Founded in the year nineteen twenty-four February 1980

locked by a huge steamroller and its equally huge
trailer, full of road metal, drawn up alongside it. Dick
tried to get the car up on the left-hand verge but it was
too high. Had he succeeded I think we might have tipped
over because we were travelling sideways. Meantime the
very quick-witted roller driver put his engine into reverse
and was actually moving backwards when we struck the
front roller. There was remarkably little damage done
and we were-able to limp into Maidenhead for repairs.
The second occasion was when we took the car
for test over some of the worst roads and hills in North
Wales and, at that time, they really were bad. There was
a sharpish bend in the narrow road somewhere near the
top of Dinas Mawddy and Dick misjudged it a little. We
ended up with the car overhanging a fearsome slope to
the valley below. Fortunately the rear wheels were still on
relatively solid ground and by jacking-up the front end,
Dick driving and me pushing, we eventually got it back
on to the road in a series of spasmodic jerks. All this took
about two hours and not a single soul or vehicle passed
by. We were both shaken, not only from fright but at the
thought of No. 5 lying a heap of wreckage down below.
So we returned to the works in a very decorous fashion.
Three Minervas fitted with double-sleeve-valve
engines were entered for the race. The pistons and sleeves
perforce had to be given large clearances and as a result
their consumption of lubricating oil was phenomenal. It
was necessary to effect a seal and to cool the sleeves. The
ultimate result was that when the throttle was closed oil
spewed into a red hot exhaust manifold which disgorged
a cloud of dense smoke. Any driver who happened to be
sitting on their tail when this happened was completely
blinded. A protest was made about this smoke emission
but was not upheld so one just kept back if one knew there
was a bad corner ahead. In this connection, an amusing
story was going the rounds of Bianchi who was driving
a Crossley. Apparently he was late arriving on the island
and, when he set off at 5.00 a.m. the next morning for his
first practice lap, no one had told him about the Minervas
and their smoke. He was unfortunate enough to find
himself close behind one of them at the end of the Sulby
straight where there is a sharp turn to the right over
the bridge. The usual thing happened and Bianchi was
enveloped in a thick cloud. He trod on every¬thing, the
car spun, and when he came to rest and could sec, found
himself in the middle of the bridge without touching a
thing but facing in the reverse direction. That evening
in a Douglas hostelry he was explaining to the company
around what had happened and that things were more
difficult for him because he did not know the course
at all, when some wag piped in, “And you are never
likely to know it either if you keep on going round it
backwards”. What befell the two Star entries in this 1914
TT was described in last month’s “Star Story”.
On Brooklands, during practice, the Humber TT
cars at full speed emitted a very high pitched whistle
which was caused by something in the radiator design.
If we were at Brooklands for a few days we used to stay
at the Heath Club,a place owned by Locke-King and run
by a Manageress, She was the one who always made
Hornstead pay his bill before going for a track record!
I have tried to trace what happened to this club
because there were many photographs there and some
very famous people used it. As a club it probably came
to an end during the first war. Travelling up to town last
December 1 got into conversation with a young lady who
said she came from Weybridge and asked if she knew
anything about the Heath Club. Not surprisingly she
said she had never heard of it but would enquire. She
informed me about a week later that she thought what
used to be the old club was now a bridge club and was
situated near the present Technical College on what used
to be part of the Locke-King Estate.
Percy Lambert, who covered the first one hundred
miles in the hour on a Talbot, was using the track a lot. His
works mechanic was a man called Day, an amiable chap
who did not mind you examining the Talbot in detail.
There used to be a block of lock-up garages near the Club
and Talbot and Star occupied adjacent compartments at
one time. Speaking of Lambert, Dick Lisle was the first
man to reach him when his car overturned and killed
him on the home banking behind the Members” Hill. The
rear tyres burst and the rear end of the car spun up the
banking and then somersaulted coming to rest upright
on its wheels at the bottom of the banking. Lambert was
lying dead half-way up. Dick said that if he had been in
his correct position on the banking the tragedy would
not have occurred. As you know, a lap counts as 2.75
miles whether you stick to the middle, the outer edge,
or the inside. Lambert seemed to be deliberately holding
the car down on the bankings and when the tyres lost
adhesion centrifugal force took over.
War broke out a month or so after the TT race. 1
went into the Army in August and that was the end
of my contact with racing cars for a good many years.
Nobby Clark’s attempt to stick a direct-drive 200 h.p. V8
Hispano aero-engine into his Crossley Tender chassis
had not really progressed very far before I was posted to
India at the beginning of 1921. The engine was purchased
from the Royal Aircraft Factory — now the RAE — for a
few pounds. I remember some chap coming along with a
secondhand Benz scroll-sprung clutch which was being
adapted. I would very much like to know the final fate of
this project. During the war the factory did much of their
engine development using single cylinders made out of
shell cases. Many cooling problems were worked out
this way. The full-sized engines were tested by rigging
them up on one end of a 60 ft. girder pivoted at its centre
and counterbalanced the other end. They were fitted
with their normal propellers and controlled from the
central pedestal. The engines could be opened up at full
power and the speed of rotation of the girder controlled
by a braking arrangement on the pedestal. Sir Dugald
Clerk’s brother was working at the RAE at that time on
“flameless” combustion. I had many interesting talks
with him but the relevance of “flameless” combustion to
engine design has been forgotten.
WALLACE MARSH.
RALLY REVIEW
17