Gilbern-Chevrolet GT: unique fire-breathing dragon

By Simon Hucknall

| 1 Apr 2026

Classic & Sports Car – Gilbern-Chevrolet GT: fire-breathing dragon

Call me a wuss, but I’m thankful it’s a dry day.

The approach to Castle Combe’s infamous Quarry Corner has been the stage of more offs than any other circuit bend in Britain.

So, harnessed into a 60-year-old, plastic-bodied sports car with a power-to-weight ratio close to 350bhp per tonne, circumspection is now my middle name.

This Chevrolet V8-powered Gilbern GT is no latter-day hybrid, either: it’s a unique and original factory-ordered car with a colourful motorsport history, steadily developed by a series of owners since 1965.

The unique Gilbern-Chevrolet GT was built with V8 power to settle an on-track grudge match

Ken Wilson was the first of those owners, and while his rationale for specifying such an unruly powerhouse is a tale to which we’ll return, it’s safe to say the Gilbern GT 1800’s standard motor – from an MGB – did not cut it for him.

In the mid-1960s that was the most potent unblown engine available for a Gilbern.

When Welsh master butcher Giles Smith and German engineer Bernard Friese (Gilbern is a contraction of their first names) produced their first cars in the late 1950s, they used a humble 998cc A-series motor from an Austin A35.

While the V8 installation was a one-off, I’d wager that few production cars have been offered with such a vast spread of outputs.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT’s current owner, Mike Lamplough, restored the car to its mid-’60s specification

As with many low-volume start-ups at the time, Smith and Friese established their business in response to Britain’s new-car Purchase Tax, which at the start of the ’60s was running at 50%.

Friese had built a glassfibre-bodied Special for hillclimbing and, after a chance meeting with Smith, the pair laid plans to produce an all-new car, still with a GRP body, but to be sold as a kit to exempt it from the dreaded levy.

Smith was based in Church Village, near Pontypridd, and a small workshop behind his butcher’s shop was used to build the first cars.

Working with local racing driver Peter Cottrell, the pair developed an attractive two-seater coupé with a high-quality body moulded mainly in one piece, for the best-possible panel gaps.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT is well balanced and stable on track, at least when its V8 isn’t fully extended – and if it isn’t raining

The shell was riveted to a square-section, steel-tube chassis, and in the Gilbern GT’s Mk1 iteration it was suspended by leaf springs at the rear and an A35 assembly at the front. An optional Shorrock supercharger was also offered to boost the A-series’ output.

It was soon clear that the Gilbern GT was a viable rival to the likes of the Marcos Xylon and TVR Grantura, while perhaps lacking the polished chassis dynamics of, say, a Lotus Elite.

In May 1960, Autosport tested one of the first GTs at Llandow Circuit and reported favourably.

Smith and Friese had envisaged selling the GT as a kit, with buyers left to source mechanicals and suspension, but they soon realised that marketing it as a component car – with a painted, wired and trimmed body, and a choice of new engine, transmission and wheels, supplied for home assembly – was vital to maintain quality.

The V8 engine and gearbox intrude into the cabin

As the GT evolved during the first half of the ’60s, with improved coil-spring and trailing-link rear suspension, and a wider choice of more potent 1489-1798cc B-series engines from the MGA and then the MGB, so did sales volumes.

By 1961, Gilbern had moved its operation to a site on ex-colliery land at Llantwit Fardre.

From building one car per month at the start of the decade, by 1965 it was making one a week and employing 20 staff.

Around this time Ken Wilson enters the story, with a dream of creating a formidable Gilbern circuit racer.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT produced around 300bhp in 1965; today, it’s output is closer to 350bhp

Ken, a well-to-do builder from Bridgend, had enjoyed success sprinting a BRM P48 in ’64.

It seems his driving style was flamboyant (current keeper Mike Lamplough tells me Wilson was described in period as ‘an accident waiting to happen’), and he was not one to take failure on the track sitting down.

Peter ‘Taffy’ Cottrell, who had been influential in the Gilbern GT’s early development, had beaten him on more than one occasion in roadgoing GT classes driving his own Gilbern GT, the second ever produced, which he had tweaked and improved in line with the production cars.

Wilson’s response was to order a new Gilbern from the factory, one that would blow Cottrell’s racer into the weeds.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT’s 5.7-litre motor, in place of the original 4638cc unit

The car that Wilson ordered in November 1964 was nothing short of radical.

While it was essentially a new GT 1800, instead of settling for the regular B-series four-pot, Wilson supplied the factory with a 4.6-litre Chevrolet small-block V8 to fit into the engine bay.

The amateur racer seemingly raided his own parts bin for the factory to beef up his car’s drivetrain and cooling system: an uprated BMC axle was used to deal with the huge increase in torque; a Lister-Jaguar gearbox was fitted (Wilson had campaigned an ex-Le Mans Lister-Jaguar a few years before); plus wheels and a radiator taken from his stock of BRM spare parts.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT’s radiator shroud

The factory’s reaction to Wilson’s request is not known, but presumably the work involved in shoehorning such a large motor into a car designed for an A-series was thought worth it in exchange for the exposure Wilson and his new machine might receive.

But not everything went to plan.

In March 1965, Gilbern GT chassis B100182 was delivered to Ken Wilson, and on 15 April it was registered with the Glamorganshire number ETX 450C.

Wilson’s early races were plagued by overheating issues that were traced to a cracked cylinder head, and it became apparent the V8 Gilbern was a handful in the wet, despite (or perhaps because of) the gumball 15in BRM wheel and tyre combination.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT has fat tyres on 15in rims, chunky wheelarches and (relatively) restrained tailfins

Ironically, the driver Wilson had set out to beat on track was enlisted to calm the GT’s spikey wet-weather handling, and for the following three years Cottrell and Wilson shared the car, with Cottrell mainly competing on circuits, Wilson at hillclimbs and sprints.

An Autosport report from a Whitsun Trophy meet at Llandow Circuit records the ‘fearsome red Gilbern-Chevrolet’ dominating before ‘Wilson spun in front of the pack at Paddock and retired’ – predictably, in the wet.

Llandow remained a favoured venue for the duo, with hillclimbs dominating the rest of their calendar, including at Shelsley Walsh, Pontypool and Castell.

There was also a smattering of drag-strip visits in 1966 and ’67, with impressive quarter-mile times recorded at Blackbushe (13.89 secs), RAF Woodvale (12.88 secs) and Santa Pod (13.66 secs), the last resulting in a class win and new class record.

Ken Wilson and the Gilbern GT brave wet conditions at the 1966 Weston-super-Mare Speed Trials © Mike Lamplough

Alas, other than some archive photos of Wilson and his Gilbern at the 1966 Weston-super-Mare Speed Trials (again in the wet), little further coverage exists of Wilson and Cottrell’s campaigning in this period.

By 1969 it looked as if the GT’s competition career had drawn to a close.

Wilson, also a keen powerboat racer, extracted the V8 to install in one of his craft.

Then, after languishing on his premises for two years, the Gilbern was advertised, sans engine, in Motor Sport at central London Saab/Gilbern dealer Ace Motors.

‘There is no doubt the Gilbern-Chevrolet GT would bite if you took liberties, but it has the potential to be an omnipotent track tool in the right hands’

But with no takers, it remained with Ace through most of the ’70s.

Sadly, Ken Wilson suffered a heart attack and died on 12 May 1974, while racing a powerboat.

The Gilbern was then advertised once more in Motor Sport by Ace Motors in December 1976, but yet again it failed to sell.

Six years later, at the end of 1982, Ace Motors’ managing director wrote to the Gilbern Owners’ Club hoping to find a buyer for the car, which had now been with him for more than a decade.

Two years later, a saviour was found in the shape of David Ellison.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT’s purposeful look matches the punch of its V8

Remarkably, ETX 450C only showed 885 miles on its odometer, suggesting that, even during its stint as a racing car in the ’60s, it had been used sparingly and likely spent more time on hillclimbs than circuits.

Rather than installing another Chevy V8, Ellison opted to fit a 1588cc Lotus Twin Cam, presumably to allow for eligibility in classic rallying, which became the next strand in ETX’s competition history.

Ellison’s wife, Catherine, entered the 1990 Manx Classic in the Gilbern, and while records are scarce, it’s thought she finished 12th.

However, other than an entry by David Ellison at the May 1993 Wiscombe Hillclimb, which was abandoned due to poor weather, there are no further records of the car being used.

The restored Gilbern-Chevrolet GT is a promising historic racing car

Fast-forward to 2011, and Ellison removed the Twin Cam intending to return it to Chevrolet V8 power.

That never happened, but five years later the car was purchased by Brian Gent from the Gilbern Owners’ Club, who in 2023 sold it to current keeper Mike Lamplough.

Mike has been ETX’s saviour. In the first year of his ownership he undertook a full restoration, returning the car to its mid-’60s racing spec with a view to competing in HRDC Allstars and Equipe Libre events, for which the Gilbern is eligible.

The GT is now faithful to how it would have looked when Ken Wilson took delivery back in 1965: squat, chunky, short of wheelbase and sporting oversized wheels shod with Dunlop racing tyres beneath flared rear arches.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT’s tongue-in-cheek ‘Warp drive’ switch

You’d never call the Gilbern stylish, but in this spec – especially in its original bright red – it has a brutish quality.

Mike admits revisions have been made, many to comply with modern-day regulations.

A Tillett racing seat has replaced the original, and much of the old switchgear has been superceded by modern controls but retained, along with the factory door cards and seats.

Outside, vented steel wheel rims replicate Wilson’s BRM-sourced originals, and beneath the skin there’s a new wiring loom and competition fuel tank.

That Chevrolet V8 is back, too, but this time – oh, goodness – it’s a 5.7-litre unit with aluminium heads.

A Holley carburettor tops the Gilbern-Chevrolet’s V8

Mike has had it dyno’d at 420bhp at the flywheel, or around 350bhp at the rear wheels.

A four-speed Jaguar gearbox and competition clutch have been fitted to deal with the prodigious torque, and while Mike admits some set-up work is still needed, the Gilbern is essentially ready to race.

So having Castle Combe circuit at our disposal, where 60 years ago Messrs Wilson and Cottrell would have been finding their feet with this über-Gilbern, couldn’t be more appropriate.

Climb through the rollcage, drop into the thinly padded Tillett and your legs are skewed to the right, the broad metal shroud encasing the back of the V8 and transmission encroaching into each footwell (the upside of this mid-front location becomes clear when we’re up to speed on the track).

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT’s simple dashboard

A fairly short gearlever and handbrake sprout from the untrimmed casing, along with a metal plate housing switches for the fuel pump, engine fan and ignition, plus the start button.

Pull away and, even though its column has been extended and I have a cushion behind me, I’m reaching slightly for the small wheel.

The gear linkage still needs tweaking, but the generous torque means we only need third and fourth on track, with the long-throw lever sitting next to your buttock in top. And then there’s the noise – and heat!

The Chevy’s deep-chested roar is gloriously unfiltered, and only our respect for Castle Combe’s mid-week sound limits keeps us from extending the modern Stack tachometer’s needle past 4000rpm.

The Gilbern-Chevrolet GT’s stubby gearlever is linked to a Jaguar ’box

Even so, it hurts your ears after a few laps (more fool me for not wearing earplugs or a lid).

The cabin rapidly reaches sub-tropical temperatures, too, with only basic metalwork between you and Detroit’s finest. But none of this matters.

Even at half-chat, the Gilbern GT is devastatingly quick, fast enough to need every inch of circuit.

Understeer is minimal, with a fine balance allowing the rear to help steer through Combe’s tighter bends, while on the faster corners, other than moderate roll, the GT is stable and secure.

There’s no doubt it would bite if you took liberties, but it has the potential to be an omnipotent track tool in the right hands.

It’s a shame this one-off Gilbern-Chevrolet never got the development it needed to turn it into a winner 60 years ago.

Maybe its second lease of life will put it on the podium.

Images: Jack Harrison

Thanks to: Mike Lamplough; Castle Combe Circuit

Factfile

Gilbern-Chevrolet GT
(data for original specification)

Sold/number built 1965/one
Construction glassfibre bodyshell riveted to tubular steel chassis
Engine all-iron, ohv 4638cc V8, two twin-choke Stromberg carburettors
Max power 300bhp (est)
Max torque n/a
Transmission four-speed manual, RWD
Suspension: front independent, by wishbones, coil springs, lever-arm dampers, anti-roll bar rear live axle, trailing arms, coil spring/damper units
Steering rack and pinion
Brakes discs front, drums rear
Length 12ft 9in (3900mm)
Width 4ft 11in (1500mm)
Height 4ft 3in (1300mm)
Wheelbase 7ft 10in (2400mm)
Weight 2425lb (1100kg)
0-60mph 6.5 secs (est)
Top speed 150mph (est)
Mpg n/a
Price new £995 (kit, 1965)
Price now £60-70,000*