Credit: Photo by Alf van Beem, taken at the Motor-Sport-Museum am Hockenheimring, Germany — released under CC0 1.0 Public Domain.
Credit: Photo by Alf van Beem, taken at the Motor-Sport-Museum am Hockenheimring, Germany — released under CC0 1.0 Public Domain.
Footwork Porsche project 1991; Porsche was already known in F1, but when they announced their return to F1 in 1991 with Footwork, expectations were sky-high.
Earlier in the 60s, Porsche as a team won just only one race and that still remains, Dan Gurney was the winner.
However, after all, this was the same company that had built championship-winning engines for McLaren during the ’80s.
Their partnership with Footwork Arrows team promised to revive the spirit, but instead of glory, the project failed and the kind of failure that would keep Porsche away from Grand Prix racing for decades.
Porsche F1 engine 3512
Porsche’s comeback was centered around a bran-new 3.5-liter V12 engine designed by Hans Mezger, the man who also designed the engine of legendary Porsche 917 flat-12 engine.
However, the 3512 was meant to compete with the best, Ferrari and Honda, on paper it sounded impressive but what happened next?
What worked in endurance racing did not automatically work in F1, from its first test the 3512 revealed its ugly side, it was massively overweight, long, and did not exploit what the team expected.
In F1, millimeters and kilograms make the difference, Porsche’s V12 was on the wrong side this time.
Too Heavy, Too Slow, Too Complicated
The biggest problem was its weight, so if you make the difference of Porsche engine and Ferrari engine of 1991 its huge:
- Porsche 3512 V12 (190 kilograms)
- Ferrari Tipo 291 V12 (160 kilograms)
30-kilogram difference completely upset the Footwork car’s balance, forcing engineers to make painful compromises in the chassis layout and aero.
But the weight was not the only issue, while Ferrari and Honda were producing engines with 850 horsepower or more, Porsche’s unit struggled to reach even 680 horsepower on a good day.
Despite being a V12, it lacked the explosive power and high-end delivery needed to compete, drivers Alboreto and Caffi, quickly found themselves battling not for points, but simply to qualify for races.
To make things even worse, the 3512 suffered from constant reliability failures, oil starvation during high-speed corners was a recurring nightmare, often leading to sudden engine seizures.
The thing that made it suffer was the unconventional central power take-off design, it was unique feature that was supposed to reduce mechanical stress, ended up causing serious sealing problems, which led to fluid leaks and further instability.
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A Car That Couldn’t Contain Its Own Engine
When designer of the Footwork team, Alan Jenkins received the final engine spec, he realized that Porsche engine won’t suit to the design of the car, the power unit was not only too heavy but too long to fit into the new FA12 chassis, leaving Jenkins no time to redesign the car.
As a result, Footwork began the season using a heavily modified design of their 1990 Arrows A11 car, it was renamed to A11C, doing everything just to fit the V12.
The old chassis was already outdated and the team was behind, and paired with an overweight engine it was impossible for them to save their season.
Alboreto and Caffi often failed to qualify, having an Porsche engine and not being competitive, something that surprised everyone.
When the F12 design finally debuted later that season, it did not make things better, the car was structurally compromised due to the engine’s bulk and poor balance.
Alboreto had a huge accident at Imola during testing the car at Tamburello, the engine’s weight distribution issues and poor integration had literally made the car dangerous to drive.
The End of the Road
By the sixth race of the season, patience had run out, Footwork decided to abandon the Porsche project and return to the more reliable Ford-Cosworth DFR V8.
Porsche was blaming Footwork for poor chassis design. While Porsche’s V12 was the primary cause of failure, the switch to the Cosworth DFR V8 did not instantly fix Footwork’s problems. It took the team another seven races to finally see a car cross the finish line
But what was the result of it?
At the Portuguese GP finally Footwork managed to finish in P15 and +3 laps behind the winner, Riccardo Patrese.
Porsche’s reputation as one of the best engine manufacturers was immense, but the 3512 engine failed to live up to expectations, underperforming in both power and design.
It was one of the shortest engine programs in F1 history, after six painful races and zero finishes, Porsche left F1 and has never returned to Formula 1 since.
Why Porsche Failed
There was no single cause behind downfall in 1991, it was a perfect storm of bad communication, rushed design and misplaced confidence.
With limited coordination with Footwork’s British chassis engineers, critical dimensions were shared too late and testing was rushed.
The company also misjudged the technical direction of F1, while rivals like Honda and Renault were pioneering lightweight, compact V10s, Porsche insisted on building a large, complex V12 that was outdated before it ever turned a wheel, the decision reflected endurance racing logic, not F1 reality, and that cost them dearly.
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So why this is important to talk and why we still remember?
It is one of the best brands in the world, a Porsche, failing in F1 is something that nobody expected.
Today, the 3512 V12 is remembered as an engineering cautionary tale, a proof that even the most prestigious manufacturers can misfire spectacularly, when they understimate F1.
The project left Porsche burned and wary of returning to the sport, although there have been rumors of comebacks over the years, none have materialized.
