Crossley Motorsports Meets 3 On The Column Classic Car Podcast

Having seen a beautiful Jowett Jupiter classic racing car on the Crossley Motor Sport stand at Race Retro this year, 3 On The Column Classic Car Podcast just had to find out more.

Edward, Jack and Manny from Crossley agreed to join us and tell us what it is like to restore and race this classic Jowett: from the lads' first meeting on the Formula Student project at Birmingham University, to the restoration, the race preparation and the competing in the Lemans classic, as well as a full-on season of classic car racing.  This is also a story of the support received from the Jowett Car Club, a classic car club that has the foresight to appreciate how important it is to get young people interested in, and ultimately to secure a future for, these classic Jowett cars.

Plus why is the classic Mini Cooper such a brilliant racing car?  If you can restore a Mini, you can restore an Aston DB4: yes, it is that simple!  Here's the story so far of the barn find DB4 that was featured in the Bangers and Cash UK TV programme.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:16

Hello, good evening, and welcome to the Free on the Columb podcast with Brian Thomas and I suppose I must be Andrew Roberts. I think you probably are. We've got a fantastic team on the podcast this evening from Crossley Motorsports. I had the opportunity to go to Race Retro about three weekends ago at Stanley Park in Worwic, and we saw this absolutely amazing tower of Jupiter on a stand, which looked fantastic. And then I realized it's part of a classic racing car operation. The team, we've got Manny, we've got Jack, and we've got Ed. So would you like to start Ed and give us a little introduction and tell us what you do?

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Yeah, by all means. So my name's Edward Crossley. I'm sort of the uh co-founder and team principal of Crossley Motorsport. I uh swing the spanners, I do a lot of the admin, and then I also drive the car as well, and um yeah, send it around the track and make sure all of our hard work comes back in one piece most of the time.

SPEAKER_04 1:32

Fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 1:36

Hello, hi, yes. I'm Manuel, often called Manny, and I'm a team mechanic. You know, we we all sort of just do your own bits, all around Bodger. And uh yeah, we we all work on the cars, and yeah, that's that's that's what I do.

SPEAKER_04 1:51

Fantastic, and we have Jack as well.

SPEAKER_03 1:54

Yeah, hello, hello everybody. Yeah, another another mechanic on the team, often seen running around. Um, you know, whether that's at the track, whether that's at the show or at the garage. Um getting stuck in, doing whatever's needed to get the job done and yeah, get what we're doing finished.

SPEAKER_04 2:15

Amazing. I mean, my thoughts on classic car racing, they tend to be very, very valuable cars, and it must be absolutely terrifying, I would think, to take such a valuable, fantastic car that you've painstakingly done all this work on and take around a track and try and get to the front and the back when everybody else is trying so hard to get there at the same time. Is that terrifying?

SPEAKER_00 2:46

Uh I would definitely say it is terrifying to some extent, um, especially when you think about some of the other machinery we go up against. For example, when we race the historic mini, you're up against Ford Galaxies, Ford Mustangs, you know, very much the sort of David and Goliath racing. Um but you can't let that that fear sort of get in the way of your judgment. Um, and also for the lads, the the thing they want to see is the car being uh run uh to the best of your ability around a track and putting all of their hard work, their time to um to you know to get to get this car running as as optimal as possible. They want to see it do well, so there's no point you nursing it round a track and being oh yeah, but I'm being nice and gentle. You know, at the end of the day, the car should come back with a couple battle stattle scars, shall we say? Um, so yeah, I think I think the lads would agree to some extent.

SPEAKER_04 3:52

Well, they're there to do the spangering anyway, so um, you've got to give them something to do.

SPEAKER_00 4:00

You can't have the car coming back in one piece.

SPEAKER_04 4:02

Maybe maybe that goes goes through the territory. So uh so how do you guys get into this then? Were you all sort of like making your pedal car go super fast when you were free or something? I mean, how does how does it how does it get to where you are now? Tell me about the journey that you guys have had to get here.

SPEAKER_02 4:22

Oh money. Right. Um yeah, so I mean cars, bikes, um, that sort of thing have always interested me. You know, I grew up in Italy, so they're you know, they're massive on you know Ferrari, they're massive on uh Moto GP and that sort of thing. So I was always just sort of interested in that. I lived in Lenato, which is it's not a very popular place, but very popular in the karting world. So there was a lot of that, you know, have you had a lot of people come in, karting championships come about, and it's you know, you could get sort of get engaged in that sort of side of things. So, you know, as I grew up, engineering has just always been the thing, you know. You can you can learn how these things run. That's what makes them really interesting, how they work, how you know, all the tides tolerances of everything, how you know all these all these parts work together to do so well. Um so yeah, so you know, I ended up at the University of Birmingham, as did as did Jack, as did uh Edward, and we sort of matched over our love for cars. I I think I'll let Jack go on from that.

SPEAKER_03 5:25

Yeah, I I think the the way we all met, and I think this is the reason why we're all real close friends, you know, on the team. We all got together with um something at university called Formula Student, where you know, we basically start from scratch and we build a car up from scratch. Um, we take that to Silverstone every year, and we we compete against other universities, other university students. Um, and I think you know that that's that's a great project because there's so many people that go to university that have you may never have even picked up a spanner, they've definitely may not have worked on the car. Like I was personally one of those. I I went to university wanting to do all of that, and I I you know I hadn't done any of it before. And um, you know, it it builds those core skills, but like what was special about that team is it's the the amount of hours you put into it, um, the amount of passion that you put into it as well. And like I can't tell you the amount of countless nights that we've all had, you know, late nights working, something goes wrong. You yeah, the last thing you want to do is stay, but you know, you grit through it as a team and keep working on, and it's that like end result. Once you see it work, you know, all those painstaking hours that you've put into it, see it out on track, you see it performing. It it I don't know how to describe that. It's just like a great feeling. And I guess what you were on about earlier about the you know the risk or the worry of out with the car out on track. We that's that's the that's the drive, you know. That that's that's where that's the exciting thing about it. Um I think we all relate to that.

SPEAKER_00 7:06

Yeah, yeah. And then I think I think with my uh myself, I I I was fortunate enough to have uh a fair bit of sort of engineering uh experience before I came to university because uh my dad actually races historic cars. So he started out racing a 1959 Cooper S Mark One Mini. Um from a very young age, there's pictures of me in a bouncer in the corner of the garage, watching him tinkering away, and then from the age of like three, four, practically, you know, when I could walk, I was there doing odd jobs here and there around around the garage. Um and then coming to uni, you get to do this incredible project, which is former student, where like Jack was saying, uh essentially you build a miniature Formula One car in a way, um, admittedly not quite as fast and not quite as technical, but it's it's for for a for an 18-19-year-old, uh, it's it's an absolutely incredible opportunity, and you build lifelong friends. However, after university, there isn't really to try and get into motorsport. Uh you can obviously work in it. You for example, I work for uh Williams F1. Uh I'm a graduate design engineer with them now. Uh, but to have the experience of being track side, getting on the spanners, or even going around a circuit, that's quite limited. So we sort of started Crossing Motorsport as a means for students and alumni to get those experiences, get hands-on, uh, get at the track side, learning what it's like to function in that sort of high-pressure environment, um, and learn all these skills which are really, really applicable to um working in in industry essentially.

SPEAKER_04 9:08

Amazing. I mean, and and it's so important that uh so many younger people coming into the industry. I mean, we we say this very much in terms of the classic car scene, because you know, people think of classic cars, they think, oh, yeah, you'll go to a freight or something, and there'll be people sitting around there with their picnic handers and cambridges, and not really sort of much for the world. I mean, you've got to kind of think, well, you need to have a plan B because you need to have a way of making sure that classic cars are actually relevant to people as they're growing up, and not just to the people that have had women since they were new and then now in their sort of seventies or something. And and I just can't think of anything, a more exciting way to get classic cars out to young people than to go racing in them. I mean, it's like it's made for it, isn't it? To get younger people involved in the sport. Do you need so?

SPEAKER_00 10:12

Yeah, definitely, definitely. Um, the the sort of best way to engage our generation and the younger generation, you know, they've got to be kept entertained, otherwise they'll get bored and they'll move on to something else. What's what there's nothing more entertaining than watching, like I said before, the David and Goliath battles of a mini and a Ford Galaxy, hammering it round the likes of Goodwood, Silverstone, uh, and you have door handle to door handle racing. But you're you're completely right. Sort of, you know, after my dad's generation, if no one has that passion, has that interest in classic cars, then unfortunately they are just gonna die out, and there's not gonna be that kind of um people coming up through the generations to look after these cars. For example, uh our Jawa Jupiter, we're obviously part of the Jawa Owners Club, and Jawa Owners Club, their age range must be from a hundred to like 55. Um, and when they heard about us, this younger generation, wanting to get involved in um uh in the Jawa, they were sort of ecstatic because they'd never had uh so many young people interested asking questions of, oh, what's a Jawa? How does it work? Why does it do this? And for them to see that and see that there is almost hope in a way that some of these younger guys may go, you know what, later on in the in my years, I I'd I'd like a Jawa javelin, I'd like a Jawa Jupiter as a summer's uh daily car or something like that. Um they actually offered us all free membership, which was quite nice as a little incentive to stay just to stay in touch, and they've actually extended that free membership now to anyone, be it be between the ages of about I think like 10 to uh 30, which is quite nice. So they're the that they are a club who are really trying to get that younger generation involved um as well, because they they they see the issue that not there's not that many young guys and girls interested in these cars, but there needs to be.

SPEAKER_04 12:30

Well, may I guess who's who's gonna take them on? That's the thing, but no one's gonna take them on, aren't they?

SPEAKER_01 12:35

Well Andrew, that well, thank you. I was you raised many interesting points. Uh I mean if we take Jowitt as a make, my guess, because they disappeared in 1954, so I'd say you'd have to be at least 76, 77 odd to even have vivid memories of them when they were new, even in their latter days. But I think as even the early 2000s are now looking alarmingly remote, they really are. Capturing the recent past is always difficult. So, therefore, a vehicle of that era, it will be a challenge in not just finding people who can maintain them, but people with direct memories, direct experience. I mean, I imagine when any three of you take the wheel of the Jupiter, it is like entering almost a parallel universe. It's so remote.

SPEAKER_00 13:35

Yeah, well, well, you you say that there's some aspects of the Jowat that are very similar to modern engineering, but you you are completely right. Uh um, from a point of a lot of a lot of the people who come up to us at shows or or at the track are often people my father's age, uh, you know, 58, 59, who actually go, my dad had one of those. So not them, their father had one and can and they have memories of going to school uh in it and being and driven around with it, which is actually something really special, and we all quite like that because young and run, you can go out and race a 4GT 40 or the big boy Ferraris, but no one has that sense of attachment with those cars because they're so they're so rare, they are in another another stratosphere in terms of value. Whereas the Jawa is a a sort of homely car in a way, and a lot of people actually relate to them quite well, and and then when they see it flying around the track, they're absolutely gobsmacked, to be honest. Of and and and then after the race, we've had them coming up going, How have you got this going so quick? What have you done? How have you done this? And and and they're amazed. For example, when we went to Le Mon Classic uh last year in 2025, our average age was about 19. And compared to the rest of the paddock and the rest of the field, whose average age was about 50, um, everyone was very sort of who are these guys? What's going on here? How on earth do they know that this car sort of exists, if you like?

SPEAKER_01 15:15

Um from your own generation. Um, a Jowit, you know, you could argue, belongs in the lost world of black and white newsreels, where all the announcers sounded like this. Yes, here's the new Down Davlin motor car. This car's going to win in the export markets. What do you think, common person? Ark this car, governor. And no mistake. Very good. Back to your hovel, you peasant. The new Jowet Javelin.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

But yes, it belongs to you. So correct. Yes, it does, it does, it does. Um, but we we we like to think that we give uh the Jow at Jupiter and the Javelin a sort of new we we we show that I guess in putting it in in our generation terms, it can be cool, you know, this can be trendy. This car isn't just uh a sort of old person's going out for a gentle stroll on a Sunday morning with the dog in the back. This is a car that can be thrashed around a track and do quite well and is quite interesting.

SPEAKER_01 16:20

Which is what it was designed to be, because the Jowit Javelin was one of our most advanced post-war designs. It was light years ahead of many of the major manufacturers. Whisper it's certainly Ford, for example, or Vox or no, I mean you could argue it's closer in appeal to maybe uh Citroen Traxian of One. And this is why, of course, you're preserving an aspect, you know, what was like a a you know, a David among Goliath of motor manufacturers.

SPEAKER_00 16:49

Yeah, definitely, definitely. And and bringing back to the point earlier of um, you know, the design characteristics of the Jowett. Well, the the Jowett uses torsion bar suspension on all four corners, and a Formula One car today also uses torsion bar suspension on all four corners. Uh Porsche 365, they use torsion bar suspension. So that technology, uh the e-type Jaguar, another one that uses torsion bar suspension, that technology was uh pioneering in the day. The Jowa Jupiter's space frame chassis, it was designed by race engineers to be light and stiff and as stiff as possible. Now, don't get me wrong, there's a few areas where they didn't quite get it right, uh, which we've found out uh the hard way. Trial and error. Yeah, or over the years you can see where they've welded bits of angle iron to the bottom of the chassis to try and stiffen it up. But it's all learning, isn't it? And that that that that that uh space frame chassis is used throughout motorsport throughout high performance vehicles. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04 18:07

I mean, when you think most of the cars in the 50s would only have basic leaf springs with each corner, wouldn't they? I mean it it just beggars it must have been remarkable when that was launched to uh sort of have a vehicle like that. And I suspect possibly Andrew, you might notice it might have been a lot more expensive to make. Maybe something else.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

And it was an expensive car to buy. I think the retail price, including purchase tax, again, that dates it, I think was ten one thousand and sixteen pounds. So multiply that by about 40 to have today's money. This was a specialist expensive car, and it was you know marketed as such. And of course, as you know better than I do, it's export sales began collapsing in the early 50s, and they needed those export sales, you know, they needed the fund, you know, export sales the um saloon to again provide a sort of income. They needed high-profile sales in the USA of the Jupiter. It didn't, and it did it wasn't happening, I think, by that 1952. But we talk about archaic vehicles designs that were still being made. Of course, Drawitz bread and butter to a degree was the remarkable Drawitt Bradford. If I any of you have ever come across one of these uh fabulous vehicles. The bread van. Yes, that's the one that's gonna be.

SPEAKER_00 19:38

Yeah, that is it's got a horrible I think it's a two-cylinder, flat, a flat two-cylinder engine in it. It's uh rather interesting, interesting vehicle. But you're but you're certainly right. There's a reason only uh what 900 Jowett Jupiters were produced between 1950 and 1954, you know, because they were perhaps expensive in their era, which actually makes them quite a rare car nowadays, which is why I think there's only lads, you might have to correct me. Are there four or three? I think it's four or three. Four, four, four Jawa Jupiter race cars, and then in terms of Jowit Javelin race cars, there's only the one, which is the one that we race and compan campaign or have done in previous years, where we learn all of all all of the um mistakes and successes which we could put into the Jower Jupiter. That and they're a horrible car to turn into a race car as well. They're not easy, they're not easy at all.

SPEAKER_04 20:45

So, was there a plan, a specific reason why you went for the tower, or did it just sort of rock up when someone said, if you want to race it, here it is, and we form great will have it.

SPEAKER_00 20:57

Um, so the origin story of the yeah, so we all started with the Jow at Javelin, and the simple well, one of the reasons for purchasing that is we wanted a car that was unique and would help us get into uh the Goodwood Revival, actually. Uh it was one of my dad's sort of long ambitions and aims uh was was to race at that prestigious event, and one of the ways of getting into that event is by having a rare car or having a car that uh no one races, essentially. And we did a lot of digging, a lot of his uh sort of going through the history books and and stumbled across this car called a Jowett Javelin, which in its day was very successful, uh Goodwood. Uh not so much now because everyone else is able to develop their cars a bit better than we can, purely because of the foundation designs that Jowett came up with, mainly in the engine. But we uh Essentially bought a I think it was a barn fine javelin and yeah turned it into a race car and we've had that since oh my gosh I think like 2015 that javelin I think and then but we didn't actually race it at Goodwood until around 2018, something like that. But there's been so much development work on that car from the engine, the brakes, suspension. Uh and then with the Jupiter, essentially in 2024, we said, okay, we want to do Le Monde Classic. How are we going to do Le Mont Classic? Well, it's a similar case as Goodwood. You have to have a car that's special or rare. Um and the Jower Jupiter is a rare car that did very well in Goodwood. Uh, sorry, in at Le Monde. Yeah. Uh it came first in in class three years in a row. Uh it was ahead of its game. So, okay, well, we have good foundations, we know what we're doing when it comes to Jowits to some extent. Let's apply the same learnings onto the Jupiter, but do it better. And what we did there is we we did do it better. We had the lads, they all had their inputs, um, like-minded people, but at the same time very different, you can all share different ideas, different ways of solving multiple problems that we had turning the Jupiter into a race car. Uh, but in the end, it has developed we've we've developed this car that is an absolute joy to drive and handles like a dream. It just needs a little more power, which is hard to get. I suppose and better brakes, yes.

SPEAKER_04 23:48

I suppose to get the maximum power then that you strive for it, I guess you'd have to change so much of the car that it actually wouldn't really be a Jar anymore, and therefore you tend to not be able to join and do the runs that you want to run.

SPEAKER_00 24:07

Yeah, yeah. So obviously, uh you know, I say, Oh yeah, okay, okay, I want more power. There's a guy out there who's put a V8 in a Jow at Javelin, but with the racing that we do, you have to stick to the rate rules and regulations. So both uh the Jow the Jupyter is to FIA, uh it has FIA HTP papers, which are essentially a passport that says this car is legal, everything done on this car could or was done in period, essentially. Yeah. At the time, that's the key. It's if it was available up in period, or if there's evidence that um it was done in period, then yes, fine, you can have it. A great example is on our Jowet, uh, in front of the driver, we have an aero screen. In period, when they raced at Le Mans, they had aero screens. All we've done is applied a bit of aerodynamics to said aero screen, which they could have done back in the day. So at uni, we were able to um run CFD analysis on the Jowet, very crude CFD analysis, may I add, um, and uh develop this aero screen that lifted the air up over the driver's head, creating a uh less drag, um, and ultimately giving us a higher top speed, if you like. So that is allowed because they did run aero screens in period. Um so you're not essentially breaking the rules, and then it's the it's all the same sort of stuff with the engine.

SPEAKER_04 25:48

Yeah, absolutely. And um it isn't just uh the Jupiter, is it? We've got a 1966 Mini Cooper S.

SPEAKER_00 26:01

1959.

SPEAKER_04 26:02

1959, sorry.

SPEAKER_01 26:04

One of the first, one of the first what do you find the most appealing aspect uh for racing uh with the uh mini? What's its main advantage is uh anyone?

SPEAKER_02 26:17

Go on lads. One of one of you got it, surely it's it's it's it's really good fun in the wet. I think uh when it's likely damp and it's you know it's it's a you know cold day at Donington and the V8 Mustangs are out, it's it's it's a good day for all the minis because I think you know we're we've only ever watched from the start, it's uh but Eddie's, you know, Eddie's a fantastic driver. And um if I if I say that will get too tired. Um driver, and um yeah, you really you you you you you know the brain really equalizes the track, and the minis can really pull out and weave in and out, and you've got all these heavier, bulkier cars sort of just trending along. And it's really good fun, you know, seeing them zip in and out between the cars, you know.

SPEAKER_00 27:05

Yeah, comes the the the front-wheel drive on the mini sets it apart in the wet, really. Uh that's when the gap really closes up against you know the Mustangs. Um and and and the fact that uh from that that little engine you can produce quite a lot of power. So from a sort of power to weight ratio, it's it's a very good car, um, if you like. And uh as much as Manny says I'm a fantastic driver, I do make many mistakes. For example, I put it, I put it on its roof last year, which wasn't ideal.

SPEAKER_04 27:41

Yes, that must have been well, I would think would have been very scary, but also incredibly annoying.

SPEAKER_00 27:49

Oh, I was I was fuming because because that weekend the lads had done an amazing job on the setup of the car. And I I did quality and I did the first race, and the car was phenomenal, brakes fantastic. We'd we'd had a prior to this with a load of issues with brakes and tire degradation, and um they they they had done a really good job of sorting the brakes, sorting the tracking, working out what tire pressures we wanted to be on, and then I qualified we qualified sort of mid-pack, and then in the race, I was able to work my way up, and I was I think I was top 10 for once, which was amazing. And I was and I can remember I said to one of the lads on the Sunday for the second race, wow, you know, this is so weird. I can like see pole position. We're not normally this high up.

SPEAKER_03 28:40

I think you were high enough first in class that week, that race, weren't you?

SPEAKER_00 28:43

Yeah, I was lines. Yeah, yeah, I was, and then I think second second lap in. No, it wasn't in the second lap, was it? It was first in the past.

SPEAKER_03 28:52

No, it was no, it was a bit later in than that. You'd gone past because I was, wasn't it? Yeah, yeah, I was on the pit lane watching you go by, and I think it was you'd gone past a couple of times, and then I'm gonna say like third time round. I I can't remember exactly. I remember being like, hang on a minute, I didn't I didn't see I didn't see the mini in that pack, and then they came around again, and I was like, Mini definitely wasn't in that pack, but like other side of the track, you don't know what's going on, you can't see over the other side. Like it was at Donington, you can't see the other side of the track. There's no TV streets or anything like that, and you're like, Well shit. I hope he's not like he's not in pain or anything, you know, and you do get bitchy at that moment.

SPEAKER_00 29:33

But unfortunately, I had uh uh got a got a tad of lift off overstier, we will say, and I'd hit I'd gone into the gravel sideways, and I stand by this. If it had been grass, I'd have been absolutely fine. I would have spun around and no problem. But because it was gravel, the side the car going in sideways dug in and over I went. And well, you can see on the uh video I was very, very angry with myself. There are a lot of naughty words that came out.

SPEAKER_04 30:05

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 30:06

Um, so yeah, by all means, if people want to go and watch that, they can.

SPEAKER_04 30:10

They have to be prepared, yes. Yeah, yeah. We'd have to change the classification of the podcast. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:22

I I have to say, I was gonna say, I have to say that listening to how you describe the Cooper's handling its abilities, you could all be motoring journalists from the early 60s reporting on this remarkable front-wheel drive car from Goodwood. If the impact abides, the um everything sort of it shows perhaps the rightness of Isigonus' designs. And as you're working on these cars, be it the Jowit, be it the Mini Cooper, do you sometimes gain both a greater appreciation of the engineers involved, the individual engineers, and a sense of um where they were going wrong?

SPEAKER_02 31:07

Oh, very much so.

SPEAKER_03 31:09

I think it's not necessarily I think it's not necessarily that they're going wrong. I think it's more, and I I find this really interesting to see it working on the classics. They didn't have a car before that they could copy, or like they didn't have a rule book which was laid out being like this is the way you should do it. They were doing stuff for the first time, they were trialing new new ways, new technologies, new features, new designs. You know, it was all brand new, and I think that's kind of what I like. I work in a a modern modern industry with electronics, and it I kind of it I can see the similarities between it, and I find like the the modern electronics is exciting because you're pushing the boundaries, you're doing something that's never been done before. You know, that that's what they were doing, just on a on a mechanical form without computers. So, I mean, I how they did it without computers, I honestly don't know. Baffles me. Um, but I think so it's not necessarily that they were going wrong, it was just they were pushing it, and so you know, you have to make a few mistakes to progress forward, don't you? And then that's when you learn from those mistakes.

SPEAKER_00 32:14

It it's it's you can a lot of the time when you're working on these cars, you can almost see the the the vision the designer had when he was creating uh the car. For example, the Jower Jupiter, the space frame chassis, they actually drew that out on the floor of the workshop to get all the lengths of the uh members, if you like. And you can see they've gone, okay, after a bit of trial and error, we need more stiffness in this member. We'll weld uh this this this plate on to increase the second moment of area. We'll do this, we'll do this. So you can see the development. Um, so there's lots of good design like that, which is designing through iteration. Um, but like Jack says, uh working in F1, when we design parts, we design them to be as light as possible. But at the same time, we have to think about the mechanics. We have to think about how the thing goes together. And when the mechanics are their track side and they've got to take that component off in a matter of seconds, how are they gonna do that? And what's the easiest way of doing that? Whereas in classic cars, there seems to be many, many situations and occasions where the designers have not thought about how it's going to come off or how on earth you're meant to get your hand in. We are convinced they must have had a production line of people with deformed hands or really thin hands to get into areas to do some nuts and bolts up, or they must have had some wacky tooling to allow them because that the some of the positions we have all had to be in to access a bolt, or some of us have had to chop up an old spanner, or yeah, yeah, make a tool that to get something really does amaze us. So you so there's there's lots of designs where we're like, wow, that's actually really clever. Like I really like that. And then there are also the other end of the spectrum where we're going, why on earth have they done this? A classic example, sorry to go on, but a classic example is the Aston Martin uh 1960 dB4 uh Mark II Aston Martin that we're restoring. The amount of slotted screws used on that car to hold bits of the trim together is insane. And some of them are in sort of the the the uh where the rear quarter window sits, uh where you've got this lovely sort of sculpted angle. It's the the screw is like right at the sort of the peak of that angle, in a way, and you're like, they must have had the smallest screwdriver to get that in, which would have been fine when it was all brand new and going together. But try doing it when it's been sat there for 45 years covered in water and soil. There are many naughty words again that come out trying to get those out.

SPEAKER_03 35:15

I think I think the most common phrase when we're working on that car is just like, why did they do this? Like, what were they thinking? It is just like near enough, everything you touch on it is like that, but it's also like a really good eye-opener for us, you know. Compared to modern design, where we're thinking about the assemblability, we're thinking of so-called pokey oak, where you know that whatever part you're working on can only go in with one way to make the assembler's life easier. These classic cars they don't have none of that, and it's such an eye-opener, and you get such an appreciation for like how hand-built they actually are. And I think like going back to what we were talking about earlier as well, like the benefit of keeping you know people engaged with classic cars is you understand those whys and why nots that were done before, and you understand how the technology has progressed, and like you know, a lot, especially like the Aston and stuff like that, you get that real appreciation for this is hand built, this is you know, okay, there's like what 400 Astons, or it's probably more than that, I can't remember. But each one is actually like one of one, you know, it is unique that the parts that go on it. They're not like I think we we show this in the video as well, don't we? That we're we're creating all of the the trim pieces on the inside, they're all written with the car's number, um, you know, handwritten. It's not like a machine stamped and that number is on it, it's handwritten for that one car. Um yeah, it's you know, it it's I think it adds to the character of the classics almost, doesn't it? But it is such an IO.

SPEAKER_04 36:50

You can almost imagine the guy at the factory with like the brown coat on with like a pencil behind his ear, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then he's got his little measuring tape, and oh yes, well, we can just put a bit of screw in there, and that would be fine, and uh everyone is different. I mean, it was a built car, wasn't it? Um absolutely, um we probably should sort of explain a bit about that because uh listeners may not know. Um it actually it's an Aston Martin DB4, and it was actually the JD Wheeler Barn find, wasn't it? And it was sold through the Bangers in Cash TV program. If I got my research right.

SPEAKER_00 37:36

You you've got you've got that cock on. Um yeah, it's a 1960 Aston Martin DB4 Mark II. It was uh we bought it through Matthewsons, uh the auction company, uh, which is featured on uh bangers and cash, which is a lovely, lovely TV show. Uh it's series 12, episode one, I believe. If any of your listeners want to go and have a watch, um, and there you you see where where the car was found, and it is very much a barn find. This this barn had um well uh it was a it was sort of a long barn, and the Aston was sort of protected by a TR7, which was quite nice, sort of to stop any thieves who perhaps knew it was there trying to pull it out. But the uh the gar the the the roof of the of the garage had collapsed uh mainly on the front section of the car. So there was trees uh growing through it, soil all sorts, and it had been very much exposed to the elements for 45 years it had been in there. Um unfortunately the owner had uh I believe he had fallen ill uh and prior to its going into the garage, I think he was some some way through restoring it or attempting to restore it, i.e., the sills have been cut off and uh a bit of bodywork has been done. But yeah, it is a true barn find. And uh our our our aim is to restore this car, uh but the and but the the real aim is to prove that you don't need to fork out a load of cash and send it to specialists. You can do a lot of this yourself. Just because it's an Aston Martin doesn't mean it doesn't have the exact same principles as restoring a Mini Cooper or a Ford Locus Cortina. It's all the same stuff, it's planning, preparation, um uh you know, it's a strip down, it's it's an engine out, it's it's it's all the same things, it's just on a slightly different uh different car, if you like. So but but of course we will use specialists where required. For example, unfortunately, we don't have painting facilities, we don't have um you know a lovely English wheel to remake some of the the body panels. However, our plan is to go to these places, go to these specialists, document what they're doing, show their story, maybe even have a go ourselves, um, and and and showing the uh the creativity of these cars and and what really goes into them, uh and sort of why the why the the price is where it is as well. And the the whole restoration will be documented. It's all uh there's two episodes on YouTube at the moment. So for any of your listeners, if they would like to go and and and watch and and see where we are at the moment, they can do. Uh yeah.

SPEAKER_04 40:43

So is it going to be raced or is it purely you will race it a bit, won't you, sure?

SPEAKER_00 40:51

The the the the aim with this car is to turn it into a driver's car. This is a car that is not going to sit in someone's garage and look pretty. It is a car that's going to look pretty out on the road when you're sending it into a core into those country lanes, uh downshifting, hearing a little um burble from the exhaust. It's gonna be pokey, it's gonna be responsive. We're essentially restoring it to its true form, what the designers intended, if you like. It's gonna we're gonna give the engine a bit of a performance update, the handling a bit of a performance update as well. Um, but um it w it may maybe it'll see a couple track days, who knows? Um but but the the main aim is to turn it into a car that you go, I wanna just go and take this out at the weekend and have some have some fun in it and and and you use the car. How it uh how that's what you should do with all classic cars, you should use them, they're not designed to just sit there and and look pretty.

SPEAKER_04 42:01

Yeah, absolutely. I mean they need to be driven, they need to be out there on the road, and people then get to see them as well.

SPEAKER_01 42:09

You're gonna drive the Aston Martin the way that David Brown intended it to be driven, in other words.

SPEAKER_00 42:14

Exactly. Exactly, yes. Yes, how he probably drove it himself.

SPEAKER_01 42:22

I have to ask, have you seen the greatest ever black and white Aston Martin DB4 film? And which if you haven't, I recommend it.

SPEAKER_00 42:31

Uh probably not. The one our generation will know is obviously James Bond. Um DB4.

SPEAKER_01 42:40

Have a look at have a look at the wrong arm of the lawn, 1962. One of the getaway cars is a DB4 GT with um a rear seat, right-hand drive. Ooh. It belonged to the leading actor, and it was sold, I think, in 2018 for 2.65 million. Spec. And you see it tape in a but in a robbery. So it's a quite a quick getaway car, um, and it clears through Oxbridge.

SPEAKER_00 43:11

Yeah, they're there, they are quick cars. And and one one of the one of the thoughts we had is do we turn this into because ours isn't a GT. Um, you know, we thought, could do we turn it into a GT, or do we go to Zigato? Do you go for the full monty and go uh into a cigato? But uh through some uh price analysis and financial planning, uh, and we decided not. Because also that would take it away from what it truly is and what people want to see. People want to see this car that was found in a barn be restored back to its former glory, how the previous owner perhaps first bought the car, if you like.

SPEAKER_01 43:54

Yeah, and it and the color scheme is so beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 43:58

Yes, it is. Go on, Jack.

SPEAKER_03 44:00

But that's a it's a fun journey to show as well. We've we've taken that to the NEC a couple of times now, um, in various different states. Like one was pretty much as we picked it up, and then one after we'd started stripping it a little bit. And it's it's always good to see the reception of people seeing it. You know, so many people have never seen a car in that state, let alone, you know, a nice Aston Martin. Um, you see people just walking past on the stand, and they'd like, you know, they double take and they're like, wait, what is that? You know, it's and we we're surrounded by some pretty nice cars, you know. Um I don't know, Triumphs and all sorts. Uh you they look spotless. We were we were opposite Meguiar's one of the last shows as well. But people are still looking at this Aston Martin, this like, you know, rusty, rusty thing, which is barely standing up. So it's it's a good story, and then we're we're at the NEC this weekend as well at the restoration show, which would be interesting to show off as well because it is now the Shelly's fully stripped. Um, we're jumping ahead of time in the videos here, but the Shelly's fully stripped. Um, it's we've had it all blasted back to the bare metal as well, which is yeah, super cool to see. We we look at it and we're like, how many people have seen like how many people are still alive that are last seen this chassis as bare metal? Like it's a pretty special thing to be able to witness and see the details and the intricacies of of how it was all designed. So yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:27

Yeah, absolutely. I'd just like to add to that, it's just like because we've been to a couple of shows now, the first time we took it out, it we we took it in the same form we found it in the barn. And you know, you'd get all these people coming over, and it's like, oh I'll be long gone before that's ever finished, and you know, oh yeah, you know, this is a massive job. You can't you can't repair that, you can't fix that, and you know, it start giving you all this advice, and you know, this all you should probably do is do this, go to this person, go to that person. And then these same people, some of them do end up going to these other shows, and it's like, oh right, fair enough, guys. You've you know you've moved on. I can see there's progress with the car, it's not it's not looking so bad. We can do something, and I think I'm really looking forward to what uh the audience interaction is this time when they said it's a bare shell. Yeah, and it's like, oh wow, okay, you know, progress is really really kicking off.

SPEAKER_01 46:17

Go on, Andrew. Well, I was going to bring something because you can't see me, so I'm trying to work like being on a radio player. When you meet such people at the NEC, are the members of the public often surprised at your youth when you're restoring this 1960 handocar?

SPEAKER_03 46:36

I think surprised and also kind of relieved as well, you know, echoing what we're talking about, getting youngsters back into classics. Like it's it's I think people are really relieved to see us taking the interest in it and trying to share that passion around.

SPEAKER_00 46:52

Um you do get uh mixed response. So being out on YouTube now, that obviously opens you up to a world of keyboard warriors, uh, as we like to call them. Um but you get loads of people who go, Wow, this is really good for his uh classic cars. This is good that you're trying to encourage the whole aim is to encourage the younger generation and show them look, you can do it, you can get involved, there's nothing stopping you. Um, and then you do also get the oh, you know, this isn't a father-son project, this isn't a project for a bunch of kids, you know, blah blah blah, or this, but the but there's nothing better than proving these people wrong. And the the amount of good conversations you have at the NEC uh restoration show, uh there's things like this of people going, wow, this is really good. And then when you tell them the story of Crossing Motorsport, what we're trying to do, why we're doing this, they're just like, wow, this more more people need to be doing this, more people need to be getting involved. Um, but yeah, people people are very, very surprised at the young age. It sort of makes me wish I could never get older and just stay this age, really.

SPEAKER_05 48:08

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 48:10

And that's the thing, and people are, you know, the people who go to shows are generally enthusiasts, and they they're there to see great cars, and you know, if younger people get involved in doing it as well, then fantastic, you know, because otherwise, as we've said before, who's going to be looking after these cars if there are no younger people? And um there's so many ways now with YouTube, social media, and and ways for everybody to get their stories out about these cars, and it just opens it up to so many more people than it ever did. I mean, 30, 40 years ago, to see cars like this, you'd have had to have had some internal link with some kind of a story and be invited to their yard to have a look, and um now it's that much more open to everybody, really. So I'm fairly conscious of the time, so I think this may be a very good opportunity to tell us a bit about your events that you've got coming up this year and sort of where you're looking to be. And we'd very much love to have you guys back at the end of the year to see you can explain to us all the wonderful things that happened on all the trophy cabinets that had to be extended to put the prices in. So, uh, so what do you got coming up this year, guys? Where are you racing? What cars?

SPEAKER_00 49:45

Um go on, Jack.

SPEAKER_03 49:47

I I guess the big one for us, which is on the horizon, is we're at the Goodwood members meeting next month where we're racing the Jowett Jupiter. Um we were there, we were at Goodwood weekend just gone on the Saturday, um, getting the first laps around the track. I mean, it was Ed's first time around Goodwood as well, which was which is good fun to see. Um, but that that's our big event on the horizon. Um, I'm gonna pass over to Ed then because I don't actually know what the future is very much last minute for me.

SPEAKER_00 50:20

Yeah, a lot a lot a lot of a lot of a lot of the events we do are are are planned or or confirmed the week before. I sort of send a message into the group chat. Lads, are you free next weekend? We need to do this to this. Um but uh yeah, so Laijad says, yeah, uh Goodwood members meeting this weekend coming. Uh we are at the NEC for the practical classic restoration show. We're on the UK TV stand with Bangs and Cash, Wheeler Dealers, and we're showcasing the Aston and what state it's in. Uh so that will be a good three days seeing what the public can make of the this uh essentially has been uh soda blasted uh uh and get their thoughts and opinions. Uh and then after that, yes, Goodwood Members meeting, which will be an amazing event for sure. Uh the the main aim with the Goodwood Members meeting is to try and potentially secure an invite to the Goodwood Revival in the summer, uh, which would be would be really good. And then in amongst all of that, we plan to be campaigning the excuse me, the Mini. Um so this will be campaigning at Silverstone, Donington, Cadwell, uh all the all your good old classic tracks, if you like, and same with the Jupiter, that will also be at um Silverstone Historic, um Donnington Historic, all of those events. And then, as well as that, um we have the Aston, which basically every weekend we have the lads around and we're making progress, we're filming for the next YouTube episode. Um, so a lot of the components now are going for sandblasting, powder coating. Uh, so that there's we're gonna be doing that at the weekends. Um, and finally, there are other projects which perhaps uh would be discussed in another podcast, another episode, I think, because uh we've got some other cars as well which uh need a whole I think a whole episode to themselves, if you like.

SPEAKER_04 52:33

We can do that, we'll we'll get that done for you. We'll sort that out in the end towards the end of the season.

SPEAKER_00 52:38

Definitely, definitely.

SPEAKER_04 52:40

Guys, um, it has been absolutely amazing to have you guys on the podcast. Um I know our listeners again are absolutely love hearing this. Um absolutely amazing, and um we um wish you all the very, very best for your season. I'm sure you're gonna win everything. I'll be surprised if you don't. Um we'll find out in a podcast later in the season, anyway. So uh where can people watch and find you? I mean you can send me the links and I'll put them on the um podcast pages anyway, but uh brief sort of how we can find you and how we can follow what you do.

SPEAKER_00 53:26

So uh Instagram and YouTube are probably the best ways. Uh if you just type in Crossly Motorsport into either Instagram, YouTube, and if any of you are on TikTok as well, we are on there. That's a bit more of the sort of jokey fun side, whereas Instagram and YouTube are sort of reserved for the the racing, the educational side, shall we say. Um, so yeah, Instagram uh and YouTube are the best places and just type in crossing motor support.

SPEAKER_04 54:00

Fantastic. That is absolutely amazing. So uh yeah, thank you very much, guys. Um, it's been an absolute pleasure, and uh we uh look forward to uh seeing you guys at the end of the season. But I will come and see you, I'll be at Resto this weekend anyway. So I will track you guys down and um come over and have a look at these cars, or certainly the D B4. I'm really looking forward to seeing that in the trash.

SPEAKER_03 54:33

It'll be a hard one to miss the D B4.

SPEAKER_01 54:36

Yeah, I think we'll be able to spot it.

SPEAKER_03 54:41

We probably will so just hope through the crowd to get to it.

SPEAKER_04 54:45

Fantastic. Thank you very much, guys. Thank you indeed.

SPEAKER_03 54:49

Thank you very much for looking forward to the next one.

SPEAKER_04 54:52

Yeah, look forward to it. Thanks, guys. All the best. Take care.

SPEAKER_03 54:55

Have a good one, bye.

SPEAKER_00 54:57

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 54:57

Cheers, bye bye.

SPEAKER_01 55:37

My favourite story is when a car, the standard vanguard, was being designed for our export markets after the war, only when the development team had a passport. So they had to test this car designed for global markets in Wales. Wow. Did it not sell very well?

SPEAKER_03 56:01

Did it not sell very well in what countries then?

SPEAKER_01 56:04

Yes, you guys it it suffered from, would you be surprised, sort of, dust leakages and lack of durability for some reason because it was tested in Wales.

SPEAKER_04 56:17

It can have a lot of dust in Wales, didn't it?