Harry Firth
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Harry Firth
Henry Leslie Firth (18 April 1918 – 27 April 2014) was an Australian racing driver and team manager. Firth was a leading race and rally driver during the 1950s and 1960s and continued as an influential team manager with first the Ford works team and then the famed Holden Dealer Team (HDT) well into the 1970s. Firth’s nickname was "the fox", implying his use of cunning ploys as a team manager. Firth won the Bathurst 500, including its predecessor at Phillip Island, four times (twice in the final two races held at the Island and twice at Bathurst). He also won the Southern Cross Rally and the Australian Rally Championship. He was inducted into the Supercars Hall of Fame in 2007. Firth has often been described as a 'bush engineer', someone who could probably build a race winning engine from nothing more than a roll of wire, while leading Australian Motoring journalist and former part-time racer Bill Tuckey once wrote of Firth that as a driver, engineer and team manager, he ...
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Orbost
Orbost is a historic early settlers town in the Shire of East Gippsland, Victoria, Australia, Victoria, east of Melbourne and south of Canberra where the Princes Highway crosses the Snowy River. It is about from the surf and fishing seaside town of Marlo, Victoria, Marlo on the coast of Bass Strait and 217 km drive to Hotham Alpine Resort. Orbost is the service centre for the primary industries of beef, dairy cattle and sawmilling. More recently, tourism has become an important and thriving industry, being the major town close to several national parks that are between the east access to either the surf or the snow, including the famous Snowy River National Park, Alpine National Park, Errinundra National Park, Croajingolong National Park and Cape Conran Coastal Park. The establishment of the Sailors Grave Brewery has also brought significant tourism to the area with its multiple festivals throughout the year. Cycling and canoeing have also become major tourist attraction ...
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1961 Armstrong 500
The 1961 Armstrong 500 was an endurance motor race for standard production sedans. The event was held at the Phillip Island circuit in Victoria, Australia on 19 November 1961 over 167 laps of the 3.0 mile circuit, a total of 501 miles (807 km). The race was organised by the Light Car Club of Australia and was sponsored by Armstrong York Engineering Pty Ltd. It was the second event held in the combined history of the Bathurst 1000, which had begun the previous year with the first Armstrong 500. Interest had waned since the previous year with the entry for this year the lowest in the races history until the fields were restricted to V8 Supercars only in 1995. Geoff Russell and David Anderson backed up their 1960 class victory in their Peugeot 403 by winning their class again. Bob Jane and Harry Firth were the only combination to complete the full race distance, earning the pair the first of their four outright race wins, although the concept of outright race win would not ...
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George Reynolds (racing Driver)
:''This is about the Australian racing driver. For similar names see the disambiguation page George Reynolds (other)'' George Reynolds (8 May 1928 – March 2012) was an Australian racing driver. The career of Reynolds, who was born on 8 May 1928, extended from the late 1950s into the late 1960s. Known primarily as a touring car and sports car driver, Reynolds won Class D of the 1962 Armstrong 500 at Phillip Island, sharing a Volkswagen with Jim McKeown. However, Reynolds is best known as outright winner (although outright winners were not officially acknowledged at the time) of the Armstrong 500, now held at Bathurst, in 1964. With three time winning partners Bob Jane and Harry Firth split amongst the entries of the factory supported Ford touring car team both Jane and Firth needed co-drivers for the 500-mile classic. Reynolds was paired with Jane and assisted Jane to his fourth consecutive Bathurst victory. Reynolds was later one of a group of drivers who raced f ...
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1964 Armstrong 500
The 1964 Armstrong 500 was a production car race held on 4 October 1964 at the Mount Panorama Circuit just outside Bathurst in New South Wales, Australia. The 500 mile race was open to Australian built production sedans of which 100 examples had been registered. It was the fifth Armstrong 500 and the second to be held at Bathurst although it is commonly referred to as the fifth "Bathurst 500". Official results reflected only class placings, with no outright winner recognized by the organizing body, the Australian Racing Drivers’ Club. The first car to complete the full 130 lap distance race was a factory backed Ford Cortina GT driven by Bob Jane and George Reynolds, the 1964 event being the fourth consecutive Armstrong 500 in which Jane had achieved an unofficial "line honours" victory. Class structure Cars competed in four classes based on the purchase price of the vehicle in Australian pounds. There was little change from the 1963 race. Class A entries proliferated, t ...
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Ford Cortina GT
The Ford Cortina is a medium-sized family car that was built initially by Ford of Britain, and then Ford of Europe in various guises from 1962 to 1982, and was the United Kingdom's best-selling car of the 1970s. The Cortina was produced in five generations (Mark I through to Mark V, although officially the last one was only the Cortina 80 facelift of the Mk IV) from 1962 until 1982. From 1970 onward, it was almost identical to the German-market Ford Taunus (being built on the same platform), which was originally a different car model. This was part of Ford's attempt to unify its European operations. By 1976, when the revised Taunus was launched, the Cortina was identical. The new Taunus/Cortina used the doors and some panels from the 1970 Taunus. It was replaced in 1982 by the Ford Sierra. In Asia and Australasia, it was replaced by the Mazda 626-based Ford Telstar, though Ford New Zealand did import British-made complete knock-down kits of the Sierra estate for local assembly fr ...
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1964 Lowood 4 Hour
The 1964 Lowood 4 Hour was a motor raceCortina GT is first home in Lowood 4-hour touring event, Australian Motor Sports, June 1964, pages 51 to 53 for production touring carsCover, Official Programme, Lowood 4hr. Production Touring Car Race, Sunday April 12, 1964 staged at the Lowood circuit in Queensland, Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ... on 12 April 1964. The race, which was promoted by the Queensland Racing Drivers' Club Ltd., was the first of three Lowood Airfield Circuit#Lowood 4 Hour, Lowood 4 Hour races to be held at the circuit. Whilst the emphasis was on class results, the Ford Cortina, Ford Cortina GT driven by Harry Firth and John Raeburn had completed the greatest number of laps at the end of the four hours. This same car, driven by Harry Firt ...
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Round Australia Trial
The Round Australia Trial was a long distance rally (a form of motorsport that takes place on public or private roads), which was run on multiple occasions between 1953 and 1998, circumnavigating Australia. Its early years were tremendously popular as the roads through large portions of the country, particularly west of Adelaide, were not in good condition. Automobile manufacturers enthused over the event as it provided a particularly severe test event for their products, proving their cars were able to stand up to whatever conditions remote Australia could provide. Early editions of the event were heroic tests and were front-page fodder for the newspapers of the era. By the 1960s, interest had waned as circuit racing, particularly the Bathurst 500 and the Tasman Series, would come to dominate Australian motorsport. A revival event in 1979 won by superstar touring car driver Peter Brock proved popular, but was not repeated until 16 years later in 1995. Interest in a new event contin ...
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Ampol
Ampol Limited is an Australian petroleum company headquartered in Sydney, New South Wales. Ampol is the largest transport energy distributor and retailer in Australia, with more than 1,900 Ampol-branded stations across the country . It also operates in New Zealand through its subsidiary Z Energy. Ampol was first incorporated in 1936 and would later be owned by Pioneer International. The Caltex brand in Australia separately began in 1941 to market petrol in its chain of service stations and was owned by Caltex Australia Limited. In 1995, the Ampol and Caltex operations merged to form Australian Petroleum, equally owned by Pioneer and Caltex Australia. Pioneer sold its shareholding between 1997 and 1998, and Caltex Australia gained full ownership of Australian Petroleum. Caltex Australia then gradually replaced the Ampol brand with Caltex over the next decade. From 2001 until 2015, Caltex Australia was owned equally by American petroleum company Chevron Corporation and the Aus ...
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Ford Cortina
The Ford Cortina is a medium-sized family car that was built initially by Ford of Britain, and then Ford of Europe in various guises from 1962 to 1982, and was the United Kingdom's best-selling car of the 1970s. The Cortina was produced in five generations (Mark I through to Mark V, although officially the last one was only the Cortina 80 facelift of the Mk IV) from 1962 until 1982. From 1970 onward, it was almost identical to the German-market Ford Taunus (being built on the same platform), which was originally a different car model. This was part of Ford's attempt to unify its European operations. By 1976, when the revised Taunus was launched, the Cortina was identical. The new Taunus/Cortina used the doors and some panels from the 1970 Taunus. It was replaced in 1982 by the Ford Sierra. In Asia and Australasia, it was replaced by the Mazda 626-based Ford Telstar, though Ford New Zealand did import British-made complete knock-down kits of the Sierra estate for local assembly ...
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1963 Armstrong 500
The 1963 Armstrong 500 was the fourth running of the Armstrong 500 touring car race. It was held on 6 October 1963. After the 1962 race, the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit was too damaged to continue to stage the race, forcing it to move to a new location, the Mount Panorama Circuit just outside Bathurst with a new organising club, the Australian Racing Drivers Club. The race was open to standard production sedans with four classes based on the purchase price (in Australian pounds) of the vehicle. Bob Jane and Harry Firth were the first team to complete the full race distance, taking victory in Class C in their factory backed Ford Cortina GT, the change of both vehicle and circuit making no difference to their result of the previous year. While outright victories were not to be recognised until years later, they had completed a hat-trick of 'first to the line' wins. Class structure The largest change was cosmetic. The bigger cars moved down the alphabet, the smaller cars ...
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1962 Armstrong 500
The 1962 Armstrong 500 was an endurance race for Australian built production cars. The race was held at the Phillip Island circuit in Victoria, Australia on 21 October 1962 over 167 laps of the 3.0 mile circuit, a total of 501 miles. Cars competed in four classes based on the retail price of each model. Officially, only class placings were awarded but the No 21 Ford Falcon driven by Harry Firth and Bob Jane was recognised as "First across the line". This was the third and last Armstrong 500 to be held at Phillip Island prior to the race being moved to the Mount Panorama Circuit at Bathurst in New South Wales where it later became known as the Bathurst 1000. Class structure For the 1962 race the division of classes was changed from engine capacity, used in the previous two Armstrong 500s, to the purchase price (in Australian pounds, the currency of the era) of the vehicle on the Australian market, with the intent to allow members of the public to make comparisons between cars w ...
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Ford Falcon XL
The Ford Falcon (XL) is a mid-size car which was produced by Ford Australia from 1962 to 1964. It was the second iteration of the first generation of the Ford Falcon (Australia), Falcon Overview The Falcon XL was introduced in August 1962,AC Bushby, The Australian Ford Falcon Collection, 1989, page 32 replacing the Falcon XK which had been in production since 1960. Visual changes from the XK included a new convex Grille (car), grille, bumper mounted park/turn lights, new taillights, and a revised, squared off roofline (on the sedans) which was promoted as the “Ford Thunderbird, Thunderbird roofline”.Tony Davis, Aussie Cars, 1987, page 86 Other changes included a new manual gearbox (although it was still a three-speed unit), new clutch, new starter motor, new air cleaner, new suspension system and a new carburettor. Both of the engines from the XK were retained; a ''Ford Straight-6 engine#Ford of Australia I-6, Falcon Six'' inline-six, which produced and an optional versi ...
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