How much are Unipower GTs really worth?
Discussion
Sorry I didn't take any photos of it at the time,no camera phones 30 years ago.
It was parked for years at the front of the then owners house which was the old station in Beauly. It was a dark maroon/brown colour with possibly magnesium minilite syle wide wheels and well worn slicks. I don't think they were 10" rims like the Minis though.
It only had one seat fitted but the interior looked to be complete and it had a right hand gear shift.The owner told me it was running a 1275 Cooper S engine, I don't know if that was true but I do remember seeing twin SU carbs through the rear engine cover. I think it may also have had rear disc brakes from the front of a Cooper S, is that right ? I had a 1968 Cooper S at the time which is why I paid so much attention to it.
Even although the body was covered in moss and it had weeds growing through the suspension I thought your Unipower was a stunning little thin,g well done for restoring it and I hope you enjoy using it.
It was parked for years at the front of the then owners house which was the old station in Beauly. It was a dark maroon/brown colour with possibly magnesium minilite syle wide wheels and well worn slicks. I don't think they were 10" rims like the Minis though.
It only had one seat fitted but the interior looked to be complete and it had a right hand gear shift.The owner told me it was running a 1275 Cooper S engine, I don't know if that was true but I do remember seeing twin SU carbs through the rear engine cover. I think it may also have had rear disc brakes from the front of a Cooper S, is that right ? I had a 1968 Cooper S at the time which is why I paid so much attention to it.
Even although the body was covered in moss and it had weeds growing through the suspension I thought your Unipower was a stunning little thin,g well done for restoring it and I hope you enjoy using it.
It started life when new in late '66 with a Downton 1275S engine, then Janspeed fitted their own 1275 S race engine in June '67. Janspeed then changed that for a Weber fed 1140 (ish)cc engine (overbored 1071 S lump) to fit in with the smaller 1150cc Special GT class as it was not competitive in the larger class (it pretty much got spanked in the smaller class anyway by Costin Nathan etc). It was raced like that until the end of the 60's and suffered from lack of development potential as the latest crossflow set up for a Mini engine would not fit in it due to the front of the engine being up against the bulkhead (needed FVA really). Like any competition car (it's never been road registered) it'll have had a few engine swaps in it's life and could have had a 1275 back in it when it was seen in that garden. The wheels were possibly JAP mags but it did have some 13" lightweight Revolutions fitted when it left Beauly (still fitted)(for now). Unipower GT competition cars did have Cooper S discs front and back.
I have found a couple of very fuzzy photos of the car when it changed hands from Beauly down south to Chris Alford (any idea what year it left that garden??) and yes it does look pretty rough! I'll try and post them up. The car was restored first time round in Belgium , to where Alford sold it as far as I know. It was repainted yellow and Roland Petit used it in endurance races at Zolder and Spa quite a number of times in the 90's.
I have found a couple of very fuzzy photos of the car when it changed hands from Beauly down south to Chris Alford (any idea what year it left that garden??) and yes it does look pretty rough! I'll try and post them up. The car was restored first time round in Belgium , to where Alford sold it as far as I know. It was repainted yellow and Roland Petit used it in endurance races at Zolder and Spa quite a number of times in the 90's.
Edited by Pete F on Thursday 15th January 21:21
When I first saw this thread about 3 months ago, the Unipower put me in mind of something, but I couldn't think what it was!
So I went trawling through my car magazines and eventually found it.
The Unipower reminded me of a Deep Sanderson DS301 as featured in Classic & Sports Car here
So I went trawling through my car magazines and eventually found it.
The Unipower reminded me of a Deep Sanderson DS301 as featured in Classic & Sports Car here
On the current page of, classics left to die/rotting there is a pic of a Rover Limo and an Aston Martin, the guy who owned that Unipower in Beauly also left a very similar early sixties Aston lying in an old wet shed along with a Bond Equipe and a Daimler Sovereign until the shed fell down on top off them.
TonyRPH said:
The Unipower reminded me of a Deep Sanderson DS301
Similar in some respects,like night and day in others.The Unipower comp cars had Cooper S brakes front and rear, were coil sprung, had Arch Motors square tubular spaceframes front to back as opposed to subframes and a Specialised Mouldings body, both companies supplied the top sportscar manufacturers and F1 teams of the day. The Deep Sanderson also lacked a rear bulkhead! So the Unipower GT was much more sophisticated but came too late to be truly competative with Ginetta, Costin and a plethera of home built specials on the scene by 1967. Unlike the Deep Sanderson ,Ogle and some of the other early Mini derivatives they're also not eligable for pre '66 events like Goodwood (well not the Revival), sadly! Unipower GTs only come up for sale every now and again (maybe once a year?)mainly as there's only about ten cars in the UK and of those very few in one piece. Well like waiting for a bus there's currently three for sale. One in Sweden and two in the UK, see here :
http://maximummini.blogspot.com/search/label/Unipo...
http://maximummini.blogspot.com/search/label/Unipo...
New Facebook page dedicated to the Unipower GT here :
https://www.facebook.com/Unipower-GT-9260961307433...
https://www.facebook.com/Unipower-GT-9260961307433...
Owners Club now has a website on www.unipowergt.uk. Lots of good accurate information on there. Prices have very much held up, with cars needing work going for around the £35-£40k recently. There are also some pristine examples going for nearly three times that.
Contact the Owners Club & Register on contact@unipowergt.uk
Contact the Owners Club & Register on contact@unipowergt.uk
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