TALES of turbocharger trickery on the Nissan Bluebirds of the Group C touring car era have long passed into folklore.
Master fabricator and Australian touring car racing veteran George Smith was part of the factory-backed team that built and developed the cars.
By the end of the Group C era in 1984, the boosted sedans were among the fastest in the category.
Indeed, George Fury took the final Bathurst 1000 pole position of the Group C era with the fastest-ever lap of Mount Panorama in a touring car.
The little 1.8-litre turbocharged engine, though, had a little bit of help.
In Part 2 of this week’s double episode release of the V8 Sleuth Podcast powered by Castrol, Smith explains the sneaky under-bonnet system that helped the Bluebird produce maximum horsepower for Fury’s Top 10 Shootout run.
He also explains that he brought the system up with touring car racing’s chief scrutineer first to make sure it wouldn’t attract their ire!
Listen to the episodes in the players below!
V8 Sleuth Aaron Noonan chats one-on-one with icons of Australian motorsport. Along with the big wins and the big moments, Noonz digs a step deeper and unearths a few forgotten tales and funny stories from their life in racing.
We’ve had an incredible chat with George Smith that set a new benchmark for the longest recording in the history of the V8 Sleuth Podcast powered by Castrol.
He shared so many stories from a career in the sport that has seen him in the middle of many of its most memorable and iconic moments that he and Noonz ended up chatting for almost four hours!
We’re releasing the first two parts this week. In Part 1, he talks about his current project: restoring the Big Kev Commodore that sat untouched for over 20 years following Paul Morris and Mark Larkham’s horror start-line crash at Oran Park in 2000.
He then shares stories from his days with Dencar, his chassis building company with Dennis Watson that was responsible for underpinning many of the Holden Commodores that competed in touring car racing from the early-1990s to the mid-2000s, including a tale involving the production line in Elizabeth that Holden executives certainly didn’t find funny at the time…
He then talks about how he got involved in the sport in the first place in Tasmania, landing a job with Harry Firth at the Holden Dealer Team, then linking up with Colin Bond’s Sydney-based HDT outpost.
Find the right Castrol product for your vehicle or equipment here with the Castrol Product Finder >>https://www.castrol.com/en_au/australia/home/oil-selector.html
V8 Sleuth Superstore >>https://superstore.v8sleuth.com.au/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
V8 Sleuth Aaron Noonan chats one-on-one with icons of Australian motorsport. Along with the big wins and the big moments, Noonz digs a step deeper and unearths a few forgotten tales and funny stories from their life in racing.
We’ve had an incredible chat with George Smith that set a new benchmark for the longest recording in the history of the V8 Sleuth Podcast powered by Castrol.
He shared so many stories from a career in the sport that has seen him in the middle of many of its most memorable and iconic moments that he and Noonz ended up chatting for almost four hours (!) and we’re releasing the first two parts this week.
In Part 2, he talks about Colin Bond’s defection from the Holden Dealer Team to Moffat Ford Dealers for 1977 and shares an incredible story about an unexpected mechanical problem that hit Allan Moffat’s #1 Falcon on the morning of that year’s Bathurst 1000.
He then talks about his move to Datsun/Nissan, initially to work on its rally cars before being a foundation member of its Bluebird Group C touring car program – and he shares a few tales and confirms/dispels a few myths and rumours about the hidden technical trickery the turbocharged rockets possessed.
Find the right Castrol product for your vehicle or equipment here with the Castrol Product Finder >>https://www.castrol.com/en_au/australia/home/oil-selector.html
V8 Sleuth Superstore >> https://superstore.v8sleuth.com.au/
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
