Editing Brabham (section)

==Motor Racing Developments==
[[File:1969 British Grand Prix P Courage Brabham BT26.jpg|thumb|right|alt=A mid-engined single-seater racing car with modest aerodynamic wings|Several F1 teams used Brabhams ([[Piers Courage]], [[Frank Williams Racing Cars|FWRC]], 1969).]]

Brabham cars were also widely used by other teams, and not just in Formula One. Jack Brabham and Ron Tauranac called the company they set up in 1961 to design and build [[formula racing]] cars to customer teams Motor Racing Developments (MRD), and this company had a large portfolio of other activities. Initially, Brabham and Tauranac each held 50&nbsp;per cent of the shares.<ref name="Law31"/> Tauranac was responsible for design and running the business, while Brabham was the test driver and arranged corporate deals like the Repco engine supply and the use of the MIRA wind tunnel. He also contributed ideas to the design process and often machined parts and helped build the cars.<ref>Tauranac referred to this as Brabham's trade; they had first met at the small [[machine shop]] Brabham ran in Sydney in the early 1950s.</ref>

From 1963 to 1965, MRD was not directly involved in Formula One, and often ran works cars in other formulae. A separate company, Jack Brabham's Brabham Racing Organisation, ran the Formula One works entry.<ref>To confuse the relationship between the two companies further, MRD was renamed Brabham Racing Developments between 1962 and 1964. Henry (1985) p. 24</ref> Like other customers, BRO bought its cars from MRD, initially at £3,000 per car,<ref>Fearnley (May 2006) p. 39</ref> although it did not pay for development parts. Tauranac was unhappy with his distance from the Formula One operation and before the 1966 season suggested that he was no longer interested in producing cars for Formula One under this arrangement. Brabham investigated other chassis suppliers for BRO, however the two reached an agreement and from 1966 MRD was much more closely involved in this category.<ref>Lawrence (1999) pp. 74–75</ref> After Jack Brabham sold his shares in MRD to Ron Tauranac at the end of 1969, the works Formula One team was MRD.{{citation needed|date=December 2021}}

[[File:Brabham BT40 of Tim Kuchel.jpg|thumb|right|alt=A mid-engined single-seater racing car with large aerodynamic wings|The BT40 was the last [[Formula Two]] model from Brabham.]]
Despite only building its first car in 1961, by the mid-1960s MRD had overtaken established constructors like Cooper to become the largest manufacturer of single-seat racing cars in the world,<ref>Unique p. 111</ref> and by 1970 had built over 500 cars.<ref name="car numbers">Lawrence (1999) p. 207</ref> Of the other Formula One teams which used Brabhams, Frank Williams Racing Cars and the [[Rob Walker Racing Team]] were the most successful. The [[1965 British Grand Prix]] saw seven Brabhams compete, only two of them from the works team, and there were usually four or five at championship Grands Prix throughout that season. The firm built scores of cars for the lower formulae each year, peaking with 89 cars in 1966.<ref name="car numbers"/> Brabham had the reputation of providing customers with cars of a standard equal to those used by the works team, which worked "[[wiktionary:out of the box|out of the box]]". The company provided a high degree of support to its customers—including Jack Brabham helping customers set up their cars. During this period the cars were usually known as "Repco Brabhams", not because of the Repco engines used in Formula One between 1966 and 1968, but because of a smaller-scale sponsorship deal through which the Australian company had been providing parts to Jack Brabham since his Cooper days.<ref>Henry (1985) p. 53</ref>

[[File:Alfa Romeo 164 procar.jpg|thumb|left|alt=A four-door saloon car which has been modified for motor racing|The Brabham [[Alfa Romeo 164|Alfa Romeo 164 "procar"]] (1988)]]
At the end of 1971 Bernie Ecclestone bought MRD. He retained the Brabham brand, as did subsequent owners. Although the production of customer cars continued briefly under Ecclestone's ownership, he believed the company needed to focus on Formula One to succeed. The last production customer Brabhams were the Formula Two BT40 and the Formula Three BT41 of 1973,<ref>Hodges (1990) p. 39</ref> although Ecclestone sold ex-works Formula One BT44Bs to [[RAM Racing]] as late as 1976.<ref>Henry (1985) p. 156. Henry claims Ecclestone did this to ensure the team would focus on its troublesome new Alfa Romeo powered BT45s.</ref>

In 1988 Ecclestone sold Motor Racing Developments to Alfa Romeo. The Formula One team did not compete that year, but Alfa Romeo put the company to use designing and building a prototype "Procar"—a racing car with the silhouette of a large saloon (the [[Alfa Romeo 164]]) covering a composite racing car chassis and mid-mounted race engine. This was intended for a racing series for major manufacturers to support Formula One Grands Prix, and was designated the Brabham BT57.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.grandprix.com/gpe/cref-mcdall.html|title=People: Allen McDonald|work=grandprix.com|access-date=26 April 2011}}</ref>
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