Art & Inspiration The Dean Jeffries GT/109

Mmmmmmmm

good ole American hot rod sports cars.

with some proud English heritage as well.

 

Listening to Chuck, they used a Lola as a design parameter, somewhere to begin vs a clean sheet of paper. A lot of it was American engineering fed to the Brits and frankly it failed miserably at 1st (historical fact). WE figured it out with the chicken farmer and the skunk works in Dearborn (Kar Kraft). I've got the Ronnie Spain book and the Kar Kraft story too. Funny thing, I worked at KK in the early 80s. Rumors abounded that within the bowels of those 2 bldgs was a whole GT40 off limits, in pieces, that only 3ppl were privy to. Of course I wasn't one of them. I ran the finish/paint dept there for about a year. Good times.

And BTW, I hope my reply didn't offend and was taken in the garage on a milk crate spirit it was given.

 

Yep, Eric Broadley the owner of and Chief Designer of Lola, did the Ford project as a one year contract on personal terms, not as anything to do with Lola Cars, and the deal included purchase of two Lola Mk6's chassis. Ford hired ex-Aston Martin team manager John Wyer to head the development team. Ironic, in a way, that the chicken farmer was then given the job to take it over from Wyer's FAV team at Slough, as the chicken farmer had won the '59 Lemans driving for Wyer's Aston Martin team. Back in the late 80's, early 90's I got to know Des O'Dell quite well, who at the time was the head of the Competition Dept for Peugeot in the UK, a role he had done since the mid 60's when it had originally been the Rootes Group Competition Dept.
Des got that job after Ford wound up FAV at Slough where he had worked for Wyer on the GT40's, as Des had been a mechanic for Wyer at Aston Martin race team in the late 50's and had been one of the race mechanics on the Shelby/Salvadori DBR.1 race winner.
Des had some very amusing and not so amusing stories about the chicken farmer from those days, as well as the early GT40 days at FAV Slough....

 

Cool story I had never heard. Do remember seeing the car in magazines back in the day. Does Dana still have the car in his collection?

 

For what it's worth, the last printing of Ronnie Spain's GT40 registry does not list any use of the car by Kar Kraft, and attributes the installation of the 4-cam motor solely to Dean (after he had seen another GT40 with that motor installed.)
Ryan, great story, by the way. I used to travel out there a lot for business (we had a client in the valley, and I made the drive from LAX to Thousand Oaks a lot) and at least three times I made coworkers stop at Dean's...yet I could never get up the guts to go in. I still kick myself for that.

 

Hmmmm IMHO there's not a more beautiful GP car out there...

 

I enjoy these storys,,,My little Miami speedshop "ComTech" was playing roadracer a lot in the later 1960s on.
By early to mid 1970s,Brian O'neil { who had been racing CanAm/Group 7,,} had got one of the GT40s,from a Ford Executive he knew. Brian wanted to drive the GT40 araound Miami,an had Red and I put AC in it.
Somewere [there's a GT 40 with a number of holes] ,that are unknown why they are there? I cut an drilled for AC back then.

 

Not sure if it`s been mentioned or not. He built a car for the Ford Custom Caravan and asked about getting a motor for the GT for payment. They agreed.

 

First, thank goodness Dean Jeffries had the foresight to keep the car intact all these years when it wasn't worth stupid money.

Second, say what you like about the (British) gentry but I'm also very happy we have someone like the Duke of Richmond who had the lifting power to rejuvenate the Goodwood racing circuit and the events taking place there, so that we have the chance to see cars like this on the track and not gathering dust as static displays. I'm not sure whether this car was out there last weekend but pretty certain another open GT40 did race.

 

I got to visit Dean twice in his shop back in 2003 and 2010 - he was happily working on his GT40 both times. He told me that his buddy AJ Foyt had given him the 4-cam engine he stuffed in the GT40. He was working on making some inner fender liners to keep rocks from chipping the paint from the inside out since the body shell was so thin. I was so disappointed to see the car at Pebble Beach after Dana Mecum had bought it and completely Un-Deaned it.



I was fortunate to own his Kustom Karrera for 47 years and became friends with Dean during the restoration. He kept asking me when he could have his car back. He was invaluable in getting the Porsche absolutely back to the way he built it in 1957. Its currently on display at the Petersen Museum as part of the 75 Years of Porsche exhibit.
Dean and I with his Porsche at Amelia Island in 2011:



and in the Petersen Museum - it will be there until March 2024





This guy thought it was pretty cool too - Steve McQueen fondling the front wheel of the Porsche back in the late 1950's

 

Dean with his Porsche in 1957


I took this picture in 2003 - Dean was adamant that you stand behind the car in photographs because the car is what people want to see. Very valuable advice that I follow to this day.



And Dean seeing his Porsche for the first time since he sold it in 1962 at Amelia Island in 2009. He couldn't keep his hands off it and personally selected the correct color of paint for its restoration.



He was visibly emotional to see the car that launched his career as a customizer again.



and a rare shot of Dean and George together with the rest of the Customizers at the show



Dean told me the secret of how to find George at a car show - "look for the tallest blonde with the biggest hooters in the crowd and George will be standing right next to her"