Engine Punk

This car is something of an enigma. Clearly an Imp Special Saloon, none of my Impish friends can identify what it is. It could be a Maguire Imp or a Davrian Imp but doesn't look quite like either. This is a very old photograph, taken at the same event where I first encountered Kermit (VT No. 101) That was at Tregrehan hillclimb in 1984 (I think). Was this speed hillclimb Imp a track refugee built by a known racing car specialist or purposely made at home to take to the hills? The photo is a little damaged as it was stuck to the back of another print and my patience in peeling it off gradually evaporated as I saw what was portrayed. I would say that it's been narrowed in the greenhouse area and has a centrally mounted single seat. There were many Imp Special Saloon 1000cc racers backalong and they were often pitted against Mini Special Saloons. Neither variety had much in common with production saloons and the formula was a delightful free-for-all. However, I thin...

Regular followers may remember I saw The Creepshow at the White Rabbit last year. One of their support bands was The Rocker Covers, a trio of automotively literate songsmiths who makeover pop hits to devise the most happily subversive covers of songs you might know. Some might be favourites given The Rocker Cover treatment and others might be on your most hated list that have also been given a similar work over to become simply brilliant! I am assured Poker Face is a Lady Gaga hit but am more familiar with The Rocker Covers version. I know - I have so much street cred. But listen to the way it starts off! That's from Brand New Cadillac by The Clash! (Except theirs was a cover version of some old bloke...) The point is, some versions can't be beat and are the ones you carry with you as your favourite. That's happened to me and so many of these songs on Revved Up. There are so many songs I think would benefit from The Rocker Cover's treatment. I could do qui...

Entered in the 2013 Land's End Trial this year was this Skoda-based Bugrat. It wasn't far away from Binky and I in the running order and at Hangman's Hill (not a section I'd been on before) I took the opportunity to have a closer look. I'm not sure what that black plastic thing is on the front wing. it's not in the other pics so maybe a carefully insulated spot of "croust" for the crew Entered by Rory Pope and Andrew Scarborough of Shaftesbury, it was running in Class 8 with all the other rear engined kit cars and specials. Its crew felt they were a bit outclassed and that they wanted more power but the Bugrat doesn't way much and more power is never enough. Believe me, I know. At around 700kg, the Bugrat was much lighter than the donor The Bugrat was designed by Vince Wright, head of RV Dynamics, and took all its vital components from the old school rear engined variety of Skoda, the one that gave Skoda its reputation that allowed vari...

The Alfa badge caught our eye Here we have another Imp spotted at Tregrehan, this time in the late 1980s. This is how I always remember the paddock at Tregrehan. Muddy. It had plenty of cooling holes, retained the handy rear hatch for loads (engine access as it turned out) but rear arches of questionable aesthetics This Imp had an Alfasud engine and gearbox mounted behind the rear seats. My mate Jerry (that's him with the carrier bag in the photo) was in the process of building something similar (more on that another time) and spotted the little Alfa badge on the front, put two and two together and went to ask some well-informed questions. As so often happens on these occasions the answers were remarkably forthcoming considering it was a competition car under developing but - hey! - that's hillclimbing chaps for you. Look at those Rotoflexes! We were particularly interested to see that the Imp rear suspension had been retained and that standard Rotofles co...

The Allard J1 at Wilsey Down Rest Halt. Everyone else has gone. After being a non-starter in the Exeter due to illness (when Binky got the cold that I had before Christmas), Team Robert looked ahead with (even) extra enthusiasm to the Land's End. It proved cold but dry and we found a rare seam of form early on with a car going better than ever only for this unravel whilst waiting for Warleggan. Still we got going again, and made a big finish by cleaning first Blue Hills 1 then Blue Hills 2. Binky (Mr Robert Robinson-Collins to you) had been fettling the Candidi Provocatore Allard J1 beforehand. New innovations included freshly greased leaf springs in the suspension, new plugs, new needle jet and the removal of the phenolic heat shield under the carb. A quick blast around the block before we set off and the car was pulling better than ever. At Popham airfield, though, a headlamp wasn't working on dip and we had to take the lamp apart under a lamp post. The headlamp had...

The longer wheelbase and different sized wheels caught my eye This car is a bit of a mystery. Many years ago I sent a picture of it into the Imp club magazine in the hope that somebody would recognise it but there was no response. The nearside sill had been built up to restore strength to the chopped around shell and the passenger door ommitted to allow air to reach the radiator, which was in front of the engine but offset to the left. I don't know much about this Californian (or possibly a Chamois coupe) myself. I spotted it at a grasstrack event somewhere in Kent around 1990 when I lived up that end of the island. I was sufficiently impressed to spend 5 exposures on it, when film was a precious resource compared to today, but made no note of its drivetrain. Twin side draught Webers give some credence to my belief that it had a Ford crossflow where the back seat would've been I am guessing that it was a crossflow Ford using  a VW or Hewland gearbox. This c...

Stephen Cuff's Imp looked so good in black. Only in strong sunlight could you see that the front end was almost totally mesh for the rather - as it turned out - undersized radiator This year is the fiftieth anniversary of the Hillman Imp and since I've had a long standing association with these under-rated little cars there will be one or two featuring on Engine Punk over the next few months. From a distance it looked like any other Imp This particular example is unfortunately no more. It was built to prove a BOBO (balls out, brain off) TVR Tuscan engine that reputedly put out 450bhp from its 4.5 litres. The Imp was pretty well filleted to take the drivetrain and Jag back axle so wasn't really a Hillman Imp at all but still - whoar! though eh? I regret asking what front suspension this thing used. Judging from the track and lack of room in the front (note the cut out for the air cleaners!) I'm pretty sure it wasn't Imp. I saw it at Tregrehan H...