The Twin-Cam M.G.
A Very Satisfactory Small Sports Car, Offering a Maximum Speed Comfortably in Excess of 110 m.p.h., Extremely Good Acceleration, Unexpected Docility and Outstanding "Safety Fast" Characteristics, Reinforced by Dunlop Disc Brakes…
THE ME0 SPECIAL AFFAIR AROSE OUT OF MY YOUTHFULL fanaticism for any link with motor racing. I had written to SCH Davis of The Autocar in 1933, asking if anyone would employ me as an unpaid, spare-time labourer, doing any kind of work on a racing car? He kindly put me in touch with a Mr Meo who lived in Hampstead, and had built a GN Special for racing at Brooklands. I was allowed to emery the front axle of a long lean all-black car. Although basically GN, it was disguised by body cowl to look much later.
The engine was a GN Vitesse with the chain-driven overhead camshafts, one above each ‘pot’, but Meo had refined the cylinder heads. A single Sunbeam motorcycle hairpin spring closed each valve. Ignition was by a Bosch magneto; lubrication from a small dash mounted tank and a Pilgrim pump. A large motorcycle-type Amal semi-downdraught carburettor supplied fuel via polished bell-mouthed ports. The fuel tank was in the tail.
The usual GN chain transmission used a 1922 bevel four-speed box with no reverse. To lower this 1922 chassis the springs had been raised on steel blocks, and this very low GN Special was slightly crab-tracked. The body was of wood, and a plywood floor alone protected the occupants from being savaged by a broken driving chain.
That was the car I found at a garage in Oppidans Road and later at another in Erskine Road, Hampstead. Being a ‘spanner-fool’, I was just given lots of emery cloth, so I spent my time writing a nine-page description of this racing GN. I was then towed to the Track behind Meo’s Salmson and had one practice run. We did about 90mph down the Railway straight, and I saw 4500rpm on the tachometer, which was driven by Meccano pinions.. Alas, the Meo was highly temperamental and difficult to start, due to oiled-up plugs and flooding carbs, calling for squirts of benzole before it would fire, and missed its races at the 1932 and 1933 Inter Club Meetings. I don’t think a photograph of the car was ever taken but if one exists, I would like to see it. Michael Meo, who died not long ago also, also had the rare Laystall Special engine in his garage.