|
LOT 110 Green
MG stands for Morris Garages. The company started off by enhancing the performance of Morris motorcars – hence the name. The company ethos was based on getting the maximum performance out of relatively sedate cars. It is perhaps fitting then that enthusiasts and racers, since MG’s inception have further enhanced the performance of these sporting cars to make them either faster on the road or more competitive on the track. Aside from their celebrity status, Clark Gable and Phil Hill owned TCs and Carroll Shelby started his career by racing one, which was sold very recently for over USD $340,000. TCs made the ideal basis for competitive racing cars and many examples are still raced all over the world today. The MG TC Supercharged Special that is offered here was built to its current specification under the guidance of Australian motor racing identity John Blanden who wanted a car that provided some of the style and performance of the P3 Alfa Romeos he had seen racing as a child without paying the huge price tag. Whilst we simply can’t claim to have seen every MG TC racing special, it would surely be hard to find a better example anywhere in the world. The car combines typical Australian ingenuity with superb style to create an extremely effective and beautiful racing monoposto that if not a P3 Alfa certainly hints towards the style of the ERAs of the 1930s. Blanden acquired this particular car – then a very rough TC racing special - for his South Australian based museum in the early 1970s from local racing identity Bob Irvine. Irvine and Don Skinner were well known racers of an unblown MG TC Special and whilst it is not clear whether the car Blanden bought was their famous car it was certainly from that source. The car was given to Rob Butcher to be rebuilt. Butcher looked after all of John Blanden’s racing cars and was given instructions to supercharge the car and replace the modified original TC body (now in the ‘Short Special’ campaigned by Phil Speer) with a more stylish P3 Alfa monoposto type of design. It is believed the body was designed and constructed by Colin Riley at Mansfied Park, South Australia and it certainly looks the part. A huge amount of work was also carried out to maximise the car’s performance. A Marshall J100 Supercharger was ingeniously fitted underneath the exhaust manifold. The car was shortened and the engine, gearbox and differential are all offset allowing the driver to sit beside, rather than above the running gear keeping the centre of gravity nice and low. A Holden limited slip differential was chosen at the time as parts were readily available and easy to maintain. The rear was fitted with quarter elliptic springs with trailing arms and a Panhard rod. Independent front suspension was tried but caused dreadful handling so the original suspension set up was re-instated. Once completed the car competed at Collingrove, Mount Tarangatta and the Geelong Speed Trials to name a few but was never fully developed. At one stage it was even run on Methanol but was put back to run on high octane petrol. During its time at the museum the car was much admired and was photographed in Michael Sherrell’s definitive bible “TCs Forever!”. When John Blanden passed away in 2004 the car was sold by the family and found its way into the hands of Paul Samuels, best known in motor racing circles for building the Wakefield park race track in Goulbourn NSW. Samuels eventually sold the car to Bill Rutty from where it was sold to the current vendor on a first refusal basis, the current owner having admired the car many times when Mr Rutty owned it. To call the current owner fastidious is an understatement. The car has been fully rebuilt mechanically (the engine a number of times) and can remarkably be started and run with more ease than many road cars. It is no slouch either - at Philip Island the car was hitting 5,500 rpm in top gear and with 40 km/h per 1000 rpm in top the vendor calculates that he must have been travelling at around 220 km/h! To list all work carried out restoring this car would simply take too long but the accompanying file of paperwork details the full history of the car, the events it has been invited to, the work that has been carried out and contains a huge quantity of correspondence regarding the car and sundry invoices pertaining to work carried out in recent years. The paperwork file will be available for inspection at the auction view or by prior arrangement. While the car is not offered for sale with a CAMS log book it is likely that one could be obtained although it would most likely be log booked to run in class Q due to the date when the car was originally built to its current specification. The current owner has not pursued a Group Q once a CAMS logbook simply because the necessity has not been there having received numerous invites to run the car at events Australia-wide. Offered for sale for the first time on the open market since its construction this fabulous TC special will provide its new owner an entry into the top Australian motorsports events including The Festival of Speed on Tweed the Phillip Island Classic and the Lobethal Grand Carnival as well as many more. With great performance and looks to match this car certainly has our vote.
For further enquiries please contact either |
