New engine delayed

Press, 28 February 1986, Page 24

New engine delayed

The Ford Motor Company’s long-awaited new Formula One Grand Prix engine, which was expected to provide a strong challenge for world championship honours this year, will not now be ready for the start of the coming season.

The Beatrice team, whose drivers Alan Jones and Patrick Tambay were to have had sole rights for the use of the turbo charged V 6 unit, will now use the 4-cylinder Hart engine which powered the Beatrice cars last season, at least for the first round of the championship, in Brazil on March 23, and possibly several more races during the early part of the season.

Little technical information has been released about the new engine, which has been built in conjunction with Cosworth Engineering. The engine’s non-appearance during early season test sessions fuelled speculation among the motoring press in recent weeks that the project had fallen behind schedule.

This speculation has, in fact, proved correct, with the announcement by Ford's Mr Walter Hayes, the man responsible for commissioning Ford’s previous challenger, the fabulously successful Cosworth DFV, that the debut of the new engine would be delayed because of problems with the engine’s complex management system.

There seems little doubt that when the new engine does arrive it will be both innovative and successful. Designed by Mr Keith Duckworth, the man responsible for the design of the which won over

150 Grands Prix, the contract for first use of the engine was eagerly sought by several Formula One teams.

Although the level of competition has greatly increased since the DFV made its victorious debut in 1967, the new engine is considered as a serious

threat by other manufacturers even before being tested in a car. In the meantime, however, Beatrice will have to persevere with the Hart engine in the hope that the manufacturer has ironed out the bugs that proved so troublesome last season.