RE: Senna's old F3 car: You Know You Want To

[marcosgt]

I suppose this is a lot for an old F3 car, but not much for a 'Senna car'.

I seem to recall a couple of years back you could get an 80s F3 car for under £20K and I could never understand why people would pay £50-100K for a tweaked up road car for 'track days' when you could have a REAL F3 for a fraction of the cost.

Is this typical of 80s F3 car prices or is it a premium for the Senna connection?

M.

[McSam]

Mound Dawg said:

I remember Martin Brundle commenting that Sennas engine was being freshened up by Novamotor the original builders in Italy while his own were being done by his team. Mid way through the season they worked out that Novamotor were fitting upgrade parts when they rebuilt them so they started sending Brundles engines off too and that's when the gap closed between the two.

That "50 bhp" will be BS though. These things breathe through a restrictor so in those days all you'd get was about 165 bhp whatever you did. We've got a Novamotor Alfa 75 Twinspark engine in work that despite all the trickery makes 165 bhp yet with a pair of 45s on a simpler Twinspark build were getting 215.

Doesn't rule out the possibility that Mr Senna had some extra holes in his airbox (say...) for the last race.

This is backwards to how people on both sides of the story have described it to me. It was Brundle who was receiving Novamotor upgrade parts first, not by sending the engine away but by having Novamotor send all their latest parts, hence the sudden closing in pace. Senna started having to push his car beyond what it was really capable of, having more accidents in the process and throwing away a lot of points. Towards the end of the season, Senna insisted on travelling to Novamotor with his engine to see what they'd do when given the same opportunity, and lo and behold with the same changes made he was able to blow Brundle away again.

As Brundle himself says, "Ayrton went on to win three world championships, and it's not as if I narrowly missed out on any of them, is it?"

[RobM77]

marcosgt said:

I suppose this is a lot for an old F3 car, but not much for a 'Senna car'.

I seem to recall a couple of years back you could get an 80s F3 car for under £20K and I could never understand why people would pay £50-100K for a tweaked up road car for 'track days' when you could have a REAL F3 for a fraction of the cost.

Is this typical of 80s F3 car prices or is it a premium for the Senna connection?

M.

There's definitely a premium for it being Senna's car. Single Seater values are hard to predict unless you're knowledgeable (which I'm not), because condition plays a huge part, as does the hours since the last engine rebuild, and finally the particular model with regard to the size of the cockpit, the availability of spares etc. Classic F3 cars of this era are quite desirable though and have some good championships with large grids, e.g. the French Classic F3 series. This car looks perfect, so could command top prices.

I've found on RT3 up for sale at £25k:

http://racecarsdirect.com/listing/58049/ralt_rt3.h...

And a few others going for mid twenties up to nearly £40k:

http://racecarsdirect.com/listing/57630/historic_m...

http://racecarsdirect.com/listing/55339/march_803b...

http://racecarsdirect.com/listing/56533/march_803_...

http://racecarsdirect.com/listing/57397/super_vau_...

O/T edited to add: Regarding modern F3 vs track day cars, which you mentioned, a modern F3 car will be circa £25k for a 2000 model, perhaps in the teens for a rolling chassis, up to around £50k for one a few years old. The big issue is the engines, which are around £13k for a rebuild (so I'm told). Official Dallara parts for the newer cars can be eye watering too - I heard of £2k for a starter motor the other day! However, a popular option is to retain the chassis, fit a road standard 2L engine with intake and exhaust modified (180-190bhp rather than 240), and jack the ride height up to 4cm, so it's eligible for club championships such as Monoposto 2000. Regarding pace, the lap record for that class with the road engines around Anglesey is 1min04, and a Mclaren P1 is 1min11 True F3 cars tend to be around 2-3 seconds a lap quicker than Mono 2000. So yes, in terms of pace on track, very good value. Even a Formula Ford for £10k will be faster than the P1 in terms of lap times.

Regarding your comparison with track day cars, a track day car like my Lotus 2-Eleven is worth about the same as a modern F3, but it just needs servicing once a year (~£500), you can order any part for it with immediate delivery, it can be driven to the race track, it doesn't need any more than a small garage to keep it in (no constant tinkering needed) and is comfortable for all shapes and sizes of driver, in both fitting in it and the forces it generates in cornering. Driving a single seater is awesome, don't get me wrong, but it's extremely noisy, hot, very cramped and requires strength, whereas the 2-Eleven is a lot more laid back with very light weight steering, a maximum of 1g in the corners and enough room for people of all shapes and sizes - it's a very different experience, and that's pretty much the fastest and least compromised track day car you can buy - comparing with a stripped out GT86 or BMW, as you may have been comparing to is another thing entirely.

Edited by RobM77 on Tuesday 3rd February 10:47