A Brief History of Titan Formula Cars
In 1965 Charles “Luke” Lucas teamed up with Roy Thomas, known as “Tom” the Weld, to form Charles Lucas Engineering, Limited. Luke bought the former Brahbam, Hulme, and Hill 1964 F2 BT16s for himself, Jonathan Williams, and Piers Courage. Roy Thomas reworked the cars to F3 specification. Charles Lucas Engineering (CLE) dominated the 1965 European F3 season, and brought a level of professionalism that was new to the junior formula. So much so that Colin Chapman hired Luke to run the Team Lotus works F3 team for the 1966 season. The team was called Charles Lucas-Team Lotus.
At the beginning of the 1966 season, Brabham F3 cars were the privateer racer’s car of choice. They were fast, durable, and easy to set up. Chapman was looking to break the Brabham strangle hold and designed the Lotus 41 F3 car. The team selected two up and coming drivers in Piers Courage and American Roy Pike to drive Chapman’s new F3 car. However, the “41” was not living up to expectations, and the team experienced handling problems with the cars. However, as the season progressed the team developed the cars. So much so, that Piers Courage finished the season sharing top F3 series honors with Chris Irwin who drove a Brabham for Graham Warner’s Checkered Flag Team.
The team’s relationship with Lotus ended when Chapman decided to keep CLE’s Firestone bonus money for himself. At the last race of the season, Chapman ran a third F3 car for Jackie Oliver under the gise of “development”. The Firestone bonus was a substantial amount of money, and this unfortunate experience drove Luke and Tom to build their own F3 car, which was the Titan Mk3. Given Tom’s experience with Brahbams and Lotus F3 cars, he incorporated the best of both marques and designed a conventional space frame car with beautiful cigar shaped bodywork.
The Mk3 made its debut at the British Grand Prix, which was held at Silverstone circuit, July 15, 1967. Roy Pike put the prototype on the poll and Luke qualified 3rd in one of the Lotus 41’s from the previous season. Luke’s car was fitted with Tom’s prototype downdraft MAE engine. Unfortunately, Luke spun at Stowe corner early in the race collecting Roy Pike, but miraculously Luke recovered and went on to win the race thanks to the horsepower of the new engine. CLE took over 100 orders for their version of the MAE, and from that point on the Titan Mk3 and CLE engines were a force in F3.
The CLE downdraft version of the MAE became the F3 standard until the formula was changed in 1970. In 1968, Roy Pike and Luke raced the Mk3 with a lot of success, and a large percentage of the F3 grid had CLE downdraft engines sitting behind the driver. CLE started out as a privateer racing effort. However, their success as a racing team pushed CLE into the commercial racecar and engine production.
Intertwined with the F3 story is a new junior formula that appeared in England during 1967. This new formula was called Formula Ford (FF) and was developed to provide a more economical way to train racing drivers. Formula 3 engines and tires were expensive, and unforgiving of inexperienced drivers. At Motor Racing Stables racing drivers school, they stuck a Ford Cortina engine in the back of an older F3 chassis, and instead of expensive racing tires they installed street radial tires on steel wheels. Formula Ford was born and it spread quickly throughout the world.
CLE recognized the sales potential of FF, and modified the Mk3 to meet the FF regulations. The modified Mk3 became the Titan Mk4 Formula Ford, which was introduced in 1968 and was instantly successful in the hands of Tony Trimmer. Tony was originally a mechanic who worked for Harry Stiller out of the CLE Highgate works and then later for (Sir) Frank Williams. Other notable Mk4 drivers included Derek Lawrence and Tony Dron. A handful of Mk4s did find their way to the United States, and they were very competitive with the Lotus 51s, Merlyns, and Crossles of the day.
In 1969 The Mk4 chassis was modified to accept the new Hewland Mk8 gearbox, and along with a few minor revisions, became the Titan Mk5 Formula Ford. Again, Tony Trimmer drove a Mk5 Titan with much success throughout the UK and Europe, and he finished second overall in the European FF championship. Titan also continued to make a favorable impression in America, which attracted the attention of Fred Opert and Pierre Phillips who were the key race car importers of the time.
During this time, CLE moved the works from their London Highgate shop to a new purpose built facility in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire (right across the street from Lola’s works). The new facility incorporated a machine shop, engine clean room, engine dyno rooms, and a car assembly area. It was a facility second only to Cosworth at the time.
The highly competitive nature of Formula Ford drove racing car manufactures to keep improving their cars. In 1970 CLE introduced the Titan Mk6 Formula Ford, which is considered one of the most successful Formula Fords ever to take to the track. Tom improved the front suspension of the venerable Mk5 chassis by utilizing a two piece upper control arm, which fed suspension loads through more of the chassis. At the same time, he redesigned the bodywork to improve down force and clean up airflow around the car. We believe that CLE/Titan Cars built somewhere between 240 and 300 Mk6s over a four year period.
US Importers Fred Opert and Pierre Phillips created Mk6 varients in an effort to offer something new to customers each year. However, CLE/Titan Cars never recognized the variants, and all Mk6 chassis were the same. The differences over the four years of production were usually minor changes to the bodywork. These changes culminated in the “duckbill” nose, which appeared in England during the August of 1972, and in the United States during the 1973 season.
During the 1972 season in the UK, Derek Lawrence and Ken Bailey teamed up to form “Team Titan”. They had a lot of success, winning 35 races between the two of them. They won a couple of championships as well as placing second and third in several more. In the US, the Mk6 was the dominant car of the era winning eleven SCCA divisional championships over its four year production life, and the SCCA Formula Ford National Championship in 1971 with Jim Harrell at the wheel.
In 1971 Luke decided that he wanted out of the business, and sold the company’s assets to Roy and then wife Diana Thomas. Roy and Diana formed Titan Cars and move the business to smaller premises in St. Neots. Luke kept his hand in motor racing and went on to work with the Hesketh Formula 1 team.
By 1974 the Mk6 was a four year old design and Tom designed a successor, which was designated as the Mk8. There were several areas that Tom hoped to improve over the Mk6. The Mk8 chassis featured what Tom called “double side panniers”, which meant that the chassis had 8 main tubes instead of the typical 4. In addition, the engine was a semi-stressed member of the chassis. Roy also tried some new suspension geometry concepts, and designed a wedge shaped body with two side mounted radiators. The wheelbase was shorter and the front and rear tracks were wider than the Mk6 to increase agility and cornering power. The nose cone was short and turned down sharply in order to get close to the car in front to enhance slip streaming, which is a big part of Formula Ford racing.
Unfortunately, the Mk8 was late off the drawing board, and suffered from insufficient development. The car was rushed into production, and once in the hands of customers problems appeared. The cars were hard to set-up, they had a tendency to oversteer, the engines overheated, and the rear magnesium uprights cracked. Titan quickly supplied update kits to sort the cars problems, and introduced the Mk9 model, which was essential a revised Mk8. However, nothing travels faster than bad news, and the company’s reputation was damaged. Two years later Tom decided to stop producing racing cars. The company shifted its focus to formula ford engine construction and racing car component manufacturing.
Today, Titan Motorsport and Manufacturing, Ltd. does a thriving business on the same site in St. Neots, England. They manufacture racing components for the top companies in the industry such as Lola, Dallara, Caterham, Cosworth, and Morgan cars. Titan hasn’t forgotten its roots, and still manufactures components for formula ford engines. Plus, many of today’s other formula car classes use Titan steering racks, suspension components, and dry sump systems! All these years later motor racing is still what Titan is all about. The 50+ person company is owned and managed by Diana Thomas and Oz Timms, both of whom started working with the company when it was an up and coming Formula 3 team called Charles Lucas Engineering!