BMW 700 RS (1961)

White-blue Delicacy

The BMW engineers were creating a small racing car with the 700 RS, which was superficially counting in the typology of the BMW 700. Apart from the front axle, independent suspension, steering and brake concept, there were not many identical parts.

In 1961, the premiere took place for the BMW-factory racer at the race in Roßfeld with Hans Stuck. The attention was not only sure because of the legendary “Bergkönig” Stuck but also of the flat and almost small BMW. In silver, the 700 RS did not have a roof and was only equipped with a small roll bar along with a windshield that was so low that you could look more over it than through it. The aluminum skin, which was straight without squiggles and pulled over in optically balanced roundings – this was the first impression of the viewers. It turned out at the first race that the car was a premium construction, had finest engine technology, agile chassis and was incredibly fast. The BMW was equipped with an air cooled two-cylinder boxer engine, which was especially built for this racing car by the Munich engineers. A cubic capacity of 697 cm³ and a performance of 70 hp were the benchmarks; furthermore a nearly quadratic stroke-bore ratio, which gave the motor more lively and as special delicacy were both overhead camshaft, which were controlled via vertical shaft. This enabled exact valve timing at a high rotational speed of 8.000 rev/min at the time, where the maximum power was transmitted to the four-speed-transmission. The boxer engine was mounted in front of the rear axle and leaded to an ideal load distribution. In combination with an extremely short wheelbase of only exactly two meters and a filigree trellis frame ensured very agile handling, made the BMW very compact and allowed versatile driving, whereby the very low vehicle weight of only 493 kg made a further important contribution. Dependent on selected gear ratio, a maximum speed between 160 km/h and impressive 200 km/h was provided.

The Munich engineers succeeded in an optimal implementation of a small racing car with the BMW 700 RS.

The model shows a BMW 700 RS-2 from 1964. Pilot was Alexander von Falkenhausen that has driven his last win on a racetrack at "Flughafenrennen Neubiberg" (near by Munich) with starting no. 102.