Listers (but not of the red dwarf kind, the poms will understand)
>1. The segment on spitfires showed works race cars which had a
>"hatchback" like appearance.
Somebody will probably beat me to the punch, but here goes (problem with a
massive time difference)!.
The works Spitfires used at Le Mans used a fibreglass hardtop, which was
produced from a mould taken from the first prototypes of the GT6, so in fact
the GT6 begat the works Spitfire looks, not the other way around (this was
already reported by someone earlier). The cars retained the panel behind the
seats (between the cockpit and the boot lid), with no bootlid being used.
These hardtops mimic the GT6 in coming down to the top of the rear valance.
A small bootlid/hatch was used in some of the cars (especially the rally
versions) to allow access the the boot area from outside the car. A large
"monza" type of fuel filter was fitted to the side of the hardtop, directly
behind the driver (rhs). Other body mods included the rampant use of
aluminium, the fairing in of the headlights, and a much reduced grill
opening at least (ie that's what you can see from the published photo's I've
seen)
The hardtops in the URL supplied by Joe Curry are "Ashley" hardtops, and
have the cut off rear, and a larger bootlid, they were a period after market
accessory. In fact the blue car is written up in the latest Triumph World.
As an aside, the factory were also developing a works GT6 entery for Le Mans
when the competition department was scaled (or shut) down. This was the
GT6R, there are a couple of pictures of the engine compartment, complete
with triple webers, in Graham Robsons "the Works Triumphs".This car would
have been quite radically different to the road cars it can be assumed
(after all the 'works' Spitfires had aluminium shells, 8 port 1147 engines,
a radically different aerodynamic shape etc, etc)
As another aside, a company from Scotland (Chic Doig is how they spell it I
think) had a part completed Le Mans Spitfire replica at the TSSC
International Meeting last year (and yes I did want to hide it in my
backpack and take it home with me).
Time to get off the soap box,
Bill and Sal Birney
'70 GT6+ (RHD)
'67 Spitfire MkII (Sal's)
birneybs@onaustralia.com.au
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