Rare thing - A Clan Crusader

[72twink]

Hi TurboClan, Ouch! That looks nasty, good job the damage was limited and none of the JK bits were affected. You must have switched to spectating as you weren't around every time I passed otherwise I'd have said hello. I'll look forward to seeing you out at other events - if I had the space I'd have another without a second thought!

[rallycross]

Another one this time a Peugeot engined modified car

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Clan-Crusder-1600cc-KIT-...

[Kdb550]

was going to post this in classics left to die also but passed this the other day in the background is what appears to be a clan crusader sat on a trailer. Looks like its been there for a while

[dinkel]

[supaimpy]

Kdb550 said:

was going to post this in classics left to die also but passed this the other day in the background is what appears to be a clan crusader sat on a trailer. Looks like its been there for a while

The Clan is just a bodyshell saved from a barn that was being cleared out , and to provide any panels needed for another Clan, so its not been left to die, its a donor

[piper]

I owned and restored a Clan Crusader in the mid 1980's, see pic below: it had a 915cc engine with a slighter hotter cam but otherwise standard. It handled really well, a friend of mine had a TVR Tasmin, on the twisty stuff and in the wet he could never keep with me. I am on my 3rd Elise now (an SC) and I think the Clan definitely had some Elise DNA. A great little underated car. I also owned a Ginetta G15 and although prettier the Clan in my opinion had the edge overall

Edited by piper on Monday 18th August 14:56

[Steffan]

piper said:

I owned and restored a Clan Crusader in the mid 1980's, see pic below: it had a 915cc engine with a slighter hotter cam but otherwise standard. It handled really well, a friend of mine had a TVR Tasmin, on the twisty stuff and in the wet he could never keep with me. I am on my 3rd Elise now (an SC) and I think the Clan definitely had some Elise DNA. A great little underated car. I also owned a Ginetta G15 and although prettier the Clan in my opinion had the edge overall

Edited by piper on Monday 18th August 14:56

You clearly know the qualities of the Clan. The Ginetta G15 and G16 were beautiful cars IMO. Almost in the league of the Lotus Elite which IMO has never been bettered in a small lightweight sportscar. For all his faults, which were many and varied, Colin Chapman was an outstanding car designer and some of his designs for small (diminutive??) sports cars are still the best IMO. However you may well be right the Clan may have had the edge over the Ginetta's, in absolute roadholding terms.

The Walkett brothers (As you will know the brains behind Ginetta)did do extremely well for many years. Like so many long gone now though I believe the brand is still offered occasionally. But not from the same management.

My first car was a Lotus Super Seven kit car in 1963 bought from CC himself as I kit and my first build. Tere were five employees at Lotus then. Magnificent car but being young and foolish I triple end to end rolled the car in a ploughed field. End of car. I was thrown clear otherwise I would not be here. I am an old fool now and still very likely to lose cars cornering too fast. On the tracks though! Roads are just unsafe for driving like that. Wonderful times then we are a fortunate generation.

[grumpy52]

Back in the day when clans were still newish I purchased an Imp sport from a neighbour. They car had resided in his garage since it had been "wheel studed" down a 3/4 panel.I diligently straightened everthing out and painted the repaired panel mot'd it and handed it over to mrs grumpy mk1 ( mk3 was the last in the series) she drove it once , declared she didn't like it and returned to her Herald.The imp was duly put up for sale and after much messing about by numpties a very PH chap came and bought it on condition I added the mountney wheel hanging in the garage and that I wouldn't be annoyed that he was going to chop it up to create a clan crusader .
He sent me photos about a year later of it completed , then about 7 months later he had destroyed it against a bridge .

[geeeman]

Steffan said:

You clearly know the qualities of the Clan. The Ginetta G15 and G16 were beautiful cars IMO. Almost in the league of the Lotus Elite which IMO has never been bettered in a small lightweight sportscar. For all his faults, which were many and varied, Colin Chapman was an outstanding car designer and some of his designs for small (diminutive??) sports cars are still the best IMO. However you may well be right the Clan may have had the edge over the Ginetta's, in absolute roadholding terms.

The Walkett brothers (As you will know the brains behind Ginetta)did do extremely well for many years. Like so many long gone now though I believe the brand is still offered occasionally. But not from the same management.

you may be surprised to know the original designer of the G15 , Ivor walklett, is stil designing and building cars through his Dare UK company.
They are still building new G4 and G12s that can pass IVA. They also do restoration of old G4 and G12 G15 G16

[Steffan]

geeeman said:

Steffan said:

You clearly know the qualities of the Clan. The Ginetta G15 and G16 were beautiful cars IMO. Almost in the league of the Lotus Elite which IMO has never been bettered in a small lightweight sportscar. For all his faults, which were many and varied, Colin Chapman was an outstanding car designer and some of his designs for small (diminutive??) sports cars are still the best IMO. However you may well be right the Clan may have had the edge over the Ginetta's, in absolute roadholding terms.

The Walkett brothers (As you will know the brains behind Ginetta)did do extremely well for many years. Like so many long gone now though I believe the brand is still offered occasionally. But not from the same management.

you may be surprised to know the original designer of the G15 , Ivor walklett, is stil designing and building cars through his Dare UK company.
They are still building new G4 and G12s that can pass IVA. They also do restoration of old G4 and G12 G15 G16

Not really, because I know the man. I am fortunate in that I have lived and been an avid kit car builder, long enough, to have got to know a lvery arge number of Kit car builders and Kit car manufacturers personally over last fifty years including Colin Chapman in his kit kit car heyday, Tim Dutton Wooley, and probably most of the manufacturers around in the last 50 years.

I still utilise a number for mechanical assistance from time to time and buy kits from them occasionally. Currently building five kit cars although this will be reduced because I will be in Italy much of the time next year driving historic Alfa Romeos with and old collector friend. Nice man Ivor walkett glad to hear he s still in harness it spurs me on to achieve more.

[geeeman]

just correcting your statement that the walkletts are long gone.
They are one of the few to last 50yrs +

[Steffan]

geeeman said:

just correcting your statement that the walkletts are long gone.
They are one of the few to last 50yrs +

If I remember correctly the Ginetta business was sold on and all the four brothers ceased involvement at that point. Hence my comment long gone. I do understand that the marque has changed entities again and may well have been revived. However in terms of the four brothers working together they are not, so far as I know still in the kit car business. Your comments on Ivor Walkett still being in the business refers to a different entity making the cars I think.

Not uncommon with kit cars the John Cowperthwaite deigns including the JC locost (locust ?) Moss derivatives and Midge etc have been reincarnated variously from time to time. But none of these derivatives approach the standards that JC offered years ago. Umpteen attempts have been made to gain on the cachet of the original businesses in the KC business including Fairthorpe, Ashley, Berkeley, Briton, Robin Hood, and unbelievable numbers of Porshe copies in various incarnations and to various stabdards. and so on.

In reality the only connections have been historic and cachet driven and not much good IMO. Ivor Walketts business may be producing absolutely superb cars and I wish him well. I am not denigrating his considerable abilities in any way. But such products are not the products of the old Walkett family business that Ginetta was. That was the point I was making.

[rallycross]

This link has a few photos of racing Clan Crusaders from the 80's in Scotland.

The black and gold one was very quick.
There also used to be a very quick red road registered clan with a black engine cover.

http://www.pindas.com/photos/smr/Ingliston19840729...

[geeeman]

A bit off topic
yes all 4 walklett brothers are no longer working together.

After the sale of ginetta cars in 1989 to a consortium in the UK, the rights to the G4 and G12 models were sold to a japanese ethusiast, who then commissioned ivor walklett to build G4/12 for japanese market. This was the start of their Dare company

Its stil very much today a walklett affair, with Ivor and his son Tom, and Trevers son Mark running the business

Lets not split hairs, the products they make today are ofcourse products of the walklett family still, all designed and produced in house, as the walkletts have done since '58...

http://www.dareuk.com/history_g4.php

[Steffan]

geeeman said:

A bit off topic
yes all 4 walklett brothers are no longer working together.

After the sale of ginetta cars in 1989 to a consortium in the UK, the rights to the G4 and G12 models were sold to a japanese ethusiast, who then commissioned ivor walklett to build G4/12 for japanese market. This was the start of their Dare company

Its stil very much today a walklett affair, with Ivor and his son Tom, and Trevers son Mark running the business

Lets not split hairs, the products they make today are ofcourse products of the walklett family still, all designed and produced in house, as the walkletts have done since '58...

http://www.dareuk.com/history_g4.php

I have no wish to split hairs. Being a retired Chartered Accountant I have a rather more technical view of the entity of a business than the majority of car enthusiasts. I wish Ivor Walkett well in his endeavours. I am aware of the history of Dare cars. Best of luck to the man.

[storminnorman]

TurboClan said:

Hi
Lurking Clan nut here. Storminnorman, it could have been mine you saw at Harewood. Its a Luff shell (made by ex lotus man Brian Luff after the factory closed), fitted with wide arches and an 'irish' front bumper. Engine is still Imp with the addition of fuel injection and a Turbo .

That's the one, it was 6th aug 2011 meet. Rainy day and quite fun to watch. I only got some blurry half shots of your car unfortunately.

[Skyedriver]

I had a Clan for 6 years and sold it in 1984 to a guy in Kendal who still has it I believe.
998/webers/deep pulleys etc
Anyway I now run cars that I cannot service or repair in a small garage with aging joints and without thousands of pounds worth of equipment and wouldn't mind going simple retro again. I know Imp bits are getting harder to come by and really now I would want a two seater dhc rather than a coupe so, and back when I did often wonder about removing the roof section al a targa, can anyone think of an Imp based convertible. I cannot..

[Steffan]

Skyedriver said:

I had a Clan for 6 years and sold it in 1984 to a guy in Kendal who still has it I believe.
998/webers/deep pulleys etc
Anyway I now run cars that I cannot service or repair in a small garage with aging joints and without thousands of pounds worth of equipment and wouldn't mind going simple retro again. I know Imp bits are getting harder to come by and really now I would want a two seater dhc rather than a coupe so, and back when I did often wonder about removing the roof section al a targa, can anyone think of an Imp based convertible. I cannot..

Nor me I am sorry to report. I was a Davrian fan myself had several years and very quick cars ther were with excellent handling. Drophhead Imp based cars I cannot recall. Have you considered that the Copy Porsche RSK/356 types f kit cars are about and an engine and gear box swap for such a car would then provide a solution that would result in the rear engined Imp driven Drophhead car that would really set you out from the crowd?

Not a difficult conversion to achieve many of tese are Skoda based using the old Duaphine derived drivetrain fitted to the Skda Feliciano convertible which was itself a rear wheel drive car. Find a non runner, of which there are plenty, roperly registered as a convertible with an age related plate and you could create a ar which gets well and as a real cachet alue.

Bit of work involved but it might get you a car that otherwise will be like trying to find the proverbial needle in the hsystack, if in fact there are any at all. Which I doubt personally. Best of luck I do think that may be the only way on this.

Lovely engine in the Imp once the incompetence of Rootes in failing to understand any the requirements of high reving alloy OHC engines revolving at different levels than the cars Rootes normaly fabricated, had been resolved and appropriate measures taken on water pumps etc. and failing to understand that rear engines are inherently liable to overheating because the airflow can so easily be obstructed by poor designs. Pity is that by that time the reputation of engine mangling had set in and the car never reached the markets it should have done. That amongst the other Rootes failures precipitated the Chrysler takeover and the death of Rootes cars.

Good luck to you.

[dryden]

I once owned a drophead Davrian,......It was factory built for Adran Evans,s sister I believe, I am not sure weather it was a 1 off or weather they made more.

[Steffan]

dryden said:

I once owned a drophead Davrian,......It was factory built for Adran Evans,s sister I believe, I am not sure weather it was a 1 off or weather they made more.

I have never seen one but Adrian was a prolific kit car man and there could be one about. How you could find one or buy one I have no idea.