Autosport International Show 2005

[Matra et Alpine]

Well just returned from Firday's trade day at the NEC.

Some great cars, nice layout in the WRC area and the Fords. With so few GT40s around it seemed that almost every oiriginal and new one was on a stand !!!

The Radical SR-8 is beautiful and as easy to sit in as the SR-3. And yes, it looks like we'll be getting one up at Knockhill for test Spoke to them to make sure UCP get the chance to be one of the first !! AND YES, they will be going back to Nordschleife with the SR-8 and quote "there will be a LOT more seconds taken off the record than you could imagine". It's as fast as they planned for

There is a beautiful conversion for Exige which turns the hardtop into a T-bar with gullwing on the roof section to ease entry. Closed it's barely discernable from the standard Exige.

The Powertec guys were great and really helpful and willing to talk openly about the engine. It IS tiny.

Also there were at least 4 other similar engines coming from companies all over Europe. One of whom does the prep for the Calaways raced over here. The 1000hp version of the engine is a work of art Siting beside their 2.2l V8 showed how miniscule the new engine is as the Callaway is "small".

Great trade show with a chance to discuss lots of issues with the leading specialists in turbo, engine management, suspension, damping, tyres and data logging. Could have spend easily a few grand

As it was came back with a few necessities for the 'new' rally car - yes we've sold the MGB GT. Roll on the Mini
Also, drove back a new acquisition of a Quantum Coupe kit car. All built already. Working so good that we did the 300 miles home in just over 3 hours

Lots of pics will follow after I get some sleep
However some to 'enjoy' for those unable to attend ......

[16-4Veyron]

Hahaha, great pics you got there!
Bad quality tho
Any cars?

[fa22_raptor]

That's a GREAT picture of the F1 cars of 2004! Too bad they missed out on either the McLaren MP4-19 or 19B as the MP4-17 hasn't been raced since 2002 (if I remember correctly). The MP4-17D was used at the start of 2003, but not the 17. If anyone's wondering what happened to the 18, it was tested but never raced as it had a multitude of problems involving chassis strength, overheating, engine integration etc.

Edit: Thinking about the RBR-01 on display there, that must really just be a repainted and rebadged Jaguar R5. I very much doubt that Red Bull would have released their 2005 car for display before it's even released!

[6'bore]

good pics, the quality could be better

[Matra et Alpine]

Originally Posted by fa22_raptor

Edit: Thinking about the RBR-01 on display there, that must really just be a repainted and rebadged Jaguar R5. I very much doubt that Red Bull would have released their 2005 car for display before it's even released!

Yeah, the biggest con in the car industry are the F1 cars shown at most shows and dealerships aroudn the world.
Most are mules and MOST have never turned a wheel in anger.
So other than showing 'livery' - and they are painted to "current spec" there's anot a lot to "being near and F1 car" these days. Espsecially since the Aero packages completely hide the engine. We "emabrrassed" a dealer a few years back by pointout out to HIM that the F1 car he was using to attract interst didnt' have an engine in it
Same with the WRC cars, look at the suspension - quite often it's stock !!!!

[Matra et Alpine]

Originally Posted by 6'bore

good pics, the quality could be better

well lighting and trying to capture the F1 wall was never going to make it easy. We were at the trade day for as purpose so I wasn't carry a tripod and lenses aroudn
And the "other" images were taken from afar. I wasn't going to be the "sad buggar" asking the dolly birds to pose and cuddle me for photos ( damn I'm getting old )
I'm fettling the new car today, so maybe tonight I'll get some other photos up.

[Coventrysucks]

Originally Posted by Matra et Alpine

Yeah, the biggest con in the car industry are the F1 cars shown at most shows and dealerships aroudn the world.
Most are mules and MOST have never turned a wheel in anger.

It isn't really a "con" as such.

An actual F1 car is a few £million, you aren't going to take a risk with that sort of investment as hand it over to some show organisers to hang up on a wall - what if it falls off? The organisers aren't going to be able to cover that ammount of insurance risk.

You wouldn't be able to see the technical bits anyway - so you aren't missing out.

BTW that McLaren is 2003 spec, so its older than the "Jag"

[Matra et Alpine]

Originally Posted by Coventrysucks

It isn't really a "con" as such.
.....
BTW that McLaren is 2003 spec, so its older than the "Jag"

That's about as close to the definition of a 'con' as you can get CS
"most" viewers won't know the difference and think they're looking at an F1 car !!
The cognoscenti know better and aren't fooled

[Pinin]

I'm going tomorrow. Do you have any car pics?

[Matra et Alpine]

Originally Posted by Pinin

I'm going tomorrow. Do you have any car pics?

Sorry guys, been busy with the new car....

Here's the Group C cars

[Matra et Alpine]

The Silk Cut Jag and the Cyclone Callaway 1000bhp engine. nice

Sports/saloon racers, WRC and Radical will come later .....

PS: There is a report each night at 8:30 (UK) on http://www.autosport.com/asiradio/autosport_radio.asx

[Matra et Alpine]

a few of the other race cars

[SPHFerrari]

pics look VERY noisey. did you have to bump up the ISO pretty high? autoshows are really hard to photograph. you should run em through some noiseware software.

[Matra et Alpine]

The GT40 and the Mini Marcos - 2 of the lowest and one of the smallest Le Mans cars

re the noise, yeah the problem was on the trade days the light didn't seem as brirght as I remembered it and the camera didn't have the range to cope and I didn't have tripod with me.( The Kodak is crap on flash as well - serious bleed, see the Silk Cut )

We were there to do some serious engineering and meetings, not just look at the cars. In reality we ran out of time and barely got a chance to see the exhibits Next year it will be a 2 day visit, too much time gets taken up on the trade stands

I also dont' ahve time to spend and only cropping and compressing to get them up there.
With more time, yep, they coudl be prettied up, hopefully guys with better camera and tripod/unipod will post better later.

The option was posting the pics as is, or not letting anyone see what was there. As this is a CAR page and not a photograpy site, I opted for the cars woudl be of interest. You decide

[paul]

just some pictures i took today, please exuse the small size!

i took so many and my cam became jammed!

only just got home about 2 hours ago but was a really good day and that callaway V16 was very nice alpina!