S – F3History

16 May, 202125 May, 2022

Swallow

Swallow Racing came into being in 1981 running a Pilbeam in FF2000 and by 1985 they had progressed to F3 with a Reynard. In an attempt to gain an advantage over the other teams they decided to design their own chassis and designer Dave Rendall, an ex-Reynard man, began work in 1986. The lack of success of the chassis meant that this would be Swallow’s only attempt at F3.

1987

The front suspension detail.
Unlike its contemporaries Ralt and Reynard who opted for aluminium honeycomb and carbon fibre respectively the 387 used glass composite for its monocoque as Rendall reckoned it the safest in event of an accident. The VW engine was mounted with a 14° tilt to the right (from the rear) to give a lower centre of gravity and lower engine cover for an improved airflow to the rear wing. Unusually a 5-speed Staffs Silent Gearbox was fitted.
Suspension was double wishbone front and rear with pull rods all round. The front dampers were mounted in front of the main tub (see picture) with the rear dampers attached vertically either side of the gearbox. The water radiator and oil cooler were in the left-hand composite sidepod.
Julian Bailey and then Peter Hardman did the initial development before Tim Davies raced the car. Sadly despite Davies best efforts the car clearly wasn’t a match for the massed Ralts and Reynards, traction in particular being a problem, and no points were scored all season. At the end of the year Swallow decided being a constructor wasn’t a viable proposition and they continued in F3 the following year as Reynard customers.

Drivers
1987 Tim Davies.

16 May, 202110 July, 2021

Swica

Built by the Swiss team Rechsteiner Racing in Lausanne the Swica (SWIss CAr) raced in the 1985 French F3 Championship. Patron of the team Pierre Rechsteiner, a former F Ford driver, instigated the design of the VW powered car, the monocoque had an aluminium lower section with a carbon fibre upper section. Results weren’t good, best was a ninth at Pau for the experienced James Weaver, and the team reverted to running customer cars. For 1986 a, presumably, new design the 386 was raced in the Swiss F3 championship for at least part of the season by Jakob Bordoli. In 1987 a Swica 387 raced in the European Championship round at Silverstone in October, it finished 20th and last, it seems this was its only appearance outside the Swiss Championship.

Drivers
1985 385 James Weaver.

1986 386 Jakob Bordoli

1987387 Christophe Hurni, Peter Stoller.

16 May, 202125 May, 2022

Svebe

1947 saw the first Svebe see the light of day, a front wheel drive DKW 800cc powered device built by Sven Andersson and Bengt Peterson (father of Ronnie). In later years a series of 500cc cars were built primarily for sprints and hillclimbs. Ronnie Peterson had been going very well in karting and his father decided F3 was the next step, in an attempt to save money Peterson Snr. and Andersson built a number of F3 Svebes.

1966

The Svebe was a direct Brabham copy that Peterson raced all over Sweden and Denmark in 1966. Results weren’t bad but the car eventually cost about twice what a Brabham would cost and faced with updating it at the end of the year the team bought a Brabham. Several other drivers also raced Svebes, most notably Freddie Kottulinsky, and like Peterson scored some reasonable places without ever being a consistent threat to the more favoured Brabhams.

Drivers

1965 Egert Haglund.

1966 Sven Andersson, Egert Haglund, Freddie Kottulinsky, Ronnie Peterson.

1967 Tommy Andersson, Gustav Dieden, Freddie Kottulinsky, Sune Rillver, Hans Uhlin.

1968 Per-Owe Söderberg.

16 May, 202125 May, 2022

Supernova

Supernova were based in Sussex and had a short-lived career as a F3 racing car constructor, they were better known for building good looking Super Vee cars.

1976

As can be seen from the picture to the left the SF3 was a slender design with conventional outboard suspension and a front radiator, the nose looks very similar to the F5000 Trojan design. Judging by the narrow wheels and tyres at the front and the rear uprights sticking out in the breeze these were not the correct wheels for the car. Powered by a Brown Ford twin-cam engine the Supernova had a couple of good early season results with a best of 3rd at Oulton Park in March.

Drivers
1976 Claude Cuicci.

16 May, 202110 July, 2021

Stella

The Stella 033 first appeared in the 1985 Japanese F3 Championship, two teams ran the cars and both were Nissan powered. Best finishing position was a fifth place for Yuuji Yamamoto, the car reappeared for five races in 1987 but was no longer competitive.

Drivers:

1985
Shigeki Matsui, Yuuji Yamamoto.

1987
Yoshinori Fujita.

16 May, 202125 May, 2022

Starfire

The Starfire first saw the light of day at the 1975 Racing Car Show in January where it appeared in FF2000 guise, it was built by Starfire Racing who were based in Fulham, Southwest London. The neat looking car was penned by a then almost unknown Patrick Head and it was advertised as also being available as a F3 or Formula Super Renault chassis. It would seem that no F3 versions were ever built.

16 May, 202125 May, 2022

Stanguellini

Vittorio Stanguellini, a FIAT dealer in Modena, began racing before the war in 1100 cc Ballilas and following the end of the hostilities in 1946 he started to manufacture his own cars based on FIAT parts. Stanguellini also developed his own engines and his 750cc and 1100cc sports car won numerous races in Italian national championships. Following the introduction of F Junior in 1958 Stanguellini built a batch of cars which were immediately successful winning the Italian Championship in 1958. In 1959 Stanguellini dominated the new International Championship with Swiss driver Michel May taking title and newcomers (and future GP winners) Wolfgang von Trips and Lorenzo Bandini taking wins in their “Stangs”. The Stanguellini-built cars always had an excellent reputation for the quality of their cars and although they were eclipsed by the arrival of the F Junior Cooper they continued to build cars for several years.

1964

Stanguellini built a Fiat-powered F3 car for the introduction of the formula in 1964, from appearances it was a neat, conventional spaceframe design with inboard front suspension. Unfortunately the Fiat engine was not competitive and this, coupled with a a lack of finance, meant that the car was never developed and it never progressed past the testing stage. This would be the last single-seater chassis to be built by Stanguellini.
It would seem therefore that the few Stangs that raced in F3 were converted F Junior models.
There were further rumours in 1970 of a new car to be raced the following year in the new 1600cc F3, interestingly it was said to be powered by a Ferrari Dino based engine but sadly it seems to have been just a rumour.

Drivers:

1964
Gianfranco Stanga.

1965
Gianfranco Stanga.

1966 Remigio Cianfriglia, Luciano Dal Ben.

16 May, 202125 May, 2022

Spider

The first Spider, the Mk1, was a F Junior chassis built by Svenharry Åkesson in 1959-60, it was fitted with a BMC engine and VW gearbox and raced by the designer himself. The Mk2 appeared in 1962 and was a development of the Mk1, in 1963 it was run as a F Junior but in 1964 it was converted to 1-litre F2 spec still with Svenharry Åkesson taking care of the driving duties. The Holbay-powered Spider Mk3 was a one-off Brabham clone, it was built in 1965 with Svenharry driving and in 1966 it was sold to Börje Björkqvist. The Mk3 was raced in both Scandanavia and Germany.

Drivers:

1965 Svenharry Åkesson.

1966 Börje Björkqvist.

16 May, 202110 July, 2021

Speedcar

Driven by Franco Foresti, the Speedcar failed to finish a race at Monza in May 1967, it also failed to qualify in June at the same venue. No engine was listed and this would seem to be its only two appearances.

Drivers

1967 Franco Foresti.

16 May, 202125 May, 2022

Sparton

Sparton was founded by Norman Pierce and Paul Jackson in 1977 in Lingfield, Surrey and the company began producing cars for the F Ford 1600 and F Ford 2000 market. They soon gained a reputation for building well made competitive cars and as a result they entered F3 in 1983 but they only lasted for two years without any success to show for it.

1983

For 1983 Sparton introduced the SE420 which was based on the company’s FF2000 car. It first appeared in the summer and by the end of the season it was starting to show reasonably well. A young Ayrton Senna tested it and was complimentary about its track behaviour.

1984

Sparton lightly modified the SE420 for 1984 building a new car in the process, the most noticeable change was fitting revised bodywork. Entered by Valour Racing Paul Jackson did the first five races of the year without any success and then switched to a Ralt for the rest of the year. In 1985 one of the cars was entered in the B class for year old cars.

Drivers:

1983
Mario Hytten, Paul Jackson, Jeff Ward.

1984
Paul Jackson.

1985

F3 History

Category: S

Swallow

Swallow

1987

Swica

Swica

Svebe

Svebe

1966

Supernova

Supernova

1976

Stella

Stella

Starfire

Starfire

Stanguellini

Stanguellini

Spider

Spider

Speedcar

Speedcar

Sparton

Sparton

1983

1984

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