2014-2020 Formula One 1.6l V6 turbo engine formula

[strad]

I don´t think it makes sense to have more sparks per combustion. You achive no higher energy by doing this.

.
Tell that to MSD and the tens of thousands of racers that use it.

[stez90]

You have something like this in diesel engines.
But this is mostly for comfort and emission reasons, e.g. small injection prior to main injection results in a smoother cylinder pressure curve.

If the efficency is high enough and fuel left they can have some kind of anti-lag with late injection/ignition.

I was referring to something like stratified charge.. Maybe the can make multiple injections/sparks "synchronized" whit the turbolences in the chamber.. Stratified charge has good efficiency because the combustion is insulated from the cylinders by the sorrounding air.. And with limited fuel, efficiency is the way to go.. imho..

[Tommy Cookers]

I don´t think it makes sense to have more sparks per combustion. You achive no higher energy by doing this.

.
Tell that to MSD and the tens of thousands of racers that use it.

MSD systems say somewhwere that they make 1 spark per combustion event above 3000 rpm (multiple sparks at lower rpm)
(I think the spark duration of capacitive discharge is too short to work well at low rpm with only 1 spark)

[Tommy Cookers]

I was referring to something like stratified charge.. Maybe the can make multiple injections/sparks "synchronized" whit the turbolences in the chamber.. Stratified charge has good efficiency because the combustion is insulated from the cylinders by the sorrounding air.. And with limited fuel, efficiency is the way to go.. imho..

the point of stratified charge is surely to combust a mixture so lean overall that it would not combust well as a uniform mixture ?
SCs point is to use partial power without corresponding throttling of induction air, ie it's for road use not racing
such a lean mixture means pumping and compressing substantially more air than is needed for combustion of the fixed fuel supply
and is thereby wasteful of supercharger work and piston work and intercooling capacity
(although some of the waste could be recovered electrically via the turbine) SC is surely worse for racing

the rules have been written to bias competitors towards SC
(by fixing the fuel rate at 10500 rpm, running lean mixture above 10500 is almost forced)
although modulated displacement would be better this is banned
although CVT benefits can be gained with existing gearbox technology (by making more ratios available) this is banned

the rules could evolve to force stratified charge
eg if the 1600cc and 10500 rpm threshold were fixed, but the fuel rate substantially reduced

[WhiteBlue]

They could run combustion methods like spray guided combustion which by nature generates a charge that is kind of stratified. They could use it richer for normal racing and lean it out for safety car running. It would very much depend of the capabilities of the DI system which are unknown at this time. But the fact that they are talking ignition systems with very high voltage indicates that the emphasis is very much on running the combustion as lean as you can get away with compared to contemporary F1 racing engines with port injection.

Btw, I do not think the compression work for a bit leaner compression would matter very much in an engine that extracts a huge surplus of energy from the exhaust turbine. The potential compressor capacity is so huge that we probably can neglect that effect.

[Holm86]

Audi had FSI (Fuel Stratified Injection) in racing years before it went into their roadcars. Was that just a marketing gimmic to call the racing version FSI as well?? Or did they actually use stratified injection in the race engines??

It was at Le Mans where gas milage is very important as well.

[Tommy Cookers]

Simon seems to be advocating the use of steel pistons
(are we saying that N/A engines need alloy pistons with their oil cooling, but the 2014 engines can have steel pistons ??)
alloy pistons transformed engines 100 years ago

he is saying that 80x53 doesn't allow big enough valves
could they use a shorter stroke and less than 1600cc then, (or is that not allowed ?)
steel heads have been designed for past engines in need of maximising valve area, to avoid the space taken by seat inserts
(this was a 'downsized' high-boost engine of 9 litres and 2500 hp or so, designed by Stuart Tresilian)
although bronze was generally used in the days before inserts (not allowed now, though)

[ringo]

not sure if posted already, but it's related.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbB1qwhKaaE[/youtube]

[pgfpro]

Awesome video!!! I think I have watch it three times now. It amazes me that they were thinking about turbo compounding that long ago for F1.

[Tommy Cookers]

IMO Duckworth wanted stable (and tight ?) rules on turbos
I think he publicised lavish turbine schemes (eg TC) to indirectly convince (frighten ?) others of the need for tight rules
TC would have needed some weird and clever transmission
Duckworth did not favour complexity, weight or bulk

IIRC around this time some things already raced by others were ruled illegal (as bypassing the engine capacity rules)

[WhiteBlue]

If you look at the manoeuvring and politicking already done at a time more than 30 years ago and with fractions of the expenditure we have now you have to be glad that the FiA got one thing right that has bogged down the technical development of F1 racing engines. Its the basic formulation of power limitation by air. Thirty years ago they did not have the technology to make engines fuel limited. They could only limit the amount of fuel that could be filled into a car which is a frustrating thing if you use it for power limitation. Drivers were pushing their cars in sight of the finish line having run out of fuel.

Today you can control the fuel flow and this fundamental difference will bring back some great development races if the rest of the rules are controlled in a sensible way. I completely hate to limit the technology in order to keep competition on a level playing field. Engineers should be able to be inventive and pursue as much power and performance as they can in many possible ways. On the other hand there must be a way to control power for the sake of safety. My view is that we will have the best F1 if the technical regulations are progressively opened more and more. In the last twenty years we have seen the engineers more and more restricted in order to provide safety and economic viability. I believe that this trend was wrong for F1 to follow. They did not have many alternatives with the way things are set up at the moment.

In the future accountants should be responsible for making sure that a level playing field exists for all teams. It should not be a burden on the engineers to provide viability to all teams or at least a minimum number of teams. Engineers in all other automotive fields are used to work within a budget and are competitive in a much wider technical envelope than F1 engineers. I hope with different cost control mechanisms we will see a revival of the old turbo age when different engine concepts were still possible and were competing against each other.

It really itches me to see that already at that time in 1985 people were politicking and not using the more efficient and powerful 4 in line engine because they thought that the politics would be tweaked towards V6es. I absolutely love the Renault Turbo story and how BMW got their road car engine F1 capable. F1 engineers in my view should be completrely free to use any engine layout they want and any turbo design. There should be absolutely no limit on variable geometries, injections systems, ignition systems or cooling design. Whoever can squeeze more ppower from a drop of fuel should be the victor. The only restrictions should be the number of people you have working on your project or the budget of it.

[Tommy Cookers]

do the rules define the accuracy of the fuel metering ?
(races can be won or lost by a margin of 0.01%, but fuel cannot be metered or even weighed to this standard)

the cars will be competing under a fuel rate limit (reductions of this will soon have cars using less than 100kg fuel per race)
no fuelling that bypasses the metering is allowed
cars burn their (lubricating) oil with essentially the same response as from burning fuel
this is equivalent to fuel bypassing the meter
(when cars are otherwise equal, 1 kg extra oil burning is worth nearly a lap)
are there rules to stop this ?

[stez90]

do they allow a "buffer" after the fuel meter? for example if the flow limit is 100% and at low rpm/off -throttle they need only 60%, could they store the unused 40% and use it for a "100+40" boost at the next acceleration?

[Tommy Cookers]

absolutely not !!
(but they can do the equivalent thing electrically to an extent governed by the power limits of the various parts)

(remember also that the fuel rate steadily falls with rpm at rpm under 10500)

[hollus]

Imagine burning that extra kilo of whatever during quali? Fuel metering is going to be a huge can of worms. I fear that season will be won by whoever manages to get the most fuel into the engine... legally or not!