What was XU 1581?

[Hedd Jones]

A friend of mine has an old photo album showing this car, i azsume supercharged at Brooklands in 1928. The "200". 

Also an earlier photo of it with a normal cowl. Obviously and earlier incarnation. It has open centre whhleels in that pic. 

Is it a well known car?

[Ruairidh Dunford]

See here Hedd: http://austinharris.co.uk/search/XU%201581

[Hedd Jones]

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_f...ef=m_notif

[Ruairidh Dunford]

Very interesting - thank you for sharing!

[Colin Reed]

This highlights the problem for anyone thinking of building a repro of any competition  car ,
as they are evolving all the time .
this in turn leads to a lot of research which turns up a lot of interesting threads.

Colin

[Ian Williams]

Can we please get this collection of photos uploaded into the Gallery and Ruairidth's archive, they show some never before seen details. There must be other fascinating photos out there waiting to be discovered if only we could find them, well done Hedd for bringing these to our attention.

[Mike Costigan]

I agree they would be an asset to the Gallery, but I think we need to ask permission first; can you do that Hedd?

The Facebook pictures do create a number of questions: There are photos of the car in original GE Brooklands form dated 1925 (date of the photo or date of the car?) and again 'partly redesigned' dated 1928, but then there is another photo dated 1938 back in more-or-less standard Brooklands form. Was the car converted back to a road car after its competition life, or should that be dated 1928(seems unlikely)?
The photo at Madresfield also appear on Austin Harris'website, where he has the driver as J P Dingle, whereas the Facebook photo is captioned as Mervyn Corey (?) and R F-W (Rodney Forestier-Walker) - presumably the photo album is correct, but Austin will have taken the name from the original negative, so ...?

[austin]

I agree they would be an asset to the Gallery, but I think we need to ask permission first; can you do that Hedd?

The Facebook pictures do create a number of questions: There are photos of the car in original GE Brooklands form dated 1925 (date of the photo or date of the car?) and again 'partly redesigned' dated 1928, but then there is another photo dated 1938 back in more-or-less standard Brooklands form. Was the car converted back to a road car after its competition life, or should that be dated 1928(seems unlikely)?
The photo at Madresfield also appear on Austin Harris'website, where he has the driver as J P Dingle, whereas the Facebook photo is captioned as Mervyn Corey (?) and R F-W (Rodney Forestier-Walker) - presumably the photo album is correct, but Austin will have taken the name from the original negative, so ...?

I assume you mean this one?

If so it was identified by Beatrice, later Tom Abernethy states as the info above. Happy to change it.

As it's one of the copy negs there is no info with it in regards to event / driver etc. that I found. Seems the details I have for that car are different all the way through it's history.

Great original photos though, I'm sure the ones of the dash would be of much interest to those trying to recreate / restore GE cars.

[Ruairidh Dunford]

Tom mentioned to me last night that he knows some history of the car - I am hoping to hear more and also that Hedd's friend will allow them to be shared here and the GE Archive, please!

[Timothy P]

Fascinating photos, thanks for sharing. Looking forward to hearing more of the car's story.