Racing in The USA
The 265C V8s ran the entire 1994 season badged as "Ilmor Indy V8".
But there was another extraordinary engine from Ilmor in 1994 - the Mercedes-Benz 500I (although work on this started long before the Mercedes takeover as a private project between Ilmor and Penske). The 500I exploited a loophole in the engine rules at the Indianapolis 500 (which was run under slightly different rules to other CART races). Originally stock-block engines based on production units, fitted with two pushrod and rocker arm actuated valves per cylinder, were permitted to run at increased cubic capacity (3.43 litres vs 2.65 litres) and significantly greater turbo boost than the pure racing engines. For several years Buick V6 units had been extremely fast but fragile; the restrictions were relaxed with the intent of permitting Buick-like engines to use stronger but still production-like blocks - the Menard engine based on the Buick took this approach, as did the unsuccessful Greenfield V8.
Ilmor realized that this provided scope for a completely new pure-bred racing engine - it would need to retain pushrods, but could be designed specifically for the requirements of the Indianapolis 500, and in strict secrecy schemed a completely new V8 engine which was approximately 200 bhp (150 kW) more powerful than the Cosworth DFS and Ilmor 265C opposition. Team Penske's cars were by far the fastest at the 1994 Indianapolis 500, and Al Unser, Jr. won the race, with Emerson Fittipaldi also figuring strongly until an accident on lap 184. The loophole was closed for 1995, and Penske, a year behind on development for Indy, failed to qualify their 265C-powered cars for that year's 500.
For 1995 the 265C V8s were rebadged Mercedes and continued to be highly competitive, but after the CART-IRL split, Mercedes gradually lost interest in American racing.
Ilmor continued working in America on the Oldsmobile Aurora V8 for the IRL (Penske entries), and later designed the normally aspirated Honda IRL engine which was used from 2003-2011.
Read more about this topic: Ilmor
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