Britain's "remarkable automotive cottage industry"

[snakeeyes]

There seems to be some perception today that, when it comes to the GT40, everyone but Shelby American--Kar Kraft, FAV, Holman-Moody--was incompetent. I personally remain in awe of Phil Remington and his contemporaries at Shelby, but let's not forget that it generally takes two or more years to work the bugs out of an endurance racer. The examples are endless--the Porsche 917, the Matras of the early Seventies, the Audi R8, and yes, even the GT40, which started to enjoy some success in 1965 but didn't have it's "Le Mans shoes" on until 1966. I once asked Rem about people referring to Kar Kraft as "Kiddie Kar," and he responded that they did some damned good work, and that he respected them.

As far as FAV, I don't know how much of the car's early failures can be blamed on FAV's "faults", as opposed to simply being the growth pains of a new design. I have read, like many of us "historians" here, that the car lost something like 50 horsepower due to the internal ducting. The gearbox problems are well-documented. The replacing of the wire wheels with magnesium ones is likewise well-known, but I can't think of any race-related failures attributable to them. Ford wanted a winner, yesterday, but I think it probably would have been difficult for anyone, Shelby or otherwise, to produce one "out of the box." Shelby did have the advantage of receiving cars that had already been run, and broken, in competition. They then took the cars to Riverside and ran the "whee" out of them, addressing concerns as they arose, which was something Rem and crew excelled at.

Cal, we'll have to talk to Phil some more about the involvement of some of the other entities in the '40's development.

Coincidentally, before his death, another Shelby legend, Carroll Smith, was working with Pete Lyons and Earl Teske on a book about the development of the GT40. Publication was postponed by Smith's unfortunate passing last year. I saw Pete Lyons at Monterey last August and he told me he was sorting through an enormous amount of fascinating information Smith had provided him, and hoped to get the book out by the end of 2003. Obviously that hasn't happened, but I noted a couple of weeks ago that Amazon.com has the book available for pre-order, with a publication date of April listed. I have e-mailed Pete Lyons to see how accurate that date is, but haven't heard back from him yet.

Bob