Maurice Philippe (30 April 1932 – 5 June 1989), also known as Maurice Phillippe, was a British aircraft and

Formula One Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...

car designer. Philippe designed his first car in 1955, called the MPS (Maurice Philippe Special), while employed developing the

Comet 4 The de Havilland DH.106 Comet was the world's first commercial jet airliner. Developed and manufactured by de Havilland in the United Kingdom, the Comet 1 prototype first flew in 1949. It featured an aerodynamically clean design with four ...

aircraft for

De Havilland The de Havilland Aircraft Company Limited () was a British aviation manufacturer established in late 1920 by Geoffrey de Havilland at Stag Lane Aerodrome Edgware on the outskirts of north London. Operations were later moved to Hatfield in H ...

. Philippe raced a

Lotus 7 The Lotus Seven is a small, simple, lightweight, two-seater, open-top, Open-wheel car, open-wheel, sports car produced by the United Kingdom, British manufacturer Lotus Cars (initially called Lotus Engineering) between 1957 and 1972. It was desi ...

in 1963 and 1964, and in 1965 was asked by Colin Chapman to be his "design team" at

Team Lotus Team Lotus was the motorsport sister company of English sports car manufacturer Lotus Cars. The team ran cars in many motorsport categories including Formula One, Formula Two, Formula Ford, Formula Junior, IndyCar, and sports car racing. More ...

. Philippe and Chapman first redesigned the

Lotus 39 The Lotus 39 was a single-seat racing car produced by Team Lotus. It was originally intended for use in Formula One, to be powered by the Coventry Climax 1.5 litre flat-16 engine. The engine project fell through and the chassis was modified to acc ...

, then produced the

Lotus 43 The Lotus 43 was a Formula One racing car designed by Colin Chapman for the 1966 season. Hampered by its heavy and unreliable BRM engine, it won only one race, the 1966 United States Grand Prix. Concept The Lotus 43 was partially based on the ...

, the classic Lotus 49, the ground-breaking Lotus 72 as well as the Lotus 56 turbine Indy cars. In 1972, Philippe left Lotus and went to work for Parnelli Jones's USAC team, designing the Cosworth-Parnelli VPJ4 for F1, which was raced in by Mario Andretti. In 1978, he replaced Derek Gardner as chief designer at Tyrrell, with the Tyrrell 008 finishing fourth in the Constructors' Championship. The 1979 Tyrrell 009 ground-effect car was less successful, only scoring four third places. In 1980, the

Tyrrell 010 The Tyrrell 010 was a Formula One racing car that was designed by Maurice Philippe for Tyrrell Racing for the season. The 010, like all Tyrrells before it was powered by the Ford-Cosworth DFV V8 engine and made its competition debut in the third ...

was introduced and was raced in modified form until 1981. In 1988, he designed the March-Alfa 89CE Indy car, but he died in 1989 before the car ran for the first time.

References

External links

Biography at www.grandprix.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Philippe, Maurice Formula One designers 1932 births 1989 deaths Lotus Cars British motorsport people