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Brabham BT49

The Brabham BT49 /ˈbræbəm/ is a Formula One racing car designed by South African Gordon Murray for the British Brabham team. The BT49 competed in the 1979 to 1982 Formula One World Championships and was used by Brazilian driver Nelson Piquet to win his first World Championship in 1981.

Brabham BT49
Brabham BT49C
Brabham BT49D
The BT49C being driven by Piquet at Monaco in 1981
CategoryFormula One
ConstructorBrabham
Designer(s)Gordon Murray (Technical Director)
David North (Chief Designer)
PredecessorBT48
SuccessorBT50
Technical specifications
ChassisAluminium alloy monocoque
Suspension (front)Double wishbone pullrod
Suspension (rear)Double wishbone pullrod
or Rocker arm
Axle trackFront: 1,702 mm (67.0 in)
Rear: 1,626 mm (64.0 in)
Wheelbase2,718 mm (107.0 in)
EngineCosworth DFV, 2,993 cc (182.6 cu in), 90° V8, NA, mid-engine, longitudinally mounted
TransmissionHewland FGA 400 / Alfa Romeo 6-speed manual
Weight580 kg (1,278.7 lb)
Fuel1979: Agip
19801981: Elf
19811982: Valvoline
TyresGoodyear / Michelin
Competition history
Notable entrantsParmalat Racing Brabham
Notable drivers Nelson Piquet
Ricardo Zunino
Héctor Rebaque
Riccardo Patrese
Debut1979 Canadian Grand Prix
RacesWinsPolesF/Laps
38
36 F1 WC
2 F1 other
7
7 F1 WC
0 F1 other
7
6 F1 WC
1 F1 other
4
4 F1 WC
0 F1 other
Constructors' Championships0
Drivers' Championships1 (1981, Nelson Piquet)

The car was initially designed in 1979 as a short notice replacement for the team's Alfa Romeo-engined BT48, after Brabham team owner Bernie Ecclestone decided to end his relationship with the Italian engine manufacturer. The BT49 was created in only six weeks using elements of the BT48 chassis together with the widely used Cosworth DFV engine. The monocoque chassis is made from aluminium alloy and carbon fibre composites. The car was fitted with controversial hydropneumatic suspension and water-cooled brakes at different points in its life.

The BT49 was updated over four seasons taking a total of seven wins, six poles and 135 points. Seventeen were eventually built, most of which survive today. Some are used successfully in historic motorsport; Christian Glaesel won the 2005 FIA Historic Formula One Championship driving a BT49D.

Concept Edit

The BT49 was created by South African designer Gordon Murray for the Brabham team during the 1979 season of the Formula One motor racing World Championship. The Brabham team had been competing in partnership with engine supplier Alfa Romeo since 1976 and won races in the 1978 season.[1] However, the team's 1979 car, the BT48, was not a great success. Alfa Romeo entered their own Type 177 and Type 179 cars in Formula One Grands Prix that summer, helping to convince the Brabham team owner Bernie Ecclestone that the partnership was over.[2] Motorsport author Alan Henry writes that Ecclestone did not want his team to take second place to an Alfa Romeo works team, and that the team designing Alfa Romeo's cars was drawing on Brabham knowledge.[3]

Alfa's engines were powerful, but had proved troublesome and according to Henry, "the days during which pure power was the main criterion had temporarily vanished by the start of 1979".[3] Instead aerodynamic ground effect, as brought to Formula One by the Lotus 78 two years earlier, was the most important factor. To allow them to focus on this, the Brabham team reverted to a known quantity, the reliable and widely used Ford Cosworth DFV engine that it had last used in 1975. Three BT49s were designed and built in only six weeks for the Canadian Grand Prix on 30 September 1979; two of them were converted BT48 chassis and one was newly built.[3]

Chassis and suspension Edit

 
BT49C without its aerodynamic bodywork, which can be seen sitting on the ground behind the chassis

Like all of its Formula One contemporaries, the BT49 chassis is a monocoque structure. It is built from sheet aluminium alloy with reinforcement from carbon fibre composite panels and is one of the first Formula One chassis to incorporate this material structurally.[4] The chassis is slightly longer than that of the BT48, and is new from the cockpit back with revised sidepods and a structural fuel tank reduced from 45 to 38 imperial gallons (205 to 173 L) capacity to match the reduced fuel consumption requirements of the DFV compared to the Alfa Romeo.[5][6] This allowed a reduction in dry weight over the BT48 of 35 pounds (15.9 kg) and of 95 lb (43.1 kg) when fully fuelled.[4]

The underside of the BT49 is shaped to create downforce through ground effect: air is accelerated under the car, reducing the air pressure beneath it and pushing the tyres down harder onto the track. This provides more grip and thus higher cornering speeds, but compared to conventional wings creates less of the drag that slows the car in a straight line.[7] In its original form, the reduced pressure area under the car was sealed off with sliding skirts which rose and fell with the movement of the car to ensure no air could leak under it. According to Murray, the aerodynamics were the car's great strength: "It had more [downforce] than any other car and it all came from the ground effect. We ran the car with no front wing at all and scarcely any at the back."[8]

The suspension, which controls the relative motion of the chassis and the wheels, is similar to that of the BT48: it features double wishbones front and rear, with the springs and dampers mounted on the chassis out of the airflow and activated by pullrods. Anti-roll bars are fitted front and rear.[9] The BT49's disc brakes are mounted outboard, within the wheel hubs, and are activated by a single four piston brake caliper for each wheel. For most of the BT49's career, it used conventional steel brakes. Lighter reinforced carbon-carbon discs and pads, a technology that Brabham had introduced to Formula One in 1976, were used in 1981 and 1982;[10] The wheels are of 13-inch (330 mm) diameter, although occasionally 15 in (381 mm) wheels were used at the front.[4] The car initially raced on Goodyear tyres, but the team had to adapt the BT49 to Michelin's new radial tyres for part of the 1981 season when Goodyear temporarily withdrew from Formula One.[11] Slick tyres were used in dry conditions and treaded tyres in the wet.

Three chassis, included the two modified BT48 units, were built for the end of the 1979 season. Two of these were re-used during the 1980 Formula One season, alongside seven new chassis.[4]

Engine and transmission Edit

 
Cosworth DFV engine mounted in BT49C. The curved underside of the car can be seen beneath it.

The Ford Cosworth DFV was produced by Cosworth in Northampton and had been used in Formula One since 1967. It is a 2,993 cc (183 cu in) normally aspirated four-stroke engine with two banks of four cylinders at 90 degrees to each other in a 'V8' configuration. It has an aluminium alloy engine block with cylinder liners. Each of its crossflow cylinder heads has a single spark plug and four valves, activated by gear-driven double overhead camshafts. This, combined with the flat-plane crankshaft, provides a relatively simple exhaust layout, in which the exhaust pipes exit on the outer side of the block.[12] The engine is water-cooled, with water and oil radiators mounted in the left and right sidepods respectively.[3] In 1980, a revised version of the DFV was introduced in which ancillaries such as the water and oil pumps were reduced in size and grouped further forwards on the flanks of the engine to provide more clearance for ground effect tunnels under the cars.[13]

Like its contemporaries, the BT49 uses the engine as a fully stressed structural component, carrying all loads between the front and rear of the car: the front of the engine bolts directly to the integral fuel tank and the back of the engine attaches to the car's rear suspension and gearbox. The Ford Cosworth engine integrated into the car much more easily than Alfa Romeo's large, heavy and inconsistently sized units: Murray described returning to the DFV as being "like having a holiday".[3]

By the time the DFV was used in the BT49, it weighed roughly 340 lb (154 kg) and produced around 500 brake horsepower (373 kW) at about 11,000 revolutions per minute (rpm). Peak torque was 270 pound-feet (366 N⋅m) at 9,000 rpm.[14] After his first test session with the car, Brazilian driver Nelson Piquet commented that he had always believed "that the DFV was quite a rough, coarse engine, but it felt quite the opposite to me. After those Alfa V12s it felt smooth and willing to rev."[3] In 1979, when the BT49 first raced, all but three teams – Ferrari, Alfa Romeo and Renault – used the DFV, and the most powerful alternative (Alfa Romeo's V12) produced 525 bhp (391 kW).[15] By 1982, most teams still used the DFV, but BMW, Ferrari and Hart had joined Renault in employing turbocharged engines: Ferrari's 1982 turbocharged V6 engine produced around 580 bhp (433 kW), while the DFV's output had remained at around 500 bhp.[16]

Realising just how competitive the BT49 was on its debut at the Canadian Grand Prix in 1979, Cosworth would supply Brabham, along with Williams special "evolution" DFV engines which had a slightly shorter stroke and higher revving capacity than a standard DFV, producing around 500 to 510 BHP at over 11,000 RPM for the 1980 season. Throughout 1980 the BT49 was regularly one of the quickest naturally aspirated cars timed on the speed-traps (meaning only the turbocharged Renaults were usually faster in a straight-line), a combination of the low drag aerodynamically slippery bodywork and the development Cosworth engine. With Williams taking the decision from the 1980 French Grand Prix to effectively sub-contract "in house" to John Judd to modify the DFVs used by Alan Jones and Carlos Reutemann, Brabham effectively become the favoured runner in 1980 of development Cosworth engines, a situation which would continue throughout the rest of the 1980 season and the entire 1981 season, which effectively promoted Nelson Piquet to the status as the favoured "works" driver for Cosworth, a relationship that ultimately concluded in triumph with the 1981 Drivers World Championship.

The BT49 was initially fitted with the same gearbox the team had been using since 1977: a six-speed unit designed by Brabham using internal components from Hewland and a casing cast by Alfa Romeo.[17]

Variants Edit

BT49B

A BT49B specification appeared early in the 1980 season; it was conceived around a new transverse gearbox designed by American gearbox specialist Pete Weismann. The new unit could be fitted with five or six gears and was tall and narrow, allowing a clearer airflow from under the car to the rear, with the intent of improving the ground effect.[18] An alternative rear suspension layout was designed to go with this gearbox. It replaced the standard pullrods with rocker arms that activated vertical coil springs mounted behind the gearbox.[19] The Weismann unit proved difficult to make reliable and was used alongside the original gearbox, mainly on a spare chassis, until the Dutch Grand Prix, after which it was put to one side.[4][20]

BT49T

A modified BT49, dubbed BT49T, was used to test the earliest versions of BMW's turbocharged Formula One engine between the 1980 and 1981 Formula One seasons. This was a 1,499 cc (92 cu in) inline four-cylinder engine, with a single KKK turbocharger mounted in the left hand sidepod of the car. The first version of the engine was said to produce 557 bhp (415 kW).[21]

BT49C

For the 1981 season, a BT49C specification was produced with a chassis lightened through increased use of carbon composite materials.[22] Five of this variant were built and two of the previous year's cars converted to this specification.[23] That year a minimum ride height of 60 millimetres (2.4 in) was introduced and sliding skirts were banned, with the intention of limiting ground effect and slowing the cars. The BT49C regained its front wings to compensate in part for the downforce lost.[24] More significantly, Murray devised a hydropneumatic suspension system for the BT49C in which soft air springs supported the car at the regulation height for checks while stationary. At speed, where the ride height could not be measured, downforce compressed the air and the car settled to a much lower height, creating more downforce.[25] Because the skirts now had to be fixed, the suspension had to be very stiff to allow them to consistently seal around the sides of the car: by the end of the 1981 season, total suspension movement was only 1.5 inches (38 mm), half of which came from the compression of the tyres.[23] A lightweight qualifying chassis was produced, featuring a small fuel tank and lighter reinforced carbon-carbon brake discs and pads.[10]

 
Rebaque in the BT49C at 1981 Argentine GP, Carlos Reutemann, behind.
BT49D

Three new BT49D chassis were built for the 1982 season,[23] featuring a still lighter chassis and one-piece bodywork. By this stage, the cars had to be ballasted to bring them up to the minimum weight limit of 580 kg (1,279 lb) specified in the rules.[26] The BT49D used the carbon-carbon brakes as standard and was one of several DFV-powered cars to be fitted with large water tanks, ostensibly for "water-cooled brakes".[5] In practice, the water was dumped early in the race, allowing the cars to race as much as 50 kg (110 lb) under the weight limit; the regulations stated coolant could be topped up at the end of the race before the weight was checked. In the view of the DFV teams, this practice met the letter of the regulations and equalised their performance with that of the more powerful turbocharged cars.[27] The 60 mm ground clearance rule was removed for the 1982 season, but the fixed skirts and very stiff suspension remained.[26]

Racing history Edit

The BT49's racing career got off to an unsettled start when Brabham's lead driver, Niki Lauda, abruptly quit the sport after 10 laps of the first practice session at the penultimate race of the 1979 season, the Canadian Grand Prix. The car soon showed promise: Piquet ran third in the race on the high speed Circuit Île Notre-Dame before retiring with a broken gearbox. Lauda's replacement, Argentine novice Ricardo Zunino, was seventh of the nine who completed the race. At the season finale in wet conditions at the Watkins Glen International circuit, Zunino spun off although Piquet set the fastest lap before a driveshaft failed, putting his car out of the race.[28]

Early in the 1980 season, Piquet's car scored points finishes at the Argentine and South African Grands Prix, behind Alan Jones' Williams FW07-DFV and the turbocharged Renault RE20 of René Arnoux. At the fourth race of the season, the United States Grand Prix West, Piquet qualified on pole by over a second in a BT49 featuring some updates to the sidepods, bodywork and suspension, before leading the race, held on the streets of Long Beach, California, from start to finish.[18] BT49s in Piquet's hands scored in seven of the ten remaining rounds of the championship. Towards the end of the season, the suspension was reworked for the Dutch Grand Prix on the high speed Circuit Park Zandvoort, lengthening the wheelbase by three inches and allowing the car to run in a lower drag configuration. Piquet won after Jones destroyed his FW07's skirts on kerbs.[4] Piquet also won the next race, the Italian Grand Prix to give himself a one-point lead over Williams driver Jones. By the end of the season the BT49 was "arguably the fastest Cosworth-powered car",[4] but Piquet lost the title to Jones at the penultimate race of the year, the Canadian Grand Prix, when a development engine failed while he was leading the race.[29] The BT49s driven by the team's second drivers—Zunino and then from mid-season Mexican Héctor Rebaque—either retired or finished outside the points, with the exception of Rebaque's sixth place at the Canadian race. The team finished third in the constructors' championship behind Williams and Ligier, unable to compete with only one car scoring points.[4]

In December 1980, Indycar driver Rick Mears tested the BT49 at Circuit Paul Ricard and was half a second behind Piquet but was faster than him at Riverside International Raceway in southern California, Mears was offered a contract to drive for Brabham in 1981 but he declined the offer and stayed with Team Penske in IndyCar.

 
Nelson Piquet driving the BT49 at Zandvoort in 1980

Disagreement between the teams and the sport's administrators over the technical regulations for the 1981 Formula One season contributed to Goodyear's temporary withdrawal from Formula One and meant that the 1981 South African Grand Prix was run by the teams to 1980 regulations using cars with sliding skirts. Piquet finished second in a BT49B, but the race did not count towards the championship.[22] The season proper opened with the United States Grand Prix West, at which the BT49C was introduced. To the team's surprise, it was the only car to exploit the "obvious" loophole in the new ground clearance regulation by lowering itself, but the BT49Cs raced with conventional suspension after the hydropneumatic system repeatedly jammed. The team revised the system continuously over the next three races and used it to set pole position at the Brazilian and Argentine Grands Prix and win the Argentine and San Marino races while continuing to suffer from the system not rising or lowering correctly.[11]

 
The Cosworth-powered Williams FW07 had a similarly lengthy competitive career and was the BT49's main rival in 1980 and 1981.

Frank Williams led an abortive protest against the car at the Argentine Grand Prix, objecting to the flexibility of the fixed skirts used to seal the underside of the car, which allowed them to replicate the effect of a sliding skirt. At the following race, the scrutineers rejected the flexible skirts. Brabham replaced them with stiffer material from one of the other teams for the race, which Piquet won.[25] As the season progressed, other teams developed their own lowering systems—a front spring and cylinder were stolen from the Brabham garage in Argentina—[11] but after a rule clarification from FISA many cars were lowered by the driver pressing a switch, a development that Murray found frustrating in light of Brabham's efforts to develop a system that he considered legal.[30] The cars ran on Goodyear tyres again from the sixth round of the championship; motorsport author Doug Nye believes this cost the BT49s good results at several races while the American company adapted to the latest Formula One developments.[23] Despite the virtually solid suspension now required to maintain a consistent ride height, which put components under greater strain,[31] Piquet built a championship challenge on the back of consistent reliability: by the end of the season, his BT49Cs had finished 10 of 15 races, with only one mechanical failure.[8] Piquet finished fifth at the final race of the season—the Caesars Palace Grand Prix—to take the title from Carlos Reutemann in a Williams FW07 by one point.[26]

Brabham had been working with the German engine manufacturer BMW since 1980 on the development of a turbocharged engine for Formula One. The BMW-powered BT50 made its debut at the start of the 1982 season, taking advantage of the high-altitude Kyalami circuit in South Africa, which favoured turbocharged cars.[26] However, the as yet unreliable BMW-powered cars were dropped for the next two races. Piquet finished first at the Brazilian Grand Prix in a BT49D, but was disqualified after a protest from Renault and Ferrari on the grounds that the car had raced underweight due to its water-cooled brakes. FISA ruled that in future all cars must be weighed before coolants were topped up, resulting in a boycott of the fourth race of the season by most of the DFV-powered teams, including Brabham.[32] Under threat from BMW, Brabham did not use its Ford-powered BT49s again until the sixth race of the season, the Monaco Grand Prix, where one was entered for Riccardo Patrese alongside Piquet in a BT50. Patrese won the race after a chaotic final lap on which several other cars stopped. Patrese used the BT49 for the next two races, taking a second place behind Piquet's BMW-powered car in the BT49's final Formula One race, the 1982 Canadian Grand Prix.[33]

Historic racing Edit

 
Christian Glaesel driving the BT49D in which he won the 2005 Thoroughbred Grand Prix championship

Since 1995, BT49s have competed regularly in the FIA Historic Formula One Championship. The championship is open to cars that competed in Formula One in the DFV era, between 1967 and 1985, in several classes to allow for equal competition. The BT49 competes in class C, for post 1971 ground effects cars.[34] In 1999, Motor Sport magazine tested a BT49D from the series featuring 530 bhp (395 kW) from its developed DFV at 11,200 rpm,[8] but the championship has since introduced rules to restrict engines to 10,500 rpm to keep costs down. While the cars' original skirts can be kept, they must be set up such that there is 40 mm (1.6 in) clearance beneath the car, a rule that removes most of the advantage of ground effect. The hydropneumatic suspension employed during 1981 is not permitted. The carbon-carbon brakes originally used in 1981 and 1982 are also banned and the cars must run with conventional brake pads and steel brakes. The cars use Avon slick tyres.[35] Christian Glaesel won the 2005 FIA Historic Formula One Championship driving a BT49D and Joaquin Folch won the 2012 championship in a BT49C.[36][37]

Complete Formula One World Championship results Edit

(key) (Results in bold indicate pole position; results in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year Team Engine Tyres Drivers 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Points WCC
1979 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 G ARG BRA RSA USW ESP BEL MON FRA GBR GER AUT NED ITA CAN USE 01 NC1
Niki Lauda WD
Nelson Piquet Ret Ret
Ricardo Zunino 7 Ret
1980 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 G ARG BRA RSA USW BEL MON FRA GBR GER AUT NED ITA CAN USE 55 3rd
Nelson Piquet 2 Ret 4 1 Ret 3 4 2 4 5 1 1 Ret Ret
Ricardo Zunino 7 8 10 Ret Ret DNQ Ret
Héctor Rebaque 7 Ret 10 Ret Ret 6 Ret
1981 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 G
M
USW BRA ARG SMR BEL MON ESP FRA GBR GER AUT NED ITA CAN CPL 61 2nd
Nelson Piquet 3 12 1 1 Ret Ret Ret 3 Ret 1 3 2 6 5 5
Héctor Rebaque Ret Ret Ret 4 Ret DNQ Ret 9 5 4 Ret 4 Ret Ret Ret
1982 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 G RSA BRA USW SMR BEL MON DET CAN NED GBR FRA GER AUT SUI ITA CPL 192 9th2
Nelson Piquet DSQ Ret
Riccardo Patrese Ret 3 1 Ret 2
Sources:[38][39][40]

^1 Placings in the constructors' championship are for chassis-engine combinations. Brabham used both Alfa Romeo and Ford-powered cars during this season: the BT49-Fords scored no points and Brabham-Ford was not classified.

^2 Brabham used both Ford and BMW-powered cars during this season: Brabham-Ford was classified 9th.

See also Edit

Notes Edit

  1. ^ Henry (1985) p.160 & p.281
  2. ^ Henry (1985) pp.210–213
  3. ^ a b c d e f Henry (1985) p.215
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h Nye (1986) p.110
  5. ^ a b Hodges (1990) p.42
  6. ^ Henry (1985) p.216
  7. ^ Haney, Braun (1995) p.17
  8. ^ a b c Frankel (May 1999) pp.46–49
  9. ^ Henry (1985) pp.215–218
  10. ^ a b Henry (1985) p.225
  11. ^ a b c Nye (1986) p.111
  12. ^ Nye (1986) p.49
  13. ^ Blunsden (1983) p.62
  14. ^ Blunsden (1983) pp.229 & 231
  15. ^ Nye (1986) p.147
  16. ^ Nye (1986) p.152
  17. ^ Henry (1985) pp.165–167 and p.215
  18. ^ a b Henry (1985) p.219
  19. ^ Jenkinson, Denis (May 1980). "Notes on the cars at Long Beach". Motor Sport. Motor Sport Magazine Ltd. LVI (5): 662.
  20. ^ Jenkinson, Denis (October 1980). "Notes on the cars at Zandvoort". Motor Sport. Motor Sport Magazine Ltd. LVI (10): 1488.
  21. ^ Henry (1985) pp.243–244
  22. ^ a b Henry (1985) p.222
  23. ^ a b c d Nye (1986) p.112
  24. ^ Lang (1992) p.12
  25. ^ a b Henry (1985) pp.223–225
  26. ^ a b c d Henry (1985) p.232
  27. ^ Jenkinson, Denis (May 1982). "The Formula One scene". Motor Sport. Motor Sport Magazine Ltd. LVIII (5): 555.
  28. ^ Henry (1985) pp.216–217
  29. ^ Henry (1985) pp.220–221
  30. ^ Henry (1985) p.223
  31. ^ Nye (1986) pp.111–112
  32. ^ Henry (1985) pp.233–236
  33. ^ Henry (1985) pp.236–237
  34. ^ Bunston, Smith (2011) p.16–17
  35. ^ Noakes (2007) pp.177–180
  36. ^ Bunston, Smith (2011) p.129
  37. ^ Miranda, Robson (24 October 2012). "F1 Historic: Joaquin Folch é o Campeão de 2012" [F1 Historic: Joaquin Folch is the 2012 Champion] (in Portuguese). SpeedRacing. Retrieved 30 July 2021.
  38. ^ "All championship race entries, in a Brabham BT49". ChicaneF1. Retrieved 30 July 2021.
  39. ^ "All championship race entries, in a Brabham BT49C". ChicaneF1. Retrieved 30 July 2021.
  40. ^ "All championship race entries, in a Brabham BT49D". ChicaneF1. Retrieved 30 July 2021.

References Edit

Books
  • Blunsden, John (1983). The Power to Win. New York: Harper Perennial. ISBN 0-900549-77-7.
  • Haney, Paul; Braun, Jeff (1995). Inside Racing Technology. TV Motorsports. ISBN 0-9646414-0-2.
  • Henry, Alan (1985). Brabham, the Grand Prix Cars. Osprey. ISBN 0-905138-36-8.
  • Hodges, David (1998). A-Z of Formula Racing Cars 1945–1990. Bay View books. ISBN 1-901432-17-3.
  • Lang, Mike (1992). Grand Prix!. Vol. 4. Sparkford: Foulis. ISBN 0-85429-733-2.
  • Noakes, Andrew (2007). The Ford Cosworth DFV. San Francisco: Ignatius Press. ISBN 978-1-84425-337-1.
  • Nye, Doug (1986). Autocourse history of the Grand Prix car 1966–85. Hazleton publishing. ISBN 0-905138-37-6.
  • Bunston, John; Smith, David, eds. (2011). FIA Historic Formula One Championship Review 2011 Yearbook. Great Somerford, England: Butler Tanner Dennis Ltd. ISBN 978-0-9570868-0-7.
Magazines
  • Frankel, Andrew (May 1999). "Simply the best". Motor Sport. Motor Sport Magazine Ltd. LXXV (5): 46–49.

External links Edit

  • Brabham BT49 in spherical 360° image Archived 13 February 2013 at archive.today

brabham, bt49, formula, racing, designed, south, african, gordon, murray, british, brabham, team, bt49, competed, 1979, 1982, formula, world, championships, used, brazilian, driver, nelson, piquet, first, world, championship, 1981, cdthe, bt49c, being, driven,. The Brabham BT49 ˈ b r ae b em is a Formula One racing car designed by South African Gordon Murray for the British Brabham team The BT49 competed in the 1979 to 1982 Formula One World Championships and was used by Brazilian driver Nelson Piquet to win his first World Championship in 1981 Brabham BT49Brabham BT49CBrabham BT49DThe BT49C being driven by Piquet at Monaco in 1981CategoryFormula OneConstructorBrabhamDesigner s Gordon Murray Technical Director David North Chief Designer PredecessorBT48SuccessorBT50Technical specificationsChassisAluminium alloy monocoqueSuspension front Double wishbone pullrodSuspension rear Double wishbone pullrodor Rocker armAxle trackFront 1 702 mm 67 0 in Rear 1 626 mm 64 0 in Wheelbase2 718 mm 107 0 in EngineCosworth DFV 2 993 cc 182 6 cu in 90 V8 NA mid engine longitudinally mountedTransmissionHewland FGA 400 Alfa Romeo 6 speed manualWeight580 kg 1 278 7 lb Fuel1979 Agip 1980 1981 Elf 1981 1982 ValvolineTyresGoodyear MichelinCompetition historyNotable entrantsParmalat Racing BrabhamNotable driversNelson Piquet Ricardo Zunino Hector Rebaque Riccardo PatreseDebut1979 Canadian Grand PrixRacesWinsPolesF Laps38 36 F1 WC 2 F1 other77 F1 WC0 F1 other76 F1 WC 1 F1 other44 F1 WC0 F1 otherConstructors Championships0Drivers Championships1 1981 Nelson Piquet The car was initially designed in 1979 as a short notice replacement for the team s Alfa Romeo engined BT48 after Brabham team owner Bernie Ecclestone decided to end his relationship with the Italian engine manufacturer The BT49 was created in only six weeks using elements of the BT48 chassis together with the widely used Cosworth DFV engine The monocoque chassis is made from aluminium alloy and carbon fibre composites The car was fitted with controversial hydropneumatic suspension and water cooled brakes at different points in its life The BT49 was updated over four seasons taking a total of seven wins six poles and 135 points Seventeen were eventually built most of which survive today Some are used successfully in historic motorsport Christian Glaesel won the 2005 FIA Historic Formula One Championship driving a BT49D Contents 1 Concept 2 Chassis and suspension 3 Engine and transmission 4 Variants 5 Racing history 6 Historic racing 7 Complete Formula One World Championship results 8 See also 9 Notes 10 References 11 External linksConcept EditThe BT49 was created by South African designer Gordon Murray for the Brabham team during the 1979 season of the Formula One motor racing World Championship The Brabham team had been competing in partnership with engine supplier Alfa Romeo since 1976 and won races in the 1978 season 1 However the team s 1979 car the BT48 was not a great success Alfa Romeo entered their own Type 177 and Type 179 cars in Formula One Grands Prix that summer helping to convince the Brabham team owner Bernie Ecclestone that the partnership was over 2 Motorsport author Alan Henry writes that Ecclestone did not want his team to take second place to an Alfa Romeo works team and that the team designing Alfa Romeo s cars was drawing on Brabham knowledge 3 Alfa s engines were powerful but had proved troublesome and according to Henry the days during which pure power was the main criterion had temporarily vanished by the start of 1979 3 Instead aerodynamic ground effect as brought to Formula One by the Lotus 78 two years earlier was the most important factor To allow them to focus on this the Brabham team reverted to a known quantity the reliable and widely used Ford Cosworth DFV engine that it had last used in 1975 Three BT49s were designed and built in only six weeks for the Canadian Grand Prix on 30 September 1979 two of them were converted BT48 chassis and one was newly built 3 Chassis and suspension Edit nbsp BT49C without its aerodynamic bodywork which can be seen sitting on the ground behind the chassisLike all of its Formula One contemporaries the BT49 chassis is a monocoque structure It is built from sheet aluminium alloy with reinforcement from carbon fibre composite panels and is one of the first Formula One chassis to incorporate this material structurally 4 The chassis is slightly longer than that of the BT48 and is new from the cockpit back with revised sidepods and a structural fuel tank reduced from 45 to 38 imperial gallons 205 to 173 L capacity to match the reduced fuel consumption requirements of the DFV compared to the Alfa Romeo 5 6 This allowed a reduction in dry weight over the BT48 of 35 pounds 15 9 kg and of 95 lb 43 1 kg when fully fuelled 4 The underside of the BT49 is shaped to create downforce through ground effect air is accelerated under the car reducing the air pressure beneath it and pushing the tyres down harder onto the track This provides more grip and thus higher cornering speeds but compared to conventional wings creates less of the drag that slows the car in a straight line 7 In its original form the reduced pressure area under the car was sealed off with sliding skirts which rose and fell with the movement of the car to ensure no air could leak under it According to Murray the aerodynamics were the car s great strength It had more downforce than any other car and it all came from the ground effect We ran the car with no front wing at all and scarcely any at the back 8 The suspension which controls the relative motion of the chassis and the wheels is similar to that of the BT48 it features double wishbones front and rear with the springs and dampers mounted on the chassis out of the airflow and activated by pullrods Anti roll bars are fitted front and rear 9 The BT49 s disc brakes are mounted outboard within the wheel hubs and are activated by a single four piston brake caliper for each wheel For most of the BT49 s career it used conventional steel brakes Lighter reinforced carbon carbon discs and pads a technology that Brabham had introduced to Formula One in 1976 were used in 1981 and 1982 10 The wheels are of 13 inch 330 mm diameter although occasionally 15 in 381 mm wheels were used at the front 4 The car initially raced on Goodyear tyres but the team had to adapt the BT49 to Michelin s new radial tyres for part of the 1981 season when Goodyear temporarily withdrew from Formula One 11 Slick tyres were used in dry conditions and treaded tyres in the wet Three chassis included the two modified BT48 units were built for the end of the 1979 season Two of these were re used during the 1980 Formula One season alongside seven new chassis 4 Engine and transmission Edit nbsp Cosworth DFV engine mounted in BT49C The curved underside of the car can be seen beneath it The Ford Cosworth DFV was produced by Cosworth in Northampton and had been used in Formula One since 1967 It is a 2 993 cc 183 cu in normally aspirated four stroke engine with two banks of four cylinders at 90 degrees to each other in a V8 configuration It has an aluminium alloy engine block with cylinder liners Each of its crossflow cylinder heads has a single spark plug and four valves activated by gear driven double overhead camshafts This combined with the flat plane crankshaft provides a relatively simple exhaust layout in which the exhaust pipes exit on the outer side of the block 12 The engine is water cooled with water and oil radiators mounted in the left and right sidepods respectively 3 In 1980 a revised version of the DFV was introduced in which ancillaries such as the water and oil pumps were reduced in size and grouped further forwards on the flanks of the engine to provide more clearance for ground effect tunnels under the cars 13 Like its contemporaries the BT49 uses the engine as a fully stressed structural component carrying all loads between the front and rear of the car the front of the engine bolts directly to the integral fuel tank and the back of the engine attaches to the car s rear suspension and gearbox The Ford Cosworth engine integrated into the car much more easily than Alfa Romeo s large heavy and inconsistently sized units Murray described returning to the DFV as being like having a holiday 3 By the time the DFV was used in the BT49 it weighed roughly 340 lb 154 kg and produced around 500 brake horsepower 373 kW at about 11 000 revolutions per minute rpm Peak torque was 270 pound feet 366 N m at 9 000 rpm 14 After his first test session with the car Brazilian driver Nelson Piquet commented that he had always believed that the DFV was quite a rough coarse engine but it felt quite the opposite to me After those Alfa V12s it felt smooth and willing to rev 3 In 1979 when the BT49 first raced all but three teams Ferrari Alfa Romeo and Renault used the DFV and the most powerful alternative Alfa Romeo s V12 produced 525 bhp 391 kW 15 By 1982 most teams still used the DFV but BMW Ferrari and Hart had joined Renault in employing turbocharged engines Ferrari s 1982 turbocharged V6 engine produced around 580 bhp 433 kW while the DFV s output had remained at around 500 bhp 16 Realising just how competitive the BT49 was on its debut at the Canadian Grand Prix in 1979 Cosworth would supply Brabham along with Williams special evolution DFV engines which had a slightly shorter stroke and higher revving capacity than a standard DFV producing around 500 to 510 BHP at over 11 000 RPM for the 1980 season Throughout 1980 the BT49 was regularly one of the quickest naturally aspirated cars timed on the speed traps meaning only the turbocharged Renaults were usually faster in a straight line a combination of the low drag aerodynamically slippery bodywork and the development Cosworth engine With Williams taking the decision from the 1980 French Grand Prix to effectively sub contract in house to John Judd to modify the DFVs used by Alan Jones and Carlos Reutemann Brabham effectively become the favoured runner in 1980 of development Cosworth engines a situation which would continue throughout the rest of the 1980 season and the entire 1981 season which effectively promoted Nelson Piquet to the status as the favoured works driver for Cosworth a relationship that ultimately concluded in triumph with the 1981 Drivers World Championship The BT49 was initially fitted with the same gearbox the team had been using since 1977 a six speed unit designed by Brabham using internal components from Hewland and a casing cast by Alfa Romeo 17 Variants EditBT49BA BT49B specification appeared early in the 1980 season it was conceived around a new transverse gearbox designed by American gearbox specialist Pete Weismann The new unit could be fitted with five or six gears and was tall and narrow allowing a clearer airflow from under the car to the rear with the intent of improving the ground effect 18 An alternative rear suspension layout was designed to go with this gearbox It replaced the standard pullrods with rocker arms that activated vertical coil springs mounted behind the gearbox 19 The Weismann unit proved difficult to make reliable and was used alongside the original gearbox mainly on a spare chassis until the Dutch Grand Prix after which it was put to one side 4 20 BT49TA modified BT49 dubbed BT49T was used to test the earliest versions of BMW s turbocharged Formula One engine between the 1980 and 1981 Formula One seasons This was a 1 499 cc 92 cu in inline four cylinder engine with a single KKK turbocharger mounted in the left hand sidepod of the car The first version of the engine was said to produce 557 bhp 415 kW 21 BT49CFor the 1981 season a BT49C specification was produced with a chassis lightened through increased use of carbon composite materials 22 Five of this variant were built and two of the previous year s cars converted to this specification 23 That year a minimum ride height of 60 millimetres 2 4 in was introduced and sliding skirts were banned with the intention of limiting ground effect and slowing the cars The BT49C regained its front wings to compensate in part for the downforce lost 24 More significantly Murray devised a hydropneumatic suspension system for the BT49C in which soft air springs supported the car at the regulation height for checks while stationary At speed where the ride height could not be measured downforce compressed the air and the car settled to a much lower height creating more downforce 25 Because the skirts now had to be fixed the suspension had to be very stiff to allow them to consistently seal around the sides of the car by the end of the 1981 season total suspension movement was only 1 5 inches 38 mm half of which came from the compression of the tyres 23 A lightweight qualifying chassis was produced featuring a small fuel tank and lighter reinforced carbon carbon brake discs and pads 10 nbsp Rebaque in the BT49C at 1981 Argentine GP Carlos Reutemann behind BT49DThree new BT49D chassis were built for the 1982 season 23 featuring a still lighter chassis and one piece bodywork By this stage the cars had to be ballasted to bring them up to the minimum weight limit of 580 kg 1 279 lb specified in the rules 26 The BT49D used the carbon carbon brakes as standard and was one of several DFV powered cars to be fitted with large water tanks ostensibly for water cooled brakes 5 In practice the water was dumped early in the race allowing the cars to race as much as 50 kg 110 lb under the weight limit the regulations stated coolant could be topped up at the end of the race before the weight was checked In the view of the DFV teams this practice met the letter of the regulations and equalised their performance with that of the more powerful turbocharged cars 27 The 60 mm ground clearance rule was removed for the 1982 season but the fixed skirts and very stiff suspension remained 26 Racing history EditThe BT49 s racing career got off to an unsettled start when Brabham s lead driver Niki Lauda abruptly quit the sport after 10 laps of the first practice session at the penultimate race of the 1979 season the Canadian Grand Prix The car soon showed promise Piquet ran third in the race on the high speed Circuit Ile Notre Dame before retiring with a broken gearbox Lauda s replacement Argentine novice Ricardo Zunino was seventh of the nine who completed the race At the season finale in wet conditions at the Watkins Glen International circuit Zunino spun off although Piquet set the fastest lap before a driveshaft failed putting his car out of the race 28 Early in the 1980 season Piquet s car scored points finishes at the Argentine and South African Grands Prix behind Alan Jones Williams FW07 DFV and the turbocharged Renault RE20 of Rene Arnoux At the fourth race of the season the United States Grand Prix West Piquet qualified on pole by over a second in a BT49 featuring some updates to the sidepods bodywork and suspension before leading the race held on the streets of Long Beach California from start to finish 18 BT49s in Piquet s hands scored in seven of the ten remaining rounds of the championship Towards the end of the season the suspension was reworked for the Dutch Grand Prix on the high speed Circuit Park Zandvoort lengthening the wheelbase by three inches and allowing the car to run in a lower drag configuration Piquet won after Jones destroyed his FW07 s skirts on kerbs 4 Piquet also won the next race the Italian Grand Prix to give himself a one point lead over Williams driver Jones By the end of the season the BT49 was arguably the fastest Cosworth powered car 4 but Piquet lost the title to Jones at the penultimate race of the year the Canadian Grand Prix when a development engine failed while he was leading the race 29 The BT49s driven by the team s second drivers Zunino and then from mid season Mexican Hector Rebaque either retired or finished outside the points with the exception of Rebaque s sixth place at the Canadian race The team finished third in the constructors championship behind Williams and Ligier unable to compete with only one car scoring points 4 In December 1980 Indycar driver Rick Mears tested the BT49 at Circuit Paul Ricard and was half a second behind Piquet but was faster than him at Riverside International Raceway in southern California Mears was offered a contract to drive for Brabham in 1981 but he declined the offer and stayed with Team Penske in IndyCar nbsp Nelson Piquet driving the BT49 at Zandvoort in 1980Disagreement between the teams and the sport s administrators over the technical regulations for the 1981 Formula One season contributed to Goodyear s temporary withdrawal from Formula One and meant that the 1981 South African Grand Prix was run by the teams to 1980 regulations using cars with sliding skirts Piquet finished second in a BT49B but the race did not count towards the championship 22 The season proper opened with the United States Grand Prix West at which the BT49C was introduced To the team s surprise it was the only car to exploit the obvious loophole in the new ground clearance regulation by lowering itself but the BT49Cs raced with conventional suspension after the hydropneumatic system repeatedly jammed The team revised the system continuously over the next three races and used it to set pole position at the Brazilian and Argentine Grands Prix and win the Argentine and San Marino races while continuing to suffer from the system not rising or lowering correctly 11 nbsp The Cosworth powered Williams FW07 had a similarly lengthy competitive career and was the BT49 s main rival in 1980 and 1981 Frank Williams led an abortive protest against the car at the Argentine Grand Prix objecting to the flexibility of the fixed skirts used to seal the underside of the car which allowed them to replicate the effect of a sliding skirt At the following race the scrutineers rejected the flexible skirts Brabham replaced them with stiffer material from one of the other teams for the race which Piquet won 25 As the season progressed other teams developed their own lowering systems a front spring and cylinder were stolen from the Brabham garage in Argentina 11 but after a rule clarification from FISA many cars were lowered by the driver pressing a switch a development that Murray found frustrating in light of Brabham s efforts to develop a system that he considered legal 30 The cars ran on Goodyear tyres again from the sixth round of the championship motorsport author Doug Nye believes this cost the BT49s good results at several races while the American company adapted to the latest Formula One developments 23 Despite the virtually solid suspension now required to maintain a consistent ride height which put components under greater strain 31 Piquet built a championship challenge on the back of consistent reliability by the end of the season his BT49Cs had finished 10 of 15 races with only one mechanical failure 8 Piquet finished fifth at the final race of the season the Caesars Palace Grand Prix to take the title from Carlos Reutemann in a Williams FW07 by one point 26 Brabham had been working with the German engine manufacturer BMW since 1980 on the development of a turbocharged engine for Formula One The BMW powered BT50 made its debut at the start of the 1982 season taking advantage of the high altitude Kyalami circuit in South Africa which favoured turbocharged cars 26 However the as yet unreliable BMW powered cars were dropped for the next two races Piquet finished first at the Brazilian Grand Prix in a BT49D but was disqualified after a protest from Renault and Ferrari on the grounds that the car had raced underweight due to its water cooled brakes FISA ruled that in future all cars must be weighed before coolants were topped up resulting in a boycott of the fourth race of the season by most of the DFV powered teams including Brabham 32 Under threat from BMW Brabham did not use its Ford powered BT49s again until the sixth race of the season the Monaco Grand Prix where one was entered for Riccardo Patrese alongside Piquet in a BT50 Patrese won the race after a chaotic final lap on which several other cars stopped Patrese used the BT49 for the next two races taking a second place behind Piquet s BMW powered car in the BT49 s final Formula One race the 1982 Canadian Grand Prix 33 Historic racing Edit nbsp Christian Glaesel driving the BT49D in which he won the 2005 Thoroughbred Grand Prix championshipSince 1995 BT49s have competed regularly in the FIA Historic Formula One Championship The championship is open to cars that competed in Formula One in the DFV era between 1967 and 1985 in several classes to allow for equal competition The BT49 competes in class C for post 1971 ground effects cars 34 In 1999 Motor Sport magazine tested a BT49D from the series featuring 530 bhp 395 kW from its developed DFV at 11 200 rpm 8 but the championship has since introduced rules to restrict engines to 10 500 rpm to keep costs down While the cars original skirts can be kept they must be set up such that there is 40 mm 1 6 in clearance beneath the car a rule that removes most of the advantage of ground effect The hydropneumatic suspension employed during 1981 is not permitted The carbon carbon brakes originally used in 1981 and 1982 are also banned and the cars must run with conventional brake pads and steel brakes The cars use Avon slick tyres 35 Christian Glaesel won the 2005 FIA Historic Formula One Championship driving a BT49D and Joaquin Folch won the 2012 championship in a BT49C 36 37 Complete Formula One World Championship results Edit key Results in bold indicate pole position results in italics indicate fastest lap Year Team Engine Tyres Drivers 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Points WCC1979 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 G ARG BRA RSA USW ESP BEL MON FRA GBR GER AUT NED ITA CAN USE 01 NC1Niki Lauda WDNelson Piquet Ret RetRicardo Zunino 7 Ret1980 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 G ARG BRA RSA USW BEL MON FRA GBR GER AUT NED ITA CAN USE 55 3rdNelson Piquet 2 Ret 4 1 Ret 3 4 2 4 5 1 1 Ret RetRicardo Zunino 7 8 10 Ret Ret DNQ RetHector Rebaque 7 Ret 10 Ret Ret 6 Ret1981 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 GM USW BRA ARG SMR BEL MON ESP FRA GBR GER AUT NED ITA CAN CPL 61 2ndNelson Piquet 3 12 1 1 Ret Ret Ret 3 Ret 1 3 2 6 5 5Hector Rebaque Ret Ret Ret 4 Ret DNQ Ret 9 5 4 Ret 4 Ret Ret Ret1982 Parmalat Racing Brabham Ford DFV V8 G RSA BRA USW SMR BEL MON DET CAN NED GBR FRA GER AUT SUI ITA CPL 192 9th2Nelson Piquet DSQ RetRiccardo Patrese Ret 3 1 Ret 2Sources 38 39 40 1 Placings in the constructors championship are for chassis engine combinations Brabham used both Alfa Romeo and Ford powered cars during this season the BT49 Fords scored no points and Brabham Ford was not classified 2 Brabham used both Ford and BMW powered cars during this season Brabham Ford was classified 9th See also EditWilliams FW07 Lotus 88Notes Edit Henry 1985 p 160 amp p 281 Henry 1985 pp 210 213 a b c d e f Henry 1985 p 215 a b c d e f g h Nye 1986 p 110 a b Hodges 1990 p 42 Henry 1985 p 216 Haney Braun 1995 p 17 a b c Frankel May 1999 pp 46 49 Henry 1985 pp 215 218 a b Henry 1985 p 225 a b c Nye 1986 p 111 Nye 1986 p 49 Blunsden 1983 p 62 Blunsden 1983 pp 229 amp 231 Nye 1986 p 147 Nye 1986 p 152 Henry 1985 pp 165 167 and p 215 a b Henry 1985 p 219 Jenkinson Denis May 1980 Notes on the cars at Long Beach Motor Sport Motor Sport Magazine Ltd LVI 5 662 Jenkinson Denis October 1980 Notes on the cars at Zandvoort Motor Sport Motor Sport Magazine Ltd LVI 10 1488 Henry 1985 pp 243 244 a b Henry 1985 p 222 a b c d Nye 1986 p 112 Lang 1992 p 12 a b Henry 1985 pp 223 225 a b c d Henry 1985 p 232 Jenkinson Denis May 1982 The Formula One scene Motor Sport Motor Sport Magazine Ltd LVIII 5 555 Henry 1985 pp 216 217 Henry 1985 pp 220 221 Henry 1985 p 223 Nye 1986 pp 111 112 Henry 1985 pp 233 236 Henry 1985 pp 236 237 Bunston Smith 2011 p 16 17 Noakes 2007 pp 177 180 Bunston Smith 2011 p 129 Miranda Robson 24 October 2012 F1 Historic Joaquin Folch e o Campeao de 2012 F1 Historic Joaquin Folch is the 2012 Champion in Portuguese SpeedRacing Retrieved 30 July 2021 All championship race entries in a Brabham BT49 ChicaneF1 Retrieved 30 July 2021 All championship race entries in a Brabham BT49C ChicaneF1 Retrieved 30 July 2021 All championship race entries in a Brabham BT49D ChicaneF1 Retrieved 30 July 2021 References EditBooksBlunsden John 1983 The Power to Win New York Harper Perennial ISBN 0 900549 77 7 Haney Paul Braun Jeff 1995 Inside Racing Technology TV Motorsports ISBN 0 9646414 0 2 Henry Alan 1985 Brabham the Grand Prix Cars Osprey ISBN 0 905138 36 8 Hodges David 1998 A Z of Formula Racing Cars 1945 1990 Bay View books ISBN 1 901432 17 3 Lang Mike 1992 Grand Prix Vol 4 Sparkford Foulis ISBN 0 85429 733 2 Noakes Andrew 2007 The Ford Cosworth DFV San Francisco Ignatius Press ISBN 978 1 84425 337 1 Nye Doug 1986 Autocourse history of the Grand Prix car 1966 85 Hazleton publishing ISBN 0 905138 37 6 Bunston John Smith David eds 2011 FIA Historic Formula One Championship Review 2011 Yearbook Great Somerford England Butler Tanner Dennis Ltd ISBN 978 0 9570868 0 7 MagazinesFrankel Andrew May 1999 Simply the best Motor Sport Motor Sport Magazine Ltd LXXV 5 46 49 External links Edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to Brabham BT49 Brabham BT49 in spherical 360 image Archived 13 February 2013 at archive today Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Brabham BT49 amp oldid 1175598776, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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