by Ray Bell » Tue Sep 22, 2015 9:08 am
James, the changes in suspensions in Elfin during this period were significant...
From the Catalina, WR275 and Mallala (admittedly before the 1964 cutoff), Garrie then went to the inboard coil/damper arrangements on the Mono combined with the swept back top wishbone of the early models.
The 400 was more conventional, much like Brabham practice, which is possibly due to the Matich influence.
The Mono was a bit of a jet on fast circuits, the small frontal area helped it at circuits like Calder and Sandown. Undoubtedly Garrie knew what he was doing when he changed the rear end. I don't know if there were changes to the front.
As an aside, there are tapered tubular extensions to the shocks on these cars made very economically from tubing manufactured for use in kitchen table legs. And as a further aside, time marching on some twenty-plus years, some of this was also used in the Bulant entry for the Shell Mileage Marathon at Amaroo Park.
Brian Rawlings had been an Elfin employee at the time of the Mono and knew of the tubing's origins. The boffin-types looking over the cars in the pits asked him where he got the tapered chrome moly tubing.
Casually, Brian would reply to these people, all high grade engineers from all over the world, "That's not chrome moly, mate!"
"What is it then?"
"That's Namco!" he'd tell them all to send them off scratching their heads.
Getting back to the subject at hand... I recall when I did the story about the 300 I was told that the suspension was pure Elfin 600... well, maybe minor changes because of the chassis shape. And as the 300 predated the 600 it shows that Garrie probably had the 600 on the drawing boards and upgraded his thoughts on the 300 when he finally put it into production.
The loveliest little Sports Racing Car of the modern era if you ask me...
James, the changes in suspensions in Elfin during this period were significant...
From the Catalina, WR275 and Mallala (admittedly before the 1964 cutoff), Garrie then went to the inboard coil/damper arrangements on the Mono combined with the swept back top wishbone of the early models.
The 400 was more conventional, much like Brabham practice, which is possibly due to the Matich influence.
The Mono was a bit of a jet on fast circuits, the small frontal area helped it at circuits like Calder and Sandown. Undoubtedly Garrie knew what he was doing when he changed the rear end. I don't know if there were changes to the front.
As an aside, there are tapered tubular extensions to the shocks on these cars made very economically from tubing manufactured for use in kitchen table legs. And as a further aside, time marching on some twenty-plus years, some of this was also used in the Bulant entry for the Shell Mileage Marathon at Amaroo Park.
Brian Rawlings had been an Elfin employee at the time of the Mono and knew of the tubing's origins. The boffin-types looking over the cars in the pits asked him where he got the tapered chrome moly tubing.
Casually, Brian would reply to these people, all high grade engineers from all over the world, "That's not chrome moly, mate!"
"What is it then?"
"That's Namco!" he'd tell them all to send them off scratching their heads.
Getting back to the subject at hand... I recall when I did the story about the 300 I was told that the suspension was pure Elfin 600... well, maybe minor changes because of the chassis shape. And as the 300 predated the 600 it shows that Garrie probably had the 600 on the drawing boards and upgraded his thoughts on the 300 when he finally put it into production.
The loveliest little Sports Racing Car of the modern era if you ask me...