The Early Days of Maserati
Five brothers with inexhaustible talent

Right now, the future looks bright for Maserati. The Quattroporte continues to win accolades as the finest sports sedan available, and is proving to be a tremendous sales success. The GranTurismo has broken new ground as a luxury sports coupe with genuine practicality – room for four adults and generous trunk space. The GranTurismo S takes things to the next level, with a larger engine delivering more power, and a new super-fast transmission. And the Maserati factory is proud to be assembling the stunning Alfa Romeo 8C coupe and Spider based on Maserati designs.

Hand in hand with its current successes, Maserati also has a long and storied history, encompassing wins in the Indianapolis 500, road cars for the rich and famous and a Formula One World Championship. We thought it worth taking a look back at the very earliest days of the company, almost a hundred years ago.

The Carcano motorised bicycle designed by the 18-year-old Carlo Maserati in 1898.

July 2, 1900: Carlo Maserati rides his motorised bicycle

Between 1887 and 1898, Rodolfo and Carolina Maserati had six children who survived to adulthood – all sons, they were Carlo, Bindo, Alfieri, Mario, Ettore and Ernesto. Carlo was a true mechanical genius; he built a rudimentary steam engine at the age of 12, and at the age of 18 he built and ran his own internal combustion engine, which was then fitted to a bicycle frame. Aged just 21, he was recruited by Fiat, where he soon became head of the experimental department. He later worked for both Isotta Fraschini and Bianchi – but tragically, he died in 1910 of tuberculosis.

Alfieri had always looked up to his older brother; an excellent mechanic in his own right, he was hired by Isotta Fraschini in 1903 on Carlo’s recommendation, where he became a mechanic for the team racing in early grands prix. He stayed with the company several years, being promoted and working abroad, first in Argentina and then in England with his brother, Ettore. But in 1914 he and Ettore decided to strike out on their own, and Societa Anonime Officine Alfieri Maserati came into being on December 1st 1914, in Bologna.

The company offered servicing of Isotta Fraschini cars, and also race-prepared Isotta engines. When Italy entered the First World War, Ernesto continued to run the business while Alfieri and Ettore worked on secondment to Isotta, where they were developing aero engines; this led to Maserati becoming a manufacturer of spark plugs after the war. Alongside this, Alfieri was still interested in racing, which led to him becoming a consultant to Diatto, in Turin. He took the standard engine and modified it, raising output from 40 to 70 hp. He also designed a new car for Diatto, for the new Grand Prix regulations.

But Diatto were in financial difficulties – in 1927 car production ended. From 1925 the company had agreed that Alfieri could take over the racing car project – and in 1926 the first car to bear the Maserati name emerged from the Bologna workshop. The Tipo 26 was a natural development of the Diatto car; the motor showed the engineering prowess of the firm. A straight-eight which displaced just 1,493cc, it put out an impressive 120 hp thanks to a supercharger – enough to propel the svelte two-seat car to over 110mph.

It was at this stage that Mario played a pivotal role in the fledgling company – unlike his mechanically-inclined siblings, he had become an artist. Legend has it that he was wandering through Bologna when he came to the Piazza del Nettuno, where he saw the large statue of the god Neptune holding a trident. This inspired Mario to draw the three-pronged badge which has been the symbol of the company ever since.

Eleven examples of the Tipo 26 were built, the last as late as 1932. The car was subject to continual revision, so there were barely two cars the same. A four-speed gearbox was introduced in 1927, and engine development saw power rise to 128 hp. One engine was even taken out to 2,109cc. However, the Tipo 26 also proved the downfall of Alfieri; racing in the Coppa Messina in 1927, his car overturned and he suffered severe internal injuries which necessitated the removal of a kidney. While he survived, he never fully recovered, and when his other kidney began to fail, he required surgery; he died in the operating theater on March 3rd 1932.

The Tipo 26 proved to be the first in a whole sequence of cars utilizing the same basic design. The Tipo 26B, first produced in 1927, used a 2-liter engine putting out 155 hp; from 1929 the company made extensive use of Elektron in the engine, a lightweight alloy produced by Isotta Fraschini. The Tipo 26MM was designed exclusively for road-racing – the MM designation stood for Mille Miglia, while the Tipo 26B MM combined the features of the preceding two models and added mudguards and running boards. The Tipo 26R was a lightweight version, and the Tipo 26C had a tiny 1,078cc engine – still a straight-eight – for Voiturette racing.

In 1929 came a truly radical car, the Tipo V4 and V5. It was as if the brothers had set out to develop a showcase for their engineering brilliance: the engine was effectively two straight-eights side-by-side, the two crankshafts sharing a common crankcase. The V4 made 280 hp from 3,961cc, while the V5 made 305 hp from 4,906cc; while the car weighed just over 1,000kg, the power made it stunningly quick. In 1929 the V4 set a class record for 10km from a flying start – at a speed of almost 153mph, a record which stood for the next eight years.

The following years saw the Tipo 26M being produced; despite the designation it was virtually a new car, with a brand new engine designed to allow capacities over 2 liters. This was developed into the Tipo 8C 2800, and was also scheduled to appear in the 8C 2500 T.A. – a project which was abandoned after Alfieri’s death.

The company now had parallel developments going on; for Voiturette racing a series of cars with 1.1-liter straight four engines was produced (Tipo 4CTR, Tipo 4CS and Tipo 4CM), while the company also produced a new straight-eight 3-liter engine which first appeared in the Tipo 8C 3000. It was then used in the Tipo 8CM grand prix car – the ‘M’ in the designation stood for monoposto, or single-seat. Using an 8CM, Tazio Nuvolari won the 1933 Belgian Grand Prix, which helped the car become a popular choice with private entrants.

1906: The Milan firm's chassis assembly shop

Tipo 26B

The mid-1930s saw a seemingly endless stream of cars flow out of the small Bologna factory, with an astonishing variety of engines – straight fours of 1.5 and 2 liters, a 3.7-liter straight-six in the Tipo 6C 34, a straight-six 1.5-liter unit for the Tipo 6CM and a 4.8-liter V8 in the Tipo V8 RI. But all the innovation, and the constant research and development required, took its toll; in 1937 the three brothers still involved – Bindo, Ernesto and Ettore – sold the company to Count Adolfo Orsi, a successful industrialist based in Modena. The brothers agreed to remain with the Maserati company for ten years, and went on to achieve great success for their new owner, most notably by winning the Indianapolis 500 in both 1939 and 1940 with the Tipo 8CTF.

Orsi moved the company from Bologna to Modena, so it would be near the foundries he owned; Maserati has remained at the same location in Modena ever since.