These venturis needed the minimum of intrusion by rear-mounted mechanical items like suspension, gearbox and engine. For Brabham and rival Ferrari , the boxer 12 engines were a ground effect disaster. Brabham's engine was not merely 75 mm wider than Lotus's Cosworth V8, it was wider where it hurt, down low in the venturi area — and it was also mm longer. The very engine around which the BT46 had been designed now blocked it from harnessing the 'suction' it needed to stay competitive.
Going into the Swedish round, Andretti led with 36 points, Lauda was a distant fifth on The Andretti and Peterson Lotuses had finished in the previous two races. Out came the BT46B Brabham argued it was legal. The fan car era ended as soon as it started. When not in use, the fan was covered by a dustbin lid, but it soon became clear what the modified Brabham was intended to achieve: when the drivers pushed the throttle, the car could be seen to squat down on its suspension as the downforce increased.
The legality of the cars was soon protested, but they were allowed to race. They qualified second and third behind championship leader Andretti. In the race, John Watson spun off on the 19th lap. Once Didier Pironi a back-marker dropped oil onto the track and with both major front-runners out the race, the remaining Brabham was in a class of its own, seemingly unaffected by the slippery surface.
Niki Lauda passed Mario Andretti around the outside of one of the corners, who dropped out shortly afterward due to a broken valve and went on to win by over half a minute from Riccardo Patrese in an Arrows.
Lotus immediately started design work on a fan version of the Bernie Ecclestone negotiated a deal within FOCA whereby the car would have continued for another three races before Brabham would voluntarily withdraw it.
However, the Commission Sportive Internationale intervened to declare that henceforth fan cars would not be allowed and the car never raced again in Formula One. Until rain turned the Russian Grand Prix on its head in the closing stages, Lando Norris was set to convert his first Formula 1 pole position into a maiden win. But having recovered well from being shuffled back at the start, Hamilton and his Mercedes team called the changing conditions spot-on for a landmark th F1 victory.
At the Italian Grand Prix Daniel Ricciardo turned around a troubled F1 season and, in F2, Oscar Piastri demonstrated once again that he is a potential star of the future. Tickets Subscribe. Sign in. Registration Sign in Facebook connect. All me. Download your apps. All rights reserved. Topic Giorgio Piola's F1 technical analysis. Main Photos Illustrations. By: Matt Somerfield. Co-author: Giorgio Piola. Oct 7, , PM. Brabham BT46 "Fan Car". The controversial Brabham Alfa Fan car made its debut in Anderstorp.
Next article Raikkonen set for new Alfa Romeo F1 deal for Load comments. Banned: The full story behind Brabham's F1 'fan car'. Formula 1. World Superbike. Or almost. In the other trench of Formula 1, the team Brabham was leading by Bernie Ecclestone and had as a designer another genius, Gordon Murray.
The South African had been the only one able to see the virtues of that Lotus 78, sometimes overshadowed by its mechanical failures. The gossip of the time pointed to the wings, but Murray saw that the strengths of the Lotus 78 were underneath the car. Murray quickly realized that Lotus was using a ground effect that stuck the car to the asphalt. That car used a beastly Alfa Romeo inline twelve-cylinder engine. It was too wide to mimic the slim Lotus 78 pontoons.
But then Murray remembered something he had already seen: the Chaparral 2J. The thing that pretended to be a car looked more like a brick on wheels.
Or a shoe box. It had its rear wheels covered and, within all its oddities, if something attracted more than nothing it was the two fans that it had in the rear. Far from what all those who saw that monster could hope, the Chaparral 2J was flying. It was presented at the Canadian-American Challenge Cup, the CanAm , a championship with practically no technical regulations that intended to rival Formula 1 with single-seaters more typical of crazy cars.
There McLaren ran, and dominated until the Chaparral 2J arrived. When that car, and its fans, took to the track they began to systematically roll two seconds faster than the McLarens.
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