Formula 1 Car By Car 1960-69 reviewed

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A book on every car raced in Formula One over the past ten years would not be too difficult to pull together. Ten years, roughly eleven teams person season, we’re talking little more than a hundred different pictures (all of which and more, incidentally, you can find here).

But the same concept is made considerably more difficult when applied to the Formula One cars of 50 years ago. In the sixties it was not uncommon for teams to run two or more different designs during a season. Customer teams and privateer entrants also existed, and some would adapt the chassis for their own purposes.

So it’s easy to appreciate what a thorough job Peter Higham has done in researching this book. It spans two major regulation changes – the introduction of 1.5-litre engines in 1961 and their replacement by three-litre units in 1966 – and gives a clear impression of how they were ‘scaled up’ when the larger engines arrived.

LAT Photographic’s vast library has been raided in order to find pictures of almost all the cars and a few gaps have been filled in from other sources. The result is a book which race car design enthusiasts will spend hours poring over, noting the detailed changes from car to car through the years.

Bringing the whole thing today is Higham’s crisply-written notes on each of the teams, cars, drivers and key developments. The thoroughness which with this has been attended to is impressive: one-off driver appearances are duly name-checked and Formula Two cars which padded out some grids also appear. Significant non-championship races are also covered.

The result is a definitive work on the cars of this period. The next instalment on the outlandish machines of the seventies should be even more engrossing.

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Formula 1 Car By Car 1960-69

Author: Peter Higham
Publisher: Evro
Published: January 2017
Pages: 300
Price: £50.00
ISBN: 9781910505182

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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18 comments on “Formula 1 Car By Car 1960-69 reviewed”

  1. What makes that decade even more interesting is the introduction of wings during the later years. Until then, it was mostly a question of trying to minimize drag.

  2. I know that It’s been done before, and has no relationship to this article, but I wanted to just thank Keith for another great year of coverage, and share my hope for many more. You do great work.

    1. Thanks Rich you’re very welcome :-)

    2. 2nd that Rich. Keith your a legend

    3. regarding Rich’s comment: yes, thank you Keith

  3. I think the cars on the jacket of the book are more or less what F1 cars should look like. I was told they need the aerofoils to overcome lift generated by the tyres at high speed, but maybe there are other ways of doing that.

    1. Agree. See avatar.

  4. Call me a Yorkshire man, but I’ve never spent £50 on a book before.
    But neither have I ever been tempted to spend £50 on a book before!
    Damn, this sounds good.

    1. Try new Apple 300£ book showing only Apple products..

      This book is a bargain and features way more MotoRacing per page…

  5. Why have you not included BRM in your collection?

  6. The cover photo shows both the very scary F1 designs of that era, as well as the “high tech safety barriers” used during those times; … a few bales of hay. How far we’ve come!

  7. the introduction of 1.5-litre engines in 1961 and their replacement by three-litre units in 1966

    That line there demonstrates how… soft F1 has become.

    1. @esteban, because the sport downgraded its regulations in 1961 to the level of Formula 2?

      1. Maybe we should remember when Formula One literally used Formula 2 regulations. Like, 2 years after the start of the championship.

        1. Tommy Scragend
          23rd January 2017, 14:21

          More accurately the World Championship of Drivers consisted of events run to Formula 2 regulations. There were still Formula 1 races held during that period, but they did not count towards the championship.

  8. Ah the era i really fell in love with F1 the sixties. I still have an working model of the same car on the cover. They don’t make toys like that anymore.
    Thank you Keith i ordered the book !

  9. Thanks Keith for bringing this to our attention.

    BTW, Amazon UK currently has this listed for 32 pounds ($40). OTOH, Amazon US has it listed at $80, so no whining by UK F1 fans ;-).

  10. Nice review, thanks Keith.

    >”we’re talking little more than a hundred different pictures (all of which and more, incidentally, you can find here).”

    While I greatly appreciate the collection “F1 Car Pictures” section of this site, it’s not a complete collection along the lines presented in this book series.

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