De Tomaso F1

De Tomaso F1

Constructor:	Scuderia De Tomaso
Predecessor:	De Tomaso F2
Successor:	De Tomaso 801
Technical specifications
Chassis:	aluminum
Weight:	445 kg
Tires:	Dunlop
statistics
Driver:	Roberto Bussinello Nino Vaccarella Roberto Lippi
First start:	1961 French Grand Prix
Last start:	1961 Italian Grand Prix
Starts Victories Poles SR 2 - - -
World Cup points:	-
Podiums:	-
Leadership laps:	-

The De Tomaso F1 was the first racing car produced directly for Formula 1 by the Italian automobile manufacturer De Tomaso . It was published in 1961. De Tomaso built a total of five of these cars in three years, each with different engines. The F1 was reported to four world championship races and nine races without world championship status by 1963 . The F1 never reached the finish line in any world championship run. The vehicles of the F1 family are considered to be the weakest Formula 1 cars of the 1.5-liter era.

background

The Argentinian racing driver and businessman Alejandro de Tomaso contested his last Formula 1 race in December 1959. He registered a Cooper T43 for the US Grand Prix , which he had equipped with an OSCA engine. In the same year he founded an automobile workshop in Modena, Italy , in which he had racing cars for various classes (and from 1965 also street sports cars) manufactured. The new brand's first vehicle was the Isis for Formula Junior , a copy of the Cooper T43 used by Alejandro de Tomaso. On this basis, the company developed the De Tomaso F2 , which in turn imitated the Cooper. The F2 appeared in a Formula 2 race in the fall of 1960. After the FIA had transferred the previous Formula 2 regulations to Formula 1 for the 1961 Automobile World Championship , the F2 made three Formula 1 races without world championship status until 1962. From the spring of 1961, De Tomaso designed a total of five more racing cars based on the F2 model, all of which were given the chassis designation F1. The wagons were unsuccessful. There were only finishings in smaller Italian races outside of the World Championship. Alejandro de Tomaso blamed the failure primarily on the motors purchased from other manufacturers. In 1962 he therefore had the model 801 designed as the successor to the F1 with an eight-cylinder engine he had developed. De Tomaso did not achieve any success with him either, so that at the end of 1963 the company initially discontinued its efforts in the monoposto sport. After a break of several years, de Tomaso briefly returned to Formula 1 in 1970 with the 505 , which no longer had anything in common with the F1 and was used by Frank Williams .

construction

Cooper T43: Prototype of the De Tomaso F1

chassis

The De Tomaso F1 was largely identical to the F2 constructed in 1960 and, like this, was very similar in concept and outwardly to the Cooper T43. The F1 had a tubular space frame . The suspension corresponded to the Isis. The chassis consisted of double wishbones , shock absorber struts and independent wheel suspension all around. The body was also modeled on the Cooper. The engine was installed behind the driver. A manual five-speed gearbox from De Tomaso took over the power transmission.

Engines

The De Tomaso F1 appeared over the years with five different engines. Four-cylinder engines from Alfa Romeo and OSCA were normally provided; they were the most frequently used engines. At the end of its career, the F1 was equipped with engines from Ferrari , Ford and Maserati for individual races .

Alfa Romeo / Conrero

Initially, De Tomaso had a 1.5 liter inline four-cylinder Alfa Romeo engine that had been tuned by Virgilio Conrero . This engine, which was already used in the first version of the previous F2 model released in 1960, was found in the F1-002 and F1-004 chassis. Its basis was a mass-produced engine with a displacement of 1,290 cm³, which Alfa Romeo used in the Giulietta series. Conrero increased the displacement to 1.5 liters and equipped the engine with a new cylinder head and double ignition . In some sources, the engine is also referred to as the Conrero R4 . Its power was given as 140 hp. It was 45 hp below the output of the BRM engines and 40 hp below that of the Ferrari engines and was the weakest engine in the field. In addition to their weak performance, the Conrero engines were also characterized by pronounced unreliability. The engine block designed for operation in road vehicles was not up to the demands of racing. The structural overload led to numerous engine defects and failures.

OSCA

Alternatively, an in-line four-cylinder engine from OSCA's four-cylinder engine was provided. It was used in chassis 001 and 002. Its power is specified with 158 hp, which roughly corresponded to the power of the weakest four-cylinder engines from Coventry Climax.

Other variants

In 1963 Roberto Lippi fitted his De Tomaso F1 (chassis 002) with an in-line four-cylinder Maserati engine (Tipo 150S); a few months later the same chassis with a six-cylinder Ferrari engine from the ( Tipo 156 ) appeared. The Maserati version competed in one, the Ferrari version in two races.

Finally, in 1963, De Tomaso equipped the youngest chassis (F1-005 with) an in-line four-cylinder engine from Ford , which had been revised by the British tuning company Holbay .

The races of the individual chassis

Between 1961 and 1963 five De Tomaso F1 chassis were produced, some of which remained in the factory while others were sold to customer teams. Sometimes amateur racers started with them. With the exception of the 1961 Solitude Grand Prix , the use of the F1 chassis was limited to Italian races. For most of the races, only a few of the F1 chassis were entered. One exception was the Modena Grand Prix , for which three F1 chassis and the F2 were entered. None of the five De Tomaso F1 survived qualification here. The largest De Tomaso line-up saw the 1963 Rome Grand Prix , in which four F1 chassis, the F2 and the de Tomaso 801 were entered. All six De Tomasos qualified on the Autodromo Vallelunga , three of them were included in the classification. The best driver was Roberto Lippi in the F1-002 with a Ferrari engine.

The F1 races in detail:

F1-001

De Tomaso sold the F1-001 with OSCA engine to the Venetian racing team Scuderia Serenissima , which started the car at the 1961 French Grand Prix . The Scuderia Serenissima, for which Maurice Trintignant and Giorgio Scarlatti drove, also registered a Cooper T51 for the same race . Both drivers only used the Cooper in practice. The English car went to Trintignant for the race, while Scarletti received the previously untested De Tomaso. Scarlatti retired after 15 laps due to an engine failure. In 1962 the 001 did not run. In 1963, Serenissima sold him to the amateur racing driver Rovero Campello , who registered him once for the Rome Grand Prix that year . Campello, for whom this was the only monoposto race of his career, finished sixth in the first run and tenth in the second. In the overall standings, he was seventh.

F1-003

The F1-003 also went to Scuderia Serenissima. In contrast to the 001, it fitted it with Conrero's Alfa Romeo engine. The car was also only brought to the start in one world championship run. Serenissima registered the 003 Alfa for Nino Vaccarella at the 1961 Italian Grand Prix; Vaccarella dropped out after an engine failure. In addition, Serenissima started the 003-Alfa twice in non-world championship races. Roberto Bussinello , who was usually associated with De Tomaso's factory team, drove it at Solitude 1961 . Bussinello had to give up after an engine failure. The Solitude race was also the only competition outside of Italy in which a De Tomaso F1 took part. At the Modena Grand Prix in the same year, Serenissima reported the 003 Alfa Romeo for Nino Vaccarella, who had already failed to qualify. Then Serenissima sold the F1-003 to the amateur driver "Condor", who took it to the start in the 1963 Rome Grand Prix. "Condor" dropped out in both races and was not classified in the overall standings.

F1-002

The F1-002 was taken over by Scuderia Settecolli , which reported it for the Roman racing driver Roberto Lippi in 1961, 1962 and 1963 at the Italian Grand Prix . For the first two years, Lippi used an OSCA engine. In 1961 he was able to qualify in Monza , but fell out of the race after the first lap with an engine failure. In 1962 , with the car unchanged, he failed to qualify as well as in 1963 when he converted the car to a Ferrari engine. In addition, Lippi appeared from 1961 to 1963 in six world championship-free races. He achieved his best result at the 1963 Rome Grand Prix , where he started the F1-002 with a Maserati four-cylinder engine. Here Lippi came fourth.

F1-004

The fourth chassis received Conrero's Alfa engine. It stayed with De Tomaso and was entered for a world championship run by the works team . Bussinello started with the 004 at the Italian Grand Prix in 1961. He started the race from 24th place, but retired after just one lap due to an engine failure. In the same year Bussinello drove the 004 at the Modena Grand Prix, where he retired after a few laps, and at the Coppa Italia , which he finished fourth. Both races had no world championship status. After that, the car was no longer used.

F1-005

The last chassis of the F1 series was not built until the beginning of 1963. De Tomaso equipped the 005 with a four-cylinder engine from Ford-Holbay. The car was only used once. De Tomaso's works team registered him for the 1963 Rome Grand Prix for Franco Bernabei . In practice, the F1-005 with a Ford engine was faster than De Tomaso's new 801, which had a self-developed eight-cylinder engine. Bernabei finished the first of the two rounds of the race after 37 of 40 laps. In the second run he did not start due to a technical defect.

Race results

Formula 1 world championship

season	team	chassis	driver	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9	10	Points	rank
1961														-	-
	Scuderia De Tomaso	F1-004 Alfa Romeo	R. Bussinello							DNF
	Scuderia Serenissima	F1-001 OSCA	G. Scarlatti				DNF
		F1-003 Alfa Romeo	N. Vaccarella							DNF
	Scuderia set colli	F1-002 OSCA	R. Lippi							DNF
1962														-	-
	Scuderia set colli	F1-002 OSCA	R. Lippi							DNQ
1963														-	-
	Scuderia set colli	F1-002 Ferrari	R. Lippi							DNQ

Formula 1 races without world championship status

season	team	chassis	driver	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9	10	11	12	13	14th	15th	16	17th	18th	19th	20th	21st	22nd	23	24	25th	26th	27
1961
	Isobel De Tomaso	F1-004 Alfa Romeo	R. Businello																			DNF					4th
	Scuderia set colli	F1-002 OSCA	G. Alberti									DNA		DNF
			R. Lippi																			DNQ					5
	Scuderia Serenissima	F1-003 Alfa Romeo	R. Bussinello															DNF
			N. Vaccarella																			DNQ
	Pescara Racing	F1-001 OSCA	L. Scarfiotti																								DNA
1962
	Scuderia set colli	F1-002 OSCA	R. Lippi									DNQ						6th
1963
	Scuderia De Tomaso	F1-005 Ford	F. Bernabei								DNF
	Scuderia set colli	F1-002 Maserati	R. Lippi								4th
		F1-002 Ferrari												DNQ
	Rovero Campello	F1-001-Osca	R. Campello								7th
	"Condor"	F1-003 Alfa Romeo	"Condor"								DNF

literature

• Adriano Cimarosti: The century of racing , Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-613-01848-9 .
• David Hodges: A – Z of Grand Prix Cars 1906–2001 , 2001 (Crowood Press), ISBN 1-86126-339-2 (English).
• David Hodges: A – Z of Formula Racing Cars. Bay View Books, Bideford 1990, ISBN 1-870979-16-8 (in German: David Hodges: Rennwagen von A – Z after 1945. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 1994, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 ).
• Mike Lawrence: Grand Prix Cars 1945-1965 , Motor Racing Publications 1998, ISBN 1-899870-39-3 (English).
• Pierre Ménard: La Grande Encyclopédie de la Formule 1 , 2nd edition, St. Sulpice, 2000, ISBN 2-940125-45-7 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Only drivers registered for world championship races are included.
2. ↑ Mike Lawrence: Grand Prix Cars 1945-1965 , Motor Racing Publications 1998, ISBN 1-899870-39-3 , p. 100.
3. ^ David Hodges: Racing cars from A – Z after 1945. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 1994, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 , p. 272.
4. ↑ ^{a b} David Hodges: A – Z of Grand Prix Cars 1906–2001 , 2001 (Crowood Press), ISBN 1-86126-339-2 , p. 75.
5. ^ David Hodges: Racing Cars from A – Z after 1945. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 1994, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 , p. 78.
6. ^ ^{A b} Mark Whitelock: 1½-liter Grand Prix Racing: Low Power, High Tech , Veloce Publishing Ltd, 2006, ISBN 978-1-84584-016-7 , p. 288.
7. ↑ ^{a b} Adriano Cimarosti: The century of racing , motor book publisher Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-613-01848-9 , S. 196th
8. ^ Mark Whitelock: 1½-liter Grand Prix Racing: Low Power, High Tech , Veloce Publishing Ltd, 2006, ISBN 978-1-84584-016-7 , p. 327.
9. ↑ Statistics of the French Grand Prix 1961 on the website www.motorsport-total.com (accessed on January 31, 2017).
10. ↑ ^{a b c d} Statistics of the 1963 Rome Grand Prix on the website www.formula2.net (accessed on January 31, 2017).
11. ↑ Statistics of the Italian Grand Prix 1961 on the website www.motorsport-total.com (accessed on January 31, 2017).