Brabham 1978 wild pre-season livery?

Was re-reading a blurb by Peter Stevens (the famous automotive and graphic designer) who was responsible for all the Parmalat liveries on the Eccelstone era Brabhams...

Apparently when Niki Lauda joined the Brabham team in 78 bringing the parmalat sponsorship, the cars (the Bt45s) were initially painted in crazy multicolor scheme - a "confusion of white, red with gold, orange, dark blue, light blue, green and yellow stripes." Lauda was not impressed, saying the car "looked like s***" and refused to drive it until the colors were sorted. Thus Eccelstone brought in Stevens for a quick fix... and the cars appeared in Argentina with much more respectable (and Martini-like) red-based scheme (tweaked later in the season with the debut of the Bt46 and the very sharp red/dark blue livery.)

Anyway, I thought this was an intersting story, and was curious if any pictures exist of the car in it's pre-season, wierd multi-color form?

I think the story is crap! Refused to drive it until the colours were sorted??? With that sort of attitude Niki would never have won a Milky Way bar in his career, much less three FIA World Championships. To get to the point, I clearly remember the car being presented to the press with unconventional surface radiators, but very conventional paint scheme.

It also does not sit well with the general tenor of Brabham schemes. After Bernie bought the team they ran in plain white, then added the Martini striping, then turned the white to red. Always very simple yet effective schemes.

To get to the point, I clearly remember the car being presented to the press with unconventional surface radiators, but very conventional paint scheme.

It was the BT46 that had the heat exchangers that didn't work!

http://www.f1journal...s/bt-46_002.jpg

think the story is crap! Refused to drive it until the colours were sorted??? With that sort of attitude Niki would never have won a Milky Way bar in his career, much less three FIA World Championships.

Well I doubt he was being literal...But Niki Lauda, being put in this position of having to drive a clownish mess of a racecar (and given his sardonic personality, and clout as a 2-time champion) it doesn't sound like an unreasonable reaction to me...

It also does not sit well with the general tenor of Brabham schemes. After Bernie bought the team they ran in plain white, then added the Martini striping, then turned the white to red. Always very simple yet effective schemes

Well, it sounds like this was the doing of the Parmalat graphics people, who were intitially given control over how their livery would look...

Anyway, I have a hard time believing this story by Stevens is an outright fabrication...

Edited by fer312t, 22 May 2009 - 17:57.

I have a hard time to believe that Lauda told the sponsor who paid his huge salary that their car looked like ****, and that he refused to drive a racecar - because of its livery.

I have a hard time to believe that Lauda told the sponsor who paid his huge salary that their car looked like ****, and that he refused to drive a racecar - because of its livery.

From what I have read about Niki Lauda over the years, I do not have a hard time at all believing that 'Super Rat' WOULD tell a sponsor that!
Tom

I!!.. oh forget it...

It also does not sit well with the general tenor of Brabham schemes. After Bernie bought the team they ran in plain white, then added the Martini striping, then turned the white to red. Always very simple yet effective schemes.

That was always one of the most endearing things about the Bernie-era Brabhams. The uncluttered liveries. Even when the sponsorship logos appeared, one could be forgiven for not even noticing them...