[woodcote]

       
      
PCS-B017 Brabham Herald Coupé Road Car - 1/32 scale slot car kit. £32 - Available here.
PCS-B018 Brabham Herald Coupé Road / Rally Car - 1/32 scale slot car kit. £35 - Available here.

       

Available now from Pendle Slot Racing are two slightly different Triumph Herald Coupé slot car kits. Originally produced by Traffic Models, the rights have been purchased and the body has been substantially lightened and modified to fit the PCS 32 chassis. The PCS Brabham Herald Coupé is available as a body only kit or a complete kit.

       

The Herald was styled by Giovanni Michelotti, giving Standard-Triumph an immediate head-turner in the highly-competitive small car market of the late 1950s. A road test report of the new Coupé in July 1959's Motorsport was extremely positive - "Splendid road-holding and cornering, ideal driving position, fantastic manoeuvrability and an 80 m.p.h. maximum speed are outstanding features of this brilliant new Coventry-built small car."

       

With the Mini Cooper S and Lotus Cortina on the market, the Herald was begging for a power upgrade. Enter Jack Brabham... As the November 1960 issue of Sporting Motorist reported "Away from the circuits Jack is a Standard-Triumph dealer at his garage in Hook Road, Chessington, Surrey, and soon after the announcement of the Triumph Herald he hit upon the idea of fitting a 1216cc Climax engine in a Herald coupe for his own use. The results were so successful he has now decided to put his conversion on the market." For an extra £345.00 on top of the basic price, you could order a Jack Brabham Herald Climax. With the 1220cc, 83bhp Climax, the Coupé could muster 0-60 mph in 10.8 secs and top speed 102.2mph.

       

The Brabham Herald Climax - and other similarly upgraded Coupés - were popular road, race and rally cars. In 1959, motor trader Ian "Tiny" Lewis worked closely with Triumph's Ken Richardson to turn one of the first Heralds manufactured into a modest, yet instantly successful rally car. "Tiny" Lewis and Tony Nash pushed the little Herald through 2400 gruelling miles to win a prestigious Coupe des Alpes and take third in class and ninth overall on that year's Alpine Rally. Nine Heralds entered the Monte Carlo Rally in 1960, four of them finishing. Probably the pinnacle of the Herald's motorsport career was an overall win on the 1961 Tulip Rally, driven by Geoff Mabbs and Leslie Griffiths. The privately-entered car - albeit with full factory support - benefited from a new points system favouring the small Herald running in a class with little competition. Nonetheless, it was a famous victory celebrated at the Standard Triumph rally department in Allesley. The #121 car was painted in the characteristic red and white seen on the built PCS model.

       

The PCS Herald Coupé is designed to fit the PCS32 chassis and can be supplied with the full components required to build a working slot car. There are two option for the basic body kit - one road car only and the other with extras to build a rally car...

       

The full kits - costing an additional £30 - include aluminium hubs and a choice of three wheel inserts...

       

The PCS Brabham Herald Coupé kits are available now from Pendle Slot Racing. Many thanks to Neil at Pendles for sending us the pictures of the two built and finished cars.

   

[Scuderia_Turini]

Cheers Andy,
I have learned something here.
I had always assumed that the Brabham conversion was bolt-on bits like manifolds and carburettor.

Leo