BRABHAM FAN CAR
ANOTHER SHORT-LIVED
legend of F1 in its innovative pomp, the Brabham BT46B was a collaboration between Gordon Murray and his engineer David Cox.
The pair were responding to Colin Chapman’s ground effect cars with a subversive solution of their own. The giant fan fixed to the back of Bernie Ecclestone’s Brabham purported to increase engine cooling on the hotter-than-hell Alfa Romeo flat-12. What it was doing in addition was sucking all the air out from under the car and sticking the car to the ground in the process. Again, it wasn’t strictly speaking against the rules, but after obliterating the competition on debut at the ’78 Swedish GP, the stink raised in the paddock was enough to make the politically perspicacious Bernie withdraw the car.