Talk:Brabham

Motor Racing Developments

I believe the official name of the Brabham team was "Motor Racing Developments", and not Brabham Racing organization. Jack Brabham was staunchly against using his own name as part of the team, and insisted on the "MRD" name - though it sounded rather unfortunate when spoken by a French commentator. The Brabham name was adopted as a moniker by commentators, but the actual entrant name on all the team's GP Entries was Motor Racing Developments. Is it possible that the author has confused Brabham with Ken Tyrrell's 'Tyrrell Racing Organisation'? Posthocergopropterhoc 5 July 2005 04:01 (UTC)

A few months ago I e-mailed Donn Gurney, who is the contact person at Brabham's website, on this very issue; apparently he asked Sir Jack, who confirmed that Brabham Racing Organisation is the correct full name for his team. — Dan | Talk 15:02, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

The team was "Brabham Racing Organisation". But the constructor was called "Motor Racing Developments". Brabham saw BRO as just another one of several MRD clients. --Pc13 22:17, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Proposed move from BRO to Brabham

Motor Racing Developments was the main company which manufactured the cars, and although BRO was the works F1 team from 1962 to 1969, it was MRD that was the entrant after that. On the policy that has been applied to other teams, this article should really be called 'Motor Racing Developments, Ltd.' but that would be hopelessly confusing. It might be better if this article was renamed 'Brabham', never properly the name of the team, but what most people know it as, and 'Brabham Racing Organisation' and 'Motor Racing Developments' redirected here. That way, most people get what they expect, and those who know the correct full titles also do so. Thoughts? 4u1e 17:44, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I'll second that plan. That is similar to the manner in which the Surtees team has been handled. Although Team Surtees (the race entrant) went through a number of names (Brooke Bond OXO etc etc) they all link back to the main Surtees page, as does the official constructor: Surtees Racing Organisation. Pyrope 15:18, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Works for me. Any other views? 4u1e 17:42, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

See also discussion at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Formula_One#Brabham. 4u1e 04:11, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Page moved. Cheers. -GTBacchus^(talk) 07:18, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

This page is now hopelessly confusing. There needs to be two separate pages. One for MRD and one for BRO. xbgs351

Rather than make a broad statement, would you like to explain your confusion? --Falcadore (talk) 05:02, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Irrelevant trivia

The babelfish translation of the Japanese symbols for 'Brabham', appears to be 'Brassiere bum'. Childish, yet hilarious. 4u1e 13:07, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

To do list

Things that need doing, in no particular order

• Check the facts - I haven't done so for any of this, most of what I've added has come from other Wiki articles, with the usual caveats
• Find some decent references for all this (I've started on this, but obviously there's a way to go...) 4u1e 07:45, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Got good hardcopy references for everything up to about 1985 now and few bits for afters. Just need to go through and apply them now...... 4u1e 22 July 2006

• Fix the writing for the Ecclestone/Murray period, put together out of cut and pastes, so not good stylistically

Considerably better now, will revise again as I go through adding the references. 4u1e 22 July 2006

• Fill out the post-1987 period - lots of murky financial dealings to untangle, if not much in the way of racing success.

Either cite some legit primary sources or delete the contradictory claims that "Ecclestone announced he had sold MRD to EuroBrun team owner Walter Brun for an unknown price" and "Ecclestone sold Motor Racing Developments to Alfa Romeo" (I'm pretty sure the former is true and the latter is a BS myth that cropped up on the internet only recently, but I can't put my finger on contemporary source)! Jelliott4 (talk) 20:37, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

• Pictures would be good. (Starting to sort this out - Gerald Swan has been kind enough to allow pictures of various Brabhams from his site www.f3history.co.uk to be released under the GFDL, which covers 1969 - 1974-ish) 4u1e 23:29, 25 May 2006 (UTC) (Found some nice creative commons stuff on Flickr as well - still missing the last few years, though) 4u1e 12 June 2006 Largely covered now. Would be nice to have one from the 1990s, just to round things off 4u1e 19:20, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
• The team summary table needs to be amended to reflect the final year of the team - its the only sensible thing to do with it, otherwise it just gets inconsistent and misleading.4u1e 13:53, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Have instead created a former F1 team template. 4u1e 9 November 2006

• Would it be an idea to list all of the chassis types produced by Brabham, for all formulae? Perhaps somewhat like the list at Lotus Cars but in table format. There's a list of the various types here, but just taking it would be too close to copying, I think. Given the sheer number of chassis types, perhaps a link to a separate Wikipedia article would be better. 4u1e 23:29, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

• Done, by using a template stolen borrowed from template:Lotus 20 July 2006

• The page doesn't have a summary of F1 World Championship results. This is going to be big - the F1 race team had a 30 year history - perhaps that could be a separate article, too. 4u1e 23:29, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Could be, but probably better to keep it on here despite its length. So long as it is treated as an appendix and doesn't break up the text. It is probably useful to compare with the manner in which the McLaren results have been tabulated. Pyrope 15:56, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Fair point - I was thinking of something more like the one at Fittipaldi Automotive, but was rather daunted by the work involved! 4u1e 17:40, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, bit much that Fittipaldi one. Ok for a team that only ever had two drivers to worry about at any one time, but for a team like Brabham that supplied customer vehicles full person-by-person-by-race results are overkill. Pyrope 18:28, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Having done it, that's what occured to me! I like it as it is in that article, because it's just about manageable - but have been putting it off for this one! I'll maybe work up a tarted up version of the McLaren one - although I still like the idea of a 'list' page giving the complete Brabham results, although I doubt I'll ever complete it!--4u1e 19:15, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

• Just gave it a quick copy edit and bumped up the pic sizes a bit (I have a small screen and dislike squinting...). There is still quite a bit or repetition, particularly between the race history and engine sections. This could do with trimming down, and maybe some internal hyperlinking to reduce the information about engines contained in the racing section? Pyrope 18:33, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Fair point re engines, thanks. I pulled those bits out originally to keep the racing history flowing without too much sidetracking. I may not have trimmed down the original text enough, though. 4u1e

Demise of the customer car business

Judging from model numbers, the production of customer cars for anything outside F1 seems to have ceased in the early 1970s after Bernie Ecclestone took over. What I've read so far (not very much!) suggests that Bernie just let the customer side die out, where you'd have thought that it could have been sold as a going concern. Anyone know what the story is? 4u1e 23:44, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Come to think of it, what company did Jack actually sell to Ron Tauranac? Was it BRO or MRD, or both?

After (much!) further reading, it seems that BRO was only the sole F1 entrant up to 1965, after that it was more of a joint effort with MRD and BRO seems to disappear at the end of 1969 when Jack sold his shares in MRD to Ron - after that the name on the entry list is almost always MRD, or a variation thereon. MRD is the company that was sold to Bernie - who has said that he wasn't interested in continuing the customer side - he may well have been right as it was around this time that Lotus and others competing in F1 also stopped producing customer cars. 4u1e 07:36, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

What is a customer car? In general, I found the article confusing. Gingermint (talk) 04:46, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

It's certainly nothing to do with custom cars! Simply a car built to sell to a customer (like those built by Dallara today), rather than one built only for the use of your own racing team (like those built by McLaren today). I'll see if that can be clarified in the text. I've reverted your edits which were inaccurate and rather loaded. If you don't understand the topic, it's perhaps dangerous to try and edit the article, at least not without gaining an understanding first. 4u1e (talk) 07:33, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I've edited to perhaps clarify what customer means. Given your edits, I imagine you mean you found the lead confusing and didn't read the rest of the article...but I've made one edit further down the article too. 4u1e (talk) 07:39, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Alternative Structure

With a 30 year history, this may become a very long (tedious?) article if it basically consists only of the 'racing history'. I've already split out the MRD bit to a separate section and I'm starting to wonder whether it would be worth splitting out a more summarised 'racing history' (just a canter through who drove for the team and where the team finished in the championship - possibly even in a table?) from a narrative history which could then gloss over the 'quiet years' (1962 - 1965), (1971 - 1975?), (1989-1992?) even more than the article does at present. 4u1e

Also wondering whether 'Technical Innovations' could be a separate section as well. Candidates for inclusion could be:

• Carbon-carbon brakes
• The 'fan car'
• Hydraulic suspension (to evade ride height restrictions)
• In race re-fuelling
• Structural use of carbon-fibre (as an addition to aluminium, not fully structural)
• The 'lay down' BT55

4u1e 07:42, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

So this would look like:

Lead

Origins of team

Team History

Racing History

Formula One

Other Formulae

Technical Innovations

Motor Racing Developments 4u1e 06:55, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Done, largely. 4u1e 01:22, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Nationality of team

This article has contained the statement that this is an Australian team since before I started messing about with it. Now, I'm not questioning the team's 'Australian-ness' in its first decade: Drivers, designer and most of the mechanics were from either Oz or New Zealand, and some components - most importantly the Repco engines - came from there. However, the nationality of a team is defined by the Motorsports national body under whom it was registered (hence Renault is indeed a French team, although the chassis operation is firmly based in the UK and largely staffed by Brits). Does anyone know whether Brabham was actually registered with CAMS (the Aussie motorsports body) or whether it was technically a British team? 4u1e 07:04, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Andreasu informs me that the team was registered with the UK motor racing body, not the Australian one. --4u1e 17:03, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Just as a query, until the advent of sponsorship liveries, the MRD/Brabham works team always ran in Australian racing colours, i.e. BRG with gold/yellow trim (see the photo of Graham Hill in the lobster claw car). How does this tally with the CSI national colours ruling that was in place until 1969? Pyrope 09:45, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Excellent question. By which I mean, I have no idea whatsoever! Given that, as you say, it was BRG with gold trim, and that other teams 'trimmed' their liveries - Lotus with yellow, for example - perhaps this was just the same thing? If so, the statement 'raced in the Australian colours' (although taken from one of the histories, I think) is a bit of an anachronism. Possibly at the time they were officially seen as racing in British colours. 4u1e 18:45, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Did a quick search (see http://www.itsanhonour.gov.au/symbols/colours.cfm) and quote "Since the late 1800s, green and gold have been popularly embraced as Australia’s national sporting colours. In 1984, green and gold were formally recognised as the national colours with widespread community support" (Note: This probably came about due Australia II's win of the America's cup in 1983 and the 'Boxing Kangaroo Flag'). It is interesting to note the BRG with gold trim used by the 'Brabham' cars falls within the colours used by other Australian sports / sporting teams (thunks of the Aussie Cricket Teams 'Baggy Green' cap with gold coat of arms emblem which goes back 70+ years as an example) BEFORE motorsport began in the 1910's.... Hmmmz lol - Aussie Racing Green? Officially it is now Green: PANTONE®348C and Gold: PANTONE®116C. Hope that helps with the Racing colours (I might send an email to Jack via the website for more confirmation yet). I would say they were racing in Australian colours. DeafCom 21:00, 30 April, 2007

Also as an Australian, the name Brabham is Australian, MRD although based in the UK, I would consider an Australian Motor racing entity based in the UK but started in Aus. Mind you, the reverse side of that is McLaren - Bruce was a kiwi (New Zealander) started and built all of his company in the UK - lol can of worms...... :) DeafCom 21:29, 30 April, 2007

Good example... UK: green; NZ:green/silver or black/silver; McLaren: orange. Go figure... Pyrope 18:28, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Extra Note - I emailed this section on 30 April, 2007 to Donn Gurney @ Race Legends Inc - recieved the following "We've sent your message on to Jack.". So hopefully I will have an answer to a few of the discussed questions (and maybe more) from Sir Jack himself.... My only problem there is if and when I add in the information - whats the go with citing the source!?!DeafCom 21:22, 2 May, 2007 - Cheers.

Hi there. Apologies for not noticing this response earlier, I've never really gotten into the habit of using my watchlist. Regarding the use of green & gold, that seems a fair reference for their unofficial use prior to 1984, and their official use after that date. I'm pretty certain the team raced under a UK license though, despite the nationality of its founders. There may not be a conflict though - Team Lotus also raced in green with yellow trimming, very similar to Brabham's colours. It may be that they were officially in UK colours, while unofficially being in Aussie ones. I've posted a note at Talk:List_of_international_auto_racing_colors#Green_.26_Gold4u1e 16:03, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

'BRG' = British Racing Green. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.7.147.13 (talk) 19:14, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Importance scale

The 'importance' for Wikiproject Australia is marked as 'not yet assessed' above. To start the ball rolling, I would suggest that it is 'Low: This article is of little importance to this project, but it covers a highly specific area of knowledge or an obscure piece of trivia.'. Much as I hate to say it, when it comes to writing the history of Australia, the history of Brabham the racing team is probably little more than a footnote, especially since the team was never actually based there. Jack Brabham would rank rather higher though as a triple F1 world champion and leader of the not insignificant Australian contribution to world motorsport. 4u1e 07:11, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Figured out the importance scale and ranked it 'low'.

BT46B Fan Car

I think the car was never banned. Ecclestone decided not to run it because he wanted to avoid an conflict among FOCA members. Ericd 00:43, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I can't give the actual quote at the moment, but according to Alan Henry's book on the team the concept of a fancar was banned (i.e. they closed the loophole that said that the primary purpose of the fan must be to cool the car, which had left room for its secondary purpose to be the creation of downforce), but the car was not ruled to have been illegal when it raced in Sweden - in other words it was a legitimate interpretation of the rules, which were then changed. The BT46B could not have raced again legally however, so it was in effect banned. I think what Ecclestone may have done is to decide not to fight the decision. I'll try and give quotes later today. 4u1e

From Brabham - The Grand Prix Cars (Alan Henry, 1985) page 187: "It should of course be emphasized quite categorically that the BT46B fan-car may have been outlawed after its victory at Anderstorp, but it was never declared illegal, nor was it disqualified from that Swedish Grand Prix success."

and: "although the fan-car was banned by the CSI, a technical commission from the sport's governing body examined the BT46B and broadly agreed with Gordon Murray's contention that the fan was employed 'about 70 per cent for cooling and 30 per cent for ground effect'".

From Brabham - Story of a Racing Team (Phil Dracket, 1985) page 98: "Before the French Grand Prix, the fan car had been banned, but the Swedish result was allowed to stand as the cars had raced there with official approval."

Sorry to go on at length, but the story that it wasn't banned seems to be quite common, I can only assume it comes from the true story that it wasn't illegal at the time of the race. It would have been illegal if it had raced again. Cheers. 4u1e 18:25, 27 July 2006 (UTC) (added emphasis from me ;-) 4u1e 21:58, 27 July 2006 (UTC))

I didn't remember were I had the info but now I think I read this in an interwiew of Gordon Murray in a French magazine. I think I still have this magazine somewhere.

I think that Henry is closer from the truth that Dracket. I'm quite certain that the BT46B Fan was tuned in such a way that more that 50% of the airflow was used to cool the engine, thus according to Murray it was legal.

I will try to find the article before making further comments. This may take some time... Cheers. Ericd 20:55, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Your latter comment on the percentage devoted to cooling agrees with what Henry says. Dracket's account doesn't contradict Henry's though - both say the "car was banned"! As an aside, I don't think too much of Dracket's book. Anyone who can refer to Nelson Piquet as Argentinean (albeit only once) or say that the Rover-BRM was a 'turbo' engined car hasn't done their research too carefully. 4u1e 21:58, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I will try to find Murray's interview. I think Murray considered that the CSI technical commision confirmed that the car was legal. I don't think the loophole was closed very fast, I think it was closed by a normal procedure not an urgency one. Ericd 23:30, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

The Official Formula 1 website write withdrawn not banned : http://www.formula1.com/insight/technicalinfo/11/468.html Ericd 00:53, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, I can give you two more examples of "banned" from books - 'The Concise Encyclopedia of F1' ( and 'The A-Z of racing cars' (1990). I can also (because I'm always fair!) give you one to support your side: A history of Brabham in the May 1999 edition of Motorsport says (p.43) that "contrary to popular opinion, it was never banned". The author? Alan Henry, 14 years after saying it was banned in his book!

More seriously, I've got some contemporary newspaper reports here from the Times. On June 24 1978, less than a week after the Swedish race, John Blunsden (also a writer for Motorsport) writes "The controversial Brabham-Alfa Romeo BT46B, the "fan car" with which Niki Lauda took victory at last Sunday's Swedish Grand Prix, will not be raced again, at least for the next three grand prix. This is the effect of a decision reached yesterday by the CSI...However the ban will not be retrospective..." (my emphasis again). Six days later he wrote: "The Parmalat Brabham team's BT46B, the "sucker car" has been banned from further racing, at least until August 1." (My emphasis again). For once an extremely rapid decision was taken by the CSI. The significance of August 1 is that by that date new rules were to have been agreed regarding the 'moving aerodynamics' thing. As the current regs say that aerodynamic parts may not move (hence the discussion over flexible wings) it seems that an agreement was reached. 4u1e 06:52, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

See also [1] and then [2]. 4u1e

IIRC, one of the reasons the fan car was banned was because of the perceived risk (real or otherwise) of the fan suction picking up any loose stones on the track and ejecting them backwards at high velocity into following drivers' faces. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.7.147.13 (talk) 19:23, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

BT50 fuel

I remember some controversy about the legality of the fuel used in the BT50. Ericd 10:49, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, you're right. There were also complaints about underweight qualifying cars - exacerbated no doubt by the team's ownership by Mr Ecclestone which some felt put them in a advantageous position when it came to interpretation of the rules. I haven't really got my teeth into that part of the article yet, there may even be scope for a 'Allegations of cheating' section to cover it all. Did you ever find the Gordon Murray article regarding the BT46B, by the way, I'm genuinely interested in getting this right! 4u1e 04:37, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm still searching for it. I'm afraid you'll to wait until september as I will be travelling coast to coast in the USA in a few days. Ericd 21:42, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Lucky you! I'm going to stick to my version for now. Have a good time. 4u1e

Put something in on this topic now as well. 3 November 2006 4u1e

GA

This article is very interesting it reads well and I have promoted it as GA Gnangarra 02:51, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Info looking for a home

This seems useful and interesting information, but I can't think where to put it! Leaving it here for now.

"By now a Formula One team budget for the year was £10 - 12 million." 4u1e 00:04, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

References

BT58

I think this section is little bit confusing:

"In 1988 Ecclestone sold Motor Racing Developments to Alfa Romeo. The Formula One team did not compete that year, but Alfa Romeo put the company to use designing and building a prototype 'Procar' - a racing car with the silhouette of a large saloon (the Alfa Romeo 164) covering a composite racing car chassis and mid mounted race engine, intended for a series for major manufacturers to support Formula One Grands Prix. The car was designated the BT58.[49]"

BT58 can be misunderstood to be that pro-car?--— Typ932^{T | C}  08:47, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

It was BT57, fixed the section...--— Typ932^{T | C}  10:39, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Joachim Luhti and other comments

Who is Joachim Luhti and why/how did he become owner of Brabham? We leave the Ecclestone section with Bernie selling the team to Alfa Romeo, and enter the next section with this Luhti chap. Presumably Alfa sold the team on quickly but we need to be told a bit more about this and Luhti.

I think at times the article is a bit confusing about whether "MRD" and "Brabham" are exactly the same thing. --kingboyk 10:32, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Ref name "Piranha" is missing (re: Luhti's conviction on tax evasion charges). Presumably it's a citation of the referenced book The Piranha Club (albeit with no page number).

I'm of the opinion that technical terms in the section "Technical innovation" shouldn't be italicised. However, I've left them italicised just in case there's some MOS guideline I'm not aware of.

Nice article! --kingboyk 10:45, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

PS my whinging in edit summaries (I am a whinging Pom) was related only to formatting and minor issues; you have a readable and well-researched article here and I wish all motor racing articles were this good! (clue: they're nowhere near it). --kingboyk 11:03, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks - I suspected the more, ahem, colourful parts of the edit summaries weren't exactly from the heart, but that way edit-warring can lie! <smug git>Luckily I have such confidence in my own supreme writing that I could never feel upset by another's comments</smug git> 4u1e 11:34, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments and questions. Alfa owned the team for most of the year it was out of F1 - hence little coverage, although there is more later on in the 'Motor Racing Developments' section. (Does this splitting out into different sections work, by the way? I wanted to keep the F1 racing history separate to make it a bit more digestible.) I can bulk up on Luhti a bit

Re MRD and Brabham - it may be confusing because it is confusing! :) 'Brabham' doesn't really exist as an organisation by that name. Pre 1968 or so there was MRD (actually called BRD between 1962 and 1965) which made Brabham cars and BRO which was a completely separate racing team which happened to use MRD-built cars. The entity 'Brabham' was sort of a combination of the two. Around 1969, BRO disappears from the histories - I suspect it was disbanded when Jack Brabham retired to Australia, but have never found anything to confirm either way. Thereafter MRD was the F1 racing team and was generally known as Brabham, but not officially called that. I've tried to cover this without getting too far into the details - I may have got the balance wrong. What do you reckon?

Kind of what I thought, but still rather confusing. Should the article even be called Brabham? I don't know. I'm guessing that the constructor is/was MRD and the racing team is/was Brabham and at some point they became one, making it not very helpful to have seperate articles on them... I think the article's layout will have to stay as it is, but could you perhaps add some of this commentary to the lead and also check each occurence of MRD and Brabham for correctness? It seems to me they're used interchangeably and this is particularly difficult in the lead. A reader should be able to read only the lead of a Featured Article to come away with a reasonable basic knowledge of the topic; the lead here is kinda failing because it's only telling us that MRD was aka Brabham. Imho! --kingboyk 11:03, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

I'll create a separate section below to go into this, it's complicated. 4u1e 11:34, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Piranha - yes, it would be that book. I'll fix it.

Italicised terms - Erm, I think there was something, but it wasn't unambiguous. I'll check. Cheers. 4u1e 10:50, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Oh one other minor thing. I've just noticed that the models of car don't seem to be wikilinked on first usage in the prose. I think they ought to be, even if the wikilinks are red (better still, stub up each red link). --kingboyk 11:08, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that's partly carelessness on my part. I'll do that for the significant cars, but not for all. I have the slightly heretical view that perhaps not every F1 car ever (not even every Brabham F1 car ever) actually needs an article. Looking at most of the articles for recent cars will tell you why! 4u1e 11:34, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Entirely fair, but if you're taking that line you probably ought to delink them in the template too. --kingboyk 12:05, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

True - but the templates are part of a bigger set, and one I don't tend to get involved in. Perhaps I'll raise it at WPF1. Cheers. 4u1e 12:35, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Well if you ever get burned at the stake for your beliefs 4u1e, I'll probably be next in line! And I know that somewhere in my tower of old Motor Sport issues I have an interview with Brundle explaining how he first met Luhti and when the deal was actually finalised. (According to Brundle, BCE introduced them early in the season, explaining the Luhti was to be a silent partner and was not to be talked about in public; he wanted to keep a low profile. Luhti then promptly turned up at the first GP in person, with a scantily-clad hooker on each arm! Some silent partner.) Pyrope 13:04, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

IIRC the, ahem, young ladies, are mentioned in Bernie's Game too. So at the least that's a confirmed rumour! The books's a slightly odd read as it basically slags Bernie off and debunks some of the more popular stories about him, but frequently interpolates BCE's own point of view (which invariably consists of 'That's not how I remember it' or 'That's not how I would have done it'. Apparently publication was delayed by legal considerations, which is I guess where Bernie's comments came in. If you want to try and include some of the detail from Motorsport (if you can find the right issue!) then go for it. Cheers. 4u1e 16:16, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

The long and complicated history of the entity known as 'Brabham'

See also discussion at the top of this page, and the linked discussion at WPF1.

'Brabham'

	Constructor	Racing team
1961	Motor Racing Developments Build MRD FJunior cars	Brabham Racing Organisation Race privately entered Coopers for JB
1962	Brabham Racing Developments Build Brabham cars for FJunior & F1	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Lotus and Brabham chassis in F1
1963	Brabham Racing Developments Build Brabham cars for FJunior & F1	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Lotus and Brabham chassis in F1
1964	Brabham Racing Developments Build Brabham cars for FJunior & F1	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Brabham chassis in F1
1965	Brabham Racing Developments Build Repco Brabham cars for FJunior & F1	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Repco Brabham chassis in F1
1966	Motor Racing Developments Build Repco Brabham F3, F2 and F1 cars	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Repco Brabham chassis in F1
1967	Motor Racing Developments Build Brabham F3, F2 and F1 cars	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Repco Brabham chassis in F1
1968	Motor Racing Developments Build Repco Brabham F3, F2 and F1 cars	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Repco Brabham chassis in F1
1969	Motor Racing Developments Build Brabham F3, F2 and F1 cars	Brabham Racing Organisation Racing Brabham chassis in F1
1970	Motor Racing Developments Build Brabham F3, F2 and F1 cars and race F1 cars	-

Stuff to note:

• MRD was re-named BRD from 1962 to 1965.
• MRD/BRD was owned by Jack Brabham and Ron Tauranac from 1961 to 1969. Jack Brabham owned BRO outright throughout. Ron Tauranac owned MRD outright in 1970 before he sold to Bernie Ecclestone for 1972.
• Other than the very first FJunior car built by MRD in 1961, all MRD cars in all formulae were called Brabhams.
• Sources differ, but BRO is reported by Jack Brabham to have run his private Coopers in 1961.
• From 1962 to 1968 'Brabham' cars were marketed and branded as 'Repco Brabhams'
• Between 1966 and 1969 MRD gradually took over running the F1 team from BRO. BRO disappears from the records in 1969.
• MRD ran Brabham entries at Indy in the 1960s, and according to some sources in F2, although I believe the latter is wrong.
• From 1970 to the demise of the company, it was called MRD. MRD was usually the name of the entrant in F1, but was sometimes varied in line with sponsorship deals. The cars were called Brabhams, and the team was casually referred to as Brabham.

The article covers 'Brabham' both as an F1 team and as a racing car constructor. Various subsets of the article could be labelled MRD, BRD, BRO, Brabham or Repco Brabham. I think the simplest thing is to go with what a 'fresh' reader would expect and just call it 'Brabham'. What do you think? I will review the article for consistent use of all these terms - I may well not have been as consistent as necessary! 4u1e 12:04, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

I'll defer to your wise judgement, but something in the lead explaining - or indeed a mere acknowledgement of - a "long and complicated history" would be a great help. A little more clarity in the article about this would be nice also but tbh the mind boggles just looking at the chart :) --kingboyk 12:07, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

As far as I remember I tried to defer explaining all this until the 'Motor Racing Developments' section, to avoid sending readers screaming off into the outer darkness with the complexity of it all. I'll review. Thanks for the comments! 4u1e 12:34, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

New F1 Rejects article

An F1 Rejects article on the decline of Brabham after 1983 has been submitted here. It might be useful to the article.-- Diniz(talk) 20:06, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Minor points

Minor points from my read-through.

• "After Jack Brabham sold his shares in MRD to Ron Tauranac at the end of 1969, the works Formula One team was MRD, although the name on the official entry list sometimes varied in line with sponsorship deals." Needs a citation.
• I more or less accidentally changed the style of dash separators (for example, lorem – ipsum) in the article from space ndash space to mdashes, and you should feel free to revert. There were one or two extant examples when I started, which was what triggered the change.
• "The practice [use of wind tunnels] only became the norm in the early 1980s, and is possibly the most important factor in the design of modern cars." While I agree with this, it's probably worth paying attention to this sentence over the next few years, given Virgin's disagreement.
• "By the late 1980s, carbon brakes were used by all competitors in almost all top level motor sports." Cite?
• "Refuelling was banned for 1984, and did not reappear until the 1994 season (until it was banned again in 2010 as a part of cost cutting measures), but tyre changes have remained part of Formula One." Tricky one, but needs a cite. Apterygial ^talk 11:02, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

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Popular culture

Does the article need a popular culture section about a HotWheels model? Genuine question, I'm completely out of date on what's acceptable these days. I would note that the quoted summary of the model ("Designed by John Cooper" (John Cooper wasn't really a designer, and never worked for Brabham), "Built by Geoff Brabham" (possible, but he was 17 at the time...)), suggests that someone somewhere has misunderstood something.... 4u1e (talk) 22:19, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Yeah... no. This is utterly superfluous, on top of being largely nonsense. There have been literally hundreds of different Brabham models from pretty much every major manufacturer over the years, so singling out this obscure HotWheels incarnation seems very odd. Was bold. Deleted. Pyrope 02:34, 22 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm the one who did the "Popular culture" section. I'm not into racing and the only 'connection' I have are what I have in my Hot Wheels collection. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only non-racing enthusiast who read the article and wondered if there were any non-racing 'connections' outside of the racing world. The only one I know about is the 1969-71 diecast Hot Wheels model.

Granted, other manufacturers may have done "literally hundreds of different Brabham models," but I'm not familiar with them and don't know anything about them. If nothing else, rather the delete the section, ADD TO IT! That's what the "<Edit>" is there for. A quick 'fix' could've been something like: "Among the many diecast manufacturers who have released a Brabham racer model is the MATTEL Hot Wheels line whose 1/64th scale version was probably the most affordable version a child could buy."

Anyway, aren't Wikipedia articles supposed to be wide in their 'appeal' and not just for a select niche?

As for the "quoted summary of the model," it was taken WORD-FOR-WORD from the description of the Hot Wheels model on page 20 of the cited work (Tomart's Price Guide to Hot Wheels, Updated 4th Edition, 2000, by Michael Thomas Strauss). So, if anyone has an issue with the "summary," take it up with Strauss. Also, check the cited source before you question something quoted from it.

Additionally, if "Brabham" is important enough to have its own article/entry, shouldn't that include all pertinent info/data for both the enthusiast AND the average, curious reader?

Out of curiosity, how many of you attend races and buy souvenirs? Are any of those souvenirs diecast representations/models of your favorite race vehicles? To me, if they're important enough for you (or anyone) to buy, then they're important enough to have at least a passing mention.

And, until I 'did' the section, how many of you even knew of the Hot Wheels diecast version? Didn't you learn something new? And isn't that what Wikipedia is all about?

Finally, even if some of you think that the Hot Wheels 'connection' doesn't warrant a "Popular culture" mention, then what would that make this article/entry have a connection to the average reader that would make it 'important' and/or relevant to them? 2600:8800:787:F500:C23F:D5FF:FEC5:89B6 (talk) 02:50, 23 May 2017 (UTC)

Sorry to have put your nose out of joint, but... In brief, Wikipedia is a general interest encyclopedia that is intended to be a readable and enjoyable introduction to a topic, not a compendium of all information that exists. Simply put, to get a good picture of Brabham it just isn't at all necessary to know that a model car manufacturer made a model of one of its cars. It would be more surprising if models hadn't been made. Specialist website and even wiki sites exist to document both HotWheels cars specifically and model cars in general, so that detailed trivia is out there for people if they want it. As for the quote you added from the Tomart book, I just hope you kept the receipt, because if that is a fair representation of the quality of information provided by that source I'd take it back to the bookshop. Pyrope 01:55, 24 May 2017 (UTC)

No, my nose was not out of joint. I was just surprised that information that I thought was relevant would be so easily deleted, dismissed, and scoffed at. Especially when only TWO people seemingly had their noses put out of joint.

As you said rather succinctly, "Wikipedia is a general interest encyclopedia ... That is intended to be a readable and enjoyable introduction to a topic, not a compendium of all information that exists." I basically agree with you, but would 'debate' that as an "introduction to a topic," an overview/summary of a compendium should be included. If not, the reader is unaware of possible/potential avenues of further interest/research.

As for a diecast model not being made being "surprising," I can name several popular cars -- both racers and on the road -- that have never had a diecast version made (like the Chrysler Cordoba and the 1955 4-door Chevy Bel Air).

And, yes, I have found many errors in the Tomart guide, but as long as name, pic, and values are correct, I'm not worried about general text. Like I said, I'm not a race fan. As such, I did not know that the "based on" info was incorrect.

I have also done some research, and, though I can't completely verify at this time, it seems that the 1969 Hot Wheels diecast model might be the very first diecast model ever made of that specific Brabham Repco F1 racer.

In fact, the moment I saw the "Brabham" article as the daily featured article, the first thing that came to my mind was my Hot Wheels diecast. That's mainly why I thought it'd make a neat "Popular culture" addition to the article/entry. 2600:8800:787:F500:C23F:D5FF:FEC5:89B6 (talk) 01:29, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm with the other editors, this kind of info does not belong here. As a side not, I might mention that one of my most valued possessions is a Corgi Toys Cooper Maserati (yellow and white, with the adjustable rear wing) that I inherited from an uncle. It is not because I don't love toy cars, but I don't consider this kind of info encyclopaedic. Oh, and props to 2600:8800:etc for going through the trouble of figuring out how to cite things in WP, I hope that you come back a lot. Thank you,  Mr.choppers | ✎  02:32, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

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Featured article review needed

This is a 2006 Featured article that has not been maintained to WP:WIAFA standards. There is considerable uncited text, the article appears not to be updated since 2010, and there are many statements that do not have as of dates or time context, yet use older sources. Unless someone can bring this article to current FA standards, it should be submitted for a Featured article review. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:35, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

• I agree with SandyGeorgia's assessment above, as there is still uncited text and no post-2015 information in the history section. I am also concerned about WP:OVERSECTION in the Racing History - other section. Is anyone interested in fixing this up? If not, is anyone interested in bringing this to FAR? Z1720 (talk) 21:21, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

As a point for consideration, the section "Brabham Racing (2014–)" is nonsense, based solely on an old announcement. Announcements in themselves are not notable, the actual event is. Since it didn't come to fruition, this entire section is fluff and should be removed. IMO the lead should even revert to the past tense (Brabham was...) since there is little to suggest that this currently is an active organization (as a side point, the article Brabham Racing might even qualify for deletion as non-notable, since it is based on mere speculation). -- P 1 9 9  ✉ 03:01, 17 November 2021 (UTC)

P199 the Featured article review is now open at Wikipedia:Featured article review/Brabham/archive1; your comment would be more effective on that page. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:05, 17 November 2021 (UTC)