You wouldn't think that one of the landmark sports car designs of the Fifties would turn out to be something designed by an accountant and powered by a fire pump engine, would you? But history has played stranger tricks. One trend of the mid-to-late 1950s was the increasing popularity of fiberglass to lower tooling costs and get new designs into production quickly. Examples include Chevy Corvettes, and Colin Chapman's first attempt at a GT car, the Lotus Elite from 1957. The elegant simplicity of Peter Kirwan-Taylor's sketches (he was, oddly, Chapman's accountant) was translated into the production prototype with the help of aerodynamicist Frank Costin. This was the first use of fiberglass as a structural material in a unitized body-chassis, here reinforced by a steel subframe for the engine and front suspension, with a roll hoop around the windshield to which the door hinges attached…
The 1,200cc single overhead cam Coventry Climax inline four was a lightweight unit with aluminum block and head, originally designed as a fire pump engine, and gained popularity with race car builders in the mid-Fifties owing to its lightness and high-revving nature.
It was an ambitious project, and early cars suffered from warping and cracking (solved on later bodies built by Bristol), while all Elites were somewhat noisy because of the intrusion of the rear suspension upright towers into the cabin. The Elite was produced through 1963, and was much more successful as a race car than as a practical road car. And perhaps it's not so unexpected that such a landmark design would come from the sketchbook of an accountant. After all, it has an elegant economy of line, and by all measures, its aerodynamic numbers work...
And what, by the way, is that intriguing orange car next to the Lotus? If you could see the Sao Paulo license plate in front, you might have a clue. Is it one of the fiberglass-bodied, VW-powered Pumas* that were built by Brazilian specialists with parts supplied by VW? Well, that would be a good guess, but this 2-seat GT was built on a VW Type 3 chassis by Volkswagen do Brasil, and the company felt confident enough about its appeal that they tooled up to build the bodies in steel on the 94.5 inch wheelbase. The body design by José Martins and Marcio Piancastelli combines a trendy Seventies wedge nose (with headlights too low for US regulations) with gentle ovoid contours. This example runs on steel wheels, but cars were raced in Brazil with alloy versions of the same design, still with the steel body. Production started in summer of 1972.
The rear view shows off the smooth curves that hinted at the car's role as a sort of Brazilian answer to the Porsche 912. Engines, accessible under a flat cover below that rear hatch, included 1.6 liter and 1.7 liters in production, while there was also a 1.8 liter water-cooled SP3 prototype; all used the 4-speed manual VW gearbox. The SP2 was a hit in Brazil, with over 10,200 built for model years 1972-'76. And one German enthusiast magazine called it "the most beautiful VW in the world", which meant SP2 might have been a good replacement for the Karmann-Ghia, phased out in the US after 1974. But VW was already planning its future around the front-drive Golf, and there would have been issues with those low headlights and skimpy bumpers.
Compared with the Aston Martin DB4 introduced in fall of 1958, the DB4 GT introduced a year later featured a shorter wheelbase (93" vs. 98"), and a more powerful version of the DB4's then-new twin-cam inline six. With over 300 hp, it would enter competition with Ferrari's 250 GT SWB, and at the time was claimed to be the fastest road-legal production car. "Production" meant 100 chassis, but most sources say only 75 were built, with another 19 bodied by Zagato in Italy.
Terry Hefty's 1959 car was the 3rd DB4 GT to be built, and was shipped to Nassau for road races there. When the Aston that Stirling Moss was scheduled to drive was damaged beyond race-readiness, he raced this one. Everything went fine until the engine ingested a loose nut from the air box. Decades later, Sir Stirling was reunited with this car and took it for a drive...
Only 30 examples of the DB4 GT were built with left-hand drive, and Aston's road-racing clientele sat on the thin-shell bucket seats that struck Coffee & Classics spectators as spartan. The instrument pod had appeared on Aston's Mark III version of the DB2/4 and on the DB4, and was a clever reference to the car's grille shape...
And while those customers, unlike DB4 customers, had to do without 2 rear seats, they got twice as many spark plugs. All DB4 GTs featured a twin-plug version of the DB4's then-new 3.7 liter inline six with its twin overhead cams, aluminum block and heads. Brakes were discs all around, with independent front suspension and a live-axle rear, much like the contemporary Maserati 3500 GT coupe. As with that Maserati, the body was designed and built by Superleggera Touring in Italy.
The Austin-Healey 3000 Mk. III was introduced in spring 1964 and was built by BMC through 1967. The low-slung convertible with roll-up windows (and in MK. III form, a wood dash) joined the roadster in spring '62, but the Mk.III was only available as a convertible. Like the earlier 100-6 and 100-4, the 3000 wore a seductively curvy body design by Gerry Coker. The engine was a 3 liter inline 6, and the 4-speed gearbox lacked synchomesh on 1st gear, but most examples the owner has seen have the overdrive his car features.
One thing the 1966 Volvo P1800S below shares with the Big Healey is that was an effort to offer a stylish GT car with powered by a reliable, if unadventurous, engine from a passenger car. Another is that Jensen Motors in England built the first 6,000 examples of the P1800 from late 1961 to spring 1963: Jensen also built all the A-H 3000 bodies. That business about using a reliable production engine must have worked for Volvo; a P1800 holds the record for the most automotive miles traveled by a single private owner: 3.25 million...
During the same period as the Volvo P1800 (named for its 1.8 liter inline four) you could also buy a Porsche 912 or a BMW 1600. The German makes both offered 1.6 liter fours; an air-cooled boxer in the Porsche, and a SOHC inline one in the BMW. The latter make would begin its slow climb from obscure cult car to upscale lifestyle accessory by offering a 2 liter version of their engine in the compact, light 1600 body called the 2002. Car and Driver magazine nicknamed it "the whispering bomb". That was in 1968...
This 1989 Ferrari Testarossa (Italian for "red head"; more on that later) is a frequent visitor to Sunday Coffee & Classics. The styling by Leonardo Fioravanti for Pininfarina manages to package the 12 cylinder boxer engine with its side-mounted radiators derived from Formula One practice, the reason for those form-dominating ducts and horizontal strakes on the car's flanks.
The mid-mounted 4.9 liter flat twelve features 48 valves and sends power to the rear wheels through a 5-speed transmission with Ferrari's trademark gated lever. The Testarossa name referred to the special series of road racers Ferrari developed in the Fifties; these Testa Rossas had their cam covers painted red, and were made in V12 and inline 4 (yes!) arrangements. Testarossas (one word by the 80s) were possibly the first pop supercars, appearing after 1985 on TV's Miami Vice, and nearly 10,000 specimens were built between 1984 and 1996.
This Ferrari 328 GTS (the S is for spider) is from the same era, and was built for the 1986 through '89 model years. It followed the popular 308GT, with slightly larger 3.2 liter, mid-mounted 4-cam V8, with 5-speed manual transaxle and styling for the 2 passenger coupes and spiders also by Fioravanti at Pininfarina. On the 4-passenger 308GT4 that began the 308/328 series, styling was by Bertone.
In 1988 the 328 signaled Ferrari's move from the analog to digital world with the adoption of antilock brakes, with suspension lightly redesigned. Overall the 308/328 series was one of the most popular Ferraris, with nearly 20,000 made, and one of the most practical for daily use.
Owing to difficulty In meeting US emissions standards which arrived in 1968, Alfa Romeo's 1750 GTV only made in into US dealerships for 1969 and 1971. The styling was refreshed from the previous "step nose" design with a flush panel between the hood and grille (no vent at the leading edge of the hood) and small circular lights inboard of the headlights, with a new horizontal grille bar. The DOHC engine, at 1779 cc, was happy to rev and offered more torque than the previous 1600.
The last version of the GTV offered Stateside was powered by a 2 liter version of Alfa's evergreen twin-cam, aluminum block four; named the 2000GTV and featured Spica mechanical fuel injection and a revised grille in which the famous Alfa shield was formed by projections in formed into the grille bars. The last GTV before the Alfetta transaxle cars took over, it was offered in the US for the 1973 and '74 model years, with the decade-old Giugiaro-designed Bertone body still looking fresh...
We fade into the late morning finale with a view of the 8th Street lineup from Pearl Street, headed up by a 1980s BMC Mini powered by a Honda VTEC four that has somehow been shoehorned into the engine bay on the tiny, 10 foot-long car. Like the Ferrari Testrossa, it's a frequent visitor to Coffee & Classics. We wondered how it might do against that Ferrari on a closed mountain road (no street racing, please). After all, 200 hp in a 1,500 pound car might be just as much fun as 380 hp in a 3,800 pounder. And, come to think of it, that Mini has more horsepower per pound...
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All photos are by the author.
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