Meet the staff
Steve
BroughtonWhen I left school I started work at British Aerospace and met Dick. During the year's he was rallying I used to help him out preparing his car and began to tune his engine. When Dick gave up rallying in 1986, I decided to give it a go myself (so it's all Dick's fault). My budget was quite small and I used to rally a Chevette, spending all my waking hours and every penny of my income just to go and compete whenever I could afford it. I used to buy components and even engines of of various companies.
As time progressed, I began building my own engines. With the knowledge I had gained working at British Aerospace and from a large majority of my friends who still worked there, I found I could build engines every bit as well as the ones I had been buying. As my knowledge increased, so did the performance of my engines. Unfortunately my pocket would not always allow me to spend what I wanted to and then in 1992 the business I was currently working in began to fade, so I decided the only other interest I had was in motorsport, so I bit the bullet and started SBD. The first 6 months were very hard and found I was making little if any money, but as the year progressed a few people I had met and spoken to were prepared to let me build some engines for them. This I did and subsequently they did extremely well and on some occasions beating other well established engine builders. This got SBD noticed and over the next year my work took off and since then I never really looked back. We now do work for works teams, teach programming and I get a regular chance to travel all around the world programming various exotic engines for different companies.
I must say that coming to work is extremely enjoyable and although I could probably earn more money elsewhere, I would say there is probably very few people that could have a job such as mine.
Dick Hulbert
I have had
an interest in Motorsport since the early 80's when I finished my apprenticeship
with British Aerospace and I became a navigator for a friend in an old
MkI Escort. After getting the bug, I decided I wanted to drive, so I built
myself a Mk II Escort in 1983.
I had known Steve for a few years since we had worked together at British
Aerospace and managed to persuade him to help me with the preparation
of the car. My rallying days lasted until 1986 when I decided it was time
to buy a house (silly move), but the funds ran dry by 1988 and I had to
give up rallying altogether.The
chance to earn good money working out in Saudi came along, so I packed
my bags and moved away. I was lured back to the UK by Steve in 1994, to
work for a living instead of an easy life and for a lot less money, but
at least I can go racing now.
I drive the SBD Duratec Westfield with Carole.
When
I joined SBD, it was an obvious move for me, because my spare time at home
was taken up with family coming around to repair, rebuild or redesign parts
of the rally cars that we store in our garage. I have lost track of the hours spent making tea, sandwiches and offering a spare hand to hold the lead light when things just won't go right. Back in the 'good old days' of events at Goodwood, it was always my job to video the excursions into the bushes or across the grass of the various cars taking part, in between making more tea and cooking on a disposable barbeque in the pouring rain. I think you could say the idea was 'if you can't beat them, join them' when coming to SBD.
Although
I should be officially retired, I have been a toolmaker for nearly 50 years
and the thought of not doing the job I love, makes me very sad. So when
my daughter Carole, mentioned that Steve could do with some help with designing
and testing prototype components, I didn't need asking twice.I now work for Steve on a part time basis, doing just that. There are many aspects of the job I enjoy, but my favourite part would be designing and producing the tooling for making many of the special components from scratch and then seeing the finished article tested and running on engines, before being sold to the retail customer. I get a great deal of job satisfaction, when I visit the Autosport show and see components that I have made, displayed on our engines.