Christian Vanderpleyn designed the C3 as a replacement for the Coloni FC188. One notable visual change was the adoption of a conventional airbox in place of the rollbar arrangement on the older car. The 3.5-litre Cosworth DFR V8 was the power unit, but the car arrived late and underdeveloped, suffering particularly from a lack of straight-line speed most evident at Spa-Francorchamps and Monza.
After Vanderpleyn departed, freelance engineer Gary Anderson was brought in to extract more performance. Anderson developed a new nosecone and front wing, which helped the C3 to its best qualifying position of the year at the Portuguese Grand Prix — but even with those revisions the straight-line deficit remained, and results did not improve meaningfully.
For 1990, Enzo Coloni secured a deal with Subaru that saw the Japanese manufacturer acquire half the team and supply its 1235 flat-12 engine, which had originally been developed by Motori Moderni with Minardi in mind. The engine produced approximately 417 kW (559 hp) against a target of 447 kW (599 hp), was chronically unreliable, and its complete assembly weighed 112 kg — a severe penalty on balance and handling. The chassis was updated to C3B specification to accommodate the flat-12, with the airbox removed and replaced by tall sidepod-mounted air ducts. The result was a car with a heavily rear-biased weight distribution and unpredictable handling.
After just eight races the Subaru relationship collapsed amid political disputes between the two companies. Coloni reverted to the Cosworth DFR, prepared by Langford and Peck, in the C3C — a chassis originally designed around the Subaru dimensions but much closer in character to the original C3, with its airbox and low sidepods restored. A noticeable improvement over the C3B, the C3C nonetheless never cracked qualifying proper. For 1991 the C3C was evolved into the C4, but results did not improve and the team folded at the end of that season.
The original C3 did not appear until the Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal, with Roberto Moreno and Pierre-Henri Raphanel sharing duties. The debut was mixed: Raphanel finished dead last in pre-qualifying while Moreno not only qualified but completed 57 laps before gearbox trouble intervened. Neither driver qualified for the following French Grand Prix, and Moreno was the only Coloni on the grid at the British Grand Prix before suffering another gearbox failure after two laps.
The team's best 1989 qualifying session came at Portugal, where Enrico Bertaggia had replaced Raphanel and Moreno qualified 15th. However, before the race a collision with Eddie Cheever's Arrows destroyed the updated front wing, and electrical gremlins forced Moreno to retire on lap 11. That would prove to be Coloni's last grid appearance in 1989.
For 1990, Coloni ran as a single-car Subaru works entry with Bertrand Gachot as sole driver. Gachot pre-qualified dead last for the United States Grand Prix and failed to make it through pre-qualifying at every subsequent race he drove the Subaru-powered C3B — including the German and Hungarian Grands Prix in the new C3C. From Belgium onwards Gachot regularly cleared pre-qualifying but never once made it through the qualifying session proper, leaving Coloni to finish the entire season without once participating in a race.
The Coloni C3's story encapsulates the precarious existence of the small teams that populated the back of the Formula One grid in the late 1980s. The Subaru episode in particular — a works engine deal that produced a heavier, less powerful, and less reliable package than the privateer Cosworth it replaced — stands as a cautionary tale about the gap between manufacturer ambition and racing reality. The C3's only enduring legacy was demonstrating what Gary Anderson, later famous for his work at Jordan, could achieve with limited material.