Osella

OsellaFA3
The Osella FA3 as seen recently in Spain. In apparently original condition it has been competing in hillclimbing.

Osella

Enzo Osella, a former sports car driver, ran the Abarth-Osella sports car racing team from 1969 until the team was taken over by Fiat. Osella continued with his own sports cars for a while but decided to switch over to the 2-litre F2 category and the first F2 chassis, the FA, appeared in late 1974. For the next 2 years the Osella F2 cars were often fast but fragile and at the end of 1976 financial problems caused the Volpiano (near Turin) based team to withdraw. Returning in 1979 with Eddie Cheever the team won 3 races and decided F1 was the next step and so in 1980 the Osella F1 was launched. Although never successful in F1 Osella were always one of the most popular teams due to their unfailing enthusiasm and continued until the end of the decade when they were taken over by Fondmetal.

1976

In 1976 Osella produced their only F3 car, the FA3, It was raced in Italian and German Championship events powered either by a Toyota (Necchi) or a Repetto tuned Lancia engines (Rosei and Witz). Best result was a 5th place for Marcello Rosei at Varano in April.

Drivers
1976 Piero Necchi, Marcello Rosei, Jean-Jaques Witz.

OsellaFA3_02
The FA3 without bodywork showing the side radiators, front and rear braced roll hoop and the Toyota Novamotor installation.

Oscar

oscar86
Hideo Fukuyama in the Oscar SK86F.

Oscar

The Oscar first competed in the Japanese F3 Championship in 1979, there seems to have been two models, the T1 and the T2. The cars were Toyota powered and were obviously competitive with Syuuroku Sasaki finishing fourth in the championship and winning the opening round at Suzuka. For 1980 a new car the T3 was introduced but results were generally disappointing. 1981 saw further modifications to the car with the emergence of the T3B and T3C, the T3C continuing into 1982 with Yoshiyasu Tachi taking a couple of third places early in the season.
For 1984 another new car appeared, the T4 but results were poor. Nothing daunted the SK86F with its pullrod suspension was the 1986 offering and it was one of their better designs with Hideo Fukuyama taking a win at Tsukuba in the rain and finishing sixth in the Japanese Championship. The SK86F continued into 1987 but it couldn’t compete with the Ralts and Reynards and Oscar disappeared from the F3 scene.

Drivers:

1979
T2
Syuuroku Sasaki, Katsuhiko Sugiura.

T1
Syuuji Kanemaru, Katsuhiko Sugiura, Fukumi Koutake, Syuuroku Sasaki.

1980
T3
Tsunehisa Asai.

T1
Masao Segawa, Tomiko Yoshikawa.

1981
T3C
Tsunehisa Asai

T3B
Tsunehisa Asai, Hideo Fukuyama, Yoshiyasu Tachi, Tomiko Yoshikawa.

1982 T3C
Hideo Fukuyama, Yoshiyasu Tachi.

1983 T3C
Yoshiyasu Tachi.

1984 T4
Kazuhiko Miyake.

1985
T4
Hisatoyo Gotou.

T1
Yoshitaka Matsumoto.

1986
SK86F
Hideo Fukuyama, Hisatoyo Gotou.

T4
Shinji Yoshikawa.

T1
Yoshitaka Matsumoto.

1987 SK86F
Hisatoyo Gotou, Syuuroku Sasaki, Takashi Yamada

Orca

ORCA
The Orca B301.

Orca

1979

The Le Mans based ORCA team announced the F3 B301 in 1979 but it never seemed to progress beyond the model shown on the left.

1980

A new car was designed for 1980, the B302, and the Toyota-powered chasis had some outings in the French F3 Championship. Driver Jean-Louis Bousquet ran reasonably well in what were generally weak fields and in the final race of the season at the Le Mans Bugatti circuit he took a season’s best of third and finished 10th in the overall championship.

Drivers:

1980 Jean-Louis Bousquet.

Oliroy

oliroy - Copy
oliroy - Copy
oliroy - Copy

Oliroy

The Oliroy arose from the ashes of the 1979 Duqueine VG3 (q.v.). Seemingly driver Bernard Perroy fell out with the Duqueine brothers over financial matters and Perroy, together with fellow driver Denis Olivera, rebuilt the VG3 as the Oliroy (OLIveira + PerROY) C1-Toyota. The car used Martini bodywork and showed flashes of promise on a number of occasions with a best finish of second behind Alain Ferté’s Martini MK27 at Le Mans Bugatti circuit in October 1980. A couple of other top 6 finishes resulted in Olivera taking 9th place in the 1980 French F3 Championship.

Thanks to Colin Painter for additional information.

Drivers:

1980 Denis Oliveira