Lyncar

[allenbrown]

Steve

Actuallly, I was quoting from the copy you kindly let me have some time ago for OldRacingCars.com. At some point, I need to resynchonise with you as it looks like you've been making spectacular progress.

Allen

[Steve Wilkinson]

Originally Posted by allenbrown

Steve

Actuallly, I was quoting from the copy you kindly let me have some time ago for OldRacingCars.com. At some point, I need to resynchonise with you as it looks like you've been making spectacular progress.

Allen

The progress made since April has been limited. Once the racing season starts I tend to drop the research projects! However by mid October I'll be back on the trail.

[Steve Wilkinson]

Martin Slater in the Lyncar 003 at Prescott in 1974

[John Turner]

Nick Overall's Lyncar 001 at HSCC meeting, Donington pit garage, 2 April, 2006

[Alan Brown]

Gurston Down May 1986 and Brighton Speed Trials Sept 1987
Ken Ayres Lyncar MS84 Cosworth 3993
Chassis number on each occasion recorded as LA78 011

PS I have a reference to Roger Orgee in a Lyncar 79A 011 with a 1975cc BDX in 1985.

[allenbrown]

Fascinating! Two cars wearing 011 at the same time?

Allen

[allenbrown]

Originally Posted by Chris Townsend

Early Lyncar history is given in a feature in Autosport 6.12.73 pp. 34-35
and runs like this

001. Appeared Racing Car Show, used by Mike Endean in 1972 F.Atlantic with a t/c engine and latterly in libre with an FVC. Think Endean still had this car in 1975. Then
to Broster.

002 John Nicholson 1972 Atlantic, badly damaged at BOAC meeting in April
and scrapped after one more race.

003 Nicholson, replacement car in 1972, retained 1973 until replaced by 005
Used by Dave Oxton at Atlantic support race for British GP

004 Hillclimb car 1973 for David Good

005 1973 Atlantic car for Nicholson built mid season. Retained 1974. To Phil Sharp
for 1975 British Atlantic. To Kevin Bowditch for Indyatlantic 1976 but may not
have appeared; seems to be sold to Frank Potts for Northern libre races later
in season
...
Chris

A slight hiccup. Potts wins a poorly-supported libre at Oulton on 11 Jul 1976 but Bowditch still has 005 in 1977. Bowditch had entered his car in a couple of G8 races early in 1976 and finally appears puts in an appearance at Mallory in July 1977.

Potts' car is called "ex-Nicholson" which narrows it down to 002, 003 and 005. If it's not 002 or 005, that leaves 003. Martin Steele has 003 for Sprints in 1975 I believe - does he retain it in 1976?

Allen

[tony griffiths]

Why not ask Martin SLater?

[Steve Wilkinson]

Originally Posted by allenbrown

A slight hiccup. Potts wins a poorly-supported libre at Oulton on 11 Jul 1976 but Bowditch still has 005 in 1977. Bowditch had entered his car in a couple of G8 races early in 1976 and finally appears puts in an appearance at Mallory in July 1977.

Potts' car is called "ex-Nicholson" which narrows it down to 002, 003 and 005. If it's not 002 or 005, that leaves 003. Martin Steele has 003 for Sprints in 1975 I believe - does he retain it in 1976?

Allen

Martin Steele was still using the 003 Lyncar in 1976 as I saw him in the car at Prescott that year. In fact he was running the car in 1974 as well!

[allenbrown]

I'm not sure if Drifty was planning to post this but I'll do it for him. He has been corresponding with Roger Orgee who has confirmed that he bought his Lyncar in 1983 from Keith Corridon, who we have established ran a Lyncar '79A' in libre, hillclimbs and sprints in 1981 and 1982. It was bought in bits, having been reversed into the armco somewhere. Roger fitted a F2 BDX and won the BRSCC Open series 2-litre class in 1984 or 1985. He sold it to a dealer in Trowbridge where it stayed for some time. Roger saw it once again at Brighton where it was "looking 'orrible without its pods".

So Orgee's Lyncar 79A 011 with 1975cc BDX that Alan Brown observed in 1985 was the Corridan car which Dan believes was previously the de Villota car.

However, that still leaves the puzzle of the 'LA78 011' plate on the Ayres Lyncar 79S. This thread started with Steve trying to trace the history of LA78-011. Can Steve tell us more about where it is today and whether it looks like the 79S or the 79A?

(edit: Just a thought - is it possible Alan transcribed the Orgee car's plate wrong and it should be 010?)

Allen

[Chris Townsend]

Ecurie Canada tested an Atlantic spec Lyncar in autumn 1978 and Price Cobb practised it at Trois Rivieres that year.
Is this the basis of the Howard Wood car in NZ series in early 1979 and
then the Villota car of 1979 [described at the time as a new car] is a separate entity? From somewhere, and I apologise for my poor notetaking, I've got the Wood car as 010

Chris

[Howard Wood]

LA 011 was essentially a new car to the same design as 010, using what parts (very few) had been recovered from 010. It was sent to Canada and the US on a sales mission with car owner John Anderson, paid for by the factory. Although tested by many of the front running teams there were no takers as the car was unable to match the times being set by other marques.
The car was shipped to NZ for the Jan 1979 series and returned to UK afterwards and Lyncar ownership.
Villotta had been running his private European F1 efforts out of a corner of the Lyncar factory in Slough so was a logical (and well funded) driver for Martin Slater to have drive the car in the UK.

[allenbrown]

OK, I'm now confused.

We have 009 as Howard's Jan 1978 car and 010 as his Jan 1979 car. But we have 011 as the Corridon/Orgee car and also 011 as the 1984 Ayers/Edwards car. Something's not right here.

Alan - could you double-check your chassis number id for Orgee in 1985 please? Is it definitely 011? Any chance it's 010?

Howard - when you say 011 was built from the remains of 010, is it possible that you mean that 010 was built from the remains of 009? Or even that 009 was built from the remains of 008? Or do you just mean that the 1979 car was built from the remains of the 1978 car and that the actual numbers are lost in the mists of time?

Thanks gentlemen

Allen

[Howard Wood]

Allen

Yes I mean the first car we built in 1977, crashed in NZ Dec 1977/ Jan 1978 was then rebuilt into the second car which then went to Canada/ US then to NZ for the Jan 1979 series.

I would go with David McKinney's records regarding the chassis numbers as we kept no records as at the time these were of no importance to us except for customs records.David was there assiduously recording those details for posterity. Martin Slater may well have some records also.

Same with March 742-U1, as I discussed previously,I can only tell you the previous history of the car as we understood it.The details regarding the modifications and changes we made to the car during our ownership are the only things I can be certain about.

Howard.

[Howard Wood]

So there is no confusion here, the first of these two (1.75?) cars was a completely new car and design. It was not designed by Martin Slater unlike the previous cars but I cannot for the life of me remember the guy's name.

The tub was very narrow with a single fuel cell between driver and engine, fabricated rocker front suspension, unique castings for bulkheads front and rear, suspension uprights front and rear all done to make the car in production form.

From our point of view, (apart from a slight design/ manufacturing fault in the front wheels which caused the front tyres to detach nearly killing me) although beautifully detailed, the design did not allow "on the fly" changes, particularly between races in far away NZ. There was a major issue with turn in particularly in slow corners, due to a very narrow front track and front suspension geometry but with pick up points machined into the castings and front rockers formed over a buck change was impossible. In other words the car was built as a production ready car rather than as a development mule.

[allenbrown]

Thanks Howard

I found a picture of the car in Autosport yesterday showing it on "its British debut" with Villota aboard. That was a pretty clear indication that it raced somewhere other than Britain so it must be your New Zealand car.

In Mike Kettlewell's 1979 Motor Racing Directory it says that chassis 008 has been built for Atlantic in 1978 as the first of the new series and its 1979 model is described as "009 onwards (Formula Atlantic)". It also talks about the prototype being written off in New Zealand which all points to 008 being the car written off and 009 being the 1979 replacement. I add this merely to confuse us further

Did you see the picture of Musetti's car on the Formula Atlantic 1975 thread on TNF? It's at the bottom of the third batch of pictures.

[Dan Rear]

Allen, this is getting interesting ! Are we now thinking there were 4 separate 'second generation' Lyncar Atlantics?? 008-011, built between 1978-79, 3 of which were written off, and one surviving at least 'til 1985 with Orgee, and variously racing/testing in Canada, NZ, Britain.

Where does this leave the Ayers car, apparently 011 too. Perhaps it was built around one of the earlier, previously discarded FA tubs ?

[allenbrown]

I'm trying not to hypothesise but something doesn't add up as we have the numbers 008, 009, 010 and 011 and apparantly only three cars.

Maybe the Corridan/Orgee car is a different car to Villota's car - we don't have any evidence to say it's the same do we? I am hoping Alan will come back and say Orgee's car was 010, not 011, because that will make more sense of the plate on Ayers' car. I agree that it's possible Ayers' car was built on an old leftover FA tub.

It's also possible that when Slater was stamping the plate for Ayers' car in 1984 he couldn't remember where he'd got to with his 1978/79 numbering and accidentally used 011 twice.

Or ... just to show how many possibilities there are, maybe 008 was the 1978 car, 009 was the Villota/Corridon/Orgee car, 010 was the MS83 sports car and 011 was the MS84 Ayers car? So much hinges on Alan's reference to Orgee's car as 010.

Anyone have contact details for Martin Slater? He can't be expected to know how the cars changed hands after he sold them but he could well be able to clear up the numbering.

[driftwood]

Guys below is the email from Roger Orgee regarding his cars and i have set him some questions so u dont have to ask them!

Here goes,memory may have faded,it's not me racing now but my son,Roger jnr in F BMW!
MARCH 742.
bought this off Jonathan Buncombe (who bought roller off Geoff Friswell) JB fitted an FVD motor and I raced it at one Silverstone libre race and intended to do F2 Aurora with it.
Saw sense at the last minute and fitted a Richardson Atlantic motor and entered Hitachi Atlantic in 1979.
As car was a real 742 it's running gear was too heavy for Atlantic so I bought a load of 772p lightweight bits off Kim Mather and got it down to a competitive weight and 772p spec.
Sold it up north as a roller at the end of 79. do u recall who to?
ATLANTIC racer male white straight!! -The 772p suffix was to add value!
so u added on a dummy 772P plate or infered car was in 772P trim INFERRED
(See here:- http://tentenths.com/forum/showthrea...=82121&page=11 - JT)

MARCH 782/79B
bought a 782 off Paul Smith (of BMTR ) Paul built this from spare parts he had in stock so God knows what the plate was!
aha this is going to be fun Smiffy said he had the rad dougal car and a pile of parts
1 car was built and sent to ZA to bernard tilanus the other is in maidstone went sprinting both cars have 782 #?? tag on them both claim to be the REAL dougall car !!
The car was then converted to 79B spec,mainly ground effect pods etc off Andy Barton. Ran in 1980 Hitachi Atlantic best place third at Thruxton.Binned it big time at Oulton park,new tub provided by Andy Barton.
Sold complete car to another chap from the frozen north (Huddersfield?) at the request of the bank manager!
Bill woodl/willy wood by any chance??
(See here:- http://tentenths.com/forum/showthrea...=87591&page=12 - JT)

LYNCAR BDX
bought this in 83 of Keith Corridon in bits.I think it became a kit of parts backwards against the armco somewhere as the casing was bust. It was originally Atlantic spec (Villota?) but Martin Slater of Lyncar (Lyn and Carol) wondered how the name came!! had fitted full ground effect side pods and exhaust system. no idea of chassis no though.
fitted full F2 Spec BDX complete with John Dunn megaphone system,and won BRSCC open series 2 litre class in 1984 or was it 85? brilliant little car,we never changed anything.Had it rebuilt at Slough where I did most of the work as Martin was building the six wheeled armoured vehicle used in Aliens 2!
Sold the roller to a dealer in Trowbridge,where it stayed for ages, and the engine to the USA (first time I ever made a profit from a racecar).
Last heard of at Brighton speed trials looking 'orrible without its pods!

Next car was the ex Danner F3000 March 86B,any questions?
u mean 85B that he won the euro F3000 c/ship! yes,WON BRITISH OPEN in 1987,ran it in 88 and sold it less dfv and bought 88d reynard f3000.
that car had v6 GA in it to go sprinting now less engine
Thought it was written off at sprint meeting as GA and polar moments didnt mix! sold it at end of 88 less DFV



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Howard Wood]

I would be most suprised if Martin Slater had built any more cars to that design as he was rather stuck with one already and it had hardly covered itself in glory! Was one of the later "Lyncar" cars a modified March?

Over in the March 722-762 forum there is a post with Q & A from Roger Orgee in which ground effect side pods are mentioned on his Lyncar.
Between Wigram and Teretonga Jan 1979 which were on consecutive weekends we made up some ground effect side pods from Autosport photos of a Lotus 78 which amazingly did improve the car a little.

When the car returned to Lyncar it would have made sense for Martin to have developed and improved on our hurried efforts including re routing the exhaust etc.

[Chris Townsend]

29.4.79 Brands, Villota's car said to be the one run recently in NZ MN 3.5.79 p. 31
DNA 29.7
DNA 15.7
No other entries… only Ingliston missing from programmes for that year.
Then Don Halliday later in year
8.9 Retired
27.8 8th

Allen
Potts car described specifically as 005 MN 15.7.76 p. 7, at Oulton FL. So borrowed from Bowditch?

Chris

[Alan Brown]

I have dug out my programme for Brands Hatch 28 July 1985 and in the list of entries for the LEP Group Formule Libre Championship Race I wrote 011 against the Lyncar 79A BDX of Roger Orgee. Incidentally he was fourth behind Alo Lawler M30, Tony Trimmer T330 (HU6) and John Brindley 821.

Alan Brown

[allenbrown]

Thanks for double-checking that number, Alan. Much appreciated.

So we have a real puzzle with these 008-009-010-011 cars.

008 The written-off 1978 prototype, according to Kettlewell. Presumably the write off in NZ 1978.
009 The 1979 'FA79' for Howard, Villota and Halliday (thanks Chris). But then where? Or was this the car written off in NZ?
010 Unknown. Or was this the Wood-Villota-Halliday car?
011(i) Unknown at first but later the Corridon - Orgee '79A'. Maybe originally the Wood-Villota-Halliday car. Also now missing.
011(ii) The Ken Ayers MS84 carrying plate 'LA78 011'. Still sprinting.

What a mess!

I guess we now need Martin Slater. Anyone know where to contact him?

[Chris Townsend]

Roger Orgee in the ex de Villota/Halliday/Corridon Atlantic based car
AS 8.1.87 p.54 review of libre races in 86 season.

I think there is only one car from NZ 79 to Orgee.

Chris

[allenbrown]

Excellent! So does that mean we can allocate the number 011 to the 1979 Villota car? Further still, does that mean we can allocate the number 011 to the car Howard drove in Jan 1979? Or are we still looking at some discontinuity somewhere along the line?