Random Picture: 6 wheeled Porsche 935

I would love some more information on this 6 wheeled car, all I’ve been able to find out from a small magazine article is it wasn’t running a 6 cylinder engine. The report stated that it sounded like more cylinders, possibly 12, and had a turbo whistle while on test at Weissach. It also speculated, as at the time many manufacturers were dabbling, that it was a 6 wheeled F1 development car. If you know any more then please get it touch.

Donington Park Grand Prix Collection

First off, I’m a big Formula 1 fan so it wasn’t going to be long before I headed over to Donington Park to visit the largest collection of F1 cars in the world. After all I’d driven past it enough times going to the racing and events (Restoration Show). So with a day booked off I made the 200 mile round trip to indulge!!!

Now a little history, Donington Park race circuit has F1 credential with it being used previously, most recently in 1993, for the European Grand Prix. It was even touted very recently with construction work started to replace Silverstone as the permanent home for F1 on these shores, though it all fell through in the end. So it’s easy to say that this is one of the best circuits in the British and a deserving home for the collection.

Random Picture

I've recently been to Donington Park to look round their F1 collection/museum, here's a sneak preview of what was on show, a McLaren MB2 from 1966-

Not your average F1 car!!!

I’ve already covered some unusual F1 cars on here like the 6 wheeled ones but this time it’s a little different. From a marketing point of view the best way to get sponsors is to let them experience the race usually this is from the hustle and bustle of the pit to give a true feel for the team etc, at one point that was all you could do, the ultimate way would be to take an F1 car out on the track. But that would probably end up with either a damaged car or at worse having to look for another living sponsor!!!!!

Yamaha OX99-11

Commissioned by the Yamaha Sports division rather than the bike one this supercar was based around Yamaha’s V12 F1 engine that was sat in the current Brabham at the time, granted detuned to only 400bhp. An engine that had yet to produce a win! The original development had started around 1990 but unhappy with the conventional supercar design that the first design company came up with Yamaha turned to IAD on the south coast of England. Within a year they had built this, a tandem 2 seater that had a definite F1 car look about it.

Life L190 F1 car

The Life Formula 1 Team was a short lived one only competing in the 1990 season. You’d be forgiven for not noticing as the L190 it only qualified twice, to be honest it hardly ever got through pre qualifying, on a number of occasions it never got past the warm up lap!!!!! So why is a poor F1 car on here, well its engine it was a W12. Running 3 banks of 4 cylinders 2 in a V and vertical middle row. Quiet a radical departure considering in the post turbo era the rest of the field was running V10’s of various angles.

Ferguson P99 4WD F1 Car

This F1 car holds a very important record, it was the only 4WD car to win an F1 race at Oulton Park in 1961 at the hands of Sir Sterling Moss. Granted it wasn’t a championship race but it was an F1 race none the less. Now 4WD is banned it will never happen again.

Ferguson had been supplying 4WD systems for cars (Jenson Interceptor FF) and heavy vehicles since the early 1950’s and believed it was now refined enough for a race car. Out of the box it was a handful not scoring to well then Moss took it out testing and changed his driving style to suit the 4WD system, obviously it worked!!

6 Wheeled F1 Cars

When you think of 6 wheeled Formula 1 cars the Tyrell P34 always comes to mind, with its iconic 4 up front wheel configuration. However a few other manufacturers had a go, but not with the front, but the rear wheels, here’s some pictures and links to a few, unfortunately the regulations in 1983 took all the fun out of it banning 4 wheel drive and soon after 6 wheeled cars-

1977 Ferrari 312T6-





1982 Williams FW08-6W-





1977 March 1-2-4-





Information-

http://www.racing65.com/greatracingcars/240march2.html

Tyrell P34-






Unfortunately with the exception of the Tyrell the other cars seem to only have been prototypes and run only a few times as a result information on them is sketchy. They do however allow you to hark back to a time when motorsport was all about trying something outrageous and innovitive to push the boundaries of the sport, its a shame the regulations don't allow this any more.

1993 Williams FW15C CVT

There have been many developments in F1 that were banned with in a few races as an unfair advantage and no doubt I’ll post some up on here in the coming months. But on 1993 Formula 1 team Williams, who were at the top of the F1 tree, had a development banned before it even ended up on the race car!!!

The Williams FW15C CVT didn’t look any different than the current race car but its sounded like no other F1 car, not the engine note it was more that fact it didn’t change gear it was always on song. The reason for this was the CVT (Constant Variable Transmission) this went beyond an automatic gear box. The principal was 2 cones connected by a belt that could slip therefore having a constantly variable gear controlled by computer. This meant all the driver needed to do was put his foot down and brake and the engine and CVT would take care of everything else in order to run at maximum efficiency. I’ve included a clip of the car being tested by a young test driver namely David Coultard so you can hear it for yourself.



For more information on CVT-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variomatic

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2007/05/03/banned-continuously-variable-transmission-cvt/

Video-