Williams FW07

The Williams FW07 was a ground effect Formula One racing car designed by Patrick Head, Frank Dernie, and Neil Oatley for the 1979 Formula One season. Developed versions of the car were further used in the 1980, 1981 and 1982 seasons. It was the first car that won a championship for Williams Racing when it won both the Drivers' and Constructors' in 1980.

It was closely based on the Lotus 79, even being developed in the same wind tunnel at Imperial College London. Some observers, among them Lotus aerodynamicist Peter Wright felt the FW07 was little more than a re-engineered Lotus 79, just having a stiffer chassis. The car was small and simple and extremely light, powered by the ubiquitous Ford Cosworth DFV. It had very clean lines and seemed to be a strong challenger for the new season, but early reliability problems halted any serious threat for the title. While not the first to use ground effects in Formula One, an honour belonging to Colin Chapman and the Lotus 78 (the Lotus 79's predecessor), Dernie may have had a better grasp of the principles than even Chapman. While Head had been developing the Lotus 78's/79's basic principles in the FW07, Chapman's design team was attempting to take the ground effect idea further ahead of rivals on the Lotus 80 engaging the entire bottom of the chassis as an aerodynamic device for generating downforce without the necessity of external wings. Since the Lotus 80 solution had many drawbacks, Chapman devised the twin-chassis concept of Lotus 86 and 88 that should have solved the issues, but it was never allowed to race due to failure to comply with existing technical rules.

When the British Grand Prix at Silverstone came around, chief designer Frank Dernie had designed and implemented a system that ensured that the car's all-important skirts touched the ground at all times and had also corrected some aerodynamic leakage at the back of the chassis between the French and British Grand Prix- Dernie has claimed that the car had a 30 percent aerodynamic improvement. The car's performance was dramatically improved- so much so that Jones set a pole position time 2 seconds faster than the initial next fastest time. Regazzoni won the race, and Jones then easily won the next 3 rounds in Germany, Austria and Holland, and he also won in Canada. The car in the second half of the season was almost unbeatable, and the only other cars that got even close to it were the Ferraris of Jody Scheckter and Gilles Villeneuve, and the Ligier of Jacques Laffite.

The FW07 became FW07B in 1980, and Alan Jones, now with Carlos Reutemann, developed the FW07 further, working especially on setup and suspension strengthening. The car was now so efficient in creating downforce from its ground effect design that the front wings were unnecessary.

At the 1980 French Grand Prix, Alan Jones used for the first time (in a race) a specially prepared John Judd developed Cosworth DFV. Previously Williams had used "development" DFVs allocated by Cosworth to constructors who were judged to provide the best potential to win races against Renault and Ferrari. Modified in John Judd's workshops in Rugby, the Judd-DFV featured an advanced camshaft/cylinder head design which allowed for greater revs than even a development DFV, producing 500-510 BHP at 11,400 RPM compared to 10,800 RPM of a standard DFV. Since both the Renault turbo V6 produced 520 BHP and the Alfa V12 around 525 BHP, it meant that from the French GP onwards both Alan Jones and Carlos Reutemann had a power deficit of just 10-15 BHP compared to the factory based Alfas and Renaults, which gave both Jones and Reutemann a fighting chance on power sensitive circuits such as Hockenheim, the Osterreichring, Zandvoort and Imola. The Williams had the advantage of only requiring a fuel tank size of 173 litres, where the Renault needed a 215 litre fuel tank and the Alfa around 205 litres, effectively giving the 1980 Williams FW07 a superior power to weight ratio.

The FW07B evolved into the FW07C for 1981, and further work was done to the suspension, especially after the FIA banned the moveable skirts needed for effective ground effect. The hydraulic suspension systems were developed by Jones, who hated the rock hard suspension. During a winter test session at the Paul Ricard Circuit in the south of France, he suggested to Frank Williams that to compensate for the harsh ride and the pounding the driver gets while driving the car that he "put suspension on the seat", which Frank thought was a good idea. However, he then replied that Jones should sit on his wallet. 'Yeah,' drawled the tough Aussie, 'then give me something to put in it!' Jones temporarily left Formula One because of the extremely unpleasant ride the FW07C gave, he later described driving the car as "wrecking the internals".

BBC's Horizon series followed the team during winter testing, and later produced the film Gentlemen, Lift Your Skirts which was broadcast during 1981. The film featured extensive behind the scenes footage of the team at work and interviews with the drivers, Frank Williams and Patrick Head.

The FW07D was an experimental six-wheeled test car (four driven rear wheels, and two undriven front wheels) tested by Alan Jones on a single occasion at the Donington Park circuit. With the FW07D proving the concept, its unique design was incorporated into the six-wheeled FW08B.