Williams FW07

Alan Jones on FW07; on his victory run at the Dutch Grand Prix in 1979

Williams FW07

The Williams FW07 was the emergency vehicle of Williams Grand Prix Engineering in the Formula 1 1979 season .

Development history and technology

The FW07 has a special place in the history of Williams. This vehicle marks a turning point for the British racing team. The FW07 was not only Williams' first winning car, it also turned a racing team that built vehicles using a modular system into a designer of independent formula cars. This was due to the now sufficient financial resources and the ideas of Patrick Head .

The FW07 was the first ground effect -Williams and had an aluminum - monocoque composite structure. The vehicle had a conventional suspension with a rocker arm at the top, triangular wishbones at the bottom and stiff internal struts. Although the two side pods were very wide to accommodate the coolers for water and oil, the FW07 looked elegant overall.

The car was powered by the tried and tested DFL V8 engines from Cosworth .

Racing history

Since Williams was late with building the new car , the FW07 made its racing debut at the Spanish Grand Prix , the first round of the season in Europe. Williams only contested the season with one car in 1978 , but Alan Jones Clay Regazzoni joined the team in 1979 as the second driver. The race in Jarama ended after starting positions 13 for Jones and 14 for Regazzoni with a double retirement. Regazzoni had to end the race after 32 laps due to an engine failure and Jones stopped after 54 laps a transmission failure.

In the third race, the Monaco Grand Prix , the FW07 received its first World Championship points. In the final stages of the race, Clay Regazzoni caught up with the leader Jody Scheckter in the Ferrari 312T4 and had to admit defeat to him by only 0.44 seconds after 78 laps.

After Alan Jones finished fourth at the French Grand Prix , Williams' big day came at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone . The two FW07s were already fast in qualifying. Alan Jones was on pole position after a lap time of 1: 11.880 minutes, which corresponded to an average of 236.344 km / h . Clay Regazzoni started the race from fourth on the grid. Alan Jones was clearly leading the race until lap 39, but had to retire due to an overheated engine. His team mate Clay Regazzoni took over the lead and secured the first win for Williams. René Arnoux in the Renault RS10 was second ahead of Jean-Pierre Jarier in the Tyrrell 010 .

This was followed by a winning streak from Alan Jones, who won the races in Germany , Austria and the Netherlands in succession and also remained successful in the penultimate competition in Canada .

However, these successes were not enough to win the World Championships, as the FW07 debuted too late in the season. Jones finished the drivers' championship in third, Regazzoni in fifth. In the constructors' cup, Williams only had to admit defeat to Scuderia Ferrari .

In 1980 the FW07 became the FW07B , which was Williams' first world championship car.

Aurora AFX Formula 1 Series

In 1980 Emilio de Villota won the overall ranking of the Aurora AFX Formula 1 series on an FW07 .

literature

David Hodges: Racing cars from A – Z after 1945. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 1994, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 .

Web links

Commons : Williams FW07 - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files