In 1956, Swiss engineer Michael May arrived at the Nürburgring for the 1,000 km race with a privately entered Porsche 550 Spyder, sporting a large strutted wing. The car passed scrutineering, but after setting the 4th best practice time overall, well ahead of the two factory backed 550's driven by Wolfgang von Trips and Umberto Maglioli, a formal complaint was lodged by Porsche team boss Huschke von Hanstein. With the Le Mans disaster fresh in everyone's minds, von Hanstein insisted that the wing obscured the view of drivers behind it, while the struts could possibly break, hitting another driver or flying into the audience. Race officials acquiesced, and May was forced to remove his wing. After another failed attempt at Monza later in the year, nothing like it would be seen again for a decade.

By 1963, Jim Hall had a genial relationship with General Motors engineers, and along with his engineering degree, used this knowledge to improve the design of his new Chaparral 2, by reshaping the front of the car to produce "downward thrust". The lap times lowered, and the Chaparral 2C started winning races. By 1965, Hall, Hap Sharp, and GM engineers started experimenting with adjustable wickerbills, using a pedal on the floor to raise or lower the rear spoiler, culminating with a victory at the 1965 12 Hours of Sebring.

Over the winter his team began construction on a brand new design, the 2E, which included every technological innovation they and GM had been developing at the time, including wings, aluminum monocoques, and automatic transaxles. The large, adjustable wing was a sensation to bystanders, but the reaction was different amongst drivers: "When we first showed up at the race track, a lot of people laughed at the wing, but I noticed the knowledgeable people didn't. Bruce McLaren was looking under the car to see where the struts went, while Dan Gurney stood by and watched. The guys that really knew, weren't laughing."

Chaparrals qualified near the front all season, but having spread themselves thin trying to run the 2E in Can Am and the 2D in the World Sportscar Championship, the cars failed to finish nearly every race, mostly due to the underdeveloped clutchless transaxle.

The 2F was once again a brand new chassis, this time using a state of the art fiberglass semi monocoque, while GM supplied a reworked 3 speed automatic transaxle. Once again the complex design of the transaxle was overwhelmed by the torque of the Chevy engine, this time a 7 liter behemoth.

Just like the 2D a year before, the 2F qualified at the front of every World Sportscar event in 1967, and failed to finish all but one. And just like 1966, that one finish was a victory. For the final race of the season at Brands Hatch, GM finally sent a stronger driveshaft capable of finishing an endurance race. After taking the checkered flag, Phil Hill, who had been loyal to Chaparral through every DNF over the last 2 seasons, retired on the spot. The FIA had already announced that prototypes would have a limit of 3 liters for 1968, so Hall and Sharp focused solely on Can Am and the revised 2G.

When Ferrari became the first F1 car to feature a wing at the 1968 Belgian GP, technical director Mauro Forghieri was asked if he was inspired by the designs of the Chaparral. He instead recalled a story from an engineer at Ferrari who helped develop Ferraris first fuel injected engine back in 1964. "He mentioned his brief experiments with mounting an aerofoil on a Porsche in 1956. I did not think much of it at the time."

https://thracing.de/wsc-legends-60s-p...

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