Lola THL2
Formula One car
The Lola THL2 was a Formula One racing car designed by Neil Oatley for FORCE and was used by Team Haas (USA) Ltd. during the 1986 Formula One season. Two of the FORCE aerodynamicists who worked on the car during its countless hours of Wind tunnel testing were a young Ross Brawn and Adrian Newey. The car debuted at the 1986 San Marino Grand Prix and was driven by 1980 World Drivers' Champion Alan Jones from Australia, and his new teammate Patrick Tambay of France.
Like its predecessor, the car was called a Lola but its only connection to the famous Lola Cars was because of car owner Carl Haas' close association with Lola founder Eric Broadley, who was also named as chief engineer for the team in 1985.
Engine and handling
The car was an evolution of the Lola THL1 which used the Hart 415T Straight 4 turbo. When the THL2 made its Grand Prix debut at Imola, it was powered by the new Keith Duckworth designed, Cosworth GBA, a turbocharged, 120° V6 engine badged and marketed as a Ford-TEC; the turbo engine was rated at about 900 bhp (671 kW; 912 PS). Although it was an improvement in power over the unreliable 750 bhp (559 kW; 760 PS) Hart engine (which was punching above its weight just to be in Formula One), the rushed and limited development of the V6 engine meant that Ford unfortunately lagged behind other engines in F1 in 1986 such as the reported 1,300 bhp (969 kW; 1,318 PS) bhp that the Lotus Renault V6 turbo had and the 1,400 bhp (1,044 kW; 1,419 PS) of the turbocharged 4-cylinder BMW engine. Continued development and testing meant that the engine started to become more competitive for the following season in 1987, but by the time this engine had made its debut in 1986, it was only a year between when Duckworth and Geoff Goddard started designing the engine to its first race; this is a very short time for a Formula One racing engine to be produced. They were some four months behind after some initial tests to turbocharge Goddard's old 4-cylinder BDA engine used in sportscars and lower formulae proved to be a failure (Duckworth had wanted to use the 4-cylinder as he believed they were more economical and compact than a V6.
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