Friday 16th April 2010

Pic Of The Week: Gardner Douglas T70

POTW brings you a hot-shoe video lap of the 'Ring, too

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"Thought you might like to see this", said Andy Burrows, as he sent us a link to this clip of a factory-built GDT70 ripping-up the Nurburgring in gloriously period style.

We did, and we thought you all might like to see it too.

Andy is the founder of Gardner Douglas, and adds the following background to this Ring adventure: "There has been much talk about how quick cars are around the old Nurburgring so we thought we would join in and check the performance of a road going GDT70. Last week I joined our Italian friends to give some support and do a little set-up on the GDT70, and this is the in-car footage of one of the laps.

"The car is a typical factory-built road going GDT70 with detachable screen removed for preservation. Engine is GM LS7 with period-style Kinsler throttle bodies, revs were limited to 6500 rpm (max is 7200rpm) which meant it was restricted on gearing down the main straight to 177mph (GPS checked). You will also see in the video the lap was not a clear run with some traffic."

The full lap time was 7.45 (with traffic and the short gearing on rev limiter), but we know there is more in the bag if we so wished!

The driver is Dario Margutti, from Bergamo, Italy-based Gardner Douglas (and Caterham) distributor Mythos Cars. To celebrate this heroic effort, weve made the GDT70 pic of the week.
(Pic courtesy of Marco Zamponi.)

Normal (1280x1024)
WideScreen (1440x900)
SuperSize (2048x1536)

 

[Oddball RS]

Nice motor, loved my MkIV GD Euro Cobra.

[alexpa]

Gardner Douglas are brilliant!

Had a go in one of their Cobra's, handled very nicely compared to a couple of others i have tried

[scubadude]

Beautiful- great sound, love the bubbling and popping on the overrun, sweet driving too

Looks like the Clio driver at the start may have got abit of a surprise :-)

[Crook]

Didn't realise GD were doing these. Such a beautiful car.
Dread to think how long I'll have to save up for...

ETA. Hmm, not so long but looks better in the red...

Edited by Crook on Friday 16th April 14:26

[Oddball RS]

I think a 'high' end LS7 type is about £75,000 factory built.

[AndrewW-G]

What a great looking and sounding car

[soad]

Now that is nice, looks far better than the last week's one!

[Riggers]

soad said:

Now that is nice, looks far better than the last week's one!

Couldn't agree more - bit of a gift this week's POTW. it has replaced the 'dab of oppo' GT3 RS pic from a few weeks ago on my office desktop.

[dinkel]

Briliant stuff!

Most supercars are sissy compared to one of these.

[Galsia]

Lovely cars although far too expensive for what they are. Should be half the price IMO.

[Chris71]

I'm just waiting for the first person to ask if it's based on an MR2.

[Crook]

Galsia said:

Lovely cars although far too expensive for what they are. Should be half the price IMO.

From the linked article from a few years ago:

"A comprehensive kit of parts providing pretty well everything needed to build one apart from engine and gearbox will cost you £22,456 including VAT, meaning that you could put a good 350bhp small block powered example together for under £30,000, while for another £7,500 Gardner Douglas will put one together for you."

That seems like good value to me? Don't see how it could have almost doubled in that time but maybe it has.

[Crook]

Some chap's build
Hopefully he won't mind the exposure!

[GTRene]

lovely car and pay-road (tolweg)

very fast car, respect.
RS

[WMP]

I make it 7m50s Bridge to Bridge. Very impressive, nice noise to. Looks like a handful on the brakes and the lift of oversteer nearly did for him at Wipperman.

I think I've seen this chap in an R500 chasing a GT2 at the 'Ring, very quick.

[Roman]

Well held at 6:27!

[vintageracer01]

THIS IS IT!

What a stunning machine! This is what I want. Badly!

[thehardman07]

Fair play, that thing shuts down the other cars on track like they're standing still. Some lovely moments of instinctive car control too, most of which I'm sure were not intended either!

And judging by the speedometer, it seems to pile on speed quicker than most cars can rev!

[P4ROT]

Roman said:

Well held at 6:27!

+1 stupid fast- speedo goes up like a superbike

[Galsia]

Crook said:

Galsia said:

Lovely cars although far too expensive for what they are. Should be half the price IMO.

From the linked article from a few years ago:

"A comprehensive kit of parts providing pretty well everything needed to build one apart from engine and gearbox will cost you £22,456 including VAT, meaning that you could put a good 350bhp small block powered example together for under £30,000, while for another £7,500 Gardner Douglas will put one together for you."

That seems like good value to me? Don't see how it could have almost doubled in that time but maybe it has.

Thats not bad actually. I'm sure I saw one for sale in the PH classifieds for more than £60k a few months ago, so looks like I was right on the money.