Lotus had broken an 1100cc Class G land speed record at Monza in 1956 with a Climax powered Lotus XI driven by Stirling Moss. The car had been designed by Frank Costin and built by W&P. There was a very close relationship between W&P and Frank Costin. Costin was an aircraft designer from deHavilland who in his spare time enjoyed working on very aerodynamic car designs. In the mid to late fifties Frank was Lotus' favourite designer and W&P were, in effect, Lotus' bodywork team. They had worked very closely together on key aerodynamic designs from the Lotus VIII to XI, and were also jointly working on projects for Lister. This was a relationship which continued throughout Costin's design career, with W&P building around 16 of his designs.

Speedwell were a well known tuning company formed in 1957 by Len Adams, Formula 1 driver Graham Hill, George Hulbert and international rally driver John Sprinzel. In the late fifties, Speedwell approached Costin and asked him to design some streamlined bodywork for the Austin Healey Sprite. This resulted in the alloy bodied Speedwell GT Sprites, with the Monza nose. Most of these Speedwell GT bodies were built by Classic Motor Crafts, possibly due to W&P's other heavy comitments to Lotus and Lister, "outside work" already causing a raised eyebrow or two with Colin Chapman, who required total commitment to his projects as a priority. However, it is believed that the prototype alloy Monza bonnet was made by W&P, given they were Costin's usual first port of call on such projects. Certainly when a GRP version of the Speedwell Monza bonnet was launched in Spring 1961, W&P were involved in the production of the GRP fronts, possibly as nominated sub-contractors to Classic Motor Crafts. By 1962 both Len and Charlie were shareholders in Speedwell and had tied up the manufacturing contract. As this photo taken late 1965 / early 1966 in the storeroom at Edmonton shows, not only were they producing the GRP Speedwell Monza front, but stacked up on the right hand-side are Classic Motor Crafts' famous Bermuda hardtops, of which W&P had just manufactured a batch, presumably under sub-contract:

photo from Cars and Car Conversions Magazine, April 1966

By 1967 W&P had acquired the full rights to the Monza front, which they then marketed as their own, possibly in settlement of monies due. They remained active shareholders in Speedwell until it went into administration in 1969.

above: redacted investment letter, and call-off invoice for Monza front.

Back to the story of the Streamliner. In late 1959, after a super-charged teardrop-shaped Sprite had achieved a Class G land speed record of 146.95 mph on the salt flats at Utah, Speedwell decided to have a go at a land speed record for an unblown Sprite. Costin was called in to design the car, and W&P were contracted to build it. The car kept the Sprite basic chassis and scuttle height. A one-piece alloy Monza-style front was crafted with headlights faired in and with front wheels covered. The rear wheels were covered with alloy spats, and rear fins smoothed off. The screen was removed, an alloy tonneau added over the passenger seat, and an alloy headrest and plexiglass canopy added, in the Lotus XI "Le Mans" bodwork style (incidentally, Len Pritchard's favourite body). The rear was cut-off Kamm style. The dimensions were carefully crafted and matched to George Hulbert's frame, who was to drive the car.

Testing took place around the North London circular, a favourite Costin test route with his Lotus work, apparently with Costin riding in the boot area of the Sprite to take measurements, and the body was adjusted to minimise drag.

Mechanically, George Hulbert put together a Speedwell "Clubman 70" balanced 980cc A-series engine on twin Amal carbs with modified valve gear, and the car had a 3.7:1 rear differential. Running on a mix of methanol and nitromethane, it put out around 92 bhp, and Costin's calculations were that a top speed of 128mph might be achievable.

On 13 April 1960, the Streamliner and John Venner-Pack's Speedwell GT "VP7", with a similar engine to the Streamliner, but run on "five star" pump fuel, were driven over to Belgium for a Belgian Class G (under 1,000 cc) record attempt. The Antwerp - Liege auto route was closed on one carriageway and the RAC Belgique set up their measuring equipment. The Speedwell GT was driven by George Hulbert over a flying kilometre on 10 runs, and taking the best 4, achieved a land speed record average of 132.206 mph (212.765 km/h). The Speedwell GT, driven by Graham Hill, over 4 runs achieved an average speed of 110.903 mph (178.482 km/h).

The RAC Belgique official record cards clearly show the land speed record to belongs to George Hulbert, and given the official requirements it seems unlikely that Graham Hill would have been allowed to "have a go" with the Streamliner part-way through the record attempt. With the car bespoked to Hulbert's frame, Graham also probably would not be able to fit into it very comfortably with canopy attached. However the Speedwell PR machine appears to have fudged the point somewhat, with subsequent press releases, advertisements and magazine articles in the UK all extolling Graham Hill's record 132.206 mph record - Graham as a successful Formula 1 driver being far more high profile and newsworthy than George. Coincidentally John Sprinzel had recently left Speedwell and Graham Hill was in the process of acquiring a majority stake in the business. It is interesting that in subsequent interviews given by George, there is no mention of Graham slipping into the Streamliner to "pull the cat out of the bag" with a final record breaking run, and indeed the figures reported in various articles telling such a tale don't stack up with the official records. George Hulbert's widow has subsequently confirmed this view of events to Tom Coulthard during his research for "Spritely Years".