I saw some shots of the body, and I really like how it looks like a Harvey Aluminum Special, or is that visa-versa?
The first of the Thompson Indy cars came in 1962. In 1963, one was sponsored by the Harvey Aluminum company, but of the 10 cars built or rebuilt, only one had that name. One of the 1963 cars rebuilt in 1964 with semi enclosed body was destroyed in the fiery mess at the end of the first lap of the 1964 Indy 500, killing its driver Dave MacDonald.
The Bugatti is another story altogether but at least killed no one except Bugatti's reputation. After WW2, the Bugatti factory had not been destroyed and Ettore Bugatti's surviving son, Roland, partnered with the Messier aircraft company (that invented the disc brake first used on aircraft, then on cars), to make aircraft parts. Messier had absorbed Hispano-Suiza, another aircraft and sometimes automotive company. The Bugatti-Messier-Hispano group made good money in the postwar era and by 1954, Roland Bugatti decided that he wanted the Bugatti name to be again on top of the rostrum. So he hired Gioacchino Colombo, the man responsible for the fantastic Alfa Romeo 158, the Maserati A6GCM (the precursor to the 250F) and the first Ferrari V12 engine, to design a new racing car.
With a man responsible for the engine design of cars that won 3 F1 world championships, one would think that Bugatti would have a winner.
Unfortunately, Colombo and Bugatti had different ideas, and the 251 turned to be one of those expensive disasters that leave everyone sore, for years or ever. The engine was set amidships but it was really wide since it was an inline 8-cylinder design. This forced a very pregnant body shape with high-drag coefficient. To complicate matters, Bugatti wanted the car to have two rigid axles, at a time when independent suspension or at least a rear De Dion axle was proven to be better. The car raced only once, qualifying last, at the '56 French GP. I saw it run there (I was 13 years old!) and it was slow and ill handling. Maurice Trintignant was driving it and parked it after 17 laps with a sticky throttle.
Two cars had been built but the second example was no better and by that time, funds had run dry for the project. Both cars were donated to the Schlumpf museum years later by the Messier-Bugatti management, and were confiscated by the French government during the annexation of the museum after the textile business of the Schlumpf brothers went belly up and the local union took over the buildings and caused some physical damage to some of the cars.
The Schlumpf family was never compensated by the French government, after years of court battles that ruined the family.
The story of the Bugatti T251 is a sad one, a really bad end to a great name.
Messier then sold Bugatti to an Italian by the name of Artioli, who had grand plans to revive the name with the most exotic GT car built yet, the EB110 (for "Ettore Bugatti").
The car, a V12 with 4 turbos, was truly a marvel of engineering and the fastest road car in the world in 1991, but came at a time of world economic depression. After building 220 or so of these wonderful machines, Artioli went belly up and the beautiful new factory was shut down and all assets sold at public auction. The Auto Union group (AKA Volkswagen-Porsche-Audi) bought the assets and has today produced another amazing machine that is the only road-legal car able to reach 270 mph, albeit not for long and at the cost of a set of special tires for each attempt, plus an entire tank of fuel and of course, the nearly $2 mil price tag.
But is is of course, no longer a Bugatti, only by name.
In 1957, Colombo went to work for Count Domenico Agusta on the famous MV motorcycles with which John Surtees won 7 world titles in the 350 and 500cc classes before moving to racing cars, eventually winning the F1 title in 1964, mostly through a bit of luck as the Ferrari 158 was hardly a match for the Lotus T33 and Brabham BT7.
Interestingly during the Classic Era of slot car racing (AKA the 1960s),there is was slot car body by Du-Bro of the Gordini 8-cylinder F1, a car looking very similar to the Bug 251 and hardly more successful, but NONE of the 251, that is, save for the one today from Penelope Pitlane.
Its color by the way was not the typical "French blue" (whatever that is supposed to be) but a much lighter color, more like what some call "baby blue", despite that I have as yet to see a baby of that color...
