MATICH'S F5000's - Fantastic Article

[Ray Bell]

That's Peter Mabey (correct spelling) in the car in this shot...

Peter now lives way up north.

[bry3500]

[Mark Bisset]

Bry,

Thanks for posting, i hadn't seen the second part of the interview, all the stuff about modified fuel cams is interesting, and not stuff Derek and i covered when we chatted about the article.

Its all indicative of FM's attributes and sensitivity as a a test and development driver. Goodyear would not have handed out testing contracts to every 'tom, dick and 'arry' it would be interesting to know how many such arrangements were 'on foot' at the time.

One anecdote Derek mentioned i forgot and must plug into the article; FM tested the A50 @ W Farm, Derek having wheel aligned the car the night before on the very sophisticated gear the team had. FM did a couple of laps and declared the toe setting was out on one side of the car. Derek protested, but relented when FM was adamant despite the care taken that they were out...sure enough they were, not a lot but enough to a very sensistive driver...which he was!

Finally the fuel cam story reminds me of a similar one in relation to Jack Brabham. The DFV was famously abrupt in its power delivery early on. Brabham used the engine for the first time in '69...and quickly modified the fuel cams of his engines to improve the 'drivability' of the Cossie. One of these cams was left in an engine returned to Cosworths' for rebuilding, the engineers quickly realised 'old Jack' had improved their design, the cam was replicated and then incorporated into all engines issued to customers from that point...

Clever Aussie Driver Engineers!...

m