CHEV 3800 GT

VMX
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by VMX » Sat 05 Mar 2011, 17:16

Yes Iw as going top guess Bob's return was when DELTA happened.

You're right about how little the fuel crisis affected sales as for some time I think the 2500, 3800 & 4100 were top sellers.

Now one has to wonder how "lesser" a profile would GM have had should BvR not have initiated the Can Am ? 100 cars and history was changed for ever prior to that there were just the Vauxhall performance 4 cyl's as sporty cars, A-series Opel Manta etc which were'nt killer cars. You come second you forgotten what count's is winning every single race overall in 1973 and perfectly timed through fate as that in itself concluded the crazy performance era. I reckon it all ended in 1973 when the fuel crisis hit everything after that did'nt really have a scare-factor as they were heavier and safer, less guages maybe not as much stripes and exhaust pipes. XR8 150 kw one pipe out the back was just that efficient, aerodynamic but no scare factor.

The 3800GT and then 4300 surely would have gone a long way carrying that flame set alight by the Can Am's but that's the story at least we know why.

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Johann65
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by Johann65 » Sun 06 Mar 2011, 14:13

If we look at the HQ Manaro of 71 to 1974 that was produced with a 350 V8 and a Muncie box in OZ. Today it is one of the great classics.
Then also the V8 (Opel) Commodores than raced so well in OZ.
This means that GMSA due to poor decision making lost out for 10 years on some memorable opportunities available then.
Recalling that GM worked on a 5 year time-frame before a new model launch this means 2 generations of know how and initiative lost.
No wonder Bob Price was re-called to GMSA.

Paul, thank you for bring this info to the forum and just help hasten my Kommando V8 project that is reaching its conclusion. :D
VMX, thank you for carrying the conversation so well. :D
Thanks to the other forum members for allowing this historic info to flow :D

Lot of good old memories!!!! :D
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1966 Opel Rekord L CLASSIC SEDAN Current Project

VMX
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by VMX » Sun 06 Mar 2011, 15:39

The first time I went to PE which was for one of the Buffalo Rally's (Biker-convention :lol: ) before the "firewater" took control of matter's went out looking for Kemptston Road and such the first time we rode around there it was a huge complex even had it's own sports fields if I remember correctly. It was a pilgrimage which I had to return to which I did in 1986 when we were called up for a 2 month riot-camp. I met up with my pal again that worked in the design department there and such was able to go have a look into the process's such as component design for stuff that was altered for our conditions. Or other powerplants whatever the differences say between what was a Vauxhall overseas and Opel here maybe. We drove our Buffel's (Military troop carrier) past the plant every day on the way to New Brighton township for our shifts.

As can be read in Paul's acount every now and then something popped up but then faded away mostly provoked by those less influencial such as maybe the workers or like BvR that managed to get his idea worked through. Had the brass been as enthiusiastic we may have been far ahead of Ford the Escort's were common'r's cars BDA's were cheap and all over the place. GM had Blydenstein power at hand as used in the two local rally Chevair's, which overseas apeared in their hot hatch Vauxhall Chevette HS and HSR's. So as good as the MK1 and MK2 Escort's achieved those years they had the priviledge of "GM's absence" here. Again with the Can Am project one year 100 cars and that was the end of the BG Capri Perana and it's few years of "proper production" as South Africa's most iconic special. If that had not happened things would have been different. Had GM been as involved as Ford through the years I reckon things would have been drastically different in the General's favour just reading about the exploit's of the GM design crew those day's. Ford were also fortunate to have some clever people furhter developing their products such as Willie Meisner, BG and others.

That 3800GT project would surely have carried GM until the next era of the Chevair/Rekord who knows had the momentum kept going at the least the Rekord may have seen production as a V8 as the Holden's did. And even more special's such as the Brock Commodore.

Was Supreme Motors in Kempston Road there when you guys were at GM, opposite GM ?

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zahistorics
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by zahistorics » Sun 06 Mar 2011, 18:34

VMX wrote:.... Ford were also fortunate to have some clever people furhter developing their products such as Willie Meisner, BG and others....
I agree. This shows what you GM 'back room boys' achieved is even more remarkable.

Ford had Lotus, Cosworth and SVO avilable from the UK, and Meissner, Basil Green and others in South Africa.

GMSA just had a few internal petrolheads, fighting the 'racing police'.

993 Kadett
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by 993 Kadett » Sun 06 Mar 2011, 21:07

I do not dwell on the fuel crisis of 1973. My view was that yes it had an impact, but things would return in time and whether we liked it or not, both old rivalries and market forces would return to normal. Whoever did not over-react and came out punching once the dust had cleared, would have a good start. Bob Price had moved to the UK and DTV started doing just fine thank you in the middle of the fuel crisis. Bill Blydenstein and Gerry Marshall obviously had the same view….. Please explain to me why we had to give up our Dealer Team activity during the fuel crisis when Vauxhall (I mean Vauxhalll guys…….really!) figured it was a good time to hurt Ford. It was because they had the will to do it…..and .....Uncle Bob.

The 4300 and other Fantastic stuff:

This was a project that we kept under wraps even from general discussion in Experimental Engineering. The reason I did this was because I had learnt the hard way that whilst some of us did what we did out of sheer passion for the cause and the company…. there were others that did not. It was simply better not to let too many people know. I had one helper in the engine design group who fed me with the Argentinian drawings that had been secreted into the building…. But before we get into the 4300 lets take a look at the strategy:

As we moved into 1973 we had an opportunity to really hurt Ford in the area of Motorsport just the same way Vauxhall were about to in the UK. We could have put them on the ropes and beaten seven bells out of them for a good number of years. This would have moved GM in the right direction in appealing to younger buyers and whilst it may not have had an immediate effect on sales, I believed we needed to drive the issue home. Now lets take the Fuel crisis out of the equation for a moment.
The Can Ams were doing a great job of moving around the country running the dog and pony shows in 1973. But the sad thing was that apart from motor sport buffs and GM people in general to whom this was a great spectacle, that was about all it was.. We were not really getting to the larger market because the fundamental culture of the organization was unchanged.. One never saw the man in the street rushing to buy a Firenza instead of a Capri just because we had bolted a SBC brilliantly into a pram.

If we were going to do this thing, I thought, lets do it properly. Some calcs quickly showed that a 4300 would be able to knock the Perana into a kocked hat on the track. That would get attention, particularly if the base car (3800Gt) was doing the business en mass on the street. Ford would have to build another lot of specials perhaps a Capri with a Cleveland and a proper rear suspension to beat it. We assessed the likelihood of that and that idea had absolutely no chance simply because the Can Ams would clobber them if they tried ….and here is a fact:

For those of you who think that the works Can Am’s were running as quickly as they could, think again. The proto can am in 1972 broke into the 1m 33’s. Subsequent cars only ran 1 sec quicker than that over the next year. Basils attempt to break the 100mph Kyalami lap came marginally short with a 1m31.93sec (100mph = 1:31.89) and that in an old spec car. For the rest of the year the cars were used to ‘play’ with and no serious development work happened until the ”flag” car. (the 15” wheel spec did not make the cars quicker on a flying lap but did sort out long distance brake and tyre wear) I was privy to discussions in which serious development was not a consideration, simply because we were running at least 2 sec quicker than the privately run Fords “why waste time and Money”. Nothing irked me more at the time than the decision to build the # 2 car as an exact replica of the 1st car. No development just get a second car onto the track ASAP so we can go and Play….

Suspension roll centres, spring rates and stab bars were changed for the first time on the 3rd car. Its first quick lap was a 1:32.2 on endurance tyres on a hot November afternoon, the car straight out of the box. We had taken the car to Kyalami on the Tuesday afternoon prior to the 9 hour to give it a shake down and then straight back to the w/shop with a ‘shopping list’. With sprint rubber and some committed suspension and engine work, the “flag car “ would have run sub 1:30’s. My calcs showed the 4300 to be in the 1.32 region – also quicker than the Fords. For those who find this hard to believe….take a peek at the lap times of Ben Morgenrood’s 4100 in 1978 after the Asthmatic Olympics (group two regs) had been terminated and carburetion made free that year… it was into the 1:34’s…. that in a car with 200cc less engine capacity, a 9 port head, 110 extra KG’s and a std gearbox. I rest my case on two counts…. 1. The 4300 would have kicked butt and 2. what an irony that a GM product had to go out of production and be run by a privateer to become the fastest saloon car in south Africa..... 6 years after it had been launched onto the market in the first place……..????? I cannot begin to describe to you the frustration I felt at Kyalami the day Ben’s car ran quickly for the first time…Grrrrrrrr


I will be making some pretty bold statements about Ford’s capabilities in the 70’s (or more to the point the lack thereof) in future posts, so before getting into hot water let me say this:
I was always someone who got to know the enemy very well indeed and one of my few real talents was in the area of vehicle specs and the ability to assess potential. I was the kind of geek who knew every last detail down to what valve spring pressures Ford ran on what engines. As a result of that you will see that whilst I am not a Ford man of any description, I had respect for the guys in motorsport at the blue oval……But as the 70’s arrived, guys like Bernie Marriner, Dick Crosby and a host of others looked into a pretty bare cupboard. The days of the BDA – BDG were kind of over for track racing due the local asthmatic regs and this area was Fords strong territory. The V6 Ford I knew was basically a converted Diesel engine and therefore a compromised petrol engine. In a straight shoot out it was never going to dominate a properly built chevy 4 cyl of similar engine capacity. That was cast in stone for me and as these scribblings will divulge, I think Ford got away very, very lightly in the 70’s, simply because GMSA did not get involved on a longer term basis.
Firstly, for those of you who refer to the chev 4 cyl as “tractor engines” (& I don’t mean you VMX because I know you share the same view as I do) is it not strange that the L4 and L6 chevy’s were designed by the same team that did the SBC. In fact a 2.5 (or 153) is exactly half a 307 and con rods, pistons and valves are interchangeable with various SBC engines. The SBC is hardly a tractor engine is it? Yet the Ford guys tend to think that their V6 is a more sophisticated machine…. when it was, in fact, designed as a diesel and Ford were originally going to run it as both a petrol and diesel. I happen to know that as fact from Ford literature….. but for anyone who may doubt that, just take a look at the crankshaft journal diameters and you will see just how large they are. Journal surface speeds are so high at high rpm that they border on self destruct and crankshaft frictional losses are higher than they should be for that size engine, great for a Diesel but not so clever for a high revving petrol engine. Does that make a V6 a crappy engine? No it does’nt, but it does put into perspective the fact that of the two, the Ford is in fact the Tractor engine not the Chevy.

For my next post I want to take you into the world of the L4 Chevy and what was going on in experimental engineering and how a Firenza L4 could have taken on the Capri V8’s as well especially on short tracks.

See you Tuesday …travelling again tomorrow.

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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by Johann65 » Sun 06 Mar 2011, 21:18

VMX wrote:That 3800GT project would surely have carried GM until the next era of the Chevair/Rekord who knows had the momentum kept going at the least the Rekord may have seen production as a V8 as the Holden's did. And even more special's such as the Brock Commodore. Was Supreme Motors in Kempston Road there when you guys were at GM, opposite GM ?
I'm trying to do what GM should have done then!! I was a naughty Barstard then and had I not done some bad things, I would most probably would have carried on at GM. Joined the Air Force and became a Flight Sergeant and did the round about.

Supreme Motors was not there in my time. Only my mate Harry Mears Jnr with Harry's Garage on the Corner of Uitehage and Kempstons Road. His dad Harry Mears Snr, was the Spares Manager at Brooks Motors (Pontiac Bedford and Vauxhall) next to Williams Hunt and Brooks (Opel, Chevrolet, Oldsmobile and Buick). Opposite the old Lions Hotel. NB!!!!

PS! the GM sports ground was home to one of the best Baseball Clubs in South Africa!
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VMX
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by VMX » Sun 06 Mar 2011, 22:15

993 Kadett wrote: The V6 Ford I knew was basically a converted Diesel engine and therefore a compromised petrol engine. In a straight shoot out it was never going to dominate a properly built chevy 4 cyl of similar engine capacity. That was cast in stone for me and as these scribblings will divulge, I think Ford got away very, very lightly in the 70’s, simply because GMSA did not get involved on a longer term basis....the Ford is in fact the Tractor engine not the Chevy....
:lol: :lol: :lol: converted diesel engine :lol: :lol: :lol: excellent ! :lol: :lol: :lol: anyway no offence this is our thread even if there are just three self-confessed GM obsessives induldging in some good old stories.

The Essex may not be a crappy engine or theoretically good for reliablility etc. but is it true that in the 70's the Army considered and tried out some Noddy cars with the Essex ? I was told that they stuck with the General's 153ci idea and reliable they were moving tons of armourplated 4 wheel tanks through the Angolan bush. I swear by the 2500 seen then go fast never seen one give up we never been without one since 1975 !

993 your memory is so sharp as exactly that which you say about the potential of the Dealer Team cars and the second built just like the first, not better and, it is told by the man himself that they only went as fast as needed and would turn up the game had Ford or anyone taken up the challenge. The flag car was upping the game after starting at the back of the grid he had I think Jochen Mass in his sight's, only using 6000 rpm, planning to up it to 7000-7500 rpm

At the next event which you also attended you should recall that both the by then aged blue/white car still managed 1 min 22,9 and the flag car 1 min 22,5 on endurance rubber ! That was about 2 seconds faster than the fastest Perana back then.

At first I thought Morgenrood's 4100 was not going to impress until I saw it at a Kylami race with creative bodywork and all it was most impressive.

You also correct about Vauxhall they carried the HC model range deep into the 70's by mid 1975 the last Firenza's were being cleared off the floor to be replaced by those facelift 1300, 1900 and Hatch models. Baby Bertha was built around 1975 I think and ran on a couple of years humiliating everything.

I was waiting for that "L4" story asked around and until now nobody could tell me but what I was thinking is that they were going to take on bigtimers in 1974 with the 4 cyl had the Team not disbanded. Which may just have prolonged the Firenza shelf-life.....

993 Kadett
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by 993 Kadett » Tue 08 Mar 2011, 09:57

Firstly guys well spotted.. been moving around too much, the return of Bob Price was to get Delta going and just a small measure of the man is to take a look at the company sales graph for the 18mths after Delta started. Mind boggling to think that they had no new product but things started to happen immediately. I don’t have the detail any more but remember it well so if anyone has the info.... love to see it again.

I want to spend some time on the L4&6 series of Chev engines and will do that on a separate post, but before I do that some info on the 4300 engine.

We knew from info coming out of Argentina that the 4.0 L racing version of the engine was both powerful and reliable. An assessment of the power data, 407bhp @7400rpm showed that we had enough power to run Kyalami at around 1.33sec with a lightweight coupe bodied 1245.

The target initially had been to be able to run at under 1:30 at Kyalami and have a go at replacing the Can Ams altogether as a backstop. This would have been easily possible with a 302 cid Straight Six using that Argentinian piece of magic. The 302 L6 was a 292 bored to 100mm from the std 98,425mm. We obviously could not use the 292 Block because it has a deck height some 45mm taller than the std L6 and weighed a ton…..BUT with a little surgery on the local 230/250cid block we could get the 292 crank to work. Pistons and rods would have to be aftermarket forgings but the assembly would have gone together to make 300 bhp street car.
Calcs on the block stresses though, indicated that this was a tricky option and would require serious development work with particular attention paid to the block rigidity and crankshaft harmonic damper. 465 bhp at 6600r/min looked to be easily attainable with mountains of torque…… BUT….. I have described the nature of the company at that time and as I said I had to be very very careful who I chatted to about what we intended to do. I did however have one sworn confidant in the Engineering group and looking at the project we both would have given our eye teeth and other bodily parts to have a go at it….. and very nearly attempted to build a nine port version of such a package without anyone knowing.

Sense prevailed, unfortunately, and the 4300 option looked like a reasonable alternative.

Bore: 101mm Forged flat tops
Stroke: 89.662mm (stock)
Capacity: 4310cc (263cid)
Cyl Head: GM ARGENTINA
Carbs: 52mm Weber Side draught (specials)
Exhaust: 2 X Tubular . 3 into 1 short stubs.

The engine block was stock 4100 but with casting thickness increased on bores, Block deck, pan rail and main journal webs. Weight increase on the block estimated to be 4 Kg.
That was the plan and orders had been placed to obtain the cylinder heads and crankshaft harmonic dampers, the two parts critical to both power and reliability.

That is as far as the 4300 project got…….we never did build a prototype engine….sad eh.

I do, however, feel the need to build a 302 L6 for old times sake using a nine port head and some throttle bodies. Street bhp an easy 350. will open a thread on the L4 tomorrow.

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zahistorics
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by zahistorics » Tue 08 Mar 2011, 15:01

That magic 302 L6 motor would make for an awesome classic racer. And it would probably fit into the fairly relaxed local rules. Being a non-V8 may also set the cat among the pigeons.

Use a 4 door shell - or maybe a station wagon just for fun (seeing as it was the station wagon that killed the GT).

Keep the stories coming, these are some of the best threads ever. I have some interesting recollections when we get onto the L4 engines and associated cars.

993 Kadett
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Re: CHEV 3800 GT

Post by 993 Kadett » Wed 09 Mar 2011, 09:17

John, the L6 302 is a great package and produced huge mid range torque, great for a Chevelle street car restoration as well, also cheap as chips to build one. You only need A/market rods to go with the bigger big end journals and a good set of forged pistons, niether of which are very pricey. I gaurantee you, mod for mod, that package will match an equivalent SBC in street use, even with a nine port head.
A comment on the Can Am times VMX. The 22.9 you quote is Nols' pole time. Of the four drivers there that day Nols was on average about 0.2 -0.3 a lap quicker than the rest. Dont forget Basil was the third driver that day in the blue car after the new car broke a sideshaft.The Blue car also had the new stab bars but not the roll centre change. (I have the detail of the changes for those that would like to know)) The new car was about 0.9 sec quicker per lap in real time but suffered from the springs being too hard. I was standing next to Frank Gardner as he had just got out of the car in practice and he used some pretty colourful language to describe that the new spring pack was a little over the top. The general feeling was that on sprint rubber and final suspension set up the new car would run consistant 20,s. A wilder cam & 3.7 final drive (In Cape Town we used a 3,5) would have helped exits out of Old BP and Hoals as well. Those cars were nowhere near running to their full potential at the end of 1973. P

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