The Roaring Season

The picture below was taken by a friend of mine and it’s the only worthwhile photo I have to put on here from its NZ history.



This is my very very long term project. I’ve owned it now for about 6 years but the shell is still the same as when I bought it. In that time I’ve done loads of research and accumulated most parts I need apart from an engine but haven’t found out very much about its NZ racing history at all.

This when the panel work was started before I bought it.



The History from the beginning.

SPU 254K (its English registration number) was built as a group 2 race car at Fords Boreham facility in 1972 with a Gomm built shell alongside two other identically spec’d cars. It was originally raced by Danish driver Erik Hoyer between 1972 and 1974 in Denmark and Europe in various touring car events and championships and powered with two different capacity engines depending on the year or series. In 1972 it raced with an 1800 BDE and 1973 with a 1300 BDH both with Lucas fuel injection.

!972


1973


As well as competing in Denmark and other European events it ran in some English RAC championship races in 1973 as one of the unofficial RS1300 cars when the rules were changed for the year to allow manufacturers to run alternatively homologated heads. Of course with 190HP the 1300 Escorts decimated the opposition. Short lived though as the rules changed again for 74 and outlawed them.

The rear suspension is what sets this apart from most other Escorts of the day. It has Len Bailey designed torsion bar rear suspension using Morris Minor torsion bars and dummy plastic leaf springs for homologation purpose only. There were two or three other Escorts of the day apart from the two sister cars running torsion bars but all were different designs. Most notable of these being Frank Gardner’s XOO 349F. I've had a look at that car and it is quite different. The torsion bars are probably Morris Minor but that is where the similarity ends really.

When the car was returned to Ford in 1975 it was prepared as a tarmac rally car for Roger Clark to drive in the 1975 Circuit of Ireland Rally with a 2 litre BDG engine still with Lucas fuel injection. I believe he was supposed to drive a new Mk2 RS1800 for the first time but the car wasn’t ready and his normal car OOO 96M was already committed to Billy Coleman so SPU was prepared. Unfortunately it had a DNF on the first day. That was its only foray into the world of rallying. I’m pretty sure it’s probably the only works Escort that was both a race and rally car. Ford was recorded as the entrant on any of the race results I've managed to find and it always remained owned by Ford until it was exported to New Zealand.











In either late 1975 or early 1976 Dick Sellens who was a customs agent and cleared all the competition vehicles for MANZ, brought it for its circuit racing pedigree as the Danish championship winning car, organised the import and campaigned it in various events of which as I said I have little knowledge. It was dogged with reliability problems and after torquing the head and fitting the belt a tooth out resulting in bent valves, it was parked it up. Dick eventually sold the car to Warren Steel in Taupo but I have no history on Warrens ownership apart from I believe he sold it eventually in bits. It disappeared for round 10 years and was found by Rayden Smith while looking for the Carney Racing /Jim Richard Willment Twin Cam which of course he still owns. Unfortunately during the 10 years it had been used as a gravel rally car with the floor taking a bit of a beating but it had never been in any sort of serious off or roll so was in reasonable condition otherwise and virtually rust free. I think all the panels at that stage were original apart from the front panel. Most importantly it still had both factory Chassis Plates attached. The torsions bars were however gone with the brackets partially removed. It had standard running gear fitted and had been crudely converted to right hand drive.

When I first saw SPU 254K in the late 90’s at Rayden Smiths a deal had already been struck to buy it so I missed out.





A few years passed by and the guy who bought it offered it to me with the body restoration started but a long way from being completed. I initially said no when he told me the price but a month or so later it was in my garage. I now have it hanging from the rafters at my business out of harm’s way for the time being while I’m working on another project. I’ve been actively researching and obtaining most of the parts I need but haven’t gone any further with the bodywork. Unfortunately when you find something you need for an ex-works Escort on Ebay it has an extra couple of zeros on the price so it’s been an expensive exercise to date but I’m going to great lengths to make it period correct. My research on it has included a trip to Finland in Dec 2007 to have a look at the remaining sister car. The shots below show the rear suspension better.







A long long long way to go before it looks anything like the old photos again!!! If anyone has any photos or info they want to share about it, that would be great. I have always wondered if it ran the plastic leaf springs in NZ.

Photo credits

Brent Hills Tauranga for the AWA shot.

John Straer in Denmark for the circuit shots.

Martin Holmes UK for the static shots at Boreham

Ford Photographic Archive UK for the colour Circuit of Ireland shots in the snow.

Esler Crawford Ireland for the colour shot in the air.

The magic of the internet.

I’ve had some very poor photos of the pages of a Danish magazine article about SPU in 1972 for quite a few years and a year or so ago managed to get hold of an actual copy. It had the name of the photographer on the first page who took the pictures in the article and a simple Google search had me in contact with him in Denmark within 24hours! He no longer had the negatives of the photos in the mag and the mag had long disappeared but to cut a long story short we negotiated a price and he sent me 121 scanned images of some original negatives he took during the 1972 & 73 seasons at a couple of Denmark circuits, all in high resolution B&W. Bonus score with them included some scans of race programs with the grids and some Castrol adverts of the time featuring the car! And again due to the magic of Google I’ve translated the original magazine article into quite intelligible English!

Wow, Chris, I'm gobsmacked by the rich history this car has. I had no idea. Have you decided which era/guise/engine you'll restore it to? Did it have an engine when you bought it? I'm guessing that when Warren Steel owned it, he would have raced it in the ShellSport series, as he was quite prominent in that. When was it exported to NZ? I expect it would have competed in the 4.2 championship initially until Motorsport NZ ditched that NZ Saloon Car Championship at the end of the '77 season?

Chris, Thats a great looking car and we will all be looking out for it in the future. Are you going to restore it to its Danish colour scheme ?

I can remember Dick Sellens name but don't think I ever saw the car race.

Jac Mac wrote:Im sure the ex Fahey Escort also had the torsion bar/plastic leaf spring setup as well, can remember checking out the plastic leaf @ Teretonga when Fahey was at Teretonga first time then years later having a good long look at the torsion bar deal at Levels/Timaru when Grant Aitken was running it in OSCA. Main advantages of the torsion bar were lower unsprung weight & allowed attachment to axle at a much closer point to the wheel than coil overs would have..

Yep the Fahay car was definitely torsion bar as it was the sister/spare car for XOO 347F. The torsion bars run inside the boot through the chassis rails whereas mine run under the boot floor. I had a good look at the Fahey car in Chch last year. I think 5 torsion bar cars remain and 2 are in NZ. Included in that count is a Willment RS1600 that is now in Holland that is a totally different design again.

Steve Holmes wrote:Wow, Chris, I'm gobsmacked by the rich history this car has. I had no idea. Have you decided which era/guise/engine you'll restore it to? Did it have an engine when you bought it? I'm guessing that when Warren Steel owned it, he would have raced it in the ShellSport series, as he was quite prominent in that. When was it exported to NZ? I expect it would have competed in the 4.2 championship initially until Motorsport NZ ditched that NZ Saloon Car Championship at the end of the '77 season?

Yep it has a rich history for sure Steve. It probably appeared as just another Escort when it started racing here. I was told it had history when I bought it but no one had any real idea or proof as I think the full story was lost. A lot of research has uncovered all the evidence though. No engine with the car unfortunately but I do have an Atlantic engine I could use at a squeeze. Plans are for an injected BDG - I do have all the injection stuff now and it was always injected. I'm only assuming it came to NZ around the end of 75 beginning of 76. I've tracked down Dick Sellens but he lost all the info on the car when he moved house around 1980 and is a little sketchy on it after all these years. He lives in the states now and has done for around 20 years. I would love to get some info on the car in the ShellSport series if anyone has some. I'd be over the moon with a good picture or two

kiwi285 wrote:Chris, Thats a great looking car and we will all be looking out for it in the future. Are you going to restore it to its Danish colour scheme ?

I can remember Dick Sellens name but don't think I ever saw the car race.

I've been leaning to the Circuit of Ireland spec as that was as it appeared last as a works car but I'm really not sure now. Probably more fitting in the Danish colours but plenty of time to decide.

From what I can tell Chris, it looks to have arrived in NZ sometime in 1975. It raced at the NZIGP at Puke in early '76, and I've found details of it at other events during the 1975/76 season. Will go through and see if I can get you more details.

I did manage to find a scratchy picture of Warren Steel in a MkI ShellSport Escort in the early 80s in a Motoring News mag, but its a newsprint mag, so very hard to make out any detail, but the car he was driving is rhd. Do you know when your car was converted?

Pretty sure it was converted to RHD after Warren owned it so unlikely to be the same car but I do stand to be corrected. Talk about a dodgy conversion. You would never get away with how it was done nowdays.

Steve Holmes wrote:Wow, Chris, I'm gobsmacked by the rich history this car has. I had no idea. Have you decided which era/guise/engine you'll restore it to? Did it have an engine when you bought it? I'm guessing that when Warren Steel owned it, he would have raced it in the ShellSport series, as he was quite prominent in that. When was it exported to NZ? I expect it would have competed in the 4.2 championship initially until Motorsport NZ ditched that NZ Saloon Car Championship at the end of the '77 season?

Hi Steve, I was working for Warren at the time, he never raced it but we stripped the car and he on sold alot of the parts. We kept the rack & front crossmember/suspension and I built the LH drive MK2 Escort for Warren at CMR under the guidance of Reg Cook.
Kris had tracked me down a while ago, but I couldnt help him much.
Barry Tyler & I also built the Chevette at the same time....... thats another story.

Steve, it looks like it makes an appearance in a couple of the photos of the grids at Bay Park you posted for Mr Hanna part 2. Maybe dates on original photos that may give some info.

Rod Grimwood wrote:Steve, it looks like it makes an appearance in a couple of the photos of the grids at Bay Park you posted for Mr Hanna part 2. Maybe dates on original photos that may give some info.

You're going to have to point them out to me Rod!

Behind the red Mustang of Haig in one photo and between the Escort of Hart and the Fiat of Mcintyre in other. Colour scheme looks same as first photo in thread, so is when first arrived.

Maybe totally different car, in first photo (Europe) left hook, in baypark right hook. But it was changed here.

Ah also first photo round headlights, Bay Park oblong. Mind you only a grille change can do that. Wheels look similar. Some one may have a programme from this meeting which will answer.

Les Laidlaw wrote:Hi Steve, I was working for Warren at the time, he never raced it but we stripped the car and he on sold alot of the parts. We kept the rack & front crossmember/suspension and I built the LH drive MK2 Escort for Warren at CMR under the guidance of Reg Cook.
Kris had tracked me down a while ago, but I couldnt help him much.
Barry Tyler & I also built the Chevette at the same time....... thats another story.

Hi there Les, thanks for that great info. And welcome to the site.

Just out of interest Les, were you with Warren when he bought the Wayne Fuller Chevy V8 powered MkI Escort in approx 1974/75? He didn't race this car either, but on sold it to an Aucklander named John Scott.

Rod Grimwood wrote:Ah also first photo round headlights, Bay Park oblong. Mind you only a grille change can do that. Wheels look similar. Some one may have a programme from this meeting which will answer.

And the rollcage looks different too Rod. The pics at the start of this thread show a diagonal bar running down from the right side top to the left side bottom which the car in the Bay Park shots doesn't seem to have.

Hey Steve,
Dont know about that one, it was before my time, I speak to Warren often so I will ask him. He wheeled & dealed alot of cars during the time I was working on his race cars.
Cheers Les

Both Baypark pix are from the 30 Dec 1973 meeting. My guess about the Escort on the front row of the 0-4200cc race and also behind the Haig Mustang would be Jim Stone's fast 1300.