page_title: 1926 Grand Prix season
section_title: Technical Innovation
hierarchical_section_title: 1926 Grand Prix season / Regulations and Technical / Technical Innovation
caption_attribution_description: English: 1926 Maserati Tipo 26 s/n 11 with Alfieri Maserati (at wheel) and Guerino Bertocchi (riding mechanic) posing. The handwriting says "Targa Florio 1926", and #5 was the entry, so this picture should be from this race which took place on April 22 or 25, 1926.
context_page_description: The 1926 Grand Prix season was the second AIACR World Manufacturers' Championship season and the first running to new 1.5-litre regulations. The championship was won by Bugatti and its Type 35 was the dominant car of the year.
  The schedule was increased from four to five championship races. The Belgian round was dropped but the British Grand Prix and San Sebastián Grand Prix were added. Many races had promising entry lists, but when a number of cars did not arrive, it led to farcical races with just a handful of starters and only a couple of finishers.
  The leading French teams of Bugatti, Delage and Peugeot arrived for the Targa Florio as, once again, the major Italian teams did not enter. The race was marred by the death of two-time winner Giulio Masetti, crashing his privateer Delage on the first lap. Once again it was the small, nimble Bugatti of Bartolomeo Costantini that held off the rest of the pack. When the works Delage team was withdrawn following Masetti's death, it left Costantini led his team to a 1-2-3 victory.
  The opening race of the championship was the Indianapolis 500. Frank Lockhart was a young rookie who substituted in to race for an ill Peter Kreis.
context_section_description: The new regulations demanded new engines and pushed engineers to think of innovative ways to get the same power from the smaller size. By using a shorter stroke, engines could greatly increase their speed, up to 7000-8000rpm.
  Faced with high development costs, Alfa Romeo and Sunbeam instead chose to retire their works teams from racing. Other teams were already prepared. Ettore Bugatti had developed his Type 35 chassis the previous year with a 1.5-litre engine, and finally accepted the need for supercharging with the new Type 39A. Although conventional, the Bugatti was reliable (only running at 5500rpm for its 120 bhp) with excellent balance and road-holding. In non-championship, Formula Libre races, Bugatti still refused to conform to supercharging the Type 35, instead chose to enlarge the engine to get more power, up to 2.3 litres as the new Type 35T. The marque's reliability made them the cars of choice for privateer drivers and wealthy amateurs.
  Sunbeam's designer, Louis Coatalen, and engineer, Vincenzo Bertarione, went across to the Paris-based sister-company of Talbot. Their 1.5-litre cars had been racing very successfully in the former voiturette class. The new supercharged Talbot 700 GPLB was delayed in appearing but was the fastest in the field. Problems arose through the season with broken front axles, poor brakes and fractured supercharger casings.
  Delage too had a new head engineer: Albert Lory was promoted, and his first design was a straight-8, twin-cam engine boosted by two superchargers. The power output of 170 bhp was the first racing engine to break the magical 100 bhp per litre mark. But with sixty bearings it was intricate and expensive. Less thought was put into channelling away the enormous heat production that would scold and burn the drivers’ feet and legs. It also caused a vacuum effect that sucked exhaust fumes back into the cockpit adding to their discomfort.
  Without the need for a riding mechanic, both the Talbot and Delage designs put the drivetrain beside, rather than under, the driver. This in turn meant the cars could be lower giving far better road-holding. The smaller front profile would be more aerodynamic, and all of this enabled the cars to keep their high speeds.
  The SIMA-Violet car was designed by Marcel Violet. With a two-stroke 1.5-litre engine, it was so light it needed to carry 200 kg of ballast to reach the weight regulations, which made it uncompetitive. However, it performed better in hill-climb events where no ballast was required. Diatto had got into financial difficulty, which was the incentive for the Maserati brothers to go and start their own company. They were supported in this venture by Conte Diego de Sterlich. Using the engine and chassis parts Alfieri had designed for the last Diatto racer, their first grand prix car was the Maserati Tipo 26, named for the current year. Like others it had twin-overhead camshafts and a Roots-style supercharger.
  In Germany, the two major companies Daimler and Benz merged in June and would henceforth be known as Daimler-Benz, and its cars as Mercedes-Benz. In the US, both Harry Miller and Fred Duesenberg developed supercharged 1.5-litre engines for the new formula.
caption: Maserati Tipo 26
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