Lola Tags For Sale

[DJSILLS]

Chassis plates for T400 HU10, T530 HU3&HU10, T333 HU10 were for sale on EBAY until owner cancelled auction. He says he cancelled the auction because he found the owners of the cars and is negotiating with them privately. Chassis plates were sometimes removed and saved by a mechanic when a car was written-off which may be the case with these 4 tags. If these cars really exist, owners step forward and tell your story! The value is in the documentation, not the chassis plate.

[Johan]

My information is that none of those cars exist any longer.
The T333 was destroyed early in 1980, the T530 HU3 in July 1980, the T530 HU10 in the construction of the VDS and the T400 in 1975. The reason Jack Smith had the chassis plates is that he plucked them off wrecks or, in the case of HU10, because it was being substantially remodeled as its tub was used the create the VDS. This information is from Allen Brown of Oldracingcars.com

That is not to say that the tags are not valuable, or that a new chassis can't be constructed to re-chassis the vin tag. It does open up the possibility of mis-representation however. I would be happy to see the tags on cars at the race track, but unhappy to see them on a car at an auction house with no proper explanation. If my information is incorrect, please come forward with the correction. It is possible that pieces of the cars still exist and if so, what pieces ?

[DJSILLS]

Thank you for confirming what I suspected. I participated in the auction because I believe recreating a destroyed car might not be a bad thing if no one else has a claim. How are we going to have a Center-seat Can-Am race with only a few cars? However, the seller of the plates indicates that he was contacted by someone who knew the owners of the cars so I'm just trying to find the truth.

Anyone have a basket-case T333 for sale?

[Johan]

Center Seat Can Am Lolas are really great cars !

[Gerald Swan]

I'm sure there is no personal bias at all from Johan .

Gerald.

[Johan]

I HAD typed a 1000 word documentary on the T332, but during the proof read phase decided I was being a bore and changed the post to simply reflect my feeling that they are great cars.

[Gerald Swan]

Very, very nice indeed (why isn't there a jealousy emoticon ).

I'm glad I don't have to polish those wheels .

Gerald.

[driftwood]

I am personally against these tags being used to recreate a car
That car effectively "died" and its oarts where scrapped sold off for spare stp other car owners so IMHO if u do not have the pile of parts in any format in the yard/spare garage u do not have a car to rebuild

If the car was crashed on the race weekend and on monday new parts orderd from factory for the rebuild the plate can justifibly be placed onto the new tub and THAT is the continous car.

However it is highly likely that the cost of rebuilding teh crashed car was more than its inherant value so it was scrapped/sold at salvage value and either a new car was purchased from factory or if model was 1-2 years old the team may hav bought a used car from another team to race

I have not participated ( nor fully read it all) in the T70 continous new car run debate but i am also not in favour of any car maker creating new cars after the intial car build was carried out- it devalues the history of the exisiting cars and now i believe the shark nose 156 ferrari is being made
the lancia D70 was re made and the auto union car
IMHO these should be known as replica/recreations and not continous cars and not allowed to race in TRUE historic races but run in demos or kit car races
A williams fw07 8 TGP car is £250-300k i can build new car for half that but where is its history GP results etc

I know of a few cars that where written off and now 20 yrs later there are 2 or 3 of the same car same plate # racing around the world and not ONE of the owners can proove their cars true roots in either rebuilding teh tub with plate or having the scrap parts in a barn for all to view and proove to a blind man that this is the crashed car parts from the race

In the days gone past it was easier for a man to create a new car from the scrapped car as info was not freely available not the internet and many books can highlight the fraudsters trail of lies and deceit

The lola tags for sale should be placed in a scrap book If some one wanst to have the 333 or 530 car running go and buy 1 of the existing cars thats running

[Kingswood]

Having had this notice board just come to my attention re these Lola chassis tags, and, as two of these tags are now in my possession, I feel some comment on this is necessary.
Lola T530 HU3 was indeed crashed at the Road America round of the Canam
Series in 1980, with reasonably serious damage sustained. VDS had a second
T530 chassis, HU4, with which they carried on with for the rest of the series
The crashed HU3 was not repaired by VDS, and in fact the damaged tub was
used as a mock up buck when the bodywork for the VDS 001 was being made
The crash of this car was caused by the failing of a Gotti cast rear wheel center
so all of these brand of wheels that VDS had left were added to the scrap pile,
along with a lot of the other parts off the car. VDS fabricator, Ian Algie,
(a New Zealander, brought many of these parts back to New Zealand with
him at the end of the season. At that time New Zealand had a domestic
modified saloon series (Sports Sedans) in which he built and raced an Alfa Romeo
Alfetta with a VDS canam chevy engine fitted to it, behind the original firewall !!
It had much other Canam influence and parts in it’s buildup. Some of these parts
he sold, and other items were used in the car or retained. I have managed over a
period of time, to track down and purchase what he sold, and what he still had.
Ian cannot remember what happened to the HU3 tub, but because the tag ended
up with Jack Smith, the tub must have been at his shop after VDS were done with
it. Jack Smith did fabrication work for VDS, and in fact did some modifications
to the front of the HU10 tub when it was fitted with the VDS bodywork
Ian said, that at the time, money was no object what so ever to the Van Der Straatens
so they never worried too much about repairs to used items, and new parts were
never a problem with the budget they had, as there wasn’t one. This car would
probably have been repaired by a lesser team, but VDS just got on with their
new second chassis. I have wheels, front and rear uprights, steering rack,
bellhousing, calipers, axles, some gearbox castings and a few other sundry
suspension items and small parts, that he brought back to NZ.
We also have T530 HU5 in our ownership, which at one time was owned by
The Burke/Ratcliffe team, of whom owned three T530 Lolas, and raced two of
them in the English Thundersports series instigated by John Foulston, and run
through the mid eighties. They purchased everything that Lola had left from the
T530 program, some of which we ended up with, with the purchase of HU5
This includes much of an unassembled tub, and front suspension and many other
small items.
I feel that with all the original HU3 parts I have, along with the Lola sourced items
from the Burke/Ratcliffe purchase, I have a reasonable claim to HU3, albeit as a
rebuild, with a large percentage of Lola sourced items, along with the original items.

Early in the ’81 season, VDS decided to do a major rethink on their canam program,
and they purchased another T530, which was converted to VDS 001 spec’
This included a totally different bodywork, total redesign on the rear suspension,
underbody tunnels, and a bunch of other detail alterations. Tony Cicale and Trevor
Harris did the design , and the work was done by the Australian Murphy brothers and
Ian Algie. As mentioned prior, Jack Smith did some alterations to the tub, in the
area that Lola normally mounted the chassis plate, so one would assume that’s how
he ended up with the HU10 plate. I believe this plate is now with the owner of this
chassis, which surely is where it should be.

T400 HU10 was the F5000 car that both Jon Woodner and Danny Ongais used in the
1975 US F5000 series It was much modified from original specification and unloved
as most T400 Lolas were at the time. The story goes it was crashed badly by Ted
Field at a private test day. Ed Obrien, was involved heavily with Danny Ongais
before the arrival of Ted Field, and to a lesser extent after, through his Bell Electric
contracting company. He owned some of the Lolas that Danny raced before Interscope took over the budget. Ed was a bit of a hoarder of sorts, and stored
many parts left over from that era, some are good, some were banged up, as Mr
Ongais bent much Lola product. After several years of communicating with Ed,
who was a man of few words, I was able to purchase all of his parts stash, which
included a good selection of the rear end of the T400, along with a McLaren Engines
Detroit chevy from when Jon Woodner ran the car. I feel that, when combined with
the plate, I have as much of that car, as is possible today, the end result to be a
rebuild with many of the cars original items

These chassis plates came to light well after I had collected all theses pieces together,
so it was a bit of a strange twist of fate that they would turn up at that time
(If one so happens to be superstitious) Ed Obrien did happen to live about 5 minutes
drive from Jack Smiths shop, on the north side of San Diego.

[Johan]

Thanks for taking the time to address this.