Bang Bang Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

[nalaeroom]

Built by Alan Mann, climbed aboard by Frank Gardner, road tested by Paddy Hopkirk, oh yeah and driven Dick Van Dyke




AA Drive magazine Autumn 1968



Alan M

[Evangelion]

I remember the AA Drive magazine as I was about 13 or 14 when it came out and read it avidly; it contained some interesting articles, road tests, interviews etc, but I think it was fairly shortlived. I know it attracted a bit of criticism from members when they realised that they'd started receiving this 'free' 12.5p magazine four times a year, at the same time as the AA annual fee went up by 50p! (Actually, the mag was supported by advertising.)

Any more interesting snippets to scan for us nalaeroom?

[Fane]

It's nothing compared to the real deal....

[RedexR]

Part of the filming was done at Russells Water near Henley , it hasn't changed that much as you can see on the images on here -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwSCFfHHV3M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQvMTzp_hxU&fea...


I remember the story of someone going to buy one of Mann's cars and they were surrounded by parts of Chitty in his garage , quite surreal.

Edited by RedexR on Thursday 5th May 22:21

[a8hex]

The windmill is on the road from Fingest to Ibstone. I used to drive around there a lot, lots of fun roads.

[Todzilla]

There's a great pub below the windmill in Turville - it's the Bull and Butcher:

http://www.thebullandbutcher.com/

and agree, there's some fun roads around there - particularly in a 6'6" wide yank!

[Roy C]

a8hex said:

The windmill is on the road from Fingest to Ibstone. I used to drive around there a lot, lots of fun roads.

[madjules]

I guess most of you knowledgeable types on PH know the real origin of the car’s name. For those who don’t, it’s a popular misconception that the name comes from the noise the famous race car of the time.

I believe the original car’s name was actually taken from a song sung by French soldiers in the trenches. The soldiers would receive papers or ‘chits’ which gave them time off from the front lines. These were more often than not used to take a trip to the local brothel (and who could blame them given the circumstances) hence the name, chitty, chitty, bang, bang!

[sumlin]

Torquay (I think) sometime around the late 80s/early 90s...

[Evangelion]

madjules said:

(loads of interesting stuff about the name)

I seem to remember reading at about the time the film came out: "the name comes from a somewhat ribald lyric attributed to Rudyard Kipling"

but I forget where now.

[tr7v8]

I saw CCBB at Crystal Palace in 1968 with the late great Graham Hill driving it with Miss Great Britain for that year in the back seat. Big crowd lots of wolf whistles etc. so Graham starts playing to crowd & ends up, stood up driving with his knee & waving to the crowd. Great even & sticks in my memory.

[a8hex]

Todzilla said:

There's a great pub below the windmill in Turville - it's the Bull and Butcher:

http://www.thebullandbutcher.com/

and agree, there's some fun roads around there - particularly in a 6'6" wide yank!

Not tried that one, when we stopped in a pub round there is was hard to go beyond the Frog where you can buy Old Luxter's Barn Ale.

[garethj]

Fane said:

It's nothing compared to the real deal....

I prefer the one in Ian Flemming's book - an 8 litre, 12 cylinder, supercharged Paragon Panther

[2volvos]

"Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, with Frank Gardner climbing aboard, completely dwarfs an Escort"

Now let's got through this for the last time. This is small, those are far away...

[6speedmanual]

I believe there were several built to support the filming and promo of CCBB.

When i was 8 we lived in La Celle St Cloud a suburban outskirt of Paris. On Sunday mornings my dad and I used to go to a Boulangerie in the next area Vaucresson.

Parked on the sreet was a film style CCBB. It never seemed to move. Even at that ege I recall peeping though some bonnet louvres and seeing what I believe was a Ford V6, realising the exhaust pipes were fakes (skinny exhaust ran along under car) and that the deep running boards housed not wings but nothing more than fresh air!

One day, saw the car driving along a road near there and then it was gone, never outside the boulangerie again.

Does anyone know the hisrory of the film props and promo cars? I seem to recall reading somewhere that 6 were built. One studio car had all the wings etc and the others were for more normal shots driving along and for promo.

Obviously the one with wings would be the most covetable because that would be the only one that can actually fly! :-p

Peter

[Evangelion]

Just remembered that I saw one of these driving through Bristol. Don't recall exactly when, but I know I was on a driving lesson at the time, which would put it somewhere between July '02 and Novenber '10. Of course my pupil had no idea what it was - even after I told him/her.

[bigblock]

Evangelion said:

Just remembered that I saw one of these.... which would put it somewhere between July '02 and Novenber '10.

So you might have seen it 2 months ago or 8 years ago

[Evangelion]

Yes, sorry to be so vague ... and I've just noticed I can't spell November.

[Rubin215]

There used to be one of them in the "Cars of the Stars" museum in the Lake District, along with various other ex-film tat.

I believe that collection has been sold on though, so have no idea where it is now.

[ChrisDT]

This is a picture i found a couple of weeks ago when clearing out my Grandads loft for him, In amongst other cars he ha worked on (Not the best quality).
He used to do work for Alan Mann racing...



There are others but cant find them on my phone at the moment...