Now in Maximum Mini Newsletter #101

Boxing Day 1962: Butterfield Musketeer at Brands'

Another American Landar R6

Maximum Mini and the honorary membership title

Now in Maximum Mini Newsletter #7:

Wild Heerey GTM found in France

Unipower GT goes continental

Butterfield Musketeer at Racing Car Show '62

Butterfield at Brands Hatch - new picture

Hey, I haven't been writing about the Butterfield Musketeer for some time now (5 years to be exact, way too long). And we wouldn't want to have this lovely if not mysterious model fade into obscurity completely, don't we? 

That's just when this lovely picture was flashed over to here by Simon Greatham, supposedly taken at the circuit of Brands Hatch where Christabel Carlisle famously (?) drove the Musketeer against a whole force of Lotuses. She spun the car in the race, thus ending the sporting career for the Musketeer. 

There's no doubt this is the red car driven by Carlisle there, which was in fact the aluminium bodied prototype made by Williams & Pritchard and rebuilt with a Cooper 1000 engine for the race and registered '292 MJH' at the time. Is it also her standing behind it here? Together with the other two fibreglass bodied Musketeers, this car seems to have vanished from the earth since that racing day now more than 60 years ago. Let's keep hope in finding at least one of them back one day.

Butterfield Musketeer at Brands Hatch in 1962. Is that Christabel Carlisle behind it?

Picture courtesy Simon Greatham

Butterfield Musketeer prototype snapped

While reading about the Tornado Talisman recently I came across some cool pictures of the car in its prototype stage at Williams & Pritchard's workshop in Edmonton, London in 1961. But hang on, what was behind it? Yep, there's no doubt about that being the Butterfield Musketeer prototype in similar build stage, too! It fits in with what Richard Butterfield told me about 10 years ago as he'd trusted the job of body-bulding to them. W&P had previously made the much-modified body for Richard's Triumph TR3 and were now given the job to make the two-seater coupe body for the Musketeer in aluminium. Richard remembered it was finished just in time to have the car assembled for the Racing Car Show of January 1962 - the same show at which the Tornado Talisman made its debut... I found the photos were on the web also, and copied them here.

What happened to the prototype Musketeer remains a mystery to this day. What we know is that the original car was put on display at the Racing Car show in 1962 with a Mini 850 engine. Later that year, it was used to plug a mould to make replica bodies in fibreglass, while at the end of 1962 the car was rebuilt with a Cooper engine. It was then entered for the Peco Trophy race at Brands Hatch with Christabel Carlisle behind the wheel. She spun it and did not finish, but after that every trace ends. Any more information would be highly appreciated.

Yep. That's the Tornado Talisman prototype. But look behind it. That's the Butterfield Musketeer!

Picture through pistonheads.com

Another view. The craftsmanship of Williams & Pritchard was famous throughout the country

Picture through pistonheads.com

And from the front. Musketeer's round headlight just visible here. This must be late 1961

Picture through pistonheads.com

There it is at during the build-up of the Racing Car show in January 1962, it was red in colour

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Behind that aluminium body is supposedly an 850 engine, with double SUs and special rocker cover

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Action on the Racing Car Show of 1962 with the Butterfield Musketeer in the foreground

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Last sight of the prototype was at Brands Hatch at Boxing Day 1962, raced by Christabel Carlisle

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

HRDC racing welcomes Mini variants

In the ever increasing popularity of Mini based cars, the UK's Historic Racing Drivers Club (HRDC) has now decided to broaden its accessibility to all pre-1966 sports-, GT- and touring cars using the A-series engine. That's great news for Mini derivatives owners wanting to race their cars. The first race will take place at Donington on 7 november this year.

HRDC Race Director Julius Thurgood states in a press release: "I have been working on this for some time now. The ubiquitous BMC 'A-Series' powerplant has been with us in motorsport for decades and has spawned so many interesting variants. However, most categories seem to run in separate classes and categories. But why should they? Why not bring all the pre-'66 BMC 'A-Series' powered cars to race together under one format? I am sure that it will provide spectacular racing and will be of great interest to both competitors and spectators alike."

I asked him why the race is not made eligible for pre-'70 or pre-'72 cars as this would make it accessible for many more variants. Julius said: "The reason for the '66 cut-off is that this is the natural date cut-off between 'historic' and 'post-historic' in the racing community. Generally the rules are tighter pre-'66 and this gives a more equal field. Later specification would then mean different tyres, wilder engines and different suspension set-ups."

And has he already had an interest from owners of Mini variants wanting to enter their cars? He said: "The entry for this race was only opened this week. We will have to wait and see what the response/which cars get entered. We know of a couple of Ogles, a DART, 2 x Deep Sandersons and Rae Davis' Jem. It will take time to coax these rarer cars out but we will do our best to do so!"

I am definitely looking forwards to seeing some more of them on the racing track. The HRDC's race format is for 30-minute events, with 15-minute qualifying. All cars must run on Dunlop CR65 historic tyres and HTP forms will not be required for this event. More information here, entry form, ready for downloading here.

UPDATE 19 October: Thurgood says Unipower GT is eligible for pre 66 A series race, too.

UPDATE 23 October: Cox GTM definitely welcome. Thurgood: "It would be great to have some early Cox cars in this race. They would be made most welcome!"

Plenty of A-series powered cars now race in HRDC - but the majority are Sprites and Midgets

Picture courtesy Jeff Bloxham

One exception now is Rae Davis in his Mk1 MiniJem, but there could be many more

Picture courtesy Jeff Bloxham

Eligible: a Cox GTM. A Mini powered Davrian, like behind it here, is not

Picture courtesy Richard Heseltine

Wouldn't it be nice to see a Landar R6 return to the British racing tracks?

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Odd-jobs like the Fisher GT, seen here at Ingliston together with a Mini Marcos, are welcome, too

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

How about a Butterfield Musketeer? Seen here raced at Brands in 1962 by Christabel Carlisle

Picture Jeroen Booij archive

Urban Legend 1: the Butterfield Musketeer

After Minis at Le Mans, the Camber/Maya files and Mystery Mini derivatives (that's still running here at an irregular basis), it's about time for a new series. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, may I introduce to you Maximum Mini's Urban Legends. A series about Mini derivative tales that may seem as hard to believe as totally irrelevant for those who do not care. Contrary to the fan, like yourself (or so may I assume, dear reader). The main questions here are: what ever happened to..., and, is there a survivor..?

And to kick off I thought it'd be nice to do so with the legendary Butterfield Musketeer - the alleged earliest of Mini derivatives that was just finished in time to make it to the Racing Car Show in London of January 1962. When I started researching the Musketeer years ago information was about as scarce as could be, and all the magazine articles and books that did mention it quoted right from the brochure. Apart from that the sources that mentioned production figures at all, chatted about 6 cars built. Humbug, or so I found out for when I'd finally tracked down the Musketeer's instigator/designer/builder Richard Butterfield in the USA. He entrusted me no more then 3 cars were ever built (full story plus many previously unseen pictures in my book - you don't believe I am giving it all away here, do you?!).

Anyhow, and here comes the legend bit that keeps on haunting me: according to Butterfield "One went to a company in Portsmouth while the other became a prototype for a twin-engine version but was never completed." The third car was the original aluminium prototype that was rebuilt with Mini Cooper engine and raced at Brands Hatch by well known Mini racer Christabel Carlisle. The thing that I find hard to digest is that it remains unknown to this day what happened to all three cars. With the prototype being a fully handbuilt car (the body was hand beaten by Williams and Pritchard's) and with a slice of motor show and racing history, that's certainly not the kind of vehicle to end up in a British scrap yard. So how about the other two? They threaten to become the holy grail to Mini derivativism to me. So please, let there be someone out there who knows something about them...

Three Butterfield Musketeers were built, not one is known. That's strange

Cover story

They say you should never judge a book by its cover, but I usually do just that. So when the Maximum Mini book was about to be finished I began to think what to put on the front. Mini derivatives, that was for sure. I had a superb shot of William Dulles' Mini Pick Up with the Le Mans Mini Marcos shell at the back that was never published before, but decided I wanted more cars in one picture.

That's when I phoned illustrator Rens Biesma with whom I worked before with great pleasure. Rens makes the most wonderful motoring related paintings, cutaway drawings and he knows his Alfa Romeos, but he liked the idea of this book too and started sketching after just one quick coffee. Some days later he came up with a drawing of the seven cars I suggested (Ogle SX1000; Broadspeed GT; Mini Marcos; Cox GTM; Deep Sanderson 301; Butterfield Musketeer and Unipower GT). I loved it. However, my publisher was convinced the book needed pictures rather then art work on its cover and that's why Rens' painting never made it. Well, here it is. Click up for more detail.

Copyright: Rens Biesma