Ligier JS7
Formula One race car
The Ligier JS7 was a Formula One racing car manufactured by Ligier. As with the preceding JS5, the letters "JS" were in tribute to Guy Ligier's friend Jo Schlesser who was killed in the 1968 French Grand Prix.
01Design
Aside from using the Matra V12 rather than the usual Ford Cosworth unit, the JS7 was a very conventional design with a Hewland six-speed transmission and a longitudinally mounted engine and wishbone suspension. The JS7 forwent the giant air intake of the preceding JS5. It was developed around Matra's new MS76 engine, mounted 7.6 cm (3 in) lower than in the JS5. The front wing design echoed that of the Ferrari 312T. The first two JS7 chassis used modified JS5 monocoques; the third and final example was built from the ground up.
In the beginning of the 1977 season, Ligier still used the four-year old MS73 engine design as the new one was not yet ready to race - the new MS76 suffered from problems with the valvetrain in Argentina and Brazil and had a narrower torque band than the old engine. The MS76 engine was not deemed fully ready to race until the Swedish Grand Prix in June, where Laffite won.
02Racing history
The JS7 competed in the 1977 Formula One season and the first two races of the 1978 season. An updated version, dubbed the JS7/9 was used for three races in 1978 until the definitive 1978 car, the JS9 was ready. Laffite's victory in the 1977 Swedish Grand Prix was the first all-French victory - chassis, engine and driver - in World Championship history.
03Complete Formula One World Championship results
(key)
| Year | Chassis | Engine | Tyres | Drivers | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | Points | WCC |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1977 | JS7 | Matra V12 | G | ARG | BRA | RSA | USW | ESP | MON | BEL | SWE | FRA | GBR | GER | AUT | NED | ITA | USA | CAN | JPN | 18 | 8th | |
| Jacques Laffite | NC | Ret | Ret | 9 | 7 | 7 | Ret | 1 | 8 | 6 | Ret | Ret | 2 | 8 | 7 | Ret | 5 | ||||||
| Jean-Pierre Jarier | Ret | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1978 | JS7 | Matra V12 | G | ARG | BRA | RSA | USW | MON | BEL | ESP | SWE | FRA | GBR | GER | AUT | NED | ITA | USA | CAN | 19* | 6th | ||
| Jacques Laffite | 16 | 9 | 5 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| JS7/9 | 5 | 5 | 7 |
* 13 points scored using the JS9.
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Ligier JS7”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
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