Les Leston 'Stirling Moss Signature Edition 1960's s/wheel

Good Grief, how much??!!

I don't usually pay that much for cars!

I found a Les Leston Appreciation Page on FB and put a pic on there last night. Had several messages since from a bloke offering me £100 for it - no wonder he is so keen to buy it!

I’d never heard of Les Leston until a few days ago.

Seems like he was quite an interesting guy…..

Alfred Lazarus Fingleston (16 December 1920 – 13 May 2012), better known as Les Leston, was a British Racing Driver.



In his early life Leston was a successful drummer for the jazz band The Clay Pigeons. He also served in WW2 as a mid-upper gunner in Lancaster Bombers.
He started racing in a Jaguar SS100, before acquiring a 500cc Cooper and his own Leston Special. He won the Luxemburg Grand Prix in 1952, beating Stirling Moss and Peter Collins, and became a Cooper works driver in 1954 winning the British Formula 3 championship in the same year. He participated in three Formula One World Championship Grands Prix, debuting on 2 September 1956. He competed at Le Mans came as an Aston Martin works driver with Roy Salvadori where he finished 6th overall in 1957.

From 1958-60 he had a successful stint in a Riley 1.5 becoming British touring car champion in class B as well as campaigning the car in the Monte Carlo Rally and using it as a daily run about for business and pleasure.

He was most famous for driving the famous DADIO - a Lotus Elite. He would become British GT Champion in this car and have many victories.

After escaping from a serious crash at Caen in 1958 when his F2 Lotus seized and the engine caught fire, he concentrated on his ever-expanding motorcar accessories business – the field that he was best known for.

Les Leston Accessories sold aftermarket parts for cars, such as steering wheels and gear levers. The steering wheels were made in Walsall and Les Leston was the first to offer such items - hence he gained the tag as the godfather of the motoring aftermarket parts business.

It was after receiving burns in the crash in Caen (where he leapt from the car at 90 mph) that he pioneered the marketing of flameproof overalls. At the time many racing drivers wore short sleeved shirts - Leston's fame and connection to all the great Formula One drivers meant that very soon a lot of them were wearing Les Leston overalls. ] Graham Hill appeared regularly in Leston's adverts in such overalls, also sporting the Leston made Graham Hill rally master jacket.
In the late 1960s Leston became a Formula One pit reporter for the BBC, until he was replaced by Barrie Gill.

In the 1990s Leston lived in Hong Kong, where he was married twice and expanded his merchandising business sourcing-in from China the giveaways, etc., that were rewards for incentives such as submitting cereal-box tops. His lifestyle involved owning a large cruiser that he would take out to sea at weekends and a jazz radio show. He frequented the bar of the Foreign Correspondents' Club, and for leisure he rode a BMW 1,200 cc motor bike.

Sounds like quite a guy!

I’m glad you’ve had some worth while input on value here, I don’t doubt the low offer would have resulted in you seeing it on eBay hours later at ten times the price.

I have a 60s mini and thought I’d pop in to check out a value, as suspected, well out of my price range!

Lovely wheel and glad you got some sound advice on value.

As a Walsallian it’s interesting to see they were made in Walsall - I wonder if they were made by cosmic?

Edit: a company called Walsall Wheels apparently...

mk1-performance-conversions.co.uk/steering_wheel_archive.htm

There's a great article on Les Leston in last month's Octane mag. His son Nick was a mate of my old boss and he raced aero engined vintage cars at Donnington and I think he is still a vintage car racer. Nick's son Oli now runs the business

That wheel will be worth at least £1k

I think the price is a realistic starting point and the photos you've put up are 'warts and all' so any potential purchaser would know what they're buying. I get the feeling that there's a fair few more on ebay now compared to when you created this thread, probably furloughed fellahs having time on their hands to clear out the shed / attic. Fingers crossed for a good result!

You sold it, so you should get it posted to the new owner asap.

I doubt we'll ever hear from oldmaninashed again...

Old man in a shed here who you thought you wouldn’t hear from. Just seen your post! I didn’t mean I wouldn’t post it to a buyer who has paid for something, I’m not dishonourable! I meant that I didn’t want to ‘post’ something for sale on eBay for £200 if it is worth £1000. It was sent to the buyer as you will see, having received a good price. If you had bothered to read the whole thread you would have seen that. Also the offer received that I quoted was before the auction had ended. Be careful how you read things.