I still don’t have the detailed results from the computer yet but I'm assured that they will be here soon.
Tony… It’s certainly odd that your car turned in such a low qualifying time as it was definitely not slow.
The tyres were a problem though and they didn't seem to like the Slotfire surface which resulted in the tail snapping out unpredictably in the corners (particularly left handers strangely enough).
Having said that I don't think that would account for such a slow time. The only thing I can think of is that there was some kind of timing glitch which went un-noticed. Or, as the times are copied from the timing system into a spreadsheet then there may have been some kind of typo error involved. So apologies for that Tony.
Here are some photos taken on the day by John Prince….
Nic Hirst in charge of qualifying chores.
Me admiring the cars before the concours voting.
Concours line up ready for inspection. These cars really look fantastic when grouped together like this.
Cars in qualifying order.
Paul Cash, myself and Pete Crane getting in a little pre race practice.
Racing in full swing. Myself, Pete Crane and Nic Hirst. Unknown spectator. Neil Hirst on race control.
Final results line up with Chris's victorious Matra out in front closely followed by Taffy's BRM and Alan's Eagle.
The beautiful winning Matra of Chris Walker.
And some driver feed back on the performance of the cars during the races. In no particular order.
36 Eagle Weslake (Alan) - Handled very well and was fast and easy to drive and could be driven into corners with speed. A very sweet car.
19 Brabham BT19 (Mel) - Performed well and had lots of grip. Drivers had to be careful in the corners as it tended to be tippy. It could be down to one of the front wheels running high off the track. Maybe due to a twisted chassis.
20 Ferrari 312 (Nigel) - This car was ballistic on the straights but a lack of stability in the corners. No brakes meant that it was a bit of handful to drive. It needed to be driven smoothly to get the best from it but it usually took a few laps to get the hang of it.
8 Cooper Maserati (Charles) - Ran well while the gears lasted and was quick and very easy and enjoyable to drive. Grip was good and handled well and could be driven quickly into the corners.
14 Lotus BRM (Mark) - The car handled well but unfortunately lacked grip on the Slotfire track and as a result was a little slow in the corners. It was fast on the straights though.
9 Lotus 49b (Tony) - Ran well despite the rough gear mesh. As already mentioned, the tyres lacked grip on the Slotfire track. As a result the corners couldn't be tackled with confidence and unfortunately the car lost time due to spin outs.
7 Cooper BRM (David) - This car was very smooth, fast and stable but the rear tyres gave little grip which meant that the corners had to be driven fairly slowly to avoid spinning. With better tyres I think this would be a difficult car to beat.
1 BRM V12 (Taffy)
- Another excellent car, handled beautifully and was very fast and a firm favourite with all the drivers. It was lovely to drive.
17 BRM H16 (Dave Jones) - A very easy car to drive at it’s full potential. It had good grip and handled well but lacked pace with the vintage K’s motor. It was great to see the steering working on the tight corners too.
6 Matra MS10 (Chris)
- This car was totally vice free and did everything well. Good grip, great handling, quick and silky smooth. And good looking. It was the car that all the drivers most wanted to take home. Nic commented that it was absolutely the smoothest car he had ever driven. Superb!
And now a few minor breakages to report. Nothing serious – mainly small parts coming adrift.
Mark’s Lotus lost the gearbox casing which got caught up between the nose and guide of Mel’s Brabham. It was a few laps before anyone noticed And may have slowed the car down a bit on that heat.
Dave Jones's front steering joint popped apart after a slow deslot and ran the rest of the heat with one wheel dragging at an alarming angle. Luckily it easily clicked back into place at the end of the heat. No problems after that.
Charles’ Cooper Maserati lost a spring from the rear suspension detail that got wedged in the slot in front of Chris’ Matra. The Matra hit the spring and launched at fairly high speed into the barrier and broke the body post. A dab of glue fixed the post and there was no other damage to the car. Chris builds ‘em tough!
The body post on the Matra broke again later when it got light coming off the bridge before the downhill ramp. It came out of the slot and hit a barrier again. More glue sorted it all out – no damage apart from that. It didn't happen again once the drivers were aware of the problem and none of the other cars had a problem with the bridge.
I thought the chicane might be a problem once the drivers got into race mode but it was no problem at all. All the drivers showed great gentlmanlyness and would always back off if a coming together seemed likely. Well done guys!
And one mechanical failure.
The gear on Charles’ Cooper Maserati finally lost all but about 4 of it’s teeth. It deteriorated during the heats and would barely run towards the end. It certainly won’t last through John’s round.
I have a spare gear which appears to be the same type but different number of teeth which I've passed on to John with the cars.
The current gear is green while the spare is yellow. I don’t know how many teeth either has but I guess they’re different. John says he’ll swap it before the next round if that’s OK.
That’s all for now until the results show up. And Neil has some photos too so I’ll post those when they’re available.
Cheers
Bryan