The
Tyrrell 012 is a
Formula OneFormula One, also known as Formula 1 or F1, and currently officially referred to as the FIA Formula One World Championship, is the highest class of auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile . The "formula" in the name refers to a set of rules to which all participants...
racing car that was designed by
Maurice PhilippeMaurice Philippe, also known as Maurice Phillippe, was a British aircraft and Formula One car designer.Philippe designed his first car in 1955, called the MPS , while employed developing the Comet 4 aircraft for De Havilland....
for the
TyrrellThe Tyrrell Racing Organisation was an auto racing team and Formula One constructor founded by Ken Tyrrell which started racing in 1958 and started building its own cars in 1970. The team experienced its greatest success in the early 1970s, when it won three drivers' championships and one...
team. It was introduced for the season, and was subsequently used in and the first few races of . It was the first chassis built by the team to be composed mostly of carbon fibre, following on from
LotusTeam Lotus was the motorsport sister company of English sports car manufacturer Lotus Cars. The team ran cars in many motorsport series including Formula One, Formula Two, Formula Ford, Formula Junior, IndyCar and sports car racing...
and McLaren. The car was powered by the short stroke version of the Ford Cosworth DFV that had previously been supplied to Lotus, after that team signed to use Renault turbo engines. The
BenettonBenetton Group S.p.A. is a global fashion brand, based in Treviso, Italy. The name comes from the Benetton family who founded the company in 1965. Benetton Group is listed in Milan .Benetton has a network of around 6,000 stores in 120 countries...
clothing company sponsored the team in 1983, with the large budget used to successfully develop the car. Although the car was light and nimble, it was no match against the massively powerful turbo cars.
Ken TyrrellKen Tyrrell was a British racing driver and the founder of the Tyrrell Formula One constructor.-Biography:...
continued to use young, promising drivers in his team and helped develop their careers.
Michele AlboretoMichele Alboreto was an Italian racing driver. He is famous for finishing runner up to Alain Prost in the 1985 Formula One World Championship, as well as winning the 1997 24 Hours of Le Mans and 2001 12 Hours of Sebring sports car races...
, in his second year for the team, scored a point in the car's first race at
ZandvoortCircuit Park Zandvoort is a motorsport race track located in the dunes near the town of Zandvoort, in the Netherlands, near the North Sea coast line.- History :...
.
For 1984, Alboreto moved on to
FerrariFerrari S.p.A. is an Italian sports car manufacturer based in Maranello, Italy. Founded by Enzo Ferrari in 1928 as Scuderia Ferrari, the company sponsored drivers and manufactured race cars before moving into production of street-legal vehicles in 1947 as Ferrari S.p.A....
and was replaced by
Martin BrundleMartin John Brundle is a British former racing driver from England, known as a Formula One driver and as an F1 commentator for ITV Sport and the BBC from 2009....
, whilst
Stefan BellofStefan Bellof was a Formula One driver who raced for the Tyrrell team...
filled the other seat. The 012 was further developed with smaller sidepods and a larger rear wing to increase downforce. A newer version of the DFV, dubbed the DFY was provided to the team by Ford. Tyrrell were now the only one of the established teams to use the venerable engine. Brundle and Bellof drove excellently, achieving solid placings and a podium place each, but after Brundle's second place in the United States Grand Prix the FIA discovered that the team had been running their cars underweight in races and had been using ball bearings in the water tanks to bring the car up to the minimum weight requirement. The FIA chose to disqualify the team's points for the season.
The 012 was pressed into service in the early races of 1985 and Bellof pulled off a run of points finishes until the 014 Renault turbo was introduced; its chassis almost identical to its predecessor's. The 012 does, however, have the distinction of being the last Formula 1 car to enter a race powered by the
Cosworth DFVThe DFV was an engine produced by Cosworth originally for Formula One motor racing. Named Four Valve because of the four valves per cylinder, and Double as it was a V8 development of the earlier, four cylinder FVA , making it a Double Four Valve engine....
engine, with Martin Brundle driving in the 1985 Austrian Grand Prix.
The 012 was Tyrrell's last truly competitive and consistent car, and is still a familiar sight in historical racing series around the world.