The Ford GTs of Robertson Racing

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Since the original engineering of the 002 chassis was complete, and many parts had been developed over the ensuing two years of racing, H and the crew were able to salvage any good bits left on the 002 chassis, order or manufacture any remaining needed components, and assemble the new 004 chassis Ford all in time for the March 12 Hours of Sebring.

You might be asking “What about chassis 003?” If you paid much attention to ALMS back in the late '00s, you might remember it as being a Falken-liveried car, which was then sold to ACS, and unfortunately completely written-off in a crash at Road Atlanta.

A picture of the Falken car can be found here for reference: https://www.flickr.com/photos/brightonjel/3388375117

Depending on how you look at it, the early '10 crash could be viewed as fortuitous, as it lead to an expansion of the team. A few months after the 12 Hour, the Robertsons were able to locate the chassis castings they needed to repair the 002 chassis. They initially began to rebuild it as a spare, but, halfway through the 2010 season, decided that they wanted to be a two-car effort. For the end of the 2010 season, Robertson Racing debuted their “new” second car for the Petit LeMans event at Road Atlanta.

But enough topsy-turvy history. Let's take a closer look at the cars.

What you see on the rest of these pages is the product of just over half a decade of engineering and development, and what culminated in a 3^rd place finish in the LMGTE Am class at the 2011 24-hours of LeMans. The Robertsons still actively campaign the cars in both HSR and SVRA vintage racing events. Built on Ford's re-imagination of the original GT40, Robertson's GTs share very little with their original Ford GT chassis. H, still the team manager, chief and center of the operation, quipped in typical British fashion that “just about the only factory bits on the cars are the windscreen wipers”. Let's take a closer look.

The hearts of these cars are surprisingly “basic”. A Ford modular V8 “cammer” block derivative with production Ford GT dual-cam heads was originally built by Roush-Yates. Current iterations of this design are supplied courtesy of Elan.

The “internal bits are bespoke”, according to H. That sounds like another term for fancy and expensive – to be expected when dealing with a name like Elan. A dry-sump oiling system circulates 11 quarts of synthetic dead dinos through this 505 crank-hp powerplant, and you can just make out its accumulator tank in the back right against the firewall.