EditProfile: Jim Hall
Jim Hall is an old driver and American car manufacturer. It took part in 11 Grand Prix of Formule 1 between 1960 and 1963 but is especially known to have created the mark Chaparral Cars, famous for its technical innovations in the year 1960 and 1970.
Heir to a family which made fortune in oil, Jim Hall takes his first steps in the medium of the sport car while integrating in 1957 the company Carroll Shelby Sports Because , in which his/her Dick older brother is already implied. Just like his/her brother, Jim launches out then in the competition, initially at the wheel of cars of the " type; sport" , then gradually in single-seater. In 1960, at the wheel of a Lotus 18 private lent by his/her friend controls Hap Sharp, it disputes even the Grand Prix of the United States, where it finishes in a beautiful seventh place. Jim Hall will take part again in the GP of the United States in 1961, before integrating in 1963 the stable BRP of Alfred Moss and Ken Gregory (respectively the father and the manager of Stirling Moss). But the adventure shows mitigated results (a fifth and a sixth place, are 3 points). At the end of 63, Hall gives up any dream of success in F1 to devote itself to the work of its life, impetus two years earlier.
Since 1961, Jim Hall indeed decided to become manufacturer in partnership with Hap Sharp. The two men decide to baptize their company Chaparral, the other name of the Grand géocoucou, a bird of Texas immortalized by the cartoon Bip Beep and Coyote. First Chaparral, the MK 1, is a traditional engine small boat V8 Chevrolet which the duet Hall/Sharp engages in tests " sport" in the United States. In 1963, Jim Hall launches Chaparral 2A which will dominate until 1965 the tests of championship SCCA. With the wire of its evolutions, the 2A is seen grafting an automatic box. It is with its flying that Hall and Sharp offer to their team her first great international victory with the 12 hours of Sebring 1965.
From 1966, Hall engages Chaparral on two faces: the challenge Edge-Am in North America and the championship of the world of the marks (primarily in Europe). For Edge-Am, Jim Hall launches 2nd, a model which will make date: it is about an small boat equipped with a back aileron (in oneself an innovation since even F1 did not explore yet this technical solution) which with the characteristic to be mobile. Starting from a third pedal (let us recall that Chaparral have an automatic box, and thus not of clutch pedal) the pilot can incline the aileron in the turns to gain adherence, and to flat give it in straight line to preserve an optimal top speed. For the championship of the world, Hall also designs a version " coupé" 2A, the 2D, that OJ Bonnier and Phil Hill makes triumph to the 1000 km over Nürburgring 1966. In 1967, Chaparral 2F dominates the tests of the championship of the world of the marks, but by the fault of a random reliability, picking the bay-trees of the victory only once (500 km of Brands Hatch with P.Hill and Mike Spence).
Driven out championship of the world by a technical change of regulation relating to the authorized maximum cubic capacity, Jim Hall concentrates the activity of Chaparral on the American tests, and in particular the challenge Edge-Am. It is in this championship that it is victim of a serious accident which puts a term at its career of pilot. That does not prevent it from continuing to explore particularly original technical solutions, as with Chaparral " aspirateur" 2J of 1970, flanked of two turbines intended to aspire the air under the car and to create a suction cup effect. Gordon Murray will copy the idea later 8 years with the Brabham - Alfa. But under the pressure of the competitors, the system is quickly banished by the legislator, involving the end of the activity of Chaparral.
At the end of the years 1970, Jim Hall starts again Chaparral, this time in the single-seater. In 1978, Al Unser gains the 500 Miles of Indianapolis over a Lola - Cosworth engaged by Chaparral Racing. Then, in 1979, he entrusts to the British engineer John Barnard the design of Chaparral 2K " wing car" that Johnny Rutherford will make triumph in Indy 500 1980.
After having left CART at the end of 1982, Jim Hall there retoune in 1991, but without the statute of " constructeur" , with a baptized team Jim Racing Hall. At the end of the season 1996, in spite of its profitable collaboration with the Brazilian hope Gil de Ferran, it decides to withdraw automobile sport.