Pete05
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- Melbourne, Australia
After winning the 1962 Driver's and Constructors' Championships, BRM had finished second each year, coming close to the championship in 1964 and having a promising 1965 season with the excellent P261. In 1966 the Formula One regulations with regards to engines were changed from a maximum of 1.5 litres normally aspirated to either 3 litres normally aspirated or 1.5 litres supercharged following complaints that the smaller engines used from 1961 - 1965 weren't powerful enough for the premier category of Motorsport. As a result many teams were left looking for a new engine supply while BRM, who built their own very successful V8 engines, had to decide on what manner of new engine to develop to meet the new formula.
BRM decided to hedge their bets by developing their existing 16 valve 1.5 litre V8 into a 32 valve 3 litre H16 (effectively two flat 8s one on top of the other and geared together) while also developing a new 48 valve 3 litre V12 in partnership with Harry Weslake and opt for whichever turned out to be the better powerplant. After much debate, Sir Alfred Owen decided BRM would go with the H16 and Weslake bought out BRM's involvement in the V12 and produced the engine that went in to power the Eagle T1G. The H16's development was complicated by BRM's involvement in two further V12 designs and a 4.2 litre version of the H16 for Lotus to use at Indianapolis.
Various camshaft vibration problems dogged the engine from the start, and to compound matters quick-fix balancing weights attached to the camshafts developed the unfortunate habit if detaching themselves and flying off within the engines causing catastrophic engine failures. Each side of the engine had to have its own water radiator, fuel metering unit, distributor and water pump, with a common oil radiator. The sheer complexity of the engine led to a truly terrible record of unreliability; engine, transmission and related problems caused 27 of the powerplant's 30 retirements from 40 entries. Jackie Stewart said of the engine "it was unnecessarily large, used more fuel, carried more oil and needed more water - all of which added weight and diminished the vehicle's agility.
The initial 32 valve engine produced 395 bhp at 10,250 rpm, with a later 64 valve variant raising this to 420 bhp at 10,500 rpm. While these constituted reasonable figures compared to the Ferrari, Honda and Weslake V12s and the Cosworth V8 of 1967, the H16 had an extremely narrow powerband and was by some distance the heaviest engine on the grid, starting out weighing 555 lbs when introduced in 1966 with the final lightweight version lowering this to 398 lbs.
The engine was also used by Team Lotus in the Lotus 43 as a stopgap while the Cosworth DFV was developed.
Like contemporary designs such as the Lotus 33 and Cooper T81, the P83 chassis was a riveted monocoque made of Duralumin with integral fuel tanks running down the chassis on either side of the driver. Unlike these cars though, the engine was designed to be a stressed member of the chassis in the same configuration that the much more successful Cosworth DFV would later establish as the norm, and was mated to a 6 speed gearbox with the gear lever unusually situated to the left of the driver. The front suspension was conventionally arranged, with unequal length double wishbones and inboard coil springs and dampers. The rear suspension consisted of twin radius arms, reversed lower wishbones, single top links and outboard springs and dampers, attached to the gearbox and engine. The size of the engine gave the car a centre of gravity that was not just rearward but higher than other cars due to the height of the upper crankshaft above the ground and the need to have the entire engine raised slightly to make room for the lower set of exhausts which left the engine from underneath the car.
http://members.madasafish.com/~d_hodgkinson/brm-H16.htm
http://members.madasafish.com/~d_hodgkinson/brm-e-H16.htm
http://www.motorsportuniversity.com/2010/06/brm-h16-monster.html?m=1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H_engine
http://www.statsf1.com/en/brm-p83.aspx
http://www.grandprix.com/gpe/con-brm.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Racing_Motors
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