The project was protracted and, as Doug Nye wrote in his 2021 V16 feature, ended up being an extremely well-publicised failure. The figures grabbed headlines, but the thing was largely recalcitrant from behind the wheel.

“The V16 could hit an unprecedented 10,000-11,000rpm, belting out more horsepower per litre than any other racing engine until late ’70s turbocharged F1,” wrote Nye.

“Long after the 1.5-litre supercharged Formula 1 to which it had been built evaporated, early 1952, the BRM V16’s output peaked at over 585bhp – 390bhp per litre.

“At the time of its design, its best rivals – like the Italian Alfetta – hit 300bhp per litre.”

Intended to be debuted at the 1950 British GP, it only managed a demonstration in front of the Royal Family there, and then croaked to a halt on the starting grid of the 1950 ‘Daily Express’ BRDC Silverstone race a few weeks later, having sheared its transmission.

The BRM would subsequently win minor races at Goodwood and elsewhere, but never reached its full potential, despite being driven by Juan Manuel Fangio and Stirling Moss.

“The V16 was a thoroughly nasty car,” said Moss. “The brakes were OK, the acceleration was incredible until you broke traction but everything else I hated, particularly the steering and the driving position. Handling? I don’t remember it having any…”

Brabham-BMW BT55

What’s notable about the BMW M12 inline four is the angle that it came at.

The power unit was tilted at 18 degrees on its side to fit into Gordon Murray’s svelte Brabham BT55, this done because the BMW engine was taller than its contemporaries, thus upsetting airflow to the rear wing.

Having the engine at such an angle caused problems with oil flow and a lack of throttle response, plus weight distribution issues, meaning the car simply couldn’t get the power down.

Producing a stunning 1,300bhp, in 1986 the car was one of the fastest in a straight line – once it finally got there.

It scored just two points and would signal the beginning of the end for the famous Brabham team.

Coloni-Subaru C3B 

Using its growling boxer engine, Subaru was a force to be reckoned with throughout the ‘90s in rallying.

It wasn’t quite the same case with its 3.5-litre flat-12 motor, designed by legendary engineer Carlo Chiti and strapped into the back of the already-hopeless Coloni.

Supposedly bearing similarities to its road car engines, the power unit put up just 500bhp, being 200bhp down on the standard-setting McLaren-Hondas.

Using the Coloni, Betrand Gachot managed to fail to pre-qualify for the first seven races of 1990.

The team switched to a Ford Cosworth engine after that, proceeding to then DNPQ another 21 times in a row into 1991. Coloni took one race off, before ‘DNPQing’ twice again. Impressive numbers!

“It’s a shame because three years ago I came here and was on pole in F3000 with a time that was as quick as what I did today,” lamented Gachot after more misery at the 1990 British GP.

Life 190

Widely regarded as the worst F1 car of all time – despite the Coloni’s best efforts – this machine was a 360-degree failure.

Not only was the car massively underweight, producing low downforce and handling terribly, it also had a woefully designed, underpowered in-house-made engine.

The W-12 unit had three banks of four cylinders, pumping out just 480bhp, while Honda and Ferrari were producing around 700.

The upshot was that on its 1990 debut at Phoenix the Life 190, driven by Gary Brabham, was an incredible 35sec off the next pre-qualifier – and nearly 40sec off Gerhard Berger’s pole time. And you thought the 2025 Alpine was bad.

Brabham walked out after two races, before veteran Bruno Giacomelli decided to put himself through a world of pain.

“I had a test before Imola, but I realised right away it was going to be a disaster,” he said.

“It was a very strange engine, a 4-4-4, like an aeroplane engine. The problem was, the guy who designed it was never able to modify anything; this was as it was born. The gearbox also gave many problems, I couldn’t really shift down.

“When they first started the season with Brabham, the material was at least fresh, but then race after race, things were getting worse and worse, because they didn’t have any spares. I never saw more than two engines.”

Footwork-Porsche FA12

Porsche is one of the successful brands in motor sport, so it’s understandable it doesn’t spend much talking about its unmitigated F1 failure: the lump in the back of the 1991 Footwork FA12.

Stuttgart’s 3512 V12 engine was massively oversized compared to its grand prix counterparts and woefully underpowered. While Michele Alboreto retired from the three races in ’91 that he raced it, Alex Caffi and Stefan Johansson only managed to qualify for one race out of four attempts between them.

“The moment eyes were set on the V12 in Suzuka the previous year, few could believe just how many of the basic tenets of F1 engine design appeared to have been forgotten,” wrote David Tremayne once Porsche had pulled out just half a season into the project.

“’When we were first shown the plans for it, I knew it was going to be big by the amount of time it took to unfold them!’ said one laconic F1 designer. ‘When we saw it, we thought Porsche had built a truck engine,’” said another.”

The famous German marque hasn’t been seen in the world championship since.

“All of this has hurt Porsche very, very much,” said its racing PR Manfred Jantke at the time. “Motor sport is the most important ambassador for what Porsche can do, and for the past 40 years we have had a high reputation. There has been considerable damage, enormous damage and loss of face for Porsche.”