Know who penned the '1992' griffith design?

[craigbunyan]

Does anyone have any information about who was behind the actual body design of the Griffith we all know and Love?

I'd love to see some concept sketches...

I have some info of my own but would like to hear if anyone else knows the score.

Thanks in advance.

p.s.

Finally got my 95 Griff500 Taraka back on the road after 3 months in the shop! What appeared to be a head gasket failure ended up being a cracked block. : (
Its now running better than ever with a new 'top hat' block from ACR (£1300 exchange including a new piston)
People may be interested to know that TVR Power mentioned that they had recently seen 'quite a few' cracked blocks on cars with the Taraka upprade.

Fingers crossed for a good run of trouble free motoring , otherwise the better half may do a Lorena Bobbitt on me!

[lazyitus]

Peter Wheeler had a fair amount of input, IIRC.

[350Matt]

John Ravenscroft did pretty much the whole car, styled, engineered, set-up , development

Peter Wheeler had some input as well but it was John's car.

Good old boy I say, damn fine effort

Matt

[RVVUNM]

Am I right in saying Peter Wheeler's dog had something to do with the front indicator design? Or am I dreaming!

[Barreti]

Noooooooo, that was that pig ugly thing the Chimp not the beautiful Griffith.

He should have sent the dog around the back to bite a couple of lumps out of its far arse too.

[RVVUNM]

oooops,sorry.

[Podie]

Barreti said:

Noooooooo, that was that pig ugly thing the Chimp not the beautiful Griffith.

Yeah, the Griff won design awards... just like the Fiat Tipo, and the Austin Montego...

[900T-R]

Podie said:

Barreti said:

Noooooooo, that was that pig ugly thing the Chimp not the beautiful Griffith.

Yeah, the Griff won design awards... just like the Fiat Tipo, and the Austin Montego...

And, of course, the Citroën Saxo - "Most Beautiful New Car Of The Year 1997 - by an Italian jury...

[spend]

Barreti said:

Noooooooo, that was that pig ugly thing the Chimp not the beautiful Griffith.

He should have sent the dog around the back to bite a couple of lumps out of its far arse too.

Dogs aren't stupid! They only chew loved things...

Bet Ned only ever cocked his leg on the ugly Griff (thats probably why they had to put covers on the headlights)

Dave

Edited by spend on Thursday 8th November 15:08

[Pasco]

Barreti said:

Noooooooo, that was that pig ugly thing the Chimp not the beautiful Griffith.

He should have sent the dog around the back to bite a couple of lumps out of its far arse too.

Very True Ian

[spend]

Pasco said:

Barreti said:

...around the back to bite its fair arse

Very True Ian

Wonder what rattled your cage?

Dave

[The AJP Griff]

350Matt said:

John Ravenscroft did pretty much the whole car, styled, engineered, set-up , development

Peter Wheeler had some input as well but it was John's car.

Good old boy I say, damn fine effort

Matt

That's interesting stuff Matt,i was always under the impression that Damian McTaggart/Nick Coughlan designed the griff.It wasn't until recently,whilst doing some research,that i found out just how much input JR had on TVR's cars,so much so that it really surprised me.I've never heard before that he designed any,though.


Pasco-stand by your beds mate - 7PM

[Pasco]

Ok Buddy

[craigbunyan]

Thanks for all the responses...

Mike: I'm pretty sure that Nick Coughlan didn't start at TVR till '92 runling him out of the dev team for the '92 show car...

I heard a story that the griff started life when a Uk motoring magazine comissioned two young RCA graduates to design a theoretical british sports car... (at the time the pair were responsible for the 'spy shot' illustrations that Autocar used to run) The project went live when the mag showed it to Peter Wheeler with the intention of getting some sponsorship for the story...
Not sure if they released the magazine article - or what mag it was...

Edited by craigbunyan on Thursday 8th November 17:10

Edited by craigbunyan on Thursday 8th November 17:12

[OscarT]

Didn't Mc Taggart and Coughlin design the interior?

[Simpo Two]

The 'classicness' of the Grifith design is proved by the fact that each time they went back to try to improve it, they actually made it worse.

I'll agree that the back is not as graceful as the front, but it's not offensive, and fits in well with the comment by a design chap I knew. He said:

'It looks like a half-sucked boiled sweet'.

And that's not a bad accolade.

Edited by Simpo Two on Friday 9th November 12:07

[hiltonig]

griff = small boot = small chest wig, chimaera its a thing of beauty !! well the back end anyway

Edited by hiltonig on Saturday 10th November 16:35

[OscarT]

The Griffith has a large boot particularly for a beautiful and desirable sports car. The Chimaera has a bigger boot - hmmm that's it.

[hiltonig]

come oscar are you saying you cannot fancy a chim?? me I love all tvr,s !!



ps i have a chim

[Columbo]

OscarT said:

Didn't Mc Taggart and Coughlin design the interior?

yeah mctagart definately worked on the interior!