British Racing Motors V16 - Races

Races

It had been intended to début the car at the 1950 Formula One Grand Prix race at Silverstone, the first race of the new Formula One World Championship, but problems with the engine, such as cylinders cracking, buckling of connecting rods, and piston failures, lead to the postponement of the race début. BRM instead had to settle for displaying the car at Silverstone with Mays driving several laps, after the BRM mechanics had worked all the previous night to get the car ready. The demonstration was witnessed by the Princess Royal, later Elizabeth II, and her husband, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

The car was first entered in a race at the August 1950 Daily Express non-Championship race at Silverstone. The one car that the team had been able to prepare was flown from Folkingham into Silverstone on the morning of the race. It had missed the practice sessions but, after three proving laps driven by Frenchman Raymond Sommer, was allowed to start from the back of the grid. When the flag dropped at the start of the race, the BRM, carrying the racing number 8, merely lurched forward and then stopped, engine screaming, with Sommer unable to get any drive. The car was pushed over to the side of the track and withdrawn. One or both inboard universal joints had failed. This was perceived as a particularly unfortunate event for the car and British Racing Motors as the Daily Express newspaper had produced a glossy brochure about the new car, and the failure of the BRM at the race is considered to have somewhat coloured people's perception of the car ever since.

The next outing was a short sprint event at Goodwood in September of that year, with Reg Parnell driving in the Goodwood Trophy, Parnell winning two races on the day in the car despite being unable to use all the car's power due to the poor weather and wet circuit. After the fiasco of Silverstone, the two wins demonstrated that the car could actually go and had tremendous speed and acceleration. Parnell said in a news interview after the races; "All we need now is a little longer time to develop it and then we hope to show the Continent what we really can do". In subsequent races Peter Walker drove a second car, and in July 1951 BRM was able to enter two cars for the 1951 British Grand Prix. During the race the two drivers suffered from extreme heat in the cockpit due to the exhaust pipes being routed inside the bodywork, a problem that had not been so troublesome in earlier, shorter, races. At one point, during one of two pit stops, Parnell and Walker had to wrap burn dressings around their legs to provide insulation from the heat, together with limiting the revs to 10,500rpm to reduce the cockpit temperature to a tolerable level. Despite this, and starting from the back of the field, Parnell finished 5th, with Walker 7th.

Later the team went to Monza, intending to run two cars in the 1951 Italian Grand Prix to be driven by Parnell and Walker, after prospective driver Ken Richardson was vetoed by the RAC. However gearbox trouble in one car led to Berthon, anticipating a similar problem in the other, withdrawing both cars. Disappointed, Mays' team returned home, but one car was able to remain at Monza for further testing due to the generosity of the track's owners, who allowed the team to run the car on the circuit and use the circuit's facilities at no charge. The car was the first Grand Prix car to use disc brakes: Girling created a set of special brakes for the car which were tested in late 1951 while still at Monza.

In 1952 Stirling Moss came to BRM to work on testing the car, with the possibility of racing it. He drove one of two BRMs in the 1952 Ulster Trophy but had problems with his car during the start. Both cars failed to finish and the race was won by Piero Taruffi driving a Ferrari. Later in 1952, BRM entered three cars in a race at Goodwood; the cars finished first, second and third.

In the same year Alfa Romeo, one of the leading players in the sport, stated that they might not participate in further Grands Prix, leaving only two major teams, Ferrari and a temporarily uncompetitive Maserati. The race organisers of Formula One wondered who could take Alfa Romeo's place.

Ferrari had built new cars for the 1952 season and BRM was then asked if it would be entering cars. BRM replied by preparing two cars for an April race at Valentino Park, Turin, one drum-braked car, and the other disc-braked, with Moss as one driver, and with Mays all the while attempting to enlist Fangio, who had until recently been driving for Alfa Romeo, as the other. This Mays succeeded in doing, however this meant missing the Turin race. Fangio came to Folkingham to test the car. At this point the BRM V16 was developing around 400–450 hp. As soon as he got in the car, Fangio seemed to take to the vehicle, driving the car with his usual élan, it being stated that all the drivers who had driven the car prior to Fangio had been in awe of it.

Meanwhile, at the missed Turin race, BRM having withdrawn, Ferraris had finished in the first six places leading the race organisers to abandon BRM as their hope of providing any real competition for Ferrari in Formula One, instead running the remaining season's races as Formula Two events. Thus by not competing in the Turin race, BRM contributed to the downfall of the Formula around which the car had been built.

In the middle of 1952 the cars were substantially rebuilt, including better cooling – most notably a greatly enlarged radiator aperture in the nose, better ventilation, and repositioning of the exhaust pipe stubs. The car had been deliberately designed with a low seating position, but Fangio, asked what changes he would like on the car, replied that amongst other things he would like a little higher seat, as he liked to see where he was going. The car was modified to Fangio's request and he drove the car intermittently throughout 1953. He later said that it was the most formidable car he ever drove during his career. At this stage the engines were developing more than 500 hp, touching 600 hp, albeit with a very peaky power curve.

After a particularly trying time with reliability problems during a 1952 race at Ulster, Fangio was asked if he would ever drive the BRM again. He replied; "I will. I consider it to be, basically, the best Formula One car ever made. All it needs is improvement in certain details. No car has ever given me such a thrill to drive, or a greater sense of absolute mastery. I will stand by it". Unfortunately for both Fangio and BRM, the following day, tired after an overnight drive from Folkingham across Europe to Monza for a race, he crashed while driving for Maserati, breaking his neck, retiring from racing to recover until early 1953.

After Fangio's accident at Monza, Mays, looking around for a replacement driver, auditioned Mike Hawthorn, who drove the car at Folkingham but later complained: "It was no use – every time I came to a corner and went below the 8,000rpm mark, the power went right off. Then, suddenly, as you reached the 8,000 mark the full power would come in and you had a job to hold the car straight. At 8,000rpm it really did motor, but the steering was nothing to write home about". Hawthorn went on to drive a Ferrari for Tony Vandervell instead. In the meantime, the car was raced by José Froilán González and Ken Wharton, who was one of BRM's own test drivers.

At around this time the trust managing BRM decided that they had gone as far as they could with the car and decided to put the assets up for sale. The best offer came from the Rubery Owen Group and Alfred Owen, who, despite the trying times with the car, had remained loyal to the project. In this period the team missed an opportunity to move the entire effort to the Midlands where, due to the prevalence of British motor companies, the team would have benefited from greater and more convenient technical and engineering support. Instead the team remained at The Maltings at Bourne.

Also in 1953, the BRM had a moment of glory at Albi. Three cars were entered in a sprint race specifically for Formula One cars. Driven by a now-recovered Fangio, González and Wharton, their main competitor was a works' Ferrari driven by Alberto Ascari. Fangio went on to win the race in spectacular fashion, although Wharton had a bad crash and did not finish. In addition, the BRMs had also suffered from tyre problems. Ascari later commented that with all the noise produced by the BRMs he had been almost unable to hear anything else while driving. This race is regarded as showing what Formula One could have been like had it been continued into 1953. During the race Fangio's car's V16 ran at a claimed 72 psi boost (4.9 ata) and 585 bhp (436 kW) at 11,800 rpm, the car reaching 186 mph (300 km/h).

At around this time Tony Rudd, who had by then joined BRM after his previous period of secondment from Rolls-Royce, suggested that they build a lightweight, short-wheelbase, version of the car for this sort of race, and this subsequently became the Mark II or Type 30. Two were built; the first used components from the wreck of Wharton's car damaged at Albi. Rudd was thinking of chasing the Class F Record with the car, and asked his former employers what they thought the engine was capable of if tuned for all-out speed for only a few miles. Rudd stated that Rolls-Royce replied; "They said it would pull 800hp with all the goodies and 1,000hp with a sprint fuel". However, the attempt on the record was never made.

Amongst the other drivers, the Type 15 Mark II/Type 30 was also driven by Ron Flockhart, the cars being raced during 1954 into 1955 while BRM worked on a new car for the new Formula One specification of 2.5 litres un-supercharged. By this time the V16-powered cars were running quite reliably, but the demise of the Formula around which they had been based prevented the Mark II cars from making a greater impact.

The cars last raced around the end of 1955. One of the later drivers was Peter Collins, who Owen thought was the only driver other than Fangio who showed the BRM Type 15/Type 30 to its best advantage.

The potential of the engine was illustrated in 1968 when Graham Hill drove the car in a demonstration in South Africa, the car being fitted with the original, larger, Rolls-Royce supercharger inlet. Hill revved the engine to 13,000rpm, at which point Rudd thought the engine would have been producing around 780 bhp.

Fangio's opinion on the BRM Type 15/Type 30 was; "It was the most fantastic car I ever drove – an incredible challenge in every way."