Waltzing around in a Westfield
Westfield has
no doors
Be warned - there is an army of men in
grey dustcoats trying to make sure that all fun has been
taken out of driving a motor car. The Political Correctness
Thought Police and the Health and Safety wallahs are padding
the corners of the table, putting talcum powder on your
willy and pulling up your pampers.
Westfield
S 2000
Face facts, today’s motor car manufacturers have become so
“safety conscious” and “green” they have produced cars that
have become interminably boring to drive. Electronic systems
decide when you have to brake harder than you are doing with
Brake Assist technology. Electronic systems decide that you
don’t know when your driven wheels are starting to spin so
kick in with Anti Skid Control, rather than you lifting the
right clog off the accelerator. Motor noters are clamoring
for the whole alphabet soup of electronic controls to be
applied to all vehicles, in the name of safety, to show just
how responsible they are.
The ‘real’ story is that the chaps in the grey dustcoats
don’t trust you and, quite frankly, you are not clever
enough to drive your own car. So here we are in the era of
the grey, featureless motor car that will get you from A to
B in total dullness. In the inevitable crashing, you will be
saved from dying impaled by a steering column or mangled by
the cream plastic dashboard. You will, instead, die from
crashing boredom.
Julian
towering over the Westfield
Against that depressing backdrop, comes Westfield. A company
that dishes up a real motor car and leaves you to work out
how to deal with acceleration, braking, and cornering, as
well as parking and pulling on the handbrake. Hallelujah!
Some motor manufacturer has given the driver back his
personal responsibility.
The Westfield tested is in reality a Lotus Super 7 clone.
The 1957 design Super 7, from the fertile mind of the late
Colin Chapman, was that of a tubular chassis with a front
engine, with gearbox attached, with rear wheel drive through
the proverbial (and cheap) cart axle. You could buy it as a
turn-key vehicle, or assemble it yourself from a kit of
parts. The Westfield follows the same basic concept.
Basic
instrumentation
As an aside, one of the reasons why the Super 7 was offered
in kit form was to avoid some of the crippling taxes on
fully assembled cars inflicted on the motorist by the
British government. However, the sneaky British government
said that assembly instructions were not allowed to be
included. Mind you, Colin Chapman was even more devious and
included dis-assembly instructions, which were not banned in
the regulations. The DIY assembler then read them in
reverse!
These days there are many Super7 clones, with Caterham and
Westfield probably the best known. Some of the others
include a Japanese clone called the “Rotus”, which turns out
to be a Lotus clone with a rotary engine up front. A
wonderful play on words and pronunciations from a country
not known for sophisticated humor. Another is the ESTfield
which uses Lada parts - an oxymoron for a performance
vehicle, if ever I heard it.
However, back to Westfield and this particular Westfield. In
true S7 concept, it is very small and has a square tube
frame, with alloy and fiberglass paneling. Front engined,
with a 2 liter Ford Duratec, through the Ford five speed
gearbox, to a limited slip diff, and this car has an
independent rear suspension, though some can have the cart
axle. Front suspension is double wishbone, with coil-over
shock absorbers, though the inner ends are bushed, rather
than rose-jointed (though rose-jointing can be ordered).
This vehicle has also been fitted with a multi-tube roll
cage and two four-point harnesses, as it is used for track
days, and it was at the Prince Bira track that I tested the
Westfield.
As opposed to the usual road tests where the tester writes,
“The doors closed with a satisfying clunk,” this is not the
case with the Westfield. It has no doors. You wriggle
through the bars of the cage and slide down into the
footwell. Explore with your feet and count the pedals and
there is the full complement of three! The clutch has a long
throw, but it is not heavy.
The dash is the usual flat piece with the instruments set in
it. Oil pressure, water temperature and fuel gauge offset to
the left and the tachometer and speedometer (optimistically
graduated to 300 km/h) directly in front of the driver.
The engine fired straight off, and there is a musical burble
from the driver’s side mounted exhaust pipe. This changes to
a raucous bark with the first blip on the throttle. A very
satisfying raucous bark.
The gear lever, mounted on the top of the alloy paneled
tunnel has a very positive throw and with first selected,
the nose was pointed towards the racing surface of the Bira
track, and the test began in earnest.
The acceleration is breathtaking, with the 190 bhp Ford
engine propelling around 600 kg of car. This compares very
well against cars such as the V12 Aston Martin Vantage, with
its 517 bhp having to struggle with 1,680 kg of (albeit very
beautiful) vehicle.
With the light weight, the brakes do not have to work hard,
and the Westfield pulled up in a straight line every time,
without any evidence of lock-up.
Again, with the light weight, the rack and pinion steering
is not heavy, and is very precise. This is no sloppy sedan
with fourteen turns lock to lock. The front end grip is
excellent, and if anything, too good at times, as it was not
too difficult to get the rear end to step out, though I feel
this was a function of the IRS system. A tweak with the
spring rates and some more castor at the front would change
all that. But that is half the fun of owning something like
a Westfield. With just the basic kit of tools, you can have
fun and experiment. Something the other motor cars will not
allow. Walk within 10 meters of an Aston Martin with a
screwdriver in your hand and you will have nullified your
warranty.
After several laps of Bira circuit it was very tempting to
just stay out there, enjoying driving in its true sense.
There was no electronic nanny to look after me, I had to do
it all by myself, and it was Fun with the capital F. The
feeling is much like it was after your Dad took off the
trainer wheels and you managed to ride your bicycle all by
yourself. Fun and satisfaction in just doing.
The Westfield is a very good example of a Super 7 clone.
Wider in the body than the original means that normal-sized
adults can get it, and the power plants these days are more
tractable than those available from Lotus between 1957 and
1973, after which the production went to Caterham.
I drew an analogy between the Aston Martin V12 Vantage,
which is expected to go on sale in Thailand for around 22
million baht, and the little Westfield. The Westfield will
set you back (depending upon the options you order) about
1.5 million baht and even cheaper if you want the kit to
DIY. Let me assure you that the Aston isn’t 15 times better
than the Westfield, and as far as bang for your baht, give
me the Westfield any time.
Westfield cars in Thailand are represented by Julian
Dobrijevic, website www. westfield-sportscars-thailand. com.
Starter kits begin at 360,000 baht, race cars from 600,000
and the fully built up road-going versions around 1.5
million. What are you waiting for?
Westfield at
Bira
Robin Williams two
point energy plan
There is just so much in the media these days
about conserving the planet for our children (let ’em go and
find their own, is my answer to all this global warming
nonsense), so I was interested to read an item from Robin
Williams. Here are the two points relating to energy in his
proposals:
1) The US will make a strong effort to become
self-sufficient energy wise. This will include developing
nonpolluting sources of energy but will require a temporary
drilling of oil in the Alaskan wilderness. The caribou will
have to cope for a while.
2) Offer Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries $10
a barrel for their oil. If they don’t like it, we go
someplace else. They can go somewhere else to sell their
production. (About a week of the wells filling up the
storage sites would be enough.)
Autotrivia Quiz
Last week I mentioned the Gobron-Brillie
and the Delaunay-Belleville, which had four pedals, instead
of three. I asked what were the pedals for, and why did it
need four? To make it easier, some Mercedes models also had
the four pedal arrangement. The answer was that there were
two separate foot brakes, one for the rear wheels and the
other for the transmission. They were supposed to be used
alternately, so they didn’t overheat!
So to this week. I have written about Lotus S7’s. When did
Colin Chapman make the first Lotus?
For the Automania FREE beer this week, be the first correct
answer to email [email protected]
Good luck!
