British Racing Motors (BRM) was a British Formula 1 motor racing team. Founded in 1945, it raced from 1950 to 1977, competing in 197 Grands Prix and winning 17. While BRM certainly created more successful F1 cars, the most astonishing has to be the BRM Type 15 with its inconceivable 1.5 litre V16 engine.
The first post-war set of rules for Formula One allowed 1.5 litre supercharged or 4.5 litre naturally aspirated engines so BRM’s first engine design was an extremely ambitious 1.5 litre supercharged V16. The design concept of the V16 had not been used extensively on automobiles before so that design problems were many and the engine did not fire for the first time until June 1949. While it proved to be outstandingly powerful, its output was produced over a very limited range of engine speed and it was ultimately unreliable and difficult to develop.
No Subscription? You’re missing out
Get immediate ad-free access to all our premium content.