UKDRN

Do you own or know the whereabouts of a piece of UK Drag Racing History or just want info on a particular machine.

Moderators: timetravel, ukdrn

 #946  by sjb
 
just see a pick of it on the opening page and wondered what happened to it as i see it for sale a couple of years ago at the nostalgia drags or hot rod drags.Did anyone buy it?think it was the body only?not sure.
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 #949  by plymoutharrow
 
Might be wrong, but does Colin Stevens Own it who does the T shirts? Can anyone help?

 #951  by muddytalker
 
Yes, thats right. Wild Bunch racer and T-shirt entrepreneur Colin Stevens (C&P Nitro T Shirts) is currently restoring what was left of the body and the chassis. From the photos I have seen Colin’s got quite a job on his hands although thanks to a few generous people out there Colin’s making steady progress.

Apparently the chassis had been cut about was in a terrible state. Who ever had had the car previously clearly didn’t know what he was doing. and as for the Avenger body, that had been abused over the years as Colin has revealed several coats of paint applied from the its original DB Motors paint job to Ollie Burn’s ‘Ollie’s Folly’ and back again to DB Motors. Having carried out some research for Colin this time last year the original owners, Kevin Burrows, Jeff Morris and Rob Spence bought the car back again towards the end of the 1974 season to run alongside the team’s new ‘Malibu Express’ Top Dragster, but records show that the car never turned a wheel in anger again.

Colin used to race the Buick ‘nail head’ slingshot dragster ‘Gold Digger’, but when that went to pastures new, Colin had to have something else to tinker with other than selling T- shirts!.

I'll get the 'Oblivion' Family Tree CD out I did for Colin and see what other info I managed to find.

 #966  by muddytalker
 
Here as promised from the original ‘Oblivion’ Junior Funny Car Family Tree CD plus some colour photos from the original 1973 Custom Car feature.

‘As with many of our drag racers, the team of Kevin Burrows, Jeff Morris and Rob Spence, came together after the early Drag Fests at Blackbushe and Woodvale, and subsequently debuted their first offering in 1969. Equipped with a small block Chevy, the team recorded respectable times around the ten second mark with the first ‘Malibu Express’ slingshot dragster.

One novel idea with the dragster was the fully enclosed cockpit which made it look rather smart and very different, but by the International at Santa Pod in 1971 they decided it was time to sell and to turn their attention to building a junior style Funny Car. Named ‘Oblivion’, the new car was powered by a stock 283ci Chevy engine (4.7 litre) with Fuelly heads and Hilborn injection. The body was an all in one fibre glass Hillman Avenger shell of stock length and dimensions, and totally home built.

The chassis was built from 1 3/8” 14 gauge tubing and 1 5/8” 12 gauge for the main rails and roll cage. Wheelbase is 108 inches, with the front axle carrying 100E spindles and home built hubs with Pirelli shod Avenger wheels. The rear end was a Chevy item with 4.11 gears spinning 8.90 Kelly Springfield’s on 8 ½ “ American Mags. Jag discs take care of the braking with the mandatory drag chute for extra safety. Steering came from a Standard 10 box, and the whole car weighed in at 10cwt.

Meantime, Jeff had been trying to get some form of sponsorship to offset some of the running costs. One interested party was Martin Dilks, owner of D.B. Motors, a local speed shop in the Leicester area. This gratefully netted a trailer for ‘Oblivion’ in return for advertising on the sides of one of the quickest and fastest Competition Altered’s of its time.
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Splashed across the January 1973 issue of ‘Custom Car’ magazine, and staring the season off with an 11.9 at 110 mph, it wasn’t long before ‘Oblivion’ started to make some serious mph by setting the class speed record at Santa Pod in July 1974, even though it was done running on pump gas.

Still, the quest to go faster was there, and ‘Oblivion’ was sold to Lawrence ‘Ollie’ Burn to make way for a new rear engined injected small block Chevy powered rail to run in Top Dragster.

As far as event records go, Laurence Burn’s purchase from D.B. Motors came midway through the 1973 season. On reflection, Lawrence feels that he made a mistake of not taking immediate delivery of the car, but instead allowed the owners to race until the end of the season.

Laurence only completed three events of the 1974 season before concentrating his efforts on his wife Liz’s dragster, the ex-Bruce Brown/Roz Prior ‘Age Machine’ slingshot. Although the car never did complete a full pass under power at these events, the altered was sold back to D.B. Motors towards the end of the 1974 season to run alongside the team’s new ‘Malibu Express’ Top Dragster, but records show that the car never turned a wheel in anger again.’


Now that there's some interest in the old girl I will e-mail Colin to see if he would like to give us a progress report and somemore up todate photos.

 #967  by muddytalker
 
Here's another shot of the car at Santa Pod taken by our very own TimeTravel.
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 #968  by sjb
 
cant wait to see this out!
and thanks for all the info
I couldant believe it when i see it for sale
good to no its in good hands

 #1012  by gold digger
 
Hi, I do have whats left of Oblivion. The car has not turned a wheel since 1974 and to be honest was very very sad, nothing basically but body and frame. The body had green mould growing on it and although complete it is in a bad way. When i saw the poor old thing I knew I could not let it go as it would have been cut up, these old race cars cannot keep being cut up, its our history.

The body needs more time and money than I can give it at the moment, I am not great with bodywork so I have put that aside for a while. The chassis is with B+J Racecars at the moment for a new re creation of the fuel tank and some front end work. I am not sure when it will be out, I am in no rush and its more a when I have money I do a bit more. I am looking for a pair of 8.5-10inch x15 inch 5 stud x4.5 slot mags at the moment if anyone has some. I still have the original Midland Metalic fronts.

The car is not the one that was for sale at the Nostalgias, that was the HILLBILLIES Avenger body now owned by Darren West.

Hope this helps, I will try to post some pics soon

 #1018  by ukdrn
 
What design will the car have when it's finished Colin?
Here is another pic of the car on the track.
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 #1024  by gold digger
 
It will come out 1st as an altered as I can't afford or have the skill to restore the body and chassis at the same time. It will be a Golddigger again as an altered anyway, then maybe Oblivion again or Golddigger. The plan is to get the chassis running and safe, get to know the car and then step it up gradually. I have tried a few places locally for quotes on the body but its not cheap[/img]

 #1049  by muddytalker
 
Just found this photo Colin sent when I ran the ‘Oblivion’ Family Tree for him. It clearly shows the extent of the restoration needed to get the chassis up to spec again after Colin first acquired the old girl.

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