The manufacturer’s legendary V16 will sing again its melody.
Almost 5 months ago, BRM sort of rose back from its ashes, like a tremendous, beautiful phoenix, announcing with the launch of a new stylish
website the intention of building F1 cars again. Now, before you get some false hopes, they aren’t actually getting back into F1 (but dear heavens would that be oh so good). No, their plan is to build again three Type 15s, the first model from the marque to race in F1, which housed the marvelous V16 that is so well known among motorsport fans.
This effort is known in the trade as
‘Continuation Series’ (different from
‘Restorations’, in which existing cars are restored back to their former glory, and
‘Sanction Lost’, which is when a car gets built from the ground up again because it got destroyed at some point in its history).
'Continuation Series' are, in simple terms, when a manufacturer basically uses unused chassis numbers (cars that never actually got built even though they were put down in the house registry), to build ‘new’ classic cars.
The interest in this project, after the discovery of three unused chassis numbers in their logbook, was sparked by John Owen, Sir Alfred Owen’s son. He affirmed:
«
Watching the likes of the Pampas Bull (Gonzalez) and, in particular, Fangio, master the power of the V16 was very special. The fabulous noise of the engine is still ringing in my ears 70 years on… In a selfish way, I have always dreamed of hearing that sound again and indeed I would like to share that experience with others. To hear it for the first time, to hear the V16 screaming at full tilt, is something special to behold».
Hall and Hall, BRM’s technical partners and historic automotive restoration specialists, were entrusted with the project, to re-build such a complex and fascinating car. A few days ago, they shared the news that they’ve successfully ran on the dyno an original BRM V16 engine. Martin Smith, Hall and Hall’s chief engine technician, said:
«
We didn’t want to push it too hard on the dyno, but even so we estimate we got about 550BHP at 10,000 RPM and 2.5 psi – which is a huge step forward as we continue to build our experience and understanding of this astonishing engine».
As for how it sounds, well I’ll leave that for you to find out: