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Weekly Motor Fix: Mike Lowe’s new Targa Abarth

20 October, 2015

When veteran Targa driver Mike Lowe — and his co-driver Philip Sutton — line up to start the 21st annual Targa NZ next Monday (Labour Day, October 26) once again they will be in a small Enzed-backed Abarth sports coupé. However it will not be the same classic model in which Mike started and finished all 20 previous week-long Targa New Zealand events.

Now that Mike’s 1964 model Abarth Berlina Corsa — ‘Barty’ — has been retired from active duty, ‘Barty 2’ will take over as his Targa car. Despite its near-identical Enzed livery, the new car couldn’t be more different from its predecessor — and that’s because Barty 2 is a modern-day front-wheel-drive Abarth Assetto Corse works race car that has been converted to R3T tarmac rally specification. It is powered by a turbocharged, front-mounted 1400cc engine that produces 140kWs of peak power for a top speed of 225km/h — giving the Mike a big performance advantage over his older Fiat.

“In the 20 years of Targa we have seen the event get faster and with less older cars running,” Mike said. “In that time we had to push Barty way beyond its design brief just to keep up and it became clear that we needed to keep him for special or smaller events, and find something else to use for the next 20 years. When I saw the new Abarths (on a visit to the factory in 2012) I knew then we had to have one.”

This year’s six-day Targa NZ event starts in Auckland on (Labour Day) Monday October 26 and finishes in Palmerston North on Saturday October 31 — check out the current edition of New Zealand Classic Car for full details and route maps.

Photo credits: Fast Company / Mike Lowe and ProShotz

Coaching from the bench: Casting plastic knobs and rubber parts

16 July, 2026

Casting rubber items is simple if you have a good original to work with. The item doesn’t have to be perfect. You can use plasticine to smooth out cracks, and you can even make whole prototypes out of low-fire modelling clay available from craft stores if you need to. Prototypes can also be made of wood or metal.
You will need mould dams to contain the liquid urethane moulding solution until it cures. You can build boxes out of strips of wood, but I have found that small plastic boxes and bowls such as those you would use for leftovers in your fridge work well if you spray them with a mould release agent.
Temperature is important to the chemical processes involved, so work in an area that can be maintained at around 20 degrees. You will also need adequate ventilation because the fumes can be dangerous to breathe. And you will want to wear latex gloves to protect your hands.

Fraser Cars – low flying into the fourth decade

10 July, 2026

With almost three and a half decades under its belt, Fraser Cars is one of New Zealand’s longest-surviving car manufacturers. The company first opened its doors for business in 1988, during the boom time for kit manufacturers. During the ’80s, around 40 different companies were building kits and turnkey cars for this niche market. Of those, only Fraser and Almac Cars (established 1981) are still in business today.
Most of the new kit car companies were killed off in the cradle by the threat of new legislation that never eventuated and definitively by the sudden availability of high-performance Japanese cars when the floodgates to second-hand imports were opened. The now long-retired founder of the company, Neil Fraser, first came across Lotus Seven replicas while racing Lotus Cortinas in the early ’80s. He regularly found himself racing against a little Caterham, a Lotus Seven–styled car built in England. He was very impressed by its simplicity and handling. In 1986 Fraser built his own Lotus Seven–type car, using the knowledge he had gained from several close looks at the Caterham.