Porsche 804
The Porsche 804 is a single-seat, open-wheeled racing car produced by Porsche to compete in Formula One. It raced for a single season in 1962 in the 1½ litre formula.
Background
In 1957 the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile changed their rules to allow cars with enveloping bodywork to compete in Formula races. That year Porsche entered three 550/1500RS Spyders in the German Grand Prix Formula Two event. Changes to the cars were minimal, being limited to removing the passenger seats and spare tires.For 1958 Porsche fielded a modified 718, called the RSK Mittellenker, for F2 events. The bodywork for this car was only slightly modified from the sportscar model, but the single seat was now in the centre of the cockpit, with the steering wheel, pedals, and shift lever relocated to accommodate the change and a fairing enclosing more of the cockpit opening. Jean Behra drove the car to a win at the F2 event at Reims that year. At the German Grand Prix at the Nürburgring, driver Edgar Barth placed sixth overall and second in his class. At the Berlin Grand Prix at AVUS the car won both its heat and the F2 class in the hands of driver Masten Gregory.
In October 1958 the FIA announced another change to the regulations for Formula One. Beginning in the 1961 season, engine capacity would be limited to the same 1.5 litres as in Formula Two. This meant that Porsche could use their F2 cars almost unchanged in F1.
In 1959 Porsche unveiled the prototype of a narrow, open-wheeled car called the Porsche 718/2 that married the 718's mechanicals with a more traditional single-seat Formula body. The unpainted car was entered in the 1959 Monaco Grand Prix, where driver Wolfgang von Trips qualified twelfth, but crashed on the second lap of the race. At Reims, driver Joakim Bonnier finished third. For 1960 the production 718/2, starting with chassis number 718201, received revised bodywork, a 6-speed transaxle, and a wheelbase extended by. A total of five cars were built. Some of these four-cylinder cars were later raced in F1 under the 1962 1½ litre formula.
For 1961 Porsche launched the Type 787. The car had a new chassis that was longer than that of the 718/2 by an additional to accommodate the Type 753 flat-eight engine in development. While it kept the earlier car's rear suspension, at the front was a new upper and lower A-arm suspension with coil springs. The first chassis completed was powered by a 547/3 four-cylinder engine with Kugelfischer fuel injection. At the Monaco Grand Prix the car retired when the fuel injection cut out. A second car, also fitted with the 547/3 engine, was completed in time to appear in the Dutch Grand Prix alongside the other 787. The cars placed 10th and 11th, but their lack of power and poor handling caused Ferry Porsche to retire the model.
Porsche would focus on building a brand new competitive formula race car with an eight-cylinder engine.
Design
General
The 804 was designed by Ferdinand Alexander "Butzi" Porsche, also known as F.A. Porsche. He is the son of Ferdinand Anton Ernst "Ferry" Porsche, and grandson of the company's eponymous founder Ferdinand Porsche. F.A. Porsche was assigned the project by the company's long-time chief body engineer Erwin Komenda.The design was done for Wilhelm Hild, an engineer with the racing department, and Hubert Mimler, another engineer who worked on a variety of projects at the company and who was assigned to the racing department at the time. The two engineers worked with FA Porsche on the car. Acting as Racing director at Porsche was Fritz "Huschke" von Hanstein.
A total of four cars were built. The fourth chassis was never raced.
The 804 gave Porsche its only F1 wins as a constructor, at the 1962 French Grand Prix, and at the Solituderennen at Castle Solitude in Stuttgart, both with Gurney as driver.
A Porsche 804 is a part of the collection of the Porsche Museum. Following an eight-month long restoration, the car appeared at the Grand Prix Historique at Monaco in 2016. The car later appeared at the 2018 Goodwood Festival of Speed.
Chassis and body
Design of the 804's chassis was headed by Helmuth Bott, Porsche's chassis engineer.Like the Porsche 787 before it, the 804 had a tubular steel frame and an aluminum body, but the two vehicles differed significantly in appearance. The 804 was narrower and lower, with a smoother surface than its predecessor that was achieved in part by using a horizontal cooling fan on top of the new flat-eight engine, in contrast to the vertically mounted cooling fan used on the four-cylinder Fuhrmann engine.
The 804 was the first Porsche to have some factory body panels made of synthetic materials. The nose and the cockpit surround were made of fibreglass later in the season.
The aluminum fuel tanks had a capacity of, and were located in the car's nose and on both sides next to the driver's seat. The cockpit was narrow and contained the driver's seat, the steering wheel, the shift lever, and the pedals. A tachometer in the middle of the instrument panel and oil pressure and oil temperature gauge gave the driver the most necessary information.
The 804 weighed approximately ; only slightly above the regulated minimum weight of.
Suspension
The suspension front and rear comprised unequal-length upper and lower A-arms. At the front, the suspension initially had only one radius rod on the bottom end of the upright. An upper rod was added later. Also at both front and rear, springing was provided by longitudinal torsion bars, and damping was by either Koni twin-tube or Bilstein monotube shock absorbers, mounted inboard. A front anti-roll bar attached to the inboard extensions of the upper A-arms.The 804 was the first Porsche to come standard with disc brakes. The car used Porsche's unique annular ring system. The 804 was also the first Porsche equipped with rack-and-pinion steering.
The car was fitted with 15-inch wheels front and back. The wheels were steel, in contrast to the magnesium pieces being used by some of the competition. The tires were 5.00–15 R tires in front and 6.50-15 R in the rear.
Engine and transmission
Design of the new Type 753 flat-eight engine for F1 was handled by Hans Hönick and Hans Mezger. The engine continued the Porsche traditions of a boxer layout and air-cooling.The bore and stroke were respectively, giving a displacement of. The oversquare dimensions kept piston speeds low, and kept the engine narrow and as far out of the airflow on the sides of the car's tub as possible, although it was still wider than the 120° V6 and 90° V8s of the competition.
A prototype engine was first started on a test-bench on 12 December 1960. That first 753 only produced .
During the development of the 804, there were concerns about the readiness of the eight-cylinder engine, so the second chassis, 804-02, was modified to accept the air-cooled 1.5-liter four-cylinder boxer engine type 547 from the 787. That chassis was later converted back to the eight-cylinder configuration. It was never raced with the four-cylinder engine.
Swiss racing driver, engineer and fuel injection specialist Michael May transferred from Mercedes-Benz to Porsche to work on the 753 engine, but wound up developing improvements for the 547/3 engine instead. May's changes included reducing the oil pressure, removing two of the engines five piston rings, using a new hardening process on the built-up Hirth crankshaft, narrowing the inlet ports, modifying the piston crowns and valve depth, using direct fuel injection, and adding a second non-drive fan impeller below the driven one. The cam profiles were unchanged. The modified engine, dubbed 547/3B, managed to produce a reliable at a time when May estimated that the 753 was producing just, the Ferrari 156 V6 engine and the Coventry-Climax and BRM V8s about. May felt that the 547/3B could win Formula One races, and showed Porsche's engineers that the 804 chassis could be modified to take the four-cylinder. He then struck an agreement with Ferry Porsche to have a 547/3B installed in a 718/2 that May would personally drive in practice at the 1962 Pau Grand Prix. When the car failed to arrive at Pau, May left Porsche for Ferrari. Only three 547/3B engines were ever built.
With a compression ratio of 10.0:1, the 753 flat-eight engine produced at 9200 rpm on its first outing. This was still less power than the new Coventry-Climax and BRM V8 engines. With the improved six-speed transmission from the Type 718 and a ZF limited-slip differential, the car reached a top speed of.
Technical summary
| Porsche 804: | |
| Engine: | Flat-eight boxer Type 753 |
| Displacement: | |
| Bore × Stroke: | |
| Maximum power: | at 9200 rpm |
| Maximum torque: | at 7200 rpm |
| Compression ratio: | 10.0:1 |
| Valvetrain: | Lower countershaft and two layshafts driving exhaust camshafts. Upper countershaft and two layshafts driving intake camshafts. Two overhead camshafts per cylinder head. Two valves per cylinder. |
| Cooling: | Air-cooled |
| Transmission: | 6-speed gearbox with limited-slip differential, rear-wheel drive |
| Brakes: | Porsche annular ring disc brakes |
| Suspension front: | Upper and lower unequal-length A-arms, torsion bars, inboard shock absorbers |
| Suspension rear: | Upper and lower unequal-length A-arms, torsion bars, inboard shock absorbers |
| Body/chassis: | Space frame of mild steel tube with aluminum bodywork |
| Track front/rear: | |
| Wheelbase: | |
| Wheels and tires: | 5.00-15 R on ?J × 15 front 6.50-15 R on ?J × 15 rear |
| Length × Width × Height: | |
| Weight : | |
| Top speed: |