32 | ClassiC Car Weekly | Wednesday 8 October 2014 Wednesday 8 October 2014 | ClassiC Car Weekly | 33

Castrol Classic OilsrOaD TesTFREE DElivERy

OFFERsn T: 01954 231668 Sales - Quote Classic Car Weekly n 1L, 1Gallon and 20L HOME WORKSHOP DRUMS Gear & Engine Oil XL30, XXL40, GP50, XL20w/501964 Gordon-Keeble GK1

PH

OTO

GR

AP

HY

Ric

hard

Gun

n

THaNks TO David Yeomans for the loan of the car used and for additional facts.

Anglo-Italian

surprise The 50-year-old Gordon-Keeble combines Bertone style

with a Chevrolet V8 engine for genuine 145mph potential

Half a century ago this month one of the most exclusive and intriguing GT cars of the 1960s was launched. A 145mph rocket which ought to have

been a world-beater, but which was thwarted by fate. And we’re behind the wheel to find out what these V8-engined rarities have to offer today.

The Bertone-styled body is beguiling – it’s hard to believe at first that it’s a glassfibre bodyshell over a steel spaceframe. No Reliant Scimitar comparisons, please; this is far more elegant and is impeccably finished. Slip inside the car and this impression is reinforced – lots of 1960s quilted PVC, shapely bucket seats, a wood-rimmed wheel, and a bank of properly labelled toggle switches make you feel you’re in a quality product.

It’s well thought-out – not only is there space for four people plus luggage, but the slim pillars and huge glass area mean that visibility is superb. Like that other celebrated 1960s Anglo-Italian hybrid, the Jensen Interceptor, the GK1 feels like far more than a Corvette engined special – and yet only 100 examples left the redundant aircraft hangar at

Southampton Airport in which they were built over a two year period.

There’s a distinctly masculine and hairy-chested feel to the GK1’s controls and you’re always aware of the 300bhp going through the rear wheels. Yet absolute power does not corrupt – when cruising, it’s as docile as big saloons of the era.

Wind noise is noticeable at high speed, but frankly you’re having so much fun you don’t care. That Chevrolet heart has the uneven throb that only American V8s seem to have – it encourages you to press on, though you need to keep your eye on that Jaeger speedo if you succumb.

And that’s because in any gear the Gordon-Keeble is a veritable hare – there’s more power than you know what to do with, and there’s instant torque to deliver sledgehammer throttle control. It’s hard to avoid being shoved back into your seat at anything more than half throttle. If you use the full rev range, first gear takes you to 70mph, second to 90mph, third to 103mph and fourth to a maximum speed of 145mph. The gearlever has a short, weighty yet decisive throw.

It’s a notchy gearbox, but not unpleasant in any way. The clutch is very heavy, and while it bites near the top, it needs a hefty shove from your left leg to release. This reassures you the drivetrain can handle the grunt. It’s matched by a confidence in the steering, too.

There’s some play that you’d expect to find in cars with steering boxes, but it’s easy to control. It can be heavy at low speeds but it’s nicely-geared and feels meaty on the move. The GK1 doesn’t handle like a sports car, then, and nor does it ride like one. It’s a car in which you could cover continents in comfort – the suspension contributes to the car’s overall air of competence, though the price you pay is that it leans quite heavily when you corner hard. At higher speeds, the front end can go a little light, but most sympathetically-treated Gordon-Keebles will be fine.

You find yourself mulling over the history of this fabulous yet forgotten GT while behind the wheel, and you can’t help but wonder exactly how on earth it managed to fail. Because once you’ve driven one, its demise seems criminal.

The Gordon-Keeble’s history can be traced back to the Peerless, a GT with Triumph TR3 running gear but its own spaceframe chassis and a De Dion rear suspension. Created by James Byrnes and John Gordon, the car was produced from 1957-1960.

Step forward Jim Keeble, who ran a garage and tuning firm in Ipswich. He had fitted a Chevrolet V8 engine into a customer’s Peerless. John Gordon loved the result and the two set up a partnership to produce a new car.

The prototype Gordon GT, developed in just six months was unveiled at the 1960 Geneva Motor Show. The body had been penned at Bertone in Italy by the then 21-year-old Giorgetto Giugiaro, his first complete design, and the chassis clothed in steel by the design house. The car was taken to America, where chairman of GM Car and Truck, Ed Cole was so impressed after driving it that he agreed to allocate 1000 327ci ‘small-block’ engines and gearboxes and to distribute the planned car through GM outlets.

The Gordon-Keeble GK1 was born, now glassfibre bodied, and deemed by The Autocar as

‘The most electrifying car we’ve ever tested’.Initially Williams and Pritchard built the bodies,

but production was soon moved in house – to a redundant aircraft hangar at Southampton Airport where Gordon Keeble would eventually employ more than 120 people. ‘The car built to aircraft standards,’ boasted the ads, and the quality was evident to all who drove it. And at £2798, when an Aston Martin cost almost £4200 and even Jensen’s CV8 was nudging £4000, the car was an utter bargain to boot.

But this underpricing meant low profit margins, and the resultant underinvestment left Gordon-Keeble constantly on the edge. Supply problems led to 20 unfinished cars sat awaiting steering boxes. The company folded in mid-1965 after just 92 cars had been built, and the workforce were laid off without pay. A further seven were built in late 1965 and 1966 by a consortium led by Jim Keeble and Gordon-Keeble distributor Howard Smith in Sholing, Southampton, renamed the Gordon-Keeble International Tourer. The price was hiked to £3626 in a desperate bid to generate

profit, but this addition of 30% to what was already an old design only served to put people off. When the new 2+2 version of Jaguar’s svelte E-type was available for less than £2400, nobody wanted an unknown GT for half as much again. By the end of 1966 the Gordon-Keeble story was all-but over.

An American, John de Bruyne, considered buying the rights to the car and facelifting it, and chassis number eight was converted into a de Bruyne spec car for the 1968 New York International Auto Show. Displayed alongside a second car of his own design, the de Bruyne Grand Sport, neither project came to fruition.

A final, 100th, car was completed from spares in 1971 by a London-based enthusiast who ordered parts as needed and sought advice from former employees about construction. The remaining four bodyshells were later cannibalised for spares. The survival rate for Gordon-Keebles is the highest-known rate of any classic car, with only 4% officially having been scrapped. More than 90 are still known to the club.

sPeCiFiCaTiONsEnGinE 5355cc/V8/OHVPOwER 300bhp@5000rpmTORquE 360lb ft@3000rpmTOP sPEEd 145mph0-60mPH 7.5secEcOnOmY 15mpgGEARbOx four-speed manual

Oil CaPaCiTyn EnGinE 4.5ln GEARbOx 1.2ln AxLE 1.5l

Oil GraDen EnGinE XL 20w50n GEARbOx EP80 n AxLE EP90

PriCe TreNDsn PROJEcT £20,000

n usEAbLE £32,500

n nicE £50,000

n cOncOuRs £60,000

GeT THe FaCTs

History: From Peerless to bust, via some Stateside near-misses

Rear seat room is surprisingly generous – but then this is more GT than sports car.Lots of leather, quilted PVC and instruments galore – this is a quality product.

See this in your mirror and you’re bound to pull over.

Excellent rear seat space and boot make the GK1 a very effective GT car.

The 5.4-litre V8 was shared with Chevrolet’s Corvette, and developed 300bhp. Fireworks would ensue.

Caption

Alternativesn JeNseN iNTerCePTOr Exactly the same cocktail of American V8 and British craftsmanship. Jensen remembered to make a profit.

n asTON MarTiN DBs V8 When Aston went Italianite. Pretty body covered a British V8 with the ultimate badge.

Pretty Bertone body was sleek and spacious.

Target price£30kTarget price£87k

Radio revolutionA radio revolution invaded British homes.Radio Caroline, the first of Britain’s legendary pirate radio stations, began regular broadcasting on 24 March from a former Danish passenger ferry the Fredericia, renamed MV Caroline and anchored off Essex. Caroline’s eventual two stations picked up millions of listeners previously restricted to the leanest diet of pop music from the BBC. The Labour Government’s Marine & Broadcasting (Offences) Act 1967 basically made it illegal to advertise on or supply pirates, which would eventually number around a dozen. Only Caroline, which switched its allegiances to the Netherlands, survived (and still does today). The BBC launched Radio One to (allegedly) fill the gap.

And now, on TVBBC 2 was launched in 1964 with the remit of providing less mainstream and more innovative programming. It would give British homes a total of three TV stations alongside BBC1 and ITV.A power cut wreaked havoc with the first evening’s broadcasting, but BBC 2 never looked back and is still with us today. Also launched in 1964 was BBC’s Match of the Day, again still a TV staple and Top of the Pops, which we still get at Christmas, bless it. ITV’s contribution to this new wave was iconic Midlands motel-set soap Crossroads, famed for its non-Hollywood standard production values but with its own appreciation society today.

Mustang Mayhem

We sometimes forget just how much excitement the surrounded the birth of the Ford Mustang, Ford’s first annual production target of 100,000 cars was surpassed in three months and a million Mustangs were built in a year-and-a-half.

Dealers who could get Mustangs were known to auction cars to customers and one purchaser even spent the night in his new purchase while the cheque cleared. The Mustang was available with a big option list and is credited with having spawned the ‘pony car’ concept – compact, affordable and sporty.

Ford of Britain launched its Corsair, and no-one camped out in showrooms overnight. They also smirked at the Daihatsu Compagno, the first Japanese car to be imported in the UK.

The top 10 mega-movies of 19641 Mary Poppins 2 Dr Strangelove3 A Fistful of Dollars4 Goldfinger5 A Hard Day’s Night6 From Russia with Love7 The Carpetbaggers8 Zorba the Greek9 Viva Las Vegas10 633 Squadron

1964 reMeMBereD

WOrDs Sam Skelton PHOTOGraPHy Magic Car Pics