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GP Talbot Darracq: The Cars

January 6, 2010 By stu

Anderson out with the restored Talbot Darracq. Photo by Vince Johnson.

Story by Pete Vack

Stuart Anderson remembers the day in 1988 he finally laid eyes on the old blue single seater. “The car was in scruffy condition and was rescued from a shed locked up like Fort Knox. It was buried under junk and festooned with creepers, but amazingly, nothing was broken.” Anderson had persuaded Jack Day’s de-facto widow to part with the car, which had been interred for over twenty years. Day had bought it in 1949 and installed a Wilson pre selector gearbox and 16 inch wheels. It was then garaged and almost forgotten, one of the lost treasures of Australia. [Read more…] about GP Talbot Darracq: The Cars

GP Talbot Darracq: The Engines

January 6, 2010 By stu

By Pete Vack and Stuart Anderson
Photos courtesy Stuart Anderson

Despite the coming-out of one of the three Talbot Darracq 1500cc Grand Prix cars in the mid 1990s, (see “Classic and Sportscar”, March 1996) there has been very little information available about the powerful, DOHC high tech engine designed by two ex-Fiat employees for the 1926 Grand Prix 1500 cc supercharged formula. The Talbot Darracq featured the first use of an offset driveshaft to allow a lower driver position and a three piece chassis frame of great beauty. But the piece de resistance was the straight-eight roller bearing DOHC supercharged engine. [Read more…] about GP Talbot Darracq: The Engines

GP Talbot Darracq: The Races

January 6, 2010 By stu

Louis Wagner in the 1.5 GP Talbot Darracq at the 1927 French Grand Prix, where he broke the lap record.
Photo courtesy of LAT via Austin Harris

By Pete Vack

An International Effort

Sunbeam-Talbot-Darracq, or STD for short, was a strange combination of French, British, Italian concerns, money and talent. To put it briefly if not perfectly accurately, in 1919, the British firms of Sunbeam and Talbot merged and in 1920, the two further merged with the French firm of Darracq. At the time, a prime force behind the boardroom doors was a mechanical engineer by the name of Louis Coatalen. [Read more…] about GP Talbot Darracq: The Races