drag'n'fly, A series power,

[fastcarl]

i'm looking for info on this car, i'm sure i read a few years back it was Nitro powered BMC A series powered ,i have seen pictures in the past but a quick google failed me .
any help please,



carl

[PhilSweeney]

carl, I remember your car from the old Miniclassic forum. I used to race Autograss so used to check in there occasionally, hope your still running the twin engines ?.

For info on A Series cars which ran, your best place to ask is on UKDRN. Also "Spirit" has come up for sale so the current owner might be a good source of info also. Check Eurodragster for the ad.

[WJM]

Drag 'n Fly was a fast supercharged bmc a series driven and built as I recall by John Whitmore. There was an older similar car driven by Harold Bull called Stripduster or something similar. They were both faster than any of the Jag powered cars and most of the V-8s at the time.

Bill

[martyn b]

There was a whole series of these rails built by Harold Bull who hailed from the Ascot area, his own having the smaller "A" series engine, which he developed over quite a few years, building in both horsepower and reliability, using a rootes type Godfrey blower (cabin pressuriser) and nitro; the car was a regular high nines/low tens performer,and at the Elvington records weekend ran over 160 on 1/4 gearing. He later fitted a second engine but the car was not so succesful, perhaps not been given sufficient development time before Harold moved on. It looked like he might have moved to top fuel but after an accident in one of SPRs rails he retired from racing. John Whitmores similar car had the "larger!" engine and was equally sucessful, although for some while it seemed Johns role was to be bridesmaid, but eventually he became the small dragster to beat. He went on to develop a similarly powered rear engine rail, but a major contribution of his to the sport was the two speed he developed and built, used by many smaller UK rails through the 70s and 80s. There were several other A series cars based on Harolds chassis plus other engines including Dick Jarmans V4 and the larger Bull chassis of Tony Anderson with a blown V6.

[Andrew Kitson]

Great days, remember this car well. I first went to SPR in 1971 and regularly since, although not at all this year sadly, as the weather has put me off or otherwise engaged. In the '70s I also went to Silverstone & Snetterton, remember Roz Prior's big TF crash at Snett!

Found some great drag racing nostalgia photo sites on the net. Here's Whitmore's car as I remember it:
http://www.ukdrn.co.uk/PICTURES/CB/slides/CB92.htm...

Loads more old pics here.Scroll down to the nostalgia galleries.
http://www.ukdrn.co.uk/PICTURES/PICTURES.HTML

...and here from JWR:
http://www.theaccelerationarchive.co.uk/john/woolf...

[CRR]

[quote=Andrew Kitson] remember Roz Prior's big TF crash at Snett!

Sure you don't mean Liz Burn?

[Andrew Kitson]

CRR said:

Andrew Kitson said:

remember Roz Prior's big TF crash at Snett!

Sure you don't mean Liz Burn?

Yes correct...doh! It was Liz, thanks. Long time ago!

[Benni]

Hi Mr. Kitson !

And the non-existent price for "Top Lurker" this month goes to.......you.....

Is there any chance of seeing you set up your scaffold at a quartermile, or drag race pit ?

I guess there would be customers interested in your great paint/printwork.

Regards,
Benni

[Andrew Kitson]

Benni said:

Hi Mr. Kitson !

And the non-existent price for "Top Lurker" this month goes to.......you.....

Is there any chance of seeing you set up your scaffold at a quartermile, or drag race pit ?

I guess there would be customers interested in your great paint/printwork.

Regards,
Benni

Thanks Benni

Good idea but I had better paint some drag racing subjects first, rather than my usual roundy roundy stuff! I want to paint a scene of Tee-Rat, loved that wild car! Or the Stripteaser minivan. Great to see her back out again, but I don't remember her in that red colour scheme. It was mainly blue plus the Castrol colours when I saw it. Anyone remember the wheelie contest it had with Al's Gasser at SPR, around '74ish? I think there was a rain down or something, so as the start area was dry, but shutdown area still wet, they had a best of 5 'best wheelies' or something like that to keep the crowd entertained.

[fester426]

Well,if you remember the wheelie contest,,, great wasnt it,,,,,it was red then,,,,,,when it was blue it was a metal car,,,,,when it was red it was plastic......bill

Edited by fester426 on Wednesday 19th November 20:56