Are you a petrol head.?
Do you love the sound of an engine on full chat?
Be careful the following may just make you wet your pants.
BRM v16
The BRM v16 must be one of the most extravagant and complicated racing engines ever built. It was designed to the 1.5 litre supercharged specification, it has a roller bearing crankshaft, it develops 600bhp at 12,000rpm and it sounds absolutely gorgeous. The engine is a beauty to look at, and the car that clothes it is legendary in late 40’s and 1950’s motor racing. The car wasn’t hugely reliable nor was it as successful as it could have been, but absolutely all is forgiven when you hear this car being driven at speed.
Sadly, in the 21st Century, we aren’t often treated to a chance to hear one of these monsters properly, firstly they didn’t make many and secondly they are worth zillions so owners tend not to push them too hard. Luckily Nick Mason, Pink Floyd drummer and exotica aficionado, owns one of these beasts and is renown for demonstrating its glorious soundtrack. “Whats the point of having a stuffed Tiger?”
Mr Mason has released a book containing detailed pictures of his exotica + a CD of engine soundtracks, click here to see it on Amazon
Click here to read a chronology of the cars history
Detail of the V16 BRM engine
The BRM v16’s at Goodwood in 1952
BRM v16 MkI 1949
Brace of v16’s
DOUBLE Click here for the soundtrack and turn it up real loud. NOTE: you can right-click and save to a local drive (this MP3 file is 2.3Mb in size, but worth every byte)
Rolls Royce Merlin - Supermarine Spitfire
Clearly the Hawker Hurricane won the Battle of Britain based on the sheer number airborne and the number of enemy aircraft it brought down, but it is the Supermarine Spitfire that tugs the heart strings. Could this be because of Reginald Mitchell’s determination to create the ultimate fighter for the RAF in the 1930’s. Could it be for the evocative wing profile. Could it be for the tales of how easy it was to fly by “the few”. Or is it the Merlin 27 litre v12 powerplant designed by Rolls Royce specifically for this aircraft under Mitchell’s exacting specification. The Merlin was applied to many aircraft flown during and after the 2nd World War but it is the romantism of the Spitfire that makes this application so pure.
Legend has it that the Spitfire was first flown on 5th March 1936 and upon completion of the 8 minute, test flight, Pilot “Mutt” Summers declared no real problems before adding “I don’t want anything touched”. The Spitfire had been born.
Great link detailing loads of Spitfire stuff
Click the links and see what you think. NOTE: you can right-click and save to a local drive.
Supermarine Spitfire wav (180Kb)
Hawker Hurricane wav (117Kb)
AVRO Lancaster - Low Pass wav (415Kb)
Amusing Spitfire very low pass Movie (1930Kb)
Mazda 787B
I first heard this car during my virgin year to Le Mans in 1991, what an initiation.
I swear that in the dead of night, from the hill at Tetre Rouge, you could tell exactly where this car was on the track. Outstanding.
From the Dunlop Bridge we could hear it coming down the start finish straight past the brand new pit complex. Accelerating all the way up to the Dunlop Chicane, briefly slowing and then flooring it under the bridge all the way down to Tetre Rouge and without changing gear once.
If you want to see the actual car that Johnny Herbert, Bertrand Gachot & Volker Weidler wrestled to win the 1991 24 hours of Le Mans, pop down to the motor museum just outside the main entrance at the circuit and there it is, complete with 24 hours worth of 14 year old filth all over it. STOP PRESS they cleaned it!!
We wanted the Jags to win, fuel restrictions and the expectation that the Rotary engined Mazda would fail before the end saw them finish 2nd, 3rd and 4th. Not bad for their final year and they did beat the Sauber Mercs fair and square.
This is what it looked like
This is what its engine looks like.. Well I recognised an alternator but that is about it
This is what it sounds like NOTE: you can right-click and save to a local drive (this MP3 file is 92Kb in size)
(if anyone has a better MP3 or WAV please contact me)
My Triumph Stag
Lets get the myths out of the way, a properly serviced Triumph v8 is as reliable if not more so than a 3.5 litre Rover v8 in the same car. It is more powerful than the equivalent 3.5 Carburetted Rover v8 and has greater torque. “The” Triumph Stag specialist, HRS, has developed a Triumph v8 Engined Stag as a race car which reliably produced upwards of 275bhp
The Triumph Stag may only have a 3 litre V8 16valve engine pushing 150bhp but I think it sounds great.
Get a Stag on the motorway on a nice sunny day with the roof down, at 70mph you can hardly hear the engine or exhaust and it is not for wind noise either. Press the throttle and it is an entirely different matter as you are enveloped in a deep throaty beat from the twin stainless steel tailpipes. As the revs rise so does the pitch of the exhaust note, all the way up to 5500rpm (which is pretty pointless because power runs out at about 5000 rpm.)
Now get the car on some a-roads, again cruising along at 60mph, give it some right foot and you are met with instant turbine like acceleration combined with that glorious exhaust note.
Big Triumph engines generally have good exhaust tone, go and thrash a 2500 saloon and tell me that doesn’t sound good. Triumph pulled one out of the bag with their only v8, could this be because the firing order of the engine produces a noise far smoother than any Buick / Rover V8 engine? Whatever! The noise was so good that in the 1971 James Bond film “Diamonds are Forever” Aston Martin (provider of official Mr Bonds hardware) “allegedly” insisted that the Stag, briefly shown early in the film, be overdubbed with the noise from a Triumph Herald, as they feared the engine / exhaust noise showing them up.
All in all the Triumph v8 Engines Stag has to be the best car for the money to provide that most pleasing of exhaust notes.
Other cars that sound great
Jaguar XJR12
Sauber Mercedes LM C11
Ferrari 250LM
Anyone help me out with soundtracks for the above?