16 replies to this topic

[John Gorski]

Chaparral and Jim Hall... always my favorite race cars and builder.

[slotbaker]

Great stuff.

JH is one of four boyhood heroes for me, along with Jack Brabham, Dan Gurney, and Carroll Shelby.

Can't get enough of them.



Thanks for posting.

[Arne Saknussem]

[Gary Mayeda]

Long live Jim Hall, like Carroll Shelby, an American icon. Great video!

[Steve Deiters]

Awesome.

[redbackspyder]

Jim Hall, brightest guy in the room!  They had to outlaw the Chaparral or shut down the Can-Am series, according to none other than Bruce McLaren...

[gascarnut]

According to the McLaren team (and Teddy Mayer), but not according to Bruce. He had unfortunately passed away before the car first raced. He died on June 2, the 2J ran for the first time on July 7 at Watkins Glen.
 
The best quote came from Denny Hulme:
 

When I saw that thing squat down, I knew we were in deep ****.

[TSR]

Actually, the 2J was a General Motors "skunkworks" project and not Hall's idea. Hall was entrusted with the car, built almost entirely at the GM R&D. GM loaned Don Gates, the project manager, to Hall to help run the car.

Problem is, GM picked the wrong engine to run the fans and that gave more problems than anything else. It was basically a snowmobile engine and was not designed to run in such hot conditions, and when it did, its fuel delivery system went into vapor lock. Then the fans quit, and the car would no longer be safe at high speeds.

It is really too bad because the idea was brilliant. Hall and his team went great lengths to develop the car, that was by far the fastest at the time, but they simply ran out of time before the FIA banned all aerodynamic inducing moving devices, and Hall got caught into the politics of it and in disgust, gave up.

He will come back to Indy to have his cars, a Lola and a Barnard-designed Chaparral "2K", win twice.

[Phil Hackett]

For anyone interested in the Jim Hall/Roger Penske/Smokey Yunick/Traco Engineering/Gulstrand Engineeringand many others-inside-stories written by a man who was there, this book is very informative and entertaining:
 

[Cheater]

Agreed. I have a copy of this book in my library.

[TSR]

In this book, you can see that Paul Van Valkenburg used a Cox Chaparral 2D body in a makeshift wind tunnel to develop the wing that will then be fitted to the Chaparral 2E later that year... there is a picture of it!

[Zippity]

I still feel the 2F is the most beautiful of all the cars of that era.

[ravajack]

In this book, you can see that Paul Van Valkenburg used a Cox Chaparral 2D body in a makeshift wind tunnel to develop the wing that will then be fitted to the Chaparral 2E later that year... there is a picture of it!

 

[TSR]

Yep, that's it!

Years ago, I talked to Paul, and he described that many of them in the R&D were playing and racing slot cars at the Groove. They would meet after work and drive there, Paul, Shinoda, Jerry Mrlik, Gates... all involved in part with the Chaparral project. 

Mrlik and Shinoda were the most involved, building their own cars and in the case of Shinoda, his own bodies, now legendary in the 'thingy" circles...

Hall was much less involved and told me that outside of his contract with Cox (that was purely a verbal, gentlemen agreement), he only dabbled with slot cars a few times, mostly for publicity.

[Mike Patterson]

John,

 

Here is the photo you posted with the missing element present:

 

[MSwiss]

PDL,
What's the story with the Canadian Chinook-Chevrolet Mk2 ?

I saw it running at this year's Goodwood Revival.

It looks pretty "Chaparral like".

[TSR]

it's a tube-frame Chevy small-block powered typical USRRC car, of which the body was inspired by the 1965 version of the Chaparral 2. Very unsuccessful in its day, it has now been completely rebuilt (actually there are two of them and a third being built) and successfully driven. It won last year and finished second this year at Goodwood against its well developed contemporaries, AKA Lola T70s with the usual array of modern components, from carbon bodies to semi-auto Hewland gearboxes... there is no vintage racing anymore in some circles, winning is first for some English types that are throwing piles of money at making themselves looking good through hidden modern technology.

 

The Chinook was the child of the Fejer brothers in Toronto. they built over 100 cars over a period of 5 or 6 years including;  USRRC cars, Can-Am cars, F5000 cars and Indy cars.

The current Chinook are effectively new cars built in England and assuming the serial numbers of the old cars, of which some remains have survived. Effectively, it is a McLaren MK1 inspired chassis, with conventional suspension and running gear. What the Brits are doing better than anyone is to make very effective racing cars from old designs, because they are really good at it...

Hence the success of the reborn Chinook...