Endurance
F1
GT cars and others ones
Ford GT40
Chevrolet
Interserie- cars
In 1982, the FIA introduced the Group C rules for closed -cockpits sportscars. Nobody was prepared, more time was needed and even the more experienced teams made mistakes during the season. The ground-effects were not fully understood and the engine choices were not clear yet. Maybe Porsche with their 956 were on top of it al!
It was German Ernst Ungar, father of the URD cars took another path. He went for the simplicity and build his first Group C design car on proven fundamentals. He developed a simple race car with a simplistic aluminium bodywork, all inexpensive. The base was a tubular chassis constructed around a 6 cylinder 465 bhp BMW M1 engine linked to a ZF FGA 5 speed gearbox. Ungar used suspensions inspired from the F1 cars from 1977-78 without looking for any ground-effect. It would be the eight type of racing car of the Ungar Racing Developments from Grafenau Germany
He used the information of Rolf Stommelen to improve the car. The water-cooling radiator was placed in the front and the driving position was also quite forward. This impression is reinforced by the plunging slope of the hood in front of a strange windshield whose height is strictly regulated. The cockpit and the gear lever was positioned to the right. The rear end of the car had a one-plane rear wing. The total weight of the car was 820 kg; the BMW engine would produce 480 bhp. A real Gr.C needed more power, but fuel consumption in those days was also being regulated.
Construction started in June 1981 and the car (Chassis 001) was shown on the Motor show Essen in December 1981.
The URD C81-BMW could only be constructed with an agreement between Ungar and team owner and driver Jurgen Kannacher. The latter had also a business of Porsche-parts in the region Köln and Dusseldorf. Racing was a great way of promoting his business.
The URD was racing under the Kannacher GT- Racing with a red livery and yellow/black sponsoring letters. But Kannacher, who also was responsible for the BMW M1 Procar was not only just there for sponsoring. Ungar did the technical stuff and Kannacher commercialized things looking after the financial part of URD.
He got chassis Nr. C81-002 and chassis Nr. C81-003 in his team in march 1982 and C81-004 in 1983.
In 1982 the URD C81 raced in the DRM, the Interserie and also in the WEC. The car made his debut in the Nürburgring 1000 km. Harald Grohs qualified P9, but in the first corner of the race he lost the car under braking.
In the 24 h Le Mans, the #30 was hired by was driven by Michel Lateste.Together with Hubert Striebig and Jacques Heuclin, they qualified in 3’47”62. In the race they were driving P17 when after 4 hours of race, the engine gave up. The last WEC race was the Spa 1000 km. Here again an engine failure after 98 laps.
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During the winter, the ZF gearbox was changed with an Hewland gearbox. Again a retirement at the Nürburgring. For the rest of the year, the European rounds of the WEC were done by Bruno Sotty and Guy Cuynet. They brought the car home in the 24h LeMans race in P14 (#54) after a very bad practice session. They got a single points again at Spa. Engine failures were usually the reason for retirements.
In the Spa race there was also a C83 car at the start. Unger had slotted a 3.0l Porsche engine in the back. The car driven by Walter Lechner, Jurgen Kannacher and Wolfgang Boller could not complete one lap as the gearbox fell apart in lap 1.
The URD team fell off the radar until 1984 when Danish Jens Winther bought the C81 and raced it in the C junior class at Sandown Park at the end of the season. Over the winter he prepared the car for the C2 division.
He got the car in the Castrol livery and Winther- David Mercer and Lars Viggo Jensen started the 1985 season. The car lacked speed but was more reliable. Except at Le Mans. American Margie Smith-Haas had hired the third seat and she was driving when the engine blew itself during the night.
Some good results earned them a fifth place in the C2 championship standings.
The car was back in 1986 when again Winter-Mercer-Vigo Jenssen did some European races. They finished in the top 5 in class every time and took fourth in the championship. Jens Winther biggest dream came through. He finished second in C2 in the 24h LeMans and were P11 overall.
At the end of 1986, Winther retired from racing and Ernst Ungar dusted off an old C81 chassis with BMW power to race again in a number of WEC races for German hopefuls Helmut Mundas and Rudi Seher. They did good, but reliability of an older car was not good.
After that URD dissapeared again from the enduranceracing.