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THE STORY OF CARTUNE (TEESSIDE)
Feb 1st
MEET THE ‘BEETLES’ – CARTUNE TEESSIDE by STEVE HOLE
Photos from www.cartunevw.co.uk – Apal Corsa image from totalkitcar archive
Although only having a limited impact on the UK’s kitcar industry (they marketed the Belgium-made Apal models, Buggy and Corsa, in the UK in 1971-72), Cartune was once the UK’s leading Volkswagen Beetle specialists, which means they would have supplied many thousands of parts to owners/builders of Beetle-based kitcars.
Indeed, the company still exists, today.
Mike Griifin (centre),Leeds & England footballer Jackie Charlton (left) and Cartune (Teesside) branch manager, Peter Raybould
Let’s wind right back and trace the company’s history, though. The Cartune name was first registered More >
SIR STIRLING MOSS’ ELVA BMW MKVII S
Jan 18th
By Steve Hole
The Elva marque is a well-regarded one in specialist car terms producing some great roadcars and some superb racers. They produced the first Courier in 1958. Elva boss, Frank Nichols was regarded as a real character and sat at the same table as other industry mavericks such as Chris Lawrence, Jem Marsh.
Lambretta Trojan took over production of the Courier (the roadgoing Couriers basically) and moved production to their site in Croydon, Nichols cracked on with the development of a string of Elva racecars between 1963-65, in the shape of the Elva GT160 and a string of other BMW-powered More >
POSITIVELY BALTIC! EXCITING NEW KIT FROM LITHUANIA
Dec 28th
Exciting new arrival from Lithuania, no less and what’s more the makers claim that it is the Baltic State’s first original kitcar design.
Thanks to totalkitcar’s friend in Lithuania Arunas for the tip off
Called the RR01 from Rhino Racing the very styling sportscar with a lightweight GRP body and gullwing doors and is underpinned by an aluminium alloy monocoque fabricated from 6061 T6 and features a built-in rollover-bar (from 25 CrMo4.
Power comes from a reconditioned Audi R8-spec 5.2-litre V10 engine complete with Audi R8 (which means at least 550bhp is on the cards!) intake manifold. The kit contents are of very More >
DANNENHAUER & STAUSS’ BEAUTIFUL SPORT-KABRIOLET
Dec 22nd
Steve Hole tells the story of the glorious DANNENHAUER & STAUSS SPORT-KABRIOLET their take on the Porsche 356 theme
by Buch-t – Own work, GFDL, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16822660
This Stuttgart-based company was run by Gottfried Dannenhauser, a VW Beetle specialist and his son-in-law Kurt Stauss, a skilled panel-beater. They had worked with well-known Stuttgart-based coachworks Stuttgarter Karosseriewerk Reutter pre-war on the KdF Wagen.
by Buch-t – Own work, GFDL, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16822660
Reutter is also a very interesting company founded in 1906 by Wilhelm Reutter and soon joined by his brother Albert. For many years they built bodies for Porsche, culminating with the 356 from 1949.
By 1954 they More >
CHRISTMAS PRODUCT REVIEW – VAX SPOTWASH HOME CORDLESS
Dec 21st
£200 well spent. You get several attachments and mine came with various cleaning and treatment products although you need to check as VAX seem to have regular special offers that give added value
VAX UK asked us to try out their new SpotWash product …
Crikey, not sure about you but back in the seventies I remember my dad proudly spending half of his week’s wages on a big old ‘wet’ vacuum cleaner. A massive thing. He’d grown fed up with the lounge carpet being filthy and he was too tight to buy a new one, even though one of his mates More >
NOT KITS (OBVIOUSLY!) BUT THEY ARE BEAUTIFUL CHRISTMAS CRACKERS!
Dec 7th
The new Speed Six Continuation Series has begun its main testing phase before customer builds begin, after the completion of the final Blower Continuation Series customer car.
In period, the two cars raced as friendly rivals; the Supercharged 4½ Litre ‘Blowers’ were prepared and entered by the Hon Sir ‘Tim’ Birkin’s private team, while the Speed Six was Bentley’s winning works entry for Le Mans in 1929 and 1930.
Today, the build and preparation of both cars come under one roof in the workshops of Mulliner – Bentley’s bespoke and coachbuilding division. With all customer Blowers now complete and delivered, Mulliner’s focus More >
A TRIBUTE TO TONY HILDER, RIP – 1936-2023
Nov 30th
TRIBUTE TO TONY HILDER b April 1936 d October 2023 by STEVE HOLE
RIP TONY HILDER. Sitting in one of his ‘greatest hits’ the glorious McLaren M1A
I am very saddened to hear of the death recently of gifted designer, the gentleman that was Tony Hilder, aged 87.
The son of the renowned landscape artist and book illustrator (he also did some stunning wartime posters), Rowland Hilder OBE, once described as ‘the Turner of his generation’.
From a young age, Tony was building Austin Seven specials and he was always going to follow an artistic type of career with that pedigree and gained a first-class More >
THE STORY OF TAURUS PERFORMANCE TUNING
Nov 23rd
TAURUS PERFORMANCE TUNING
Steve Hole tells the story of the almost forgotten Taurus Performance Tuning operation. Along with Speedwell and Downton Engineering, they were one of the ‘big three’ of the many Mini-orientated tuning companies of the sixties.
Founded in 1961 by Ted Marchant, using his star sign as the company name. Ted worked at a BMC dealership in Holland Park in the service department and along with his friend and colleague, Ken Pacey, they would tune friends’ engines at the weekend and in the evenings.
Ultimately, they were urged to start their own business and this resulted in the foundation of Taurus More >
THE STORY OF SCUDERIA FILIPINETTI
Nov 16th
The Story of Georges Filipinetti and SCUDERIA FILIPINETT
Scuderia Filipinetti was one of those teams that always popped up in international motorsport (usually sportscars and world endurance, in this case) in the sixties without ever really setting the world on fire. However, their cars were always of the highest quality and immaculately turned out.
The man behind the team was a mercurial character, a chain smoker called Georges Filipinetti, who hailed from Switzerland where he was a very successful businessman who also had a passion for motorsport. Described as a property developer he was mainly known for being the Swiss importer for More >
TRIBUTE TO AN ICONIC COMPANY – GRAND PRIX METALCRAFT
Nov 1st
A marvellous subject for Classic Kit Cars & Specials is GRAND PRIX METALCRAFT, which belongs right up with the very best specialist car and racing car metal bashers such as Williams & Pritchard, Wakefields, The Robert Peel Company, Maurice Gomm, Shapecraft and Arch Motor & Engineering.
Founded in 1968, by brothers Peter and Bob (b 1933) Hingerton with their friend Alf Goodenough (b 1934) in North London.
The three had met at aircraft manufacturer Handley Page in Cricklewood in the mid-fifties where they served a seven-year engineering apprenticeship in the company’s metal workshop. They then moved to Rolls-Royce subsidiary coachbuilders Mulliner Park More >
