5 replies to this topic

[plantfitterRich]

Hi all, I can't picture what It would look like. Is bonnet stripes on a mk1 looker a yay or nay?

Cheers for your views

Richard.

[mk1coopers]

Hi all, I can't picture what It would look like. Is bonnet stripes on a mk1 looker a yay or nay?

Cheers for your views

Richard.

The MK1 Cooper Car Co racers had bonnet stripes, its where Rover got the idea for bonnet stripes on the later cars, they work very well with the MK1/2/3 ect Mini

Edited by mk1coopers, 20 November 2010 - 03:49 PM.

[mk1leg]

Hi all, I can't picture what It would look like. Is bonnet stripes on a mk1 looker a yay or nay?

Cheers for your views

Richard.

The MK1 Cooper Car Co racers had bonnet stripes, its where Rover got the idea for bonnet stripes on the later cars, they work very well with the MK1/2/3 ect Mini

AH beat me to it I was just digging out some old pics..............blast...............

[CobraV8]

My Car is mk1 style with bonnet stripes - have a look at pics in signature.

[Cooperman]

A bit of history for you youngsters if I may.
The bonnet stripes were originally used by BMW on the Tour de France in order that they could identify from a distance which car was which from their 3-car team of Makinen, Altonen & Hopkirk. One car had a single stripe on the RH side of both bonnet and boot-lid, one had the stripes on the on the LH side and one had 2 stripes on front & rear.
The racing cars then had them on the Britax and other team cars, again to aid recognition, but later for appearance.
There could be so many Minis in one race that clear identification was not easy in the days before advertising was allowed on competition cars.

[mk1coopers]

A bit of history for you youngsters if I may.
The bonnet stripes were originally used by BMW on the Tour de France in order that they could identify from a distance which car was which from their 3-car team of Makinen, Altonen & Hopkirk. One car had a single stripe on the RH side of both bonnet and boot-lid, one had the stripes on the on the LH side and one had 2 stripes on front & rear.
The racing cars then had them on the Britax and other team cars, again to aid recognition, but later for appearance.
There could be so many Minis in one race that clear identification was not easy in the days before advertising was allowed on competition cars.

I'd agree with some of the statement above, but it was BMC not BMW (probably a typing error ), and the Cooper Car Co were using green with stripes on their race cars a long time before they were involved with Minis, so just used their normal racing colours on the Minis too. The CCC (and Workd rally cars / other racers) used various means for identification, including coloured lights / coloured squares / dots / ect