegate the MGA to 95th? Shame

Range Rover. Deserves its place. Took this on the press launch by Goonhilly Down, 1970.



Love lists

Hillman Imp. On road test for The Motor with Penny Duckworth by door. Pre-launch picture so badges taped over.

100.Range Rover Evoque 99. Ginetta G40R 98. Vauxhall Astra 97. Marcos TSO 96. Honda Civic 95. MGA 94. Vauxhall Chevette HSR 93. Triumph Dolomite Sprint 92. Allard J2 91. Honda Jazz 90. Sunbeam Tiger 89. Nissan Juke 88. Invicta Black Prince 87. Noble M12 86. Lotus Carlton 85. Caterham Seven 160 84. Caparo T1 83. Rolls-Royce 10 HP 82. Triumph TR5 PI 81. Radical RXC 80. Triumph 1300 79. Daimler SP250 Dart 78. Morgan 4/4 77. Renault Megane RS 225 76. Noble M600 75. Lotus Sunbeam 74. Morgan Plus 8 73. BAC Mono 72. Gordon-Keeble 71. Austin-Healey Sprite 70. MGB GT 69. Bristol Fighter 68. Ford Cortina 1600E 67. Bowler EXR 66. AC Ace 65. Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow 64. Austin FX4 63. Napier-Railton 62. Caterham Supersport 61. Triumph 2000 60. Jaguar F-type 59. Morgan 3-wheeler 58. Reliant Scimitar 57. TVR Sagaris 56. Ford Escort RS2000 55. Bentley Continental GT 54. Ford Capri RS3100 53. Delorean DMC-12 52. Aston Martin V8 51. Ascari KZ1 50. Aston Martin V12 Vantage S 49. Subaru Impreza WRC 48. Hillman Avenger Tiger 47. Triumph Stag 46. Hillman Imp 45. Lister Storm 44. Rover P5B 43. Lotus Evora 42. Rover P6 3500S 41. Nissan Qashqai 40. Ariel Atom 39. Vauxhall Prince Henry 38. Aston Martin One-77 37. Rover 75 36. Jaguar XJ 35. Austin Seven 34. Bristol Blenheim 33. Lotus Cortina 32. Austin-Healey 3000 31. Aston Martin Vanquish 30. Lotus Seven 29. Land Rover 28. Jensen-Healey 27. Lotus Esprit 26. MG Midget 25. McLaren 12C 24. Morris Minor 23. Lotus Elan 22. TVR Speed 12 21. Rover SD1 20. TVR Chimaera 19. BMW Mini 18. Bentley Blower 17. Jaguar XF 16. Ford GT40 15. Rolls-Royce Phantom 14. Lotus Elise 13. Jaguar D-type 12. Ford Sierra RS Cosworth 11. Jensen FF 10. Ford Escort Mexico 9. TVR Griffith 8. Aston Martin DB5 7. Jaguar XJ220 6. McLaren P1 5. Yamaha MOTIV.e 4. Range Rover 3. Jaguar E-type 2. McLaren F1 1. original Mini

Works Austin-Healey 3000 rally car test. I am the fresh-faced youth.

Kintyre

It was probably rash for Land Rover to take a full page of The Daily Telegraph claiming you could drive across Kintyre. I knew Kintyre. In 1940 I watched Donald Smith of Drumalea set off, with Home Guard* armband and rifle, to scan sea and sky for Germans. We had family in Campbeltown. My favourite uncle Johnstone Milloy; his sisters Flora, Jessie and Minnie were teachers who, it seemed, had educated generations. My step-grandmother Martha came from Drum-something-else near Machrihanish where I watched Spitfires, and Liberators from America.

So I knew the dotted line in Land Rover’s ad was a boggy hillside and challenged it. I took one of the new V8 Land Rovers on it and got bogged down. Land Rover was cross, said I hadn’t been driving it properly so sent top cross-country driver Roger Crathorne, a Range Rover development engineer, to show me how. They sent a Range Rover, with a winch and flew me to Machrihanish. A Land Rover Product Strategist, brought along the same V8 Land Rover with the same tyres I had used. A wet peat bog was passed by outflanking it. A ridge that had looked impassable because there was a ditch the other side proved no great difficulty. The secret was to tackle it obliquely so that there was always one wheel on hard standing.

The Forestry plantation, however, was impenetrable. Ditches dug to drain the hillside were too much. We could have used ladders to bridge gaps, but that, we decided would impugn the spirit of the advertisement. We tried the hill from the middle, reaching Lussa Loch by the forestry road but that was no use either. Only something tracked was ever going to negotiate the sage and peat above Putechan. The Range Rover’s winch pulled us out.

With ground-anchors, helpers and time it would have been possible, but that would have been as relevant as putting the Land Rover on the back of a tractor or lifting it across by helicopter. It turned out that somebody from the advertising agency had been told that anywhere you could walk, you could drive a Land Rover. The advertisement was duly withdrawn. It was 1980. Roger Crathorne is now retiring but not before contributing a treasured foreword to The Land Rover File, 65th Anniversary Edition






*Donald’s armband still said LDV (Local Defence Volunteers) as I recall. I was only six.

Rolls and Royce

Inseparable as Gilbert and Sullivan or Victoria and Albert, Rolls and Royce created the world's most recognisable brand name 110 years ago, Wednesday 4 May 1904. They met at the Midland Hotel Manchester not only producing “The Best Car in the World” (Rolls-Royce was never modest), but aero-engine excellence throughout the Second World War and ever since.

Right: Merlin in a Spitfire.

Only a little of the credit belonged to The Hon Charles Stewart Rolls,

(below)

an Edwardian gentleman to his elegant fingertips, complete with uniformed chauffeur and mechanic, but famously stingy. The late Sir Thomas Sopwith described him as, “curiously unlovable.” Rolls felt he had little to learn from Royce, a northern engineer, a crane manufacturer with an infinite capacity for taking pains. But as an ardent balloonist and aerial adventurer Rolls’s lifestyle was expensive, and the sales company set up with £6,500 from his father, Lord Llangattock, needed a new line to augment his imported French cars. Flying exploits were his undoing. Rolls achieved the melancholy distinction of being the first pilot killed in a British air crash at Bournemouth on 2 June 1910.

Workaholic, obsessive, sickly Frederick Henry Royce’s pursuit of perfection knew no bounds and, ill from overwork, he dismantled his Decauville to make it function properly. It was a car, he concluded, “...marred by careless workmanship,” so he set about designing something better. The result was an experimental car Rolls drove out of the Midland Hotel's carriage court (demolished in the 1930s to make way for a reception area) and realised that this 2-cylinder was as smooth and quiet as a 4-cylinder. Rolls instructed his partner, Claude Johnson to take on the Royce car, and negotiate for C S Rolls & Co

(Royce below)

to have exclusive rights.

The great engineer and the parsimonious aristocrat signed their agreement on December 23, 1904. Claude Johnson thought double-barrelled names had a ring to them, and made his contribution to the motoring lexicon, inserting a clause stipulating that the cars would henceforward be known as Rolls-Royces.

Later one of the 40/50 cars was painted silver and called The Silver Ghost. It was the fashion to apply names to individual cars, rather like ships. The title stuck, and the Silver Ghost remained in production for eighteen years. Phantoms, Wraiths, Shadows and Spirits followed. Rolls-Royces were always beautifully made although scarcely inventive, and never above taking somebody else's component (an automatic transmission from General Motors, or a patent suspension from Citroën) and adapting it to its own exacting standards. An engine from Munich, transmission from Friedrichshafen, even an aluminium body from Dingolfing, has not been entirely out of character.

In 1914 the Admiralty instructed Lieut Walter Owen Bentley of the Royal Naval Air Service to find out why its new French aero engines were overheating. By 1916 he had designed one himself the Bentley rotary

(below)

, which saw service in Sopwith Camels, and was used by the RAF until 1926.

After the war Bentley wasted no time getting into car production. His 3 Litre appeared at the London Motor Show in 1919, yet the foundations of the Bentley legend were laid at the Le Mans 24 Hours race in France. Bentleys won it five times against opposition from Mercedes-Benz, Alfa Romeo, and Bugatti, but following the 1929 depression even the extravagant Bentley Boys had to economise. In July 1931 Bentley Motors called in the receiver.

Napier had not made a car since 1925, it was now predominantly an aero engine manufacturer, but was so impressed with the new 8 Litre opened negotiations to buy Bentley Motors. In September The Autocar confidently announced that an agreement only awaited formal approval. The receiver called for sealed bids, but the mysterious British Central Equitable Trust dashed Napier’s hopes. Weeks later the subterfuge was revealed. Rolls-Royce, learning of Napier's interest, had pre-empted its rival.

Bentley never forgave what he regarded as Rolls-Royce's deceit, and although he joined Bentley Motors (1931) Ltd soon left, forbidden from ever applying his name to a car again.

In 1933 Rolls-Royce announced the Derby-built Silent Sports Car, and with a few memorable exceptions, Bentleys became little more than badge-engineered Rolls-Royces. The exceptions included the splendid Continentals of the 1950s, with sweeping lines inspired by a contemporary Buick, and the new Continental developed by the VW-owned company. More in

The Complete Bentley also available as an ebook THE COMPLETE BENTLEY.

, Dove Publishing Ltd.

(right, WO Bentley bust at Bentley Motors, Crewe)