11.

1 Elfin, Bluebird and Norman Australian Land Speed Records

Elfin Sports Cars Pty Ltd is the oldest continuous Australian racing car manufacturing company,
founded by Garrie Cooper and manufacturing sports and racing cars since 1957. The original factory
was located at Edwardstown in suburban Adelaide and is currently located at Braeside, Melbourne.
Elfin is currently owned by Tom Walkinshaw, who also owns Holden Special Vehicles. Elfins have
won 29 championships and major Grand Prix titles, including two Australian Driver's Championships,
five Australian Sports Car Championships, four Australian Tourist Trophies and three Formula Ford
titles. World Formula One Champion James Hunt raced an Elfin, as did French Formula One driver,
Didier Pironi. Elfin also took out the Singapore Grand Prix, twice won the Malaysian Grand Prix and
also won the Australian Formula Two Championship in 1972 with Larry Perkins in an Elfin 600B.

Between 1961 and 1964 Elfin made twenty open-wheeled single-seater Formula Junior and Catalina
vehicles. The two models differed only in minor specifications with the majority built as Formula
Juniors. International Formula Junior class rule require production-based engines with a either
1000cc/360kg car or 1100cc/400kg car, using production gearbox cases and brakes. I understand
that the Elfin Formula Juniors were originally fitted with Cosworth Ford Anglia (105E) 1100c engines,
though the Catalinas were fitted with a larger 1475cc Ford engine to meet Australian class rules.

Elfin Catalina Chassis Number 6313 was built for Dunlop Tyres for use on the Lake Eyre salt to
determine certain characteristics for the tyres that were fitted to Donald Campbell's Bluebird land
speed record attempts during 1963. The Elfin was fitted with 'miniature Bluebird tyres" and driven over
the salt to determine factors such as co-efficient of friction and adhesion using a Tapley meter. The
Tapley Brake Test Meter is a scientific instrument of very high accuracy, still used today. It consists of
a finely balanced pendulum free to respond to any changes in speed or angle, working through a
quadrant gear train to rotate a needle round a dial. The vehicle is then driven along a level road at
about 20 miles per hour, and the brakes fully applied. When the vehicle has stopped the brake
efficiency reading can be taken from the figure shown by the recording needle on the inner brake
scale, whilst stopping distance readings are taken from the outer scale figures.

It is believed that the Elfin was running a (relatively) normal pushrod 1500cc Cortina engine with A3
cam and Weber DCOE carburettors for the Bluebird support runs. The photo below was taken on
Lake Eyre and shows Donald Campbell alongside the red Elfin holding aloft a wind speed meter, with
the 3,320kW Bluebird-Proteus CN7 to the right.





The photo to the right shows Ted Townsend, a Dunlop tyre fitter
seconded to the Bluebird team in the Elfin.

Bluebird went on to set the world land speed record at Lake Eyre at
403.10 mph (648.73 km/h) on July 17
th
1964. Campbell has been
quoted as saying We've made it we got the bastard at last.


Some nice history, but I guess you are wondering where the Normans are, right? When the Bluebird
record attempts were completed, the Bluebird Tyre designer Mr Andrew Mustard (of North Brighton,
Adelaide) bought the Elfin from Dunlop. The Elfin was in quite poor condition as a result of its work on
the Lake Eyre Salt, with the magnesium based suspension struts quite corroded. A restoration took
place over the end of 1963 and into 1964, and a single Norman supercharger fitted (see, told you this
story had Normans ). The vehicle was then used at Mallala Race Circuit, and for record attempts for
1500cc vehicles in 1964 using the access road alongside the main hangars at Edinburgh Airfield
(Weapons Research Establishment) at Salisbury, South Australia. The northern gates of the airfield
were opened by the Australian Federal Police to give extra stopping time. At this time the Norman
supercharged Elfin had:
a single air-cooled Norman supercharger, driven by v-belts and developing around 14psi. The v-
belts were short lived, burning out in around thirty seconds,
four exhaust stubs, with the middle two siamesed,
twin Amal carburettors,
a heavily modified head by Alexander Rowe (a Speedway legend and co-founder of the Ramsay-
Rowe Special midget) running around 5:1 compression and a solid copper head
gasket/decompression plate. The head had been worked within an inch of its life, and shone like a
mirror. The head gasket on the other hand was a weak spot, lasting only twenty seconds before
failing. As runs had to be performed back-to-back within an hour, the team became very good at
removing the head, annealing the copper gasket with an oxy torch and buttoning it all up again...
inside thirty minutes.

The Norman supercharged Elfin, operated by Mustard and Michael McInerney set the following
Australian national records from its Salisbury runs on October 11
th
, 1964:
the flying start kilometre record (16.21s, 138mph),
the flying start mile record (26.32s, 137mph), and
the standing start mile record (34.03s, 106mph).
The Australian national records are established (or broken) in conformity with the rules established by
the Confederation of Australian Motorsport (CAMS). A national record is said to be a class record if it
is the best result obtained in one of the classes into which the types of cars eligible for the attempt are
subdivided, or absolute record if it is the best result, not taking the classes into account. The Norman
supercharged Elfin falls into Category A Group I class 6. This class is based on the Fdration
Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) category system, and consists of automobiles (not necessarily
production) with reciprocating two- or four-stroke supercharged engines of 1100-1500cc capacity, with
free fuel. For the curious, our grey motored Norman blown early Holden is eligible for Category A
Group I class 8 (2,000-3000cc).
In 1983 CAMS made a decision to fully align the Australian national land speed records with the FIA
requirements. The pre-1983 records were not fully compliant with all the FIA requirements, and hence
have been set in stone they can no longer be challenged. This means the Mustard/McInerney
records above are still standing. However, the decision meant that all available records were declared
vacant and able to be filled under the newly adopted FIA requirements for a speed record attempt.
Two of the Mustard/McInerney type records have since been set as follows:
the flying start kilometre record (set by S Brooke in a Daihatsu Charade Turbo, 26.76s in 1985),
and
the flying start mile record (again set by S Brookes Daihatsu Charade Turbo, 40.03s in 1985).
The third Mustard/McInerney type record (for the standing start mile) does not have an Australian
record holder. This is the case for many of the new (post 1983) classes, where no national records
have been set (since 1983). Before you get too excited about going out and claiming all those
records, there is a catch. A typical national record attempt is likely to cost between $5000 and
$10,000... plus the vehicle costs.

The photo below shows the Elfin in its 1964 guise at Salisbury, with McInerney in the foreground with
his hands over the Amal carburettors.

Directly below the four black exhaust stubs is what appears to be the red Norman supercharger, with
an alloy end plate and brass welsh plug facing the camera. Note that in this state of tune the engine
was able to be held together for only short periods (like nine minutes...) with only twenty seconds
being typical with the car at full noise.

The photo below shows McInerney (in glasses to the left) with Mustard in the cockpit.


This was not the Elfins only association with Norman superchargers. The Elfin was later modified to
have:
dual air-cooled Norman superchargers (identical to the single Norman used earlier), mounted over
the gearbox. The superchargers were run in parallel, with a chain drive. The chain drive was driven
by a sprocket on the crank, running up to a slave shaft that ran across to the back of the gearbox
to drive the first supercharger, the down to drive the second. The boost pressure in this
configuration had risen to 29psi,
two 2" SU carburettors (with four fuel bowls) jetted for methanol by Peter Dodd (another Australian
Speedway legend and owner of Auto Carburettor Services),
a straight cut 1
st
gear in a VW gearbox. The clutch struggled to keep up with the torque being put
out by the Norman blown Elfin, and was replaced with a 9 grinding disk, splined in the centre and
fitted with brass buttons... it was either all in, or all out.

In the twin Norman supercharged guise the vehicle was driven by McInerney to pursue the standing
mile, standing 400m and flying kilometre records in October 1965. Sadly, the twin-Norman
supercharged Elfin no longer holds those records, as the mile and flying kilometre (together with a
few more records) were set at this time by Alex Smith in a Valano Special. The Valano Special is a
Valiant 225 slant-six powered car with a fibreglass Milano body made by JWF Fibreglass. The
pictures below show Smith in the Valano at Templestowe Hill Climb (once Australias steepest paved
road at a gradient of 1:2 or 22) in Victoria, a year later in 1966.

The day following the 1965 speed record trials (Labour Day October 1965), McInerney raced the twin-
Norman supercharged Elfincar at Mallala as a "Formule Libre" as there was insufficient time to revert
the engine back to Formula II specifications. The photo below shows the McInerney in the Elfin at
Mallala Race Circuit:



The car was used for training the South Australian Police Force driving instructors in advanced
handling techniques, and regularly used at Mallala and other venues (closed meetings for the Austin 7
club, etc). It was sold by Mustard to Dean Rainsford of South Australia in 1966, though sadly without
the Norman supercharger (by then it was running the mildly tuned Cortina engine again). The vehicle
continued adding to its racing history, with Rainsford droving it to a win in the 1966 Australian 1
Litre Championship Round 4 (the Victorian Trophy, Sandown, Victoria on the 16
th
of October 1966).

In the ensuing twentysix years it passed through nine more owners before Rainsford re-acquired it in
1993. After many years of fossicking, Rainsford has located the original Mustard/McInerney
supercharged engine used in the 1965 record attempts. The engine is located in Gawler, South
Australia (not far from the record track at Salisbury) ... sadly without its Norman supercharger see
photo below.