1951 OSCA 4500G

What's in a name? How strange an existence it must be to have built something from the ground-up; to see that thing come to fruition, but because of financial troubles it is purchased by another? How much more strange would it be to work for what was your property at one point but is now owned by another? How much more surreal would it then be to see what still bears your name continue on without you, while you go and try and start a competitor company? It would have to feel much akin to the bully who takes the smart person's test and puts their own name on it as though their own. This is what the Maserati brothers, Ernesto, Ettore and Bindo, faced when they started Officine Specializzate Costruzioni Automobili (OSCA) in 1947.

The Maserati brothers were geniuses when it came to automobile design, but events in the world around them impacted them adversely. Their cars were talented and they achieved much success. However, in the late thirties Mercedes-Benz and Auto Union came on the scene. Victories were much harder to come by, and too, the prize money to keep going. In a short amount of time the talented brothers didn't have the capital to pay their debts, let alone go racing. Without the opportunity of their cars paying off their genius, the brothers had to look to other means to keep working. Adolfo Orsi stepped in to save the brothers' company. However, the brothers were in servitude to Orsi for a contract period of ten years. Everything the brothers made or produced was the property of Adolfo, including the family name. Once the ten year contract was up, the brothers threw off tradition and, in essence their name, and started another car company to compete in grand prix and sports car racing.

At their factory outside Bologna, Italy, the Maserati brothers began work designing a car to compete in the 1951 Formula One and non-championship grand prix season. What the gentlemen designed would become known as the 4500G and it was only produced for just the 1951 season. The regulations were announced to change going into the 1952 season. The 4500G was more of a car designed to take on the likes of Alfa Romeo's 159 and the Ferrari 375. But like Ferrari, the Maserati's found the supercharged cars, like the Alfa Romeo 159, too tough on tires and consuming way too much gasoline. Therefore, the decision was to use a higher liter, normally aspirated engine.

A 4.5 liter V12 engine was developed for the 4500G. Not unusual for the time, the V12 light alloy engine was designed at an angle of 60 degrees. With a little tweaking, the brothers were able to get the engine to develop over 330 brake horse power. The Maseratis offered this engine to other teams and private entrants, but they only had very limited interest. One interested buyer was Prince Bira. Bira had the V12 placed in his Maserati 4CLT/48 and promptly went out and won the very first race in which he competed with the OSCA engine powering his Maserati chassis. It was the intention of the brothers to build these engines for other private entrants and small teams, as they had for Prince Bira. They believed that with their efforts tweaking them there would be many customers. When that plan didn't come to fruition, the brothers continued with their plan to make their own grand prix car for the 1951 season.

The design Ernesto came up with was a cigar-shaped chassis. It wasn't small like the Simca-Gordini T15 chassis. However, it was more-shapely than many of its competitors. A large, round grill dominated the nose of the car. The grill wasn't blunt, but was rounded slightly. The front suspension incorporated double wishbones and coil springs. Each of the wheels utilized drums for its braking power. Each of the drums had a couple of fins machined into the rim of the drum to help aid in the cooling of the brakes. On the leading edge of the front drum brakes there was a screen and openings that further helped to cool the brakes.

Covered over by the body paneling was a steel tubular ladder frame. The engine cowling sported numerous louvers on the top and along the sides to help eradicate the incredible heat built up within the engine cowling by the tight-fitting V12 engine. Out of each of the cylinder heads protruded an exhaust pipe. Each of the pipes blended into one exhaust pipe and ran back along the car between the rear wheel and chassis. The exhaust pipe only extended just past the front of the rear tires. The ends of the exhaust then actually angled in toward the underside of the car. The positioning of these exhaust pipes on either side of the car was low, down near the very bottom of the car. This helped keep the extremely hot exhaust pipes away from the driver's cockpit, unlike that found on the Alfa Romeo 158 Alfetta.

As with most cars, and their designs of the day, the driver sat up high, greatly exposed in the 4500G. The cockpit itself was rather sparse, dominated mostly by the large wood steering wheel. Only a few gauges were installed on a very small instrument panel. On either side of the small rounded windscreen were round rear-view mirrors. Unlike other designs from other car manufacturers, these mirrors were simply attached and had no paneling to help aerodynamically. The transmission of power to the wheels for the OSCA was done through a four-speed manual gearbox. The transmission and gearshift for the rear-wheel driven 4500G was located between the driver's legs. The gearshift extended out from the floor, low and kind of behind the steering wheel.

As was usual at that time, housed in the large, rounded structure behind the driver was the car's fuel tank. The tank filler position on the 4500G was located at the top along the spine of the car's rear-end, right behind the driver's head. The rear suspension utilized the popular and much better de Dion tube axle. This was attached to longitudinal torsion bars that were exposed along the sides of the car.

The career of the 4500G was incredibly short-lived given the regulation changes that came along in 1952, thereby, prohibiting such a car the chance to compete. However, with Bira's success the first race out with his OSCA engine, and the ninth place by Rol in its one and only race, the Maserati brothers continued to prove their engineering prowess. As with the 4500G, every one of the Maserati brothers seemed to be out of timing with things and were never able to achieve all they were deserving. Their engineering sense was usually right on, but with the death of Alfieri, their business sense was not. Their name would continue to go on to great fame and success, but seemingly without any of them as part of it. They were, by their talents and abilities as car designers, the epitome of what their name came to stand for. However, it was their name that was allowed to continue.

Wikipedia contributors, 'O.S.C.A.', Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 25 November 2010, 08:58 UTC, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=O.S.C.A.&oldid=398779986 accessed 21 December 2010

Wikipedia contributors, '1951 Italian Grand Prix', Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 23 October 2010, 12:07 UTC, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1951_Italian_Grand_Prix&oldid=392391673 accessed 21 December 2010

'OSCA Tipo G4500', (http://www.ultimatecarpage.com/car/3890/OSCA-Tipo-G-4500.html). Ultimatecarpage.com. http://www.ultimatecarpage.com/car/3890/OSCA-Tipo-G-4500.html. Retrieved 21 December 2010.

By Jeremy McMullen