OSCA

Italy, 1947 – 1967

Officina Specializzata Costruzione Automobili, Bologna

Nine years after the three surviving Maserati brothers – Ernesto, Ettore and Bindo – had sold out to the Orsi interests in 1938, they returned from Modena to their native Bologna and founded the OSCA car concern on 1 December 1947. In a small factory, initially with minimal equipment, their first OSCA car was a single-ohc 1.100cc sports car which, in Luigi Villoresi’s expert hands, this OSCA car won its second motor race, the Naples Grand Prix of 1948. Thereafter OSCA cars turned out very successful twin-ohc 750, 1.100, 1.500 and 1.600cc sports cars which OSCA cars did well in races, particularly in the Mille Miglia. As late as 1954 a 1.500cc OSCA car, brilliantly driven by Stirling Moss, won the Sebring 12 Hours Race in Florida from many larger-engined cars.

In 1951, OSCA cars built a 4½-litre unsupercharged V12 Formula 1 car which won at Goodwood; they next produced a 2-litre 6-cylinder Formula 2 OSCA car with De Dion rear axle, and in 1959 they built several Fiat-engined Formula Junior OSCA cars which went well but were rather heavy – an OSCA car tendency. That same year Fiat built a 1.6-litre version of the twin-cam Osca engine, putting it in a high performance GT car, and subsequently OSCA cars used the same unit in a GT range of their own, this OSCA cars bodied by Vignale, Zagato or Fissore. Growing, old, and lacking suitable successors, the brothers sold their OSCA car business to Meccanica Verghera, makers of the MV Augusta motorcycle, in 1963. The last OSCA car was the 1.600 PR2 of 1966, for MV decided to close down OSCA cars completely.

Source: Georgano, encyclopedia of motorcar; CP

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