(car engine revving) (car backfires) - It's the tuning team known
for rally racing, wacky wings, and the sickest Escort ever made. But did you know they also made the most successful F1 engine ever? (car engine roaring) This is the episode of Up to
Speed where I want more cars in it than any other
episode of Up to Speed. (car engine roaring) This is everything you need to know to get up to speed on Cosworth. (upbeat music) It all started in the 1950's with a couple of blokes
from Northampton, England. Mike Costin and Keith Duckworth
were engineers at Lotus, but they felt a little
limited in what they could and could not do. So they came up with a
plan to start a company on the side building race
engines to their own specs. But like any small startup
they ran into a problem. That's when they went to their boss over at Lotus, big dog Colin Chapman. And they were like, "Mr.
Chapman, we would like "to start designing race
engines for race cars. "But laddies, that's
what you're doing here. "Don't you like my engines?" Quack, quack, quack, quack. "Yeah, like Duckworth said, we love Lotus. "We just want to do our own thing. "But gentlemen, why do you need me?" Quack, quack. "Oh, it's money you're after. "I love you boys. "Here's all the pounds you need. "But I have a few conditions." So Costin and Duckworth started Cosworth, a portmanteau of their last names which makes you think would we be talking about them now if they named
their business "Tinduck." In 1958, Cosworth Engineering
Limited set up shop in a rat infested old
garage in Northampton. Colin Chapman agreed to
bankroll the new company but with a few conditions. Duckworth was free to leave Lotus, but Mike Costin, who had just
signed a new contract, had to stay on as an engineer. And Lotus had first dibs on
any of the Cosworth engines. Now Costin would clock
out of his job at Lotus and use his off time to
engineer over at Cosworth. He did this for the first
four years of the company. It's just like how I clock out of Donut, and then I go work on
my own YouTube channel, Babies Reacting to Surgery. Click that bell so you don't miss any babies reacting to any surgeries. Development soon began on
their first race engine. Duckworth had his eye on a brand new type of
racing called Formula Junior. This was an entry level class
of open wheel racing limited to 1000 cc engines using
basically stock engines. It was meant as a gateway to F1, and it would be the perfect
proving grounds for the lads. Mike Costin and old Ducky Boy, as I like to call him, had a working relationship with Ford already through Lotus. So the gents were able to secure two Ford engines
that were developed for the 1959 Ford Anglia. These babies were small. I'm talking one liter small. They only made 39 buff ponies stock, but the boys tinkered
with the cylinder heads and tested new cam shaft designs. They got the second motor,
the Mark 2 up to 75 skinny yet powerful Bronies which is
nothing to shake a stick at. Then they sold that engine
to Lotus who dropped it in their Super 7. It was already a stellar car, but with the new Ford Cosworth engine inside, it straight up
killed at the track. Lotus Super 7 started
dominating competitions. The Mark 3 engine was
an even more powerful version of the Ford Inline 4, now making 95 mid-century horses. I'm talking Eames ponies. I'm talking Frank Lloyd
Wright Clydesdales. This was the first engine Cosworth made that wasn't
exclusively sold to Lotus. Other race teams were
like, "Hey, what the heck? "We want one of them dag
blasted engines too." And Cosworth was like,
"Right on, rock and roll." The success of the new engines
meant that Cosworth wasn't financially dependent on Lotus anymore. Oh no boy, they were free. I make my own money. I buy my own clothes. I do what I want dad. Quack, quack, quack, quack. It was clear that the engineers at Cosworth could make a
banger, slappin' engine. Colin Chapman new it and Ford knew it. So in 1966 Colin Chapman played matchmaker and convinced Ford to invest in Cosworth. They signed a $100,000
contract that included the development of two different engines, the four cylinder FVA engine
or Four Valve type A was based on a Ford cross flow engine block. It feature twin overhead cams, 16 valves, Lucas Fuel Injection which sucks and Duckworth's very own
custom cylinder head. This inline four could
produce 225 horsepower at 9000 rpm and would go on to dominate Formula Two until 1971. It's an amazing engine. But it was just the start
of what was to come. You see the FVA was just proof of concept for the next project, Cosworth's screaming three liter V8 named the
DFV which I assumed stood for damn fast vehicle, lightning. If there's one thing you need to know about Cosworth, it's this engine, okay. The DFV was the first engine
completely designed by Cosworth and there was one more thing
I wanted to mention about it. Oh yeah, it was the most
successful F1 engine of all time. (car engine roaring) Think about that fellas and gals. That's like if I loved
saxophone music which I do, and I loved it so much that I decided to make my own saxophone from scratch. Then that saxophone went on to become the best saxophone ever made and Bill Clinton would play my saxophone at the Hollywood Bowl. And everybody would clap
and nobody would laugh. The double four valve engine,
like its name implies, was basically two of the four cylinder FVA engines duct taped together. Cosworth produced the
fully custom cylinder blocks and crank case in-house. The three liter V8 made 410 buff HRSPRS. At the time, one of their
biggest competitors, the Ferrari 312 made the
same amount of power, but they used four more cylinders. The first time the engine was used was in the 1967 Formula 1 Dutch Grand Prix. Colin Chapman threw it in his Lotus 49, and driver Jim Clark took first. That's not bad. That's the first friggin'
time that they used it. So Formula 1 is very strict about who gets to use their footage, but
we were granted rare access to a piece of film of
the Dutch Grand Prix. Please. (host imitating race cars) And down the stretch they come. I'm gonna win. (host imitating race cars) And Cosworth has done it. They've crossed the finish line and (mumbles) the checkered flag. First time out, and they win it. They win it all. Oh, this footage is so authentic. What an amazing race. What authentic footage. Here they are on the podium. It looks so real, that
feel of authenticity. And look at them spray the stuff. He's kissing his girlfriend. She's Cindy Crawford. I can't believe this is real footage. Oh, he jumps over those
crocodiles like a mad man. Oh, there's the pirates. Oh no, the pirates have showed up. The pirates have showed up
and they're swashbuckling. Colin Chapman swings down
on a rope like a Robin Hood and cuts all their heads off. Not only a great engineer
but a great swordsman and a great statesman and
great, great authentic, not at all faked footage. (men and women laughing behind-the-scens) Cosworth actually made a whole
F1 car on their own one year, but it never raced. It was way ahead of its time. It had a four wheel drive system cooked up by Duckworth himself, a
magnesium block DFV engine and was built using a lightweight wood and aluminum composite. It was supposed to compete at
the 1969 British Grand Prix. But it was silently withdrawn,
because it was too good. We'll never know. Duckster's laboratory continued
to develop race engines but on the commercial side,
that's the stuff we can buy, another project was
beginning to take shape. Ford of Europe was
working on a replacement for the hugely successful
small family car, the Anglia. Cosworth had a ton of experience messing with the Anglia's engines, so they were the natural choice to build an upgraded version
for its successor, the Escort. The BDA or Belt Drive type A
engine was a 1600 cc inline four with duel overhead
cams and 16 valves. It was developed for homologation purposes for a little thing called rally racing. Maybe you've heard of it. We talk about it a little bit. (car engine roaring) The first car to use the BDA engine was the Ford Escort RS1600. This thing racked up tons of rally wins. It made a 120 horsepower which was unheard of for
a small car at the time. By 1969 Ford and Cosworth
were basically BFF's. They raced each other. They did business together. They picked each other
up from the airport, because that's what's friends do Nolan. Ford would never make
Cosworth take an Uber from the airport, because
they have a weird rash. The RS1600's more athletic
brother, the RS2000. Bought it in 1973. It was slightly more powerful
and refined than the RS1600 with a zero to the 60 time of nine seconds and a top speed of 110. (car engine roaring) This car also racked
up a ton of rally wins. If you wanna know more about
all these dang Escorts, you can check out the Up to Speed episode, you guessed it, on the Escort. (car engine roaring) We could go on and on
about Cosworth's race wins, but that would be a very long video. And I have to go poo-pooh. So I'm gonna hurry things up. My apologies. In 1975, Cosworth took their
already very successful DFV engine and slapped
on a friggin' turbo. (car engine roaring) It now made 840 buff
yet intelligent horses. The DFX quickly became
the standard Indy car engine, dethroning the
dominant Offenhauser, aka the Offy engine. Now success was not always
guaranteed for Cosworth. In 1975, Chevrolet produced
5,000 Cosworth edition Vegas. But GM's general manager at the time, a little dude named
John Delorean, aka, Doc from Back to the Future, wanted to improve performance
of the Vega following in the onset of emission standards. So he sent an engine designer to England to scope Cosworth out in hopes that they would design
a cylinder head for Chevy. Cosworth agreed. The next five years were
spent troubleshooting engine problems, going back
and forth with the EPA, and worst of all taking away horsepower to meet emission standards. When the Cosworth Vega made
it off the production line, it absolutely 100% failed to deliver. It was originally meant
to have 170 HRSPRS, but the final product only made about 110, and it was almost double the
price of a base model Vega. They only sold about 3,500 of the expected 5,000 hand-built Cosworth Vegas. And the rest were scraped. I think that it looks pretty sick. And they did make a 290
HRSPR version for the track, but it wasn't enough
to sell any road cars. Now this was the first time
Cosworth ever had their name on a production vehicle. And unfortunately, it
was a monumental stinker. Their production models would have to be better in the future or
their reputation would suffer. But while the Vega was
struggling, Cosworth powered cars were slaying rally
races around the world. (car engine roaring) The new RS1800 debuted with
a second gen Escort in 1975. This was when we first
started seeing features on their rally cars that are
now classic Cosworth style. And I'm talking big old wild wheel arches and signature fitman of high beams on the front for night rallying. The RS1800 had an updated version of a twin cam engine
design for the RS1600. A new engine rules meant they
could bore it out and get... This is getting ridiculous. I have to do something. I must find him. (somber music) (siren blaring) Where are you? (man crying) See if I get any calls. The updated inline four
made 245 herstey hogs and was now made into a
straight-cut five-speed ZF gearbox. With the RS1800 the Cosworth rally team was basically unstoppable. (car engine roaring) But do you think Cosworth
kicked back and got cozy? If you said yes, you're
wrong, 'cause they didn't. They constantly strived to
make their engines better, more powerful, and more
dominant than the competition. With production ramping up for a third generation Escort in 1980 and rally racing gaining
steam, Cosworth found themself on the precipice of something great. This decade would produce
some of the most iconic Cosworth powered cars ever. Ford had won the World
Rally Championship in 1979 with a Cosworth powered RS1800. But the FIA was about to
launch a new rally class. They had way fewer
restrictions than Group A or as like to call it Group Baby. Enter Group B. (car engine roaring) Group B rules were very
relaxed when it came to engine size, car weight,
and constraints on technology. Ford did one of those big,
oh no, we're gonna need to make our cars better. So the boys at Cosworth took a variant of their twin cam inline four and slapped a big ole turbo boy on it. (host screams) A 1.8 liter BDT engine produced just over 200 horsepower
for the street version. But the race version, the
race version, could make up to 450 buff mother fathers. Ford put a 300 horsepower
version of the BDT in their brand new third-gen Escort. And the result was the RS1700T. (car engine roaring) Development of this car turned out to be a huge pain in the arse, 'cause the third-gen Escort was built on a front-wheel drive platform which wouldn't be the
best for rally driving. Then freakin' Audi came out of nowhere with the Quattro all wheel drive system and started slaying the competition. Just kick 'em right in the nards. Ford tried to scramble to
make the 1700T all wheel drive but ended up scraping the
entire project in frustration before it could ever officially race. They decided that the only way to compete with the all-wheel drive
Audis and Peugeots was to build an all-wheel drive
car from the ground up. Ford built the chassis. Ghia designed the body. And Reliant built the shell. It was like a group project
and everyone did their part. And guess what? They all got an A. The result was the RS200. (car engine roaring) Mounted in the middle of
this tiny, awesome looking car was the Cosworth BDT engine, the turbocharged four banger was now tuned to make 250 HRSPR on the street with race versions all the way up to 444 buff horses at 8,000 rpm and 360 tweeerk bois. This is one of the coolest
Cosworth cars ever made. Kent Block has one. He won't shut-up about it. Every time we have a frickin'
internet car guy potluck he's like, "Hey guys,
you seen my Cosworth?" We're like. - [Men In Unison] "Ken,
yes we've seen it." - [Host] And he's like, "Do you like it?" We're like. - [Men In Unison] "Yes Ken we like it." - He is cool though, cooler than me. But it didn't do great in competition. It was too heavy to compete with the Italian and French cars. And one time it flew off of
road and killed three people. Group B is crazy. And if you wanna learn more about it watch the Up to Speed on it. For now, Colby show 'em
how crazy Group B is. (car engine roaring) Cosworth as a company never
stopped being in demand. They were constantly approached to work with other manufacturers to develop high performance
homologation engines. Mercedes saw the value
in their tuning skills and commissioned the company to produce some homologation versions of their entry level sedan. Enter the Mercedes Benz
190E 2.3, 16 Cosworth. Add it to the list. The rally versions were insanely powerful. And the street versions are literally one of my favorite
looking cars of all time. Cosworth also worked
with Opel helping design a long throw diesel crank engine for a rally version of the Opel Manta and Ascona, as well as a
two liter 16 valve engine for the Astra and Calibra. Later on Cosworth tuned a
turbocharged 2.7 liter V6 for the B5 Audi RS4 which made 381 HRSPRS and had a zero to 60 time of
less than 5 frickin' seconds. If I could have a B5 RS4 I
would probably do anything. In the early 1980's Ford
teamed up with Cosworth to work on a brand new Group A project. This time it was for the
rear-wheel drive Ford Sierra. They needed 5,000 engines to
meet the homologation minimum and asked if Cosworth
could bring the power up to 180 HRSPRS for the street version. Cosworth agreed, but under two conditions. Number one, the street engines had to be at least 200 horsepower and Ford had to not by five, but they had to buy 15,000 of them. And in 1986 the Sierra
RS Cosworth debuted. Add it to the list. (car engine roaring) It had a turbocharged two
liter YBB engine derived from the Pinto with custom
Cosworth cylinder heads, a Borg Warner T5 gearbox, and a massive whale tail, swallow tail. Let me know in the comments
what you call this wing. This is the first car that people started
calling the Cossie. The YBB engine made 240
horses for the street version and more than double that for the track. A select 500 of the
Sierra coupes were sent to the Aston Martin plant in Tickford to get the special treatment. What do I mean by special treatment? Boy I'm glad you asked. These Sierras got a bigger turbo charger, better fuel system, a frickin' arrow kit. They lowered the suspension. And most importantly, they got discreet decals that read RS500. So if you looked closely, you could tell. While the street version
can make 224 buff horses, the track version made five hunna. (car engine roaring) The RS500s dominated touring car racing from 1987 to 1992, winning
championship after championship after championship after championship after championship all over the world. And towards the end of its run, track versions of the two
liter engines were making up to 680 horsepower. The only thing that could challenge the RS500 was the R32 Skyline. And that's friggin' Skyline. The Sierra Cosworths were doing great in Group A rally racing. But the platform was about to transition into being a front-wheel drive car, and the engineers at Ford
of Europe had a little idea. Let's take the YBB engine and put it into a smaller
all-wheel drive car. YBB? More like, why not BB. Enter the Ford Escort RS Cosworth, one of the sickest hatchbacks ever made. Add it to the list. (car engine roaring) This Cossie had a body
designed by Karmann in Germany. It had a wing like the Sierra's and significant aerodynamic upgrades on the rest of the body. The adjustable front
splitter made the Escort RS the first production car
that could produce downforce on the rear and the front. It had a big old turbo with
a big violent entry that came on around 3,500 rpm. (car engine roaring) Just like a Group B car. But most importantly the production inline four engine sent 224 horses and 224 tuerks to all four wheels which makes it a perfect horse port. (horn blows) Guys we did it. (man claps) Nowadays Cosworth is still
based out of Northampton. And they're still low
key upgrading engines. You can get a Cosworth tune-up for your AE86 that buffs
horsepower up to 280. Add it to the list. They even made a limited run
of Subaru Impreza Cosworths. Add it to the list. The new Honda NSX has an engine that was partially
designed by Cosworth. This one does not get added to the list. They totally did it wrong. Their inspiration was a
like a luxury muscle car. You don't design. They've got a rich, crazy history. They've made some of the
coolest cars in the world. And they're still innovating. They've made huge leaps in
hybridization, connectivity, and the future of propulsion. And they're still collaborating. The Aston Martin Valkyrie,
one of the most intense race car looking street
cars ever, has a 6.5 liter naturally aspirated
Cosworth V12 under the hood. With 1,130 buff Cossie horses on tap, it's clear that
Cosworth isn't slowing down any time soon. Where are you? (somber music) (man crying) I love you.
