Tyrrell 008 fan car ?

Hi I stumbled upon this interesting site from an ex Formula 1 mechanic, but what made even more fascinating was the secret Tyrrell 008 fan car mention on the web page below.

It's the first time i've heard about the existance of such a car, does anybody know any more ?


http://www.jonathang...s.com/page3.htm


Rob

No idea about the Tyrrell fan car, but what an incredible website.

Fantastic - beyond that, I can't find words...some of the pictures are mind-blowing.

Well spotted and here's to Jonathan Greaves

Originally posted by MCS
Fantastic - beyond that, I can't find words...some of the pictures are mind-blowing.

Well spotted and here's to Jonathan Greaves

Definitely agreed!!

Agreed, great website.

Just love the early 70's F2 cars, to me they are pure racing cars.

Originally posted by MCS
Well spotted and here's to Jonathan Greaves

If he's not a TNFer he should be.

Yes indeed, very good read and superb photos!

Still no insight into the fan car from anybody ?

Maybe it was so secret nobody ever knew about it ..........

until now !

he actually states that it ran at Ricard, but I cannot believe nobody, not even someone at Tyrrell took a picture, if so, what a shame..............

Originally posted by f1steveuk
...I cannot believe nobody, not even someone at Tyrrell took a picture, if so, what a shame..............

I guess they buried the pics, along with the car and the drawings out back of the shed.

Very good 1st of April story, far better than the Max Mosley one...

The 008 "fan car". Now there's something that brings back memories....and they are not of April 1st !

As one of the four designers involved in the project, with one of them being Chief Designer, "the all 'round nice guy and extremely competent race car designer" Maurice Phillipe, I was a designer at Tyrrell from 1976 until the end of 1980.
As "Wingnut" says, it was indeed a concept that was tested on the 008 at Ricard towards the end of 1977 in preparation for the 1978 F1 season.
The idea was to house the water radiator and oil coolers underneath and at the back end of the chassis. The fan was mounted via a 'Silentbloc' bushing to the end of the crank and air was drawn through the radiator and coolers in the bottom rear edge of the chassis and exhausted , via ducting, through the fan and up and over the inlet trumpets rearwards. If you look at the top of the engine cover of a 008 you will see a channel that was where the air exhausted.
Brian Lisles (now a long time member of Carl Haas' organisation) was responsible for developing the fan and its drive. The final iteration was being tested at the above mentioned Ricard test, when " as I have heard the story" a Brabham "employee" spotted what was going on underneath the 008 when the car was up on the chassis stands ! The rest, as they say is history ??
When Maurice was first discussing his idea with us in the Tyrrell Design Office, his, what we considered perfectly valid argument to have the concept accepted (by FISA I think it was at the time), was to say the layout was identical to a road car layout, i.e., fan mounted on the front of the engine, drawing air though the radiator, and exhausting the air past the engine. This was to say that the 'primary function' of the fan was engine cooling, not aerodynamic. Maurice had considered driving the fan via the gearbox, but we, and he, all thought that its 'primary function' would too obviously be seen not to be cooling but aerodynamic gain and that it would therefore be a 'moveable aerodymanic device'...........
As the 1978 racing was rapidly approaching, it was decided to temporarily shelve the fan development and quickly move the radiator and oil coolers to the rearward sides on the chassis/bodywork. This is how the car was press released and raced.
By the time we found some "spare time" to re-visit the project, Brabham had introduced their fan car in Sweden, it was banned ,and that was that.
Another interesting well kept "secret" feature designed into the 008 was active camber control. This again was Maurice's idea and was a concept he prototyped on his Mk3 Cortina road car ! At that stage the camber was initially controlled via a pendulum controlled spool valve, front and rear. The response time was acceptable for a road car, but deemed too slow for a racing application. This was when MOOG servo valves first appeared on the motor racing scene, to solve the response problem.
As one of my areas of design responsibility on the Tyrrells was suspension (front and rear), I had to do the installation design of the system for the 008.
If you have a chance to see a 008 at a historic meeting, or museum, you will perhaps then understand why the front and rear top wishbones were not directly mounted to the chassis and rear frame.
As the racing season progressed, the active camber project was also put on hold. It was resurrected for the 009 car, but due to the suspension layout, the control was done via links to the outboard of the bottom wishbones....unfortunately, much more heavily loaded.
This layout was tested by Didier Pironi at the June 1979 Silverstone tyre test. The system worked fine, but as the Goodyear cross-ply tyres of that era were heavily cambered in profile, the lap times with and without the system operating were identical. So, due to the weight penalty and no performance gain, it was decided to remove the system from the car.
I hope the above isn't too confusing or boring, but it's good to give Maurice some credit for some of the interesting engineering concepts he investigated that never " saw the light of day ".............although the first guy to try suction fans was Jim Hall and his crew.....or was it a kid who sent a sketch of the concept to him ??????

Great explanation, shows theres still stuff not out there in the public domain. Thanks

Yes, superb info "from the horse's mouth"! I always wondered about the "strange looks" of the 008...

Thanks Gene, Rudi & JacnGille have gone quiet!!

When I was at FOM Gordon Murray mentioned that the fan idea was a development of someone else's idea, when I said Jim Hall, he said, "no no, much more recent, and not far from here".

The BT46B started off with a tank engine cooling fan, but that exploded so the Brabham boys ended up making their own. And it was never actually banned, Brabham withdrew it!

Originally posted by f1steveuk
Thanks Gene, Rudi & JacnGille have gone quiet!!

I haven't thought of anything else funny to add.

Have read accounts of the Ricard test.
The 008 was much slower than the P34 and Patrick Depailler said that there was something wrong at the rear
of the car.
Thanks God, Bernie had sent a special agent to spy the Tyrrell tests and bring the secrets back home.
Just anxious to read the next part of the 008 fan car story.

Ooops ! Forgot that the Brabham fan car was withdrawn from competition and not banned. Sorry !

Regarding the 008s first Ricard test, I don't recall specific rear suspension problems, although we did try different rear geometries during the course of the 1978 season, but I do remember that the rear wing mounting wasn't as rigid, and therefore stable, as it should have been. This was modified early on in the cars life. Maybe that instability was more what Patrick (Depailler) was feeling at the rear of the car.