bry3500 wrote:Initially entering Drag Racing, Maurice Rissman built and raced highly modified cars & bikes taking many victories and twice breaking national class records. His engineering creativity attracted interest from the circuit racing fraternity for whom he designed, built, and modified, several avant-garde sports-sedans, During 1978 the engineering freedoms afforded to this field of racing lead to the design and construction of what was arguably Australia’s first full space-framed racing sedan, based upon a 1979 Ford Falcon.
Maurice built the Alfa for Peter Cross
"it had full tunnels fluted into the underside and running rearward from a high pressure area under the front axle. I tried a few variations of sliding skirts but the rough surface of Lakeside, combined with inferior dampening of poor quality shocks made it impossible to maximise the potential. In the end we settled for heavy poly carbonate sacrificial strips under each side. It was a fabulous little car and out performed a lot of it's bigger competition, but suffered up high. The small block Windsor just can't breathe enough to satisfy the high rev nature of the bore & stroke. That's why Ford developed the Boss cylinder heads on the later variation of the same engine we developed way back then."
It did several races at Surfers & Lakeside and also Mt Cotton hillclimb . The fate and current whereabouts unknown
The workmanship on that car is amazing! Are any of the subsequent owners known Bry?
Steve Holmes wrote:Can he remember who raced it after he sold it Bry?
Maurice never raced it..he built the car for Peter Cross,,the blue stickers on the front of the car read...Peter Cross forward detailer.. Maurice has a fine pedigree of building cars which includes Group C Touring Cars -( John English Ford XD Falcon), Group A Touring Cars with Mitsubishi Motors Japan, Sports Prototypes - working for the Rothmans Porsche Team. He also worked in Japan involved with Toyota’s Group A Corolla and has done a lot of work with open- wheelers.
I met John English on the weekend. Neat guy, and still a bloody good peddler. He was telling me about his two Group C Falcons. He said one was built from the Dick Johnson 'rock' shell, the second was the Moffat Federation Insurance car. I assume Maurice built up the Johnson shell for English?
No clues yet about Peter Cross..I'm on to it ..I'll ask Maurice about the Johnson shell. His description is " the infamous ‘wall-eating’ John English/Paul Gulson Pye Audio Ford XD Falcon"
The car (JXC806D in Leyland Spec) started as a new 3500 Auto shell in 1970 and was put together at Abingdon BL Competitions Department , painted Leyland blue and white, and fitted with a Traco Olds engine out of another Works car (JXC808D).
The car raced at Nurburgring, before Jim Smith went to England and bought the car with financial assistance from BL Australia subsidiary.
His purchase included both Rover V8 factory racing engines.
In 1972 Smith got sponsorship from Shell and Camel Filter Cigarettes and the P6 was painted yellow with a 550 bhp 5 litre Repco Formula 5000 unit .
Smith sold the car to the Jarrett brothers who sold it in 1976 to David Craig and changed from yellow to blue. The Rover was severely damaged in a garage fire,
In December 1984 it was sold through Auto Action magazine to a Sydney enthusiast, but there the trail goes quiet..
As seen on another forum,,"A request from the current owner of this car - if anyone knows the whereabouts of the CAMS log books could they please get in touch through the webmaster. It is a possibility that the Camel spec log book was lost in a fire where the car was housed, but the log book for the Traco engined Leyland Australia spec is also missing.
bry3500 wrote:No clues yet about Peter Cross..I'm on to it ..I'll ask Maurice about the Johnson shell. His description is " the infamous ‘wall-eating’ John English/Paul Gulson Pye Audio Ford XD Falcon"
So are we talking about the real version of this car which was at the Lakeside 50th meeting.
A car I've long been interested in as much for its mystique than anything was Warwick Hendersons Corvette. The car raced in the 1982 Australian GT/Sports Sedan Championship, although it only made a couple of appearances and wasn't near the pace of Alan Jones' Porsche 935 or Peter Brocks Monza etc, but the car itself is still quite interesting. Maybe Rowan knows more about it? The 1982 Australian Motor Racing Annual suggests the Corvette was ex-IMSA, but this pic shows it was rhd. I got this from the Corvettes of Geelong website: http://www.corvettesofgeelong.com/desktop_calendar_2006.html
Looking through a copy of the 1982 Australian Motor Racing Yearbook, Henderson's corvette only competed at the Calder round of the 1982 GT Championship, and after a troubled qualifying, was last on the grid and recorded a DNF in heat one when an oil line came adrift, and retired in heat two in a cloud of smoke.
Checking through Natsoft results, Warwick Henderson turned up at the 2002 Historic Sandown meeting, again driving a Corvette (what else) but had another troubled meeting. After that, who knows?
Steve Holmes wrote:A car I've long been interested in as much for its mystique than anything was Warwick Hendersons Corvette. The car raced in the 1982 Australian GT/Sports Sedan Championship, although it only made a couple of appearances and wasn't near the pace of Alan Jones' Porsche 935 or Peter Brocks Monza etc, but the car itself is still quite interesting. Maybe Rowan knows more about it? The 1982 Australian Motor Racing Annual suggests the Corvette was ex-IMSA, but this pic shows it was rhd. I got this from the Corvettes of Geelong website: http://www.corvettesofgeelong.com/desktop_calendar_2006.html
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My memory is that Warwick built the Corvette here (Geelong) and used a set of Greenwood panels from the US. A give-away is RHD.
Thanks guys. Yeah I figured it was probably Aussie built. The rhd and wheels are the tell-tale signs. Still an interesting car, although in 1982, even Peter Brock driving Bob Janes immense Chevy Monza still wasn't a match for Allan Jones' 935. So what hope did the rest of those guys have. I think Jones won every single race that season.
Whatever happened to the Peter Finch/Gordon Stephenson HQ Monaro sports sedan that raced in the early 80s? was a nice looking car. Spent some time in WA.
Did Warick ever race the Corvette in the US as suggested in this old copy ( nov 1981 ) Corvette club newsletter? Also would anyone have some photos of it in it,s origianl configuration?
The 'Camels Hump' Rover!!!.....Chris Farrell was the 'Alloy/Hammer-n-Dolly' guru (Moffat/Beechey/Jane and about every early Alloy Dragsters body of the time) had me assisting him this particular Friday on the Camel 'Hump' making some mods for the Saturday/Sunday Calder 'Sports Sedan' meeting, remember these where the days of no Thurs/Friday 'Pre' ,practise, just show up Saturday and qualify of the trailer
....so it's like 11.clock at night, pick up is around 7oclock in the morn.,we hav'nt eaten as we had no money,job completed/ done ,(we will probably get payed in 30 days)clearing a path for the 'Hump' for loading on trailer when Chris steps over the Oxy line that is swinging in an arch from the tall 5ft bottle to the work bench, boot tounge catch's the Oxy line....Craaasssssh.....Boof!!!.....Wham,turns the boot lid inside out!!! ....f;: #%^*+¥€^%#}|][<£^%><ck......7 o'clock pick-up Chris had waved his Magic Wand ,I had waved the spray gun...Presto!!!!!.....WHAT DAMAGE!!! .....still hadn't eaten .........regards thunder427/MJ ..........the Rover got very serverly 'rear-ended' at Calder when it wasin it's 'Blue' livery........I didnt hear about the fire!
Steve Holmes wrote:A car I've long been interested in as much for its mystique than anything was Warwick Hendersons Corvette. The car raced in the 1982 Australian GT/Sports Sedan Championship, although it only made a couple of appearances and wasn't near the pace of Alan Jones' Porsche 935 or Peter Brocks Monza etc, but the car itself is still quite interesting. Maybe Rowan knows more about it? The 1982 Australian Motor Racing Annual suggests the Corvette was ex-IMSA, but this pic shows it was rhd. I got this from the Corvettes of Geelong website: http://www.corvettesofgeelong.com/desktop_calendar_2006.html. [ATTACH=CONFIG]5722[/ATTACH]
..........Steve, Warwick Henderson was the last of the, 'cause I can', thinking Generation,when I was building the Bob Jane Camaro I rang Warwick regarding his thoughts on Big Block /Exhaust /systems,his advise which I adhered to 100% was to only use USA/Hedman Headers,he went on to subjest the the Gen2 Camaro BB/ headers would be a better fit, they would flow better And I would have to modify two pipes on the right side as they would be to close to the firewall.....got to tell you he was absolutely spot on, Warwick knew his craft well, the sad part was by the time I got to perfect his instructions Warwick had the calling to the big race track in the sky.......thank you and RIP Warwick Henderson, racers racer and Gentleman........with regard thunder427/MJ
mid-year wrote:Did Warick ever race the Corvette in the US as suggested in this old copy ( nov 1981 ) Corvette club newsletter? Also would anyone have some photos of it in it,s origianl configuration?[ATTACH=CONFIG]7026[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]7027[/ATTACH]
Well thats interesting! I wonder if this ever happened?
thunder427 wrote:..........Steve, Warwick Henderson was the last of the, 'cause I can', thinking Generation,when I was building the Bob Jane Camaro I rang Warwick regarding his thoughts on Big Block /Exhaust /systems,his advise which I adhered to 100% was to only use USA/Hedman Headers,he went on to subjest the the Gen2 Camaro BB/ headers would be a better fit, they would flow better And I would have to modify two pipes on the right side as they would be to close to the firewall.....got to tell you he was absolutely spot on, Warwick knew his craft well, the sad part was by the time I got to perfect his instructions Warwick had the calling to the big race track in the sky.......thank you and RIP Warwick Henderson, racers racer and Gentleman........with regard thunder427/MJ
Thanks Myles, he obviously new his stuff. Whatever happened to the Corvette?
..I'll ask Maurice about the Johnson shell. His description is " the infamous ‘wall-eating’ John English/Paul Gulson Pye Audio Ford XD Falcon"
