Unsolved mystery

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Marie de Lacrowe wrote:

[...]  3_ speaking of the Cosworth DFV, a strange huge cylinder positioned after the cylinders and before the change area, what was his operation and what it was for?

Got an example picture for that?

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That's the oil reservoir

Michael Drechsler wrote:

That's the oil reservoir

i would say either michael nailed it that its a reservoir, or maybe just an overflow catch. only speculate this due to the fairly high position of the mounting, and because i can't see and plumbing out the bottom only 3 connections at the top (there could be at the bottom but hidden from view). maybe 1 each of cylinder head breathers and 1 crankcase breather? only a guess.

but certainly nothing out of the ordinary i dont think.

best,
dave

Yes it's an oil catch tank on the DFV.

Other two questions are rather vague so it's hard to answer. The offset steering wheel does not ring a bell, which Brabham and Tyrrell models are you thinking of, specifically ? Same thing about your gearbox question : "British F1" is very vague indeed and anyway the vast majority of F1 constructors (whether British or not) in the DFV years did not build their gearboxes but used Hewland ones. As long as those were 5-speed the pattern was the same as virtually every racing 5-speed gearbox (which I have always used in simracing as well) :

X-2-4
1-3-5

The reason for such gearbox grids of course being that you want to minimize the instances where you have to make a lateral movement when changing gears, to avoid missing a gear and over-revving the engine. As the first gear is usually only used for starts on most racing cars, with this pattern you only cross from third to fourth gear, instead of crossing from 2 to 3 and 4 to 5.

When 6-speed boxes were introduced (around 1977/78 IIRC) it obviously switched to :

1-3-5
2-4-6