Okrasa Special

[Barry]

Thank you: just got back in from an evening session kicking ideas around. We're making discoveries all of the time, not all ideal, but all useful.

Just now and then we get a glimse from a certain angle and get a real sense that there is a correctly proportioned shape trying to get out. Blink, and it's gone again.

Steve did try one thing, which he may or may not post up, depending on how brave he's feeling. Suffice to say it threw up quite a few issues / pointers. A useful excercise that probably won't go any further than duct tape musings ....

I'll let Steve post up his thoughts on the evening since he's the man with the pictures .

[steve wright]

Barry and I did indeed spend a tremendously useful evening up at the workshop last night working on the design of the rear of the car. In some respects it was a really successful evening, in others it was frustrating, as we have definitely tripped over a fairly fundamental issue which unbeknownst to us has been impacting the design of the car.

The good news is we’ve made strides with the design as we now know the rear arches are definitely too narrow (i.e. they need to be wider when looking directly down onto them, the “small arse” syndrome has almost gone, with the car no longer looking like it’s on tiptoes, and the rear Kamm tail lip really looking fantastic when viewed in the flesh from all angles, but… (and you can hear it in this entire paragraph can’t you) we’ve realised the roof of the car is too big for the rear of the car.

We always knew buttresses solved many of the problems associated with the transition from the roof to the rear of the car, the GTO uses exactly this to good effect:


But what we didn’t realise is that the lower corners of the rear window drop a very long way down to the base of the roof, and the roof width itself is proportionality far wider as a percentage of the rear of the car than most designs that are considered classics. For example, look at how narrow the rear of a 911 or 356 are in comparison, noting how much actual (and visual) width the rear arches get. On the Special the rear arches are 4 inches wide measured from the edge of the C-pillar to the outer edge of the wing, whereas on the 356 it’s 13 inches! Check out these images of a Chevron, 250LM and Porsche 910 to see this in the extreme:




The only car I can find that still looks great design-wise is the Lotus, but even that suffers from this issue to a degree:


So we have an official problem as Barry puts it! If we widen the rear arches towards the centreline of the car then we need to also raise them or lower the boot lid to allow the width in. The former then makes the rear arches look frog-like from side on, the latter spoils the transition from roof to boot. I crudely added buttresses:



And it made a real difference to the rear of the car, transitioning better roof to rear, narrowing the rear window and shrinking the effect of the wide roof, but it didn’t work when viewed in profile. Interesting idea though. Barry suggested sectioning the Ghia roof at the rear to make it narrower (just an evenings work apparently to do that in the steel…!) but I don’t feel it’s appropriate to mess with what David Small created.

And before any of the exponents of the concept of a different rear on the car cry out, it makes no difference: the rear treatment would not get away from the fact that the rear of the roof is too big (visually) for the rear of the car.

So the only other alternative I see is to widen the rear arches outwards. This probably isn’t a bad thing as the wing to wheel spacing is marginal already with 4.5 inch rims, but I am worried about it looking frog-like. This seems like the best option though, look how Ghia themselves dealt with this issue:


The width of the rear arches is significantly wider than the Special, but the Ghia always looked under-tyred in standard form. On reflection I remember suggesting to Barry we go with the 356 Abarth GTL rear arches which have a lovely aggression to them but with Macauleys renditions we thought they looked a little too contrived. It might be time to resurrect these, and think about slightly wider rear rims and tyres as well as spacers.

Either way we both know we have realised the extent of our design competence. Al (Pandora) has offered to assist with 3-D sketches and scale mock-ups and I think we’ve naturally reached this stage. Barry and I could continue to play and fiddle, but what we really need is someone to validate the big design ideas and see that we’re not inadvertently breaking design principles, and also help us figure out what we do with the rear roof section (oddly the front is fine, and consistent with most other beautifually designed cars like the 911, 356, Dino, etc).

The journey (and it is definitely a long and winding one) continues…!

[Pandora]

I'm not sure i agree about the proportions being out, but mindful of retaining the originators intent (and our conversation about replacement glass) i'd suggest trying to Add 1" of metal along the top of the arch and along the doors upper surface to widen the car and keep the proportions? it could run out towards the front. Just beefing out the rear wings might work, but the result will be more brutal/ purposeful looking than sleek.

What we need is a model....
Al

[Pandora]

Oh, and I recently had a set of damaged Chevron B8 panels I was going to restore..... I woke up, smelled the coffee and sold them off sharpish. we could have had a deal.......

Oh. and don't be swayed by the proile of the cars above - they are all later nominal 2 seaters with very wide wheels / tyres, hence the narrow cockpit to body proportion. rear view of DB5 / 250 SWB / GTO would be interesting. And remember the special is a smaller car withe the same sized occupants which will influence scale and proportion

[51 coupe]

Having followed the development of the design from the outset I'd throw in my tuppence at this stage.

The roof height in proportion to the body is too high. I think this may be messing with the design. Try sketching it with 1-1.5" chopped from the roof line. It just looks glass heavy.

All of the cars in the above photos have narrow glass height. It appears so far on the O.S. to be virtually 50/50 roof/body.

I understand the Ghia roof is a inherent part of the design but it means that you are how you interpret the design. I do think bringing the rear wing height up to be beneficial.

Personally I'd like to see less Kamm and perhaps more Abarth GTL in the rear. This is still 'period correct'. Porsche didn't produce a kamm design until '64.

Just my view.

[steve wright]

Hi 51 Coupe. unfortuantely we're stuck with the roof height because this is original to the car and I don't want to mess with what David had already built. It does constrain us but I can't bring myself to change it. Interestingly the car is only 41 inches high... just an inch taller than a GT40, so it's by no means tall! when you put it next to a 911 or 356 they teeter over it. which tends me towards thinking that Al (Pandora) is on the right track here - visually the roof dominates the car because the body isn't wide enough (at the rear) to accommdate the roof. Also worth remembering that the Okrasa Special was a British built car - although it's got German mechanicals the chassis is English and the roof Italian in design, so we're by no means confined to a Germanic design. Aston was putting Kamm's on the project cars in '61 so the influence and timing is perfect. In fact I kind of like the idea of it being a fusion of different styles: when it's parked in a paddock somewhere or in the field of the Goodwood Revival I want petrolheads to wander around it thinking, "damn, I recognise hints here of such and such, but I don't recognise it, maybe it's a prototype of a particular marque?" What I'm keen to avoid is someone going, "there's a replica of a such and such gone wrong!"

I'm hoping next week to raise the rear arches by a small margin and widen them by an inch to see what that does to the relationship with the roof, as Al has done in his sketches (i.e. leave the bootlid where it is). I expect by widening the arches we'll then be able to make the rear Kamm slightly smaller in the lower edges near the rear wheels because as you look from the rear of the car the extra width of the arches makes the car overall look wider, solving the "no arse" problem. What I might do rather than put GTL arches on it is simply cut the wire frame away from the chassis and drop a piece of inch wide wood in at the rear, so we get a smooth transition front to rear, but I'll as ever have a play with the wire and masking tape and see what works best. I should've taken shares in the masking tape company!

[steve wright]

A brilliant day at the Goodwood Revival saw Ian and I spend almost two hours with Pandora (Al) discussing various design ideas and cues in the paddock. A really productive time and invaluable in getting us on the same page, so I'm hoping we can make some significant progress on finishing the design now. Thanks for your time yesterday Al.

[Pandora]

A pleasure!

[Pandora]

Just to let you all know why it's all gone a bit quiet (from my point of view anyway)

Having agreed to help out making models etc to help Steve and Barry into the final furlong, and to pop down to the other end of the country to look over the car, I rather carelessly accepted an offer on my house on the Monday as I headed home from Goodwood!

As such I've had to concentrate on the pressing issue of finding a place to live! (my wife tells me it's more important than old cars!?!)

Anyway, I have now found a place, sadly with only a single garage (I know that'll be your first question) and we move in at the End of November. This means I have to pack up the house and more worryingly the garage. You wouldn't believe how much space a dismantled hillclimb car takes up!

Once we get moved I'll be building a workshop / studio / woodworking shed in the garden, but in reality because of the timing of the move it's going to be into the new year until I get the time to catch up with Steve and Barry.

So whilst my role isn't critical to the project, I'm still very much on board folks, it's just the boring 'real life' stuff is getting in the way for a wee while.

Al

[Bruce M]

Still within earshot of the 1 o'clock gun or have you moved elsewhere?

[Pandora]

yup, just moving over the river to Dunfermline. Fetch me the lang spoon which is needed to sup wi' the fifers.......

As for 'freedom' - nothing inspires national pride more than a bigotted midget Australian with his pus covered in blue paint it seems. :0)

[Bruce M]

Indeed... Ironic really, like the Wallace statue in Stirling which used the Gibson likeness.

So you have swaped the 1 o'clock gun for the sound of squealing tyres echoing down from knockhill...... Can't argue with that

[Pandora]

4 miles door to door. I checked.

Still a long way to carry my car in its current state though

[steve wright]

Hey Al. In the nicest possible way, you've not been missed. New job and a small amount of work on the race car means I've not even looked at the Okrasa Special since Goodwood, so don't worry! I will set about pumping out those rear arches in the next few weeks though to see whether that gives the car hips and finally sorts the poor rear end view! Cheers, Steve

[Pandora]

Ha ha, I'll not be too offended! I was just worried that all these other chaps would be missing out on their Okrasa fix whilst we all mucked about with our boring everyday stuff.

I've also made some progress on my other project - the development of a new safety roofrack system for vans, but that might be even more boring than tales of someone else buying a house!

Al