MATTER OF A PINION

Well-resolved steering can make good driver's cars great. Will the complex, electric-powered cars of tomorrow make the grade? Steve Cropley visits the experts to find out 

- Steve Cropley

We are standing in the R&D headquarters of Titan, the UK manufacturer of some of the world's most advanced automotive steering systems, looking at a large screen showing a map of the Suzuka Formula 1 racing circuit. A dot moves rapidly around it, representing a car.

In the average teenage bedroom this would be part of an elaborate computer game, but here it's much more serious. Map and screen belong to a bespoke test rig being used to develop the light, supersecret, by-wire EPAS (electric power-assisted steering) system of a leading F1 car that must remain nameless for now.

The F1 connection is just one indicator of how quickly 60-year-old Titan has progressed in the hands of a new team that started running it in 2015 and took ownership in 2022. Today, the company can create advanced and bespoke steering systems of all kinds: hydraulic, electric/electronic systems, and versatile, microprocessor-controlled, by-wire mechanisms for the cars and commercial vehicles that are just around the corner. Planning a driverless car? They can help steer that, too.

Titan started life in the 1960s making single-seat racing cars, surviving in that business until 1978. At the same time, it was building up a portfolio of engineering activities, and developing a range of Titan engine equipment and oil systems that survive as a profitable sideline to this day.

The company began specialising in mechanical steering in the 1980s, supplying other race constructors and specialist road car manufacturers like Caterham and Lotus. One important application was Gordon Murray's tandem two-seater Rocket, kitted with Titan gear in 1991, but that was very simple by modern standards. Under its owners of the time, Di Thomas and Oz Timms, Titan functioned mostly as a supplier of precision-engineered parts to clients - until the recession of 2009 arrived and its activities were badly affected.