Early Cars
de Joux's first car was a 1936 Austin Seven Ruby. He removed the body, designed and built a fibreglass body for it. Possibly New Zealand's first. Internationally de Joux is perhaps best known as the designer and manufacturer of a series of fibreglass bodies for Buckler sports cars. One of the first Buckler's to his design was Ivy Stephenson's.
From there he created a Holden Special followed by a Ferrari Special. Jack Brabham commented that the Ferrari was the best non factory built car he had seen and offered him a job. de Joux declined.
de Joux bought the Ferrari 375 that José Froilán González drove and won the 1951 British Grand Prix at Silverstone from New Zealand racing driver Ron Roycroft. He converted it into a Gran Turismo that looked like a genuine factory built Ferrari road car. It was an exquisitely proportioned car used by de Joux daily for the next four and a half years until he sold it. The car was restored back to a single seater by a Christchurch classic car enthusiast and is now owned by Bernie Ecclestone.
In 1962 de Joux and Auckland mechanic Kevin Lamb made two deJoux Gran Turismo cars. The GT's look like a cross between a Maserati A6G and an AC Bristol Zagato with 1950's and 1960s styling. Also around this time De Joux is thought to have designed the Orchid, a 1960's period racer, molded by The Australasian Motor Works. Among several sports racers de Joux built was a Ferrari-Jaguar combination - called the Ferraguar.
Read more about this topic: Ferris De Joux
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or cars:
“Quintilian [educational writer in Rome around A.D. 100] thought that the earliest years of the child’s life were crucial. Education should start earlier than age seven, within the family. It should not be so hard as to give the child an aversion to learning. Rather, these early lessons would take the form of play—that embryonic notion of kindergarten.”
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“The startings and arrivals of the cars are now the epochs in the village day.”
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