Showing posts with label military base racing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label military base racing. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 02, 2025
Tuesday, January 04, 2022
The East side of Maui is home to a Bailey Bridge built by the Army Corps of Engineers, which led me down a rabbit hole of research and I discovered the Pu'unene Naval Air Station (1940-1947) which later became a dragstrip.
One of the original steel and concrete bridges on the Hana Highway in Maui, Hawaii, damaged by erosion, has been paralleled by a Bailey bridge erected by the Army Corps of Engineers.
https://www.mauiinformationguide.com/hana.php
https://www.flickr.com/photos/80651083@N00/with/3779600934/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/80651083@N00/with/3779600934/
In the mid-1950's, Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Connecticut purchased a war-surplus Bailey Bridge so vehicles could enter/exit the infield and paddock sections of the track while races were taking place. The bridge has been in continuous service since, and was relocated to new, raised pilings in spring, 2008. The track believes this may be the sole-remaining WWII-era Bailey Bridge in regular daily public service in the USA.
https://en-academic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/59256
The Bailey bridge is a portable pre-fabricated truss bridge, designed for use by military engineering units to bridge up to 60 m (200 ft) gaps. It requires no special tools or heavy equipment for construction, the bridge elements are small enough to be carried in trucks, and the bridge is strong enough to carry tanks. It is considered a great example of military engineering.
Donald Bailey was a civil servant in the British War Office who tinkered with model bridges as a hobby. He presented one such model to his chiefs, who saw some merit in the design and had construction started at a slow rate.
The bridge was taken into service by the Corps of Royal Engineers and first used in Italy in 1943. A number of bridges were available by 1944 for D-Day, when production was ramped up. The US also licensed the design and started rapid construction for their own use. Bailey was later knighted for his invention, which continues to be widely produced and used today.
http://bridgehunter.com/category/tag/bailey-truss/
Navy use of the Pu'unene Naval Air Station began in 1940, When elements of Utility Squadron VJ-3 arrived to tow targets & operate target drones for the fleet. The Army Air Corps also established a small support base at the airfield in the same year.
After the Pu'unene Airport was closed, Maui racers began using the old runways for impromptu races. It was decided to use an old runway for drag races and time trials in May 1956; it remains in use as Maui Raceway Park as an automobile “drag strip” and park for such activities as go-kart racing and model airplane flying.
The base was commissioned as Naval Air Station Maui in 1942, but it was smaller than a larger air facility on the coast five miles to the northeast at Kahului, NAS Maui was renamed NAS Puunene when the larger NAS Kahului was opened in March 1943.
The Navy's facilities at the field were expanded, to support CASU 4 & VF-72.
Army forces eventually concentrated on Oahu, leaving the Navy as the primary user of the field.
By the end of the war, Puunene had a total complement of over 3,300 personnel & 271 aircraft.
A total of 106 squadrons & carrier air groups passed through during WW2.
Tuesday, February 09, 2016
the 1954 Savannah Grand Prix ( Hunter Air Force Base, SCCA) had a Bugatti Royale as the pace car! And it had been ordered by the King of Romania, -but- the war got in the way, so it was hidden in the Paris sewers
Savannah Grand Prix. Hunter Air Force Base, GA. March 14, 1954.
Bugatti Type 41 Royale Coupe de Ville Binder.
The second Royale built, but the first to find a customer, is chassis no.41.111 Never actually delivered to the King of Romania due to the war, but it was hidden from the Nazis by storing it in the sewers of Paris
Sold in April 1932 to French clothing manufacturer Armand Esders.
Ettore's eldest son, Jean, fashioned for the car a dramatic two-seater open body with flamboyant, full-bodied wings and a dickey seat, but no headlamps. In this form it became known as the Royale Esders Roadster.
Purchased by the French politician Paternotre, the car was rebodied in the Coupé de ville style by the coach builder Henri Binder. From this point onwards, known as the Coupé de ville Binder
Briefly located in the United Kingdom after World War 2, and was then acquired by Dudley C. Wilson of the US in 1954.
Dudley Wilson was a sports car racer, and in 1948, won at Langhorne. This Philadelphia track was created in 1926, as the 1st dirt track built specifically for car racing.
On his death in 1961 it passed to banker Mills B Lane of Atlanta for $4500 before in 1964 taking up residence in The Harrah Collection at Reno, Nevada, bought at the then sensational price of $45,000 (approximately what the car had cost new).
Sold in 1986 to an American collector, home builder, and US Air Force General William Lyon, who offered the car during the 1996 Barrett-Jackson Auction by private sale, where he refused an offer of US$11 million; the reserve was set at US$15 million.
In 1999, the new owner of the Bugatti brand, Volkswagen AG, bought the car for a reported US$20 million. Now used as a brand promotion vehicle, it travels to various museums and locations
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bugatti_Royale
here it is before it was rebodied.
only half a dozen Royales were built, of which three were sold. One went to France, another to Germany and the third to England.
In chassis number order there’s the Coupe Napoleon (Ettore’s own car that has had five different bodies), the Binder Coupe de Ville (two bodies), the Weinberger (original roadster body), the Park Ward (original limousine body), the racy Kelner coupe (original grand tourer body) and finally (though possibly the first made) the Double Berline de Voyage (original body).
the Coupe Napoleon is in France’s Mulhouse National Automobile Museum, together with an authentic replica of No 2 with original roadster body. The Weinberger cabriolet now resides in The Henry Ford
Hunter AFB was distinctly unique in that it became the only U.S. military installation named for a living American, Major General (Retired) Frank Hunter. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_Army_Airfield
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