Miller FD

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Following up the lead set by Mark Dees again, here's my interpretation of the front-drive Miller chassis histories:

1) the 1924 Durant/Durant #2 car

Originally built for Jimmy Murphy, the project was taken to completion by sponsor/driver Cliff Durant, who qualified for two or three events but apparently never achieved a race start. Dave Lewis and Bennie Hill then took the epoch-making 2nd place finish at Indy, but after a few more starts by Lewis and a possible match race appearance by Earl Cooper the car was stored away in early 1926. It reappeared in 1927, owned and driven by Frank Elliott (with relief by Fred Frame), and then again two years later, driven by Henry Turgeon for Carl Ricketts. For 1930 Ricketts had the car "widened" for the new two-man-car era, and in this form it ran at Indianapolis for several more years, reputedly until 1947!

2) the 1925 Miller/Hill #21 car

The only Miller FD built with outboard front brakes, the car was withdrawn from the 1925 Indy 500 and, reputedly, sold to Packard's R & D department. It also reappeared racing in 1927, now owned by Reed & Mulligan, and driven by Bruce Miller, Sam Ross and Bert Karnatz over the next three years, after which it was rebuilt into a two-seater by Dave Evans. In 1930 it was sponsored by Indiana car dealers Jones & Maley, leading Dees to suggest that racing people Milt Jones and Henry Maley were involved with the car when, in reality, they weren't. Frank Brisko acquired it a year later, and eventually rebuilt it into a single-seater again, which ran with a 6-cylinder Brisko engine and further modifications at Indy until 1946.

3) the 1926 Miller/Lewis #1 car

Dave Lewis drove this car during its first two seasons (with a little help from Earl Cooper), and became the first driver ever to win a 'proper' motor race in a front-drive racing car on June 12 in 1926 at Altoona Speedway (PA). Hollywood stuntman Cliff Bergere purchased the car in 1928 and drove it for two seasons, with relief by Peter Kreis on occasion. Apparently, it wasn't raced again after 1929, and likely broken up to build the Dunning/De Soto two-man car in 1933.

4) the 1926 Miller/Cooper #5 car

Earl Cooper drove this car in 1926 and eventually purchased it, to run it alongside his fleet of three Cooper front-drive racing cars that were, essentially, Miller copies. Jules Ellingboe wrecked the car in its only 1927 appearance, and all signs point to it being sold to and rebuilt by Red Shafer, racing driver and fledgling racing car manufacturer from Iowa. Babe Stapp, Ralph Hepburn, Russ Snowberger and Cliff Woodbury drove the car besides Shafer himself, who sold it in 1930 to the English division of the French car manufacturer Derby, to become the famous Derby-Miller record car. Gwenda Stewart took many records over the next six years, after which the car disappeared into the murk...

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5) the 1926 Duray/Duray #12 car

Leon Duray purchased this car late in the year, winning the season finale and then the 1927 opener to boot! He drove the car, with occasional relief stints by Cliff Bergere and Ralph Hepburn, until setting sail for France in the summer of 1929 where, interestingly, he apparently used his other car for record attempts at Montlhéry. In September, he is said to have used this one in the 1.5-litre heat of the Monza GP, where he retired, before selling it to Ettore Bugatti. Reputedly the one resting in the IMS museum today, it held both the IMS lap record and the closed-course world record for several years.

6) the 1926 Kreis/Kreis #15 car

Only used in three races late in 1926, indications are that the car was dismantled and rebuilt as the thoroughly modified 1927 Detroit-Miller, which was later rebuilt into the Miller-Hartz Mk II.

7) the 1927 Hartz/Hartz #1 car

Harry Hartz had this car built to defend his National crown, but it was late in getting ready, and proved troublesome in competition. In October, he crashed badly at Salem and received injuries that virtually ended his brilliant driving career. The car is said to have burned to cinder.

8) the 1927 de Paolo/de Paolo #3 car

Pete de Paolo got off to a bad start with his new car, but after two retirements and quite a few modifications he won enough to be crowned National Champion for a second time, the first driver to live to see this feat accomplished, and the first driver to win the title (mostly) on a front-drive machine. Sadly, he was rather badly injured in a practice crash at the Brickyard the following year, and the car was subsequently driven by Wilbur Shaw, Bob McDonogh and Cliff Woodbury. It changed ownership from de Paolo to a man named Dodds, thence to Harry Hartz who planned to make his racing comeback with the sister car to the one he had crashed in, but ran out of time before the formula change. Undeterred, he rebuilt the car into the Miller-Hartz Mk I, the fastest two-man car for the first three years of the "junk formula".

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9) the 1928 Boyle/Woodbury #10 car

Team leader Cliff Woodbury's regular car, it was driven by Fred Comer in October at Salem when he crashed fatally. Repaired, Pete de Paolo drove it at Indy in '29, then Woodbury crashed it at Altoona in the Keech fatal wreck, injuring himself to such an extent that he quit racing. The car was repaired once again, and Wilbur Shaw and Deacon Litz drove it in the second Altoona event that year. Apparently, it was this car that was used for record runs in 1930, and eventually broken up to build the 1932 Boyle two-man car.

10) the 1928 Miller/Hepburn #16 car

Equipped with a lot of extra hardware, this car was supposed to be the "final answer" in front-drive racing car design, but it wasn't especially fast, and terribly unreliable. Ralph Hepburn remained its only driver in US competition, even after it was bought by Leon Duray following the Auto Show fire in early '29, probably as a bargain, and shed of most of its special hardware. Apparently, it was this car that Duray used in Montlhéry, and possibly Arpajon, for record runs, and then at the Monza GP in the 3-litre heat, where he fought a brilliant battle with Varzi and Brilli-Peri on P2 Alfas, and Borzacchini on a Maserati 26B. Unfortunately, the hard-pressed Miller broke under the strain, but one would love to have seen a well-prepared 122 rear-drive take the fight to the Europeans, even on the combined oval/road course! This car, like #5, was purchased by Bugatti and returned to America by Griff Borgeson three decades later, reputedly the one in the Smithsonian today.

11) the 1928 Boyle/Comer #25 car

Fred Comer and Cliff Woodbury drove the car in 1928, and Woodbury won the season finale with it, then took pole at Indy the following year. Unfortunately, he destroyed the car thoroughly in a fourth-lap crash, and was the first one out of the competition. Indications are that the remains of the car were eventually bought by Russ Snowberger to build his 1937 Packard-powered two-man car.

[Vitesse]

Michael: are you able to shed any light on the two Millers driven by Boucly and Marret in 1933? They were run in the 1100cc class at Nîmes (Boucly only) and then in the Coppas Ciano and Acerbo, finishing the year at Brno. Possibly in hillclimbs as well?

Logically, they ought to be the two ex-Duray cars, but I've never seen any indication that they ever left Molsheim until Borgeson "rescued" them. And why 1100cc? Given that they weren't designed for road racing anyway, why reduce the engine capacity?

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Originally Posted by Vitesse

Logically, they ought to be the two ex-Duray cars

Hardly, Richard! Remember, those cars were designed mainly for constant velocity board tracks; they were hardly competitive at Indy, and certainly all but useless on road courses!

This is one of the riddles that I wasn't going to tackle until much later, but since you insist , I nosed around a little and... found almost nothing! The best clue is a small picture in Venables's "Fifteen-Hundreds", p42, which shows the start of the Brno race. The caption isn't very clear, but assuming the cars were lined up in order of their numbers, Boucly's Miller would be the one in the centre of the picture, directly ahead of the Alfa, with Marret's car hidden in the smoke beyond, or possibly the monoposto ahead to its left.

Notice the car in the center has a headrest, and more to the point a left-hand exhaust, the latter virtually excluding any possibility of it being a Miller. True, front-drive Millers had their exhaust on the left side, but as already mentioned they were not suited at all for road racing, and the exhaust was anyway routed differently. Also, this car clearly is not a front-drive, and neither is the car ahead to the left. That one, however, could well incorporate Miller body parts, but the photograph is far too poor for a conclusive pointer. It certainly isn't a Miller chassis, however, that I can clearly make out! Unfortunately, I can't say anything useful at all about the car hidden by the smoke.

I'd say the cars can't have been Miller FDs, for the reasons given, and also not Miller 91s, since those were mostly accounted for in the States. It is remotely possible they were Miller 122s, rebuilt to 1500 cc, but I think that's not very likely. One such car is known to have gone to Europe, but to the best of my knowledge was completely rebuilt into a hybrid Miller in the twenties already, and probably didn't leave Britain after that.

Also, how (and why!) would you reduce its capacity further? A new crankshaft? Hardly likely, and difficult to manufacture because of the imperial dimensions. A new block? Not a reasonable possibilty, for sure! Wet Liners? Possible, but that would have made for a bore-to-stroke ratio of 1 to 2! There still remains the possibility of original Miller 91 engines in 122 chassis, since 91 engines were probably easier to get in the thirties than 122s, but that would still mean a bore-to-stroke of 1 to 1.6!

Richard, you're extremely knowledgable when it comes to thirties 1500 cc racers, do you think the sources could have been confused about those cars, because quite frankly I don't think they were (American) Millers at all! Perhaps a European Special, built by someone named Miller? A cursory check showed the 1931 Brooklands 500 winning Riley to have been entered by a Mr. Miller - Brooklands Rileys had left-hand exhausts, didn't they? Too far fetched a thought??

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Sigh, now I can't edit at all!!!

Meant to say bore-to-stroke ratio, not relation!

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And wet liners, of course... :blush:

(Both the above amendments have been made to the original post. Just PM me when you need to make an 'out of time' edit, and I'll do it for you, asap - JT)

[Vitesse]

Hmm. An interesting bit of lateral thinking, but I'm not sure it works. Your "Mr Miller" would actually be Captain (later Sir) Alastair Miller, who somehow acquired the two Opels which Carl Joerns had to leave behind at Brooklands in 1914. He was Wolseley's Competition Manager in the early 20s and a well-known Brooklands habitué right through the decade.

He didn't actually win the 1931 500, although he did win his class. But he seems to have retired from active race driving after the end of the 1931 season, an occurrence probably not unconnected with his bankruptcy in 1932/3. However, he was also the entrant of the Paul/Philip Riley which came second in the 1932 500, but I'd guess that was the same car as he had raced in 1931. As the assets disclosed at his bankruptcy hearing were just £783 (against liabilities of £12,171!), £200 of which was Brooklands prize money and cups, I can't see him owning more than one Riley. He did have an unspecified engine and various parts, but these were described as of no value. Captain Miller only merits one mention in Dr Birmingham's Riley book, again in connection with the 1931 500.

[Vitesse]

Oh, and in subsequent years he was involved in some very dodgy dealings, not to mention a couple of prison sentences and some court cases involving little girls ....

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Richard, that was just an example of what is possible - I wrote "cursory check", didn't I?

I'm not saying per se the cars were built by Alistair Miller (thanks for the first name, I thought it was him but wasn't sure), but Miller isn't exactly a rare surname, is it? And still, seeing he went bankrupt in 1932, maybe a couple of French racing drivers snapped up some cheap racing hardware, no?

Whatever, I'm nearly 100 % certain those cars didn't have any connection to Harry A. Miller!

[Vitesse]

Taking your lateral thinking a bit further, Michael, I've come across a couple of drivers called Meunier (French for Miller). There's a Michel Meunier (who he?) and the comparatively better-known Roger Meunier, who was a Brussels garagiste. The latter raced sports cars in the late 40s and early 50s, so is probably too young to have been building specials in the early 30s.

There's also the mysterious Monsieur Moulin (French for windmill), who turns up in early 30s races in Bugattis. I wonder ....

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More evidence:

- it can't have been the Duray cars, because they were still in their original colours when they went back to the United States thirty years later! Hardly likely that Boucly and Marret drove them with "Packard Cable" signage...

- it can't have been (American) Millers at all, because Boucly and Marret weren't exactly field chasers, were they? As far as I can tell, they both had some decent results, and with potent cars like the Millers they should have dominated the class. I realise they never appear to have finished a race, but you don't find them in the reports either, and with a Miller they should have had no problems dealing with Bugattis, Maseratis or MGs, to say nothing of Amilcars and Salmsons!

This all adds up to a very odd story: the potential of the Miller wasn't really well known in Europe, and to an extent it isn't even today. Why would two French drivers go to the trouble of acquiring those cars (or even only the engines!), then modify them to run in a category they weren't built for, only to underachieve BIG time? Does not really compute!

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Richard, any clues as to how the story about the cars being American Millers originated? I know Venables described them as such, and Sheldon probably took it from there. Have you ever seen period sources for that?

[Vitesse]

Sadly, English reports of minor races in "faraway countries of which we know little" were usually very brief and concentrated on the British competitors - if there were any. I doubt they covered Nîmes at all and the other races would only have been noticed because of Howe's, Straight's and Hamilton's participation.

I do have the Santuccione/Smoglica book on Pescara - given the number of typos in names I think they probably used original sources (possibly even official entry lists) to compile the grids. But no clue there - they just seem to let them pass as "Millers" without further comment.

Another possibility might be an Amilcar engine. Again a guess, but there's half the name!

The most likely place to find anything would probably be a French report on the Nîmes race.

[Vitesse]

Michael - I asked on a French BB about these cars. Our old friend Jean-Maurice tells me that Boucly's car was actually the one in which René Cozette was killed at Montlhéry attempting a record on August 20th 1929. So it was actually a 2-stroke - originally built for Prince Ghika, who set several records with it. Calling it a Miller was just a way of trying to get more start money - presumably on the grounds that people in Europe might have heard of Millers but would have no idea what one looked like!

Marret tried the same trick, but J-M cannot remember what the car was: obviously not another Cozette though.

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Brilliant, Richard!