Old Mother Gun, 1927 Bentley Jackson Special at Classic Days 2014, Schloss Dyck Germany
Old Mother Gun, a former Brooklands racer with a fascinating history. Converted to a single-seater by Richard Marker, and fitted with a 6 1/2-litre Bentley engine in 1934, it was then rebuilt on a longer chassis by Robin Jackson as a single-seat racing car designed with one purpose in mind: to lap the banked Brooklands track faster than any other. As the Bentley-Jackson Special, it duly achieved this on several occasions, touching 145mph and completing laps at more than 130mph; and this in an era when a car was considered sporting if it would top 60mph in a straight line. In a busy career Mother Gun has done about 180 races. First at Le Mans in 1928 and second in 1929, it was consistently modified through the 1930s, notably by Richard Marker and Robin Jackson, and ran in the last race at Brooklands when George Harvey-Noble obtained the final 130mph badge. Vaughan Davis began its restoration in the 1960s, which was completed at Stanley Mann’s workshop. The car has an undertray, which probably helps stability at high speeds. Harvey-Noble told Mann that the car was managing 148mph on the Railway Straight and in a straight line it would “easily do 160”.
Size: 4928px × 3264px
Location: Dyck Castle near Düsseldorf, North Rhine Westphalia, Germany, Europe
Photo credit: © eddie linssen / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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