[woodcote]

   

Slot.it CA36e Opel Calibra V6 - ITC Mugello 1996 - Oliver Gavin. RRP £64.95. Available now.


It's always a treat to receive a bundle of photographs from Galileo Engineering - and this latest batch is no exception. Featuring another tasty livery on Slot.it's awesome Opel Calibra V6 DTM racer, the car is also a nice tribute to British driver Oliver Gavin, who retired from motorsport last year.

       

Bedfordshire-born Gavin was a rising star in the mid-90s. At 19-years-old he'd won the prestigious Autosport 'Young Driver of the Year' award for 1991, hitting the headlines as winner of the British National Formula First Championship. Gavin finished runner-up in the British Formula Vauxhall Championship the following year and moved up to the highly-competitive British Formula 3 Championship in '93 - winning five races and ending the season runner-up. A disappointing year in Formula 3000 followed, but Gavin returned to British F3 and took the 1995 title with six wins, overcoming fierce rival - and future Jordan F1 driver - Ralph Firman in the final race at Thuxton. For Gavin, a test drive with the Pacific F1 team materialised during the year and he was scheduled to drive at the 1995 season-ending Australian Grand Prix... but the FIA refused him a Super Licence in rather controversial circumstances. Pacific folded soon after and Gavin's rise was halted...

       

Pictured above with other former 'Young Driver of the Year' winners at the 1996 award ceremony, Ollie Gavin (third from left) spent that year racing in the FIA International Touring Car Championship - the short-lived global expansion of the German DTM. He'd got a season-long contract with one of the big-hitters - Joest Racing, who were effectively the Opel works team. Depending where the ITC was racing, Gavin's #8 Calibra carried either Opel or Vauxhall sponsorship...

       

However, as team-mate Manuel Reuter battled Bernd Schneider and Alessandro Nannini for the 1996 ITC championship, Gavin's best results were a pair of sixth places at the Estoril weekend in May. Arriving at the crucial Mugello round, Gavin was forced to hand his car to championship-leader Reuter and make do with the spare. ITV's Simon Taylor takes up the story, with lots of coverage of Brits Gavin and Franchitti...



It was certainly a better weekend for the Scotsman, with a fourth and a second - moving up to third in the championship standings, behind Schneider and Reuter. Race 1 started well for Gavin in the Opel, passing eight cars to end the first lap in eighth - only to be scuppered by a Stop & Go penalty for nerfing Modena's Alfa. A decent start in Race 2 fizzled out in a retirement. Gavin was dropped for Hockenheim, returning at the final two rounds in Brazil and Japan - 16 points left him in twenty-third place and looking around for a drive to re-boot his career. His most significant role was three seasons driving the F1 safety car - although he would have much preferred to be in a car following it.

       

Of course, Ollie Gavin joined Corvette in 2002 and carved out a magnificent palmarès in international sports car racing. At Corvette, Gavin has more starts (202), championships (five), race wins (51), 24 Hours of Le Mans victories (five) and pole positions (25) than any other driver in the programme’s history. One particularly memorable victory was at Daytona in 2016, when Gavin held off Antonio García's sister Corvette to win the GTLM class by just 0.034 seconds at the end of 24 hours. Oliver Gavin announced his retirement in October 2020 - and his final race was a fourth place finish in class at the 2021 WEC Spa 6-Hours, this time alongside García. He now runs his own driving academy, in partnership with Corvette - and is interviewed by Simon Arron in this week's Motorsport magazine.

       

Back to Gavin's Opel - and his is the sixth livery on Slot.it's Calibra V6 - plus a white kit, that has just been re-released (with no major revisions, I'm told). Of course, Reuter eventually won the championship in 1996 - his black car was produced by Slot.it, alongside another 1996 Joest Calibra of Alex Wurz. The DTM/ITC Calibra was 4-wheel drive - and although the Slot.it model is rear-wheel drive, it is relatively easy to convert using the Slot.it 4WD components. Indeed, suitable wheel inserts are included under the tray. As you can see, the car is fitted with the new SP45 cables, allowing a Slot.it Carrera or Scalextric digital chip to be fitted without any soldering.

The Ollie Gavin Opel is available to buy now from all your usual Slot.it retailers. It's the best of the Classic DTM/TC range, so they usually get snapped up pretty quick.

A big thanks to Jo, Stefano and the team at Galileo Engineering for sending us the pictures and answering questions.

   

[Kevan]

Now that's a good looking car 

[rallyhub]

Looks perfect, except the wheel diameter is too small.
I wouldn't have expected that from Slot.it.

Hub

[Alcopa]

A beautiful car, no doubt and my box from Pendles is expected tomorrow...  However, I am with 'Hub's' that the wheels on this and most of the DTM cars are too small - and you can see by the fact that they don't fill the wheel wells- just picture their lovely photos next to one of the prototype.  Not sure what can be done - larger tires maybe - but that doesn't make the wheel larger --

BTW - to keep parity in our racing classes - I need to outfit some M3 conversions with slot it  DTM wheel/tires - does anyone have the part's numbers?  Cheers!!

[woodcote]

Slot.it have chosen their 15.8mm hubs and 0.5mm offset inline motor pod as standard components for their Classic DTM / TC range. They do look too small on most cars, although the actual hubs did vary in size across the years the Slot.it range covers. It’s a rare compromise on authentic scale representation to give a standard mechanical basis for a racing class.

Specifically, the Slot.it part numbers are:

Front wheels: W15808225-P
Rear wheels: W15808215-A
Inserts: PA-71, 75, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82 etc. are all DTM / TC sizes and styles. The PA-55 Group C BBS insert set also look good on a late-80s early 90s Sierra or M3 - and the set includes 4 inserts to fit the 15.8mm DTM hubs.

[Alcopa]

Thank you Andy -- and agree - there need to be compromises and that is a small one --

Oh - thanks for the part numbers - do you know the OEM number of the tires??

Cheers!

[woodcote]

The OEM tyres on the DTM / TC models are PT-1228-C1. Although you won’t be getting the nice manufacturer decals on the side walls.

I find these standard C1 compound tyres mildly disappointing. They are advertised as ideal for Scalextric Sport track, but have poor grip out of the box - especially on Sport track! A swap to the P6 compound tyres (advertised for Carrera track) transforms the grip and the lap times - suddenly the real potential of a Slot.it car is unleashed…

The PT-1207-P6 tyres are a good start for Carrera or Sport track. The PT-1207 mould is nice and tight, so the tyres fit the small DTM wheels. The tyres are a fraction (0.1mm) smaller in diameter on the 15.8 wheels and are slightly wider (10mm vs 9.5mm). There are also other compounds in this mould that are ideal for smooth wood and abrasive Ninco/Policar track surfaces. A set of 4 tyres replaces the rears on two cars.

There’s this wheel/tyre chart, which can be helpful if used with a searchable parts catalogue (eg Pendles site)…

   

[Alcopa]

Thank you Andy -- I agree they are a little slippery -even on my painted sport track - but manageable - and was thinking of keeping them -however your suggestion might sway me.  The issue was the converted FLY E-30's with better tires and Olifer chassis (same motors and in line) will eat up any of the slot.it s -so I need to make them a little more 'loose' - and right now, they are on better rubber than the OEM DTM ones...

Got the Gavin car from Pendles on Wed. - so beautiful - almost want to shelf queen it.  Then did a bit of YouTube surfing and saw Ollie get centerpunched at Mugello - so I figure I can risk racing it!  Have a great weekend!