My 206S Prototype has returned to active service, better than ever!

OK gentlemen, for your viewing pleasure, I give you my newly restored 206S Prototype copy, built by Sam Johnson in Australia back in the 90s.

I am the 3. owner incl. the builder himself. I acquired the car in 2013 or 2014 I think and have driven it at every opportunity and enjoyed every second. However, the engine was pretty much rubbish when I got it, and eventually the whole shooting match needed some serious work. Luckily, my bank balance looked good so the car spent 10 months at Corse Automotive, and it has returned to life, better than it ever was!



I have attached a video link above of the builder talking about the car (start at 45 minutes for the 206S section) and as you'll see, this is a very perfect body/chassis copy, painstakingly measured and recreated by Sam, a master craftsman (watch all the video to understand). The old 206S pictures in the video show the hand measurement techniques from the 1990s and Sam tells of the discrepancies in the body that he fixed. The body is basically perfect and the frame is actually perfect, though I have had to remove the original pedal box now and modify the seat and frame to accommodate a different modern pedal box for my height. The whole video is excellent, but from 45 minutes is the interesting part here.

The old engine was a 2L alloy modified (rather badly) for 2.4L pistons with odd dimensioned heads and poorly worked. It was never really very good, but usable. The new engine is a 2L all alloy unit constructed from parts of the original engine and the used 2L engine formerly in the Dulon L10B Dino engined car. We were able to construct a full engine with all the necessary bits. The heads (one from each engine) were done correctly and 117 small things were also fixed in the engine. It was a nightmare actually, but someone else's The Dulon engine had been built by a bit of a cowboy originally, so it was quite a lot of work to adjust. It does have an Arrow crank and better cams and pistons, so all is not lost. We haven't dyno-tuned the engine yet, but a quick 147 bhp @ 7500 rpm at the wheels was shown during some testing.

I am reasonably happy with the engine now, though some fine tuning to smooth the curves will be needed.

We changed the pedal box in the car, and modified the seat angles to accommodate my height. This was a safety and scrutineering issue, even for simple speed events. It wasn't really possible to use the original pedal set, so there's a modern Tilton (?) floor unit now.

The suspension has also been extensively re-worked by an industry expert in the matter. Sam explained driving the car in the video as "twitchy", and he's correct - the car would misbehave badly under certain stress conditions - hopefully this will have been corrected. The suspension also rubbed holes in the walls of tyres when the driver was pushing on, this issue has also been corrected - thankfully!

So, that's the short story.

The car had a couple of installation sessions at SMP last November, and issues observed have now been corrected. I'll be running it in regularity at Phillip Island in March and will also be participating in the historic car demonstration (with speed) at the Australian Grand Prix later in March. I think the last time I drove on Albert Park was in my F5000 back in around 2010. The track's changed a bit, but it'll be fun to put the boot in there.

I'll add pictures to the comments as I dig them up

 

Starting with the good stuff.

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A video of the car after first engine startup.

 

It's a gem for sure ... I am researching, but my tag says 32R so I believe my car was copied from original #32. I have yet to verify this

 

The "old" 2.3L engine dyno, and the new 2L dyno. Experts will observe what will be needed. The new dyno reading is probably quite a bit lower than actual, for several reasons. We'll chase HP later

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This is the original dyno of the Dulon engine before it was removed from that car. It's different/better now - or we expect that it is.

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From my builder. An example of the sort of things you find built by other people. I've never seen an engine that didn't need money spent on it to fix the cockups from previous engine builders. This is a perfect example of the issues one needs to address.

https://youtube.com/shorts/SgOPjkFqQTQ

 

https://sealed.sothebys.com/PB23

#32 is confirmed here, where Robs Lamplough is named as the former owner, reiterating the name mentioned by Sam in the 2014 video in the OP.

 

This is a rare video from in the car on a beautiful evening at Sydney Motor Sports park. This was my last run with the car before we parked it.



... and yes, we fixed the mirror and the poor gearbox linkages.

 

... and I have the bills to prove it.

I may sell the 206S if a correct and substantial offer is forthcoming, but for this year I expect 1 or 2 more runs after March later in the year

 

I forgot I had this later one as well ... but no GPS data, sadly.

 

Finally, we have the 206S on Phillip Island in the hands of Pro driver Kyle Tilley. Sadly, the tyre folks couldn't produce tyres, and the car is a pig to drive with what are essentially "wooden" tyres. I was disabled at the time, so Kyle stepped in, as one does in these situations.

 

These are old photos from when I purchased the car. The seats are a little different now, and obviously the pedal box not seen here has changed.

Was there some particular view you needed?

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Hmmm ... this post has a shockingly low view count.

I'd have thought fellow Dino nutters would be interested in good photos, videos etc. of what is certainly one of the very best ever produced 206S copies.

Oh well, such is life - and mine is fine

 

The good news, is that I own several replicas as well as originals of various makes. I actually do not give a tinker's what anoraks think of replicas like the ones I own. It is I who sit in them and drive them, and in the end this is all that counts.

 

I just reviewed all my pics, and I have no more of the interior. Sorry about that.

 

I have no idea of the total body of 206Ss, but #32 from which mine was copied, is RHD as can be seen in the Sotheby's link a little higher up.