1978 Williams FW06

This is a photograph That I took at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

After the Williams Team had competed with a customer March 761 in the 1977 season, Frank Williams got Patrick Head to design a car for the 1978 season, and the result was this Williams FW06. The car was powered by the 2,993cc V8 Ford-Cosworth DFV engine and just one car was entered for each of the 16 races that season, driven by Alan Jones. His best place was a second place in the penultimate race of the season, the United States Grand Prix, and he finished the season in eleventh place in the Drivers' World Championship with Williams in ninth place in the World Constructors' Championship.

2003 McLaren MP4/17D

This is a photograph that I took at the Donington Park museum in September 2014.

It’s a 2003 McLaren MP4/17D. a car that competed in the Formula One World Championship races in 2003. It had a 2,998cc Mercedes-Benz V10 engine and was driven by David Coulthard and and Kimi Räikkönen. They each won one race – Coulthard the  Australian GP and Räikkönen the Malaysian GP - and Räikkönen ended the season with 91 points and second place to Michael Schumacher in the Drivers’ World Championship while Coulthard had 51 points in seventh place. McLaren finished in third place in the Constructors’ Championship.

1959 Cooper-Climax T51

This is a photograph that I took at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It's a 1959 Cooper-Climax T51 and the book 'Great Racing Cars of the Donington Collection has this note about it:

 

The works cars of Brabham and Salvadori began running 2.2-litre Climax engines and Leonard Lee of the Coventry company authorized development of full 2½-litre units for 1959. With 2,495cc, and 240bhp the Cooper-Climax T51s were on a power-to-weight par with the front-engined opposition, and Jack Brabham and Bruce McLaren – his youthful New Zealand team-mate – proved them totally competitive. Brabham won the Monaco and British GPs, and when his car ran out of fuel while leading the United States GP at Sebring, McLaren took over to score a victory which assured Brabham and Cooper-Climax of the World Championship titles.

 

There’s also this note about the T51 in the Donington Collection:

 

Cooper-Climax T51

Chassis unnumbered – Collection property – believe to be works No. 2 car, as driven by Bruce McLaren in 1959. To Collection from the late Jo Siffert’s collection of racing cars, Fribourg, Switzerland.

Jaguar F1 Cars

This is a photograph that I took at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014 and shows the Jaguar cars that competed in Formula One racing from 2000 to 2002, each with a 3 litre V10 Ford Cosworth engine, after Ford had  taken over the Stewart Racing Team in 1999.

On the left is the Jaguar R1 with which the team competed in the 2000 Formula One season but which proved largely disappointing, despite flashes of promise. It generally proved difficult to drive and suffered from an unreliable gearbox. Eddie Irvine, the 1999 championship runner-up could only score 4 points, placing the team ninth overall in the Constructors’ Championship. The R1 was the last F1 car that Johnny Herbert raced, the experienced Englishman retiring at the end of the season. It was also the car in which Luciano Burti made his race debut.

 

On the right is the 2001 Jaguar R2 which was driven for the whole of that season by Eddie Irvine with Luciano Burti driving the second car in the first four races and Pedro de la Rosa taking over that car for the remainder of the season. Eddie Irvine posted the best result for the team with a third place in the Monaco Grand Prix.

 

In the middle is the 2002 Jaguar R3 driven by Eddie Irvine and Pedro de la Rosa, the best finish being third place for Eddie Irvine in the Italian Grand Prix. This particular car was De la Rosa’s regular car during 2002 and was later used in tests in the Pininfarina wind tunnel. The colours show the air pressure around the car – blue for low, green for neutral, and red for high pressure, which created the downforce to keep the car on the road.

1991 Williams FW14

This is a photograph that I took on a visit to the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It's the 1991 Williams FW14 that was designed by Adrian Newey with a 3,493cc Renault V10 engine. It was driven by Nigel Mansell and Riccardo Patrese in the 1991 season, Mansell finishing in second place in the Drivers' Championship to Ayrton Senna and Patrese in third place with Williams in second place in the Constructors' Championship. With minor alterations the FW14B was almost unbeatable in 1992 with Mansell winning nine races and Patrese's sole victory and a string of second places gave him second place in the Drivers' Championship.

1944 Volkswagen Kübelwagen Type 82

I took this photograph at the Donington Park museum in September 2014 in the area set aside for Tom Wheatcroft’s son Kevin’s collection of World War II military vehicles.

It’s a 1944 Volkswagen Kübelwagen Type 82, over 50,000 of which were built between 1940 and 1945.

 

AI tells me that the military vehicles were moved into private storage when the museum closed down in 2018.

1957 Vanwall 'Streamliner'

I took this photograph at the Donington Park museum in September 2014.

It's the 1957 Vanwall F1 car with the streamlined body that never actually raced. The Vanwall of 1956-58 was designed by Colin Chapman and the body by Frank Costin, and it used the Vanwall engine designed by Norton engineer Leo Kuzmicki which was basically an enlarged version of four single-cylinder 498cc Norton engines joined together. The streamlined body was taken to the high-speed Reims circuit (a triangular five-mile road circuit with just two sharp corners and a couple of long sweeping curves) in July of 1957 for the non-championship Reims Grand Prix for evaluation. Regular drivers Stirling Moss and Tony Brooks were unavailable and Roy Salvadori and Stuart Lewis-Evans were drafted in for the race. Both drivers tried the streamlined car in practice, but it proved no faster than the normal one, which both drivers preferred to use in the race.

2004 Williams FW26

This is one of the Williams F1 cars that were in the Donington Park Museum on the last time I went there in September 2014.

It's a Williams FW26 which was campaigned by the Williams team in the 2004 season. The car was designed by Patrick Head, Gavin Fisher and Antonia Terzi, and had a 2,998cc V10 BMW engine. It was driven by Juan Pablo Montoya in all 18 races while the driving of the second car was shared by Ralf Schumacher, Antonio Pizzonia and Marc Gené. Juan Pablo Montoya finished in fifth place in the World Drivers' Championship winning the last race of the season, the Brazilian Grand Prix, while Ralf Schumacher had a second place finish in the Japanese Grand Prix to end up in ninth place in the Championship. Williams finished in fourth place in the World Constructors' Championship. The car pictured has the narrower nose that was used towards the end of the season.

Zugkraftwagen Famo Half track

I took this photograph at the Donington Park museum in September 2014 in the area set aside for Tom Wheatcroft’s son Kevin’s collection of World War II military vehicles.

It’s a Second World War German Zugkraftwagen Famo Halftrack which was a heavy duty German half track vehicle used for heavy towed guns and for tank recovery. It was powered by  a 10.8 litre V12 Maybach engine.

1942 Trippel SG-6 Schwimmwagen

As well as the Grand Prix Collection at Donington Park there was a separate area set aside in the later years of the museum for Tom Wheatcroft’s son Kevin’s collection of World War II military vehicles. This is a photograph of one of them that I took on a visit there in September 2014.

It’s a 1942 Trippel SG-6 Schwimmwagen, an amphibious vehicle originally designed in 1935 and intended for civilian use but adapted for use by the Wehrmacht in 1937. It has a 6-cylinder inline 2½ litre Opel engine.

1977 Wolf WR2

This is a photograph I took at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

Walter Wolf was a Canadian who became a Formula One constructor in 1976 by buying the assets of the Hesketh team when it withdrew from F1. The first car designed and built by the team led by Harvey Postlethwaite was WR1 which, driven by Jody Scheckter, won its first race in Argentina then went on to win the Monaco and Canadian Grands Prix, finishing second to Niki Lauda in the Drivers' World Championship and fourth in the World Constructors' Championship. It was powered by the Ford Cosworth DFV 2,993cc V8 engine. This is the second car built, WR2 which Jody Scheckter drove in three races in 1977, finishing in third place in the Spanish Grand Prix, second place in the German Grand Prix, then another third place in the Dutch Grand Prix.

Donington Park Museum

This is a photograph that I took at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

I don’t remember if there was an explanation for the ‘John Player Grand Prix’ sign but the British Grands Prix of 1972 to 1978 and 1981 to 1985 were sponsored by the John Player conglomerate, though most of the cars in this picture are from earlier or later years or not F1 cars. On the extreme left is the BRM P153 with which Pedro Rodriguez competed in the 1970 F1 season and next to that is a 1974 Trojan T101 Formula 5000 car. The car in the middle is a Stewart SF1 as driven by Rubens Barrichello and Jan Magnussen in the 1997 season and next to that is a 1993 Lola T330 Formula 5000 car. The car on the extreme right is a 1976 Hesketh 308D, mainly campaigned that season by Harald Ertl.

 

1985 Williams FW10

This is one of the photographs I took on a visit to the Donington Park Museum in September 2014

It's a Williams FW10, a car that was campaigned by Nigel Mansell and Keke Rosberg in the 1985 season. Designed by Frank Dernie it had a 1,494cc twin turbocharged V6 Honda RA165-E engine, and with four wins it finished in third place in the World Constructors' Championship. Keke Rosberg won the Detroit and Australian Grands Prix and was third in the World Drivers' Championship, while Nigel Mansell won the European Grand Prix at Brands Hatch and the South African Grand Prix to end up in sixth place.

1990 McLaren MP4/5B

This is one of the cars that I photographed at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It's a 1990 McLaren MP4/5B, a redesigned version of the MP4/5, which was powered by a 3,493cc Honda V10 engine and was driven that season by Ayrton Senna and Gerhard Berger. Ayrton Senna won six of the thirteen races, and with two second place and three third place finishes won the World Drivers' Championship with 78 points. Gerhard Berger had two second place and five third place finishes to earn 43 points and ended up in fourth position in that Championship. McLaren won the World Constructors' Championship with 121 points, ahead Ferrari with 110 points.

Friday's Ferrari

This is a photograph I took at the Ferrari Racing Days meeting at Silverstone in September 2014.

It's a 1985 Ferrari 328 GTS and has the F106AB 2,927cc 32 valve V8 engine with twin overhead camshafts per bank. The Ferrari 328 was produced between 1985 and 1989, a total of 7,412 cars - 1,344 of the GTB and 6,068 of the GTS. It replaced the 308 model and was superseded by the Ferrari 348.

The numbering of this car, and its predecessor and successor, followed the then Ferrari convention of using the engine capacity then the number of cylinders. Hence the Dino 246 was 2.4 litres and 6 cylinders, the 308 was 3.0 litres and 8 cylinders, and the 328 was 3.2 litres and 8 cylinders.

2000 Williams FW22

This is one of the cars that I photographed at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It's the Williams FW22 that was driven for the Williams Team by Ralf Schumacher and Jenson Button (in his first F1 season). The car was designed by a team led by Patrick Head and had a 2,998cc V10 BMW engine. Ralf Schumacher's best results were three third place finishers and he ended up with 24 points and fifth place in the World Drivers' Championship, which was won by Michael Schumacher, while Jenson Button didn't manage any podium finishes and managed 12 points to get eighth place. The Williams Team ended up in third position in the World Constructors' Championship, won by Ferrari.

1995 McLaren MP4/10B

This is a photograph I took at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It’s a McLaren MP4/10B that competed in the 1995 season, mainly driven by Mark Blundell and Mika Häkkinen. The team switched from the Peugeot engines used the previous season to the Mercedes Benz 2,999cc V10 FO110 engine but the car was no more successful than in the 1994 season. Mark Blundell scored 13 points to finish in tenth place in the World Drivers’ Championship whilst Mika Häkkinen did slightly better with two second place finishes to end the season in seventh place with 17 points. McLaren managed fourth place in the World Constructors’ Championship with 30 points.

1955 Vanwall

The Donington Grand Prix Collection at the Donington Park museum included a comprehensive display of Vanwall F1 cars. This is a photograph of one of those cars that I took on a visit there in September 2014.

It's the 1955 Vanwall that was driven in the 1955 season by Mike Hawthorn, Ken Wharton and Harry Schell. The engine was designed by Norton engineer Leo Kuzmicki, and was basically four Manx single-cylinder 498cc motorcycle engines which by 1955 has been bored out to a capacity of 2489cc. The car only managed one finish in the 1955 World Championship races, a ninth place in the British Grand Prix shared by Ken Wharton and Harry Schell. A couple of wins and a few podium finishes were recorded in minor British events. The way the Vanwalls were displayed on this visit to the museum was far better than on the previous occasions that I’d been there, but they still hadn’t got the lighting quite right.

1995 Williams FW17

This is one of the Williams cars that I photographed at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It's the Williams FW17 that was driven by Damon Hill and David Coulthard in the 1995 season. The car was designed by Adrian Newey and had a 2,992cc V10 Renault RS7 engine. Damon Hill won four of the seventeen Grands Prix that season to finish in second place in the World Drivers' Championship to Michael Schumacher who won nine of the races in his Benetton. David Coulthard won one race and Williams finished in second place in the World Constructors Championship to the Benetton team.

1989 Williams FW12C

This is a photograph that I took at the Donington Park Museum in September 2014.

It's a Williams FW12C, a car that was used for all but the last four races of the 1989 season. It was based on the previous season's FW12, but a 3,493cc Renault V10 engine was used instead of the FW12's Judd V8 engine. Thierry Boutsen and Riccardo Patrese drove the cars, Patrese finishing in third place in the World Drivers' Championship and Boutsen in fifth place - both with the help of points won in the last four races of the season in the FW13B. Patrese didn't win any of the races but Boutsen won in Canada and Australia (the latter in the FW13B), Patrese finishing ahead of him in the Championship thanks to a greater number of high-placed finishes. Williams finished the season in second place in the World Constructors' Championship.