2014-2020 Formula One 1.6l V6 turbo engine formula

[pgfpro]

One thing I came across when calculating different inputs into my spreadsheet is in todays rules for 2014 a 6 cylinder verses a 4 cylinder.

At 10500rpm delivering 100kg/hr a 6 cylinder using DI will only have 2.857 m/s to deliver fuel during the compression stroke or 180* crank rotation. With a 235 cc/min PI of today you would have a pulse width of 1.79 giving you a duty cycle of 62.5%.

At 10500rpm delivering 100kg/hr a 4 cylinder using DI will only have 2.857 m/s to deliver fuel during the compression stroke or 180* crank rotation. With a 235 cc/min PI of today you would have a pulse width of 2.68 giving you a duty cycle of 93.8%

IMO I believe this was the main reason they went with the 6 cylinder format. It was more of a way to make use of today's DI at full max power. I personally think the 4pot is a better engine to go with but I don't think today's DI is capable yet.

Now my example of above is using a well know PI injector that is proven to deliver 235 cc/min. The DI injectors will flow more, but keep in mind there will be injector dead time and some valve overlap for cooling and clean charge they can't use the full 2.857 m/s or 180* crank rotation to deliver fuel. So this will shorten the time for fuel delivery.

m/s=milliseconds

[Tommy Cookers]

I understand that for fuel efficiency it is best to compress the air without fuel because you can prevent early combustion much better. In order to do this you need a fuel delivery system that work in microseconds. You need to be able to have the fuel delivered into the fully compressed air, atomised and evaporated in a very short time. This process also fully exploits the cooling effect of the evaporating fuel only that it looses no cooling to the surrounding metal parts of the engine because the effect is contained in the compressed air charge.

@pgrpro
even without the above demand, there's not much time between inlet valve closure and sparking

Ferrari raced their 120 deg V6 1.5 litre (NA F1) with Bosch (mechanical?) DI in 1962 at 10500 rpm
it was hard to get the fuelling right

[pgfpro]

I understand that for fuel efficiency it is best to compress the air without fuel because you can prevent early combustion much better. In order to do this you need a fuel delivery system that work in microseconds. You need to be able to have the fuel delivered into the fully compressed air, atomised and evaporated in a very short time. This process also fully exploits the cooling effect of the evaporating fuel only that it looses no cooling to the surrounding metal parts of the engine because the effect is contained in the compressed air charge.

@pgrpro
even without the above demand, there's not much time between inlet valve closure and sparking

Ferrari raced their 120 deg V6 1.5 litre (NA F1) with Bosch (mechanical?) DI in 1962 at 10500 rpm
it was hard to get the fuelling right

Interesting do you recall what this engines injectors flowed?

After looking at my cam specs even at only 135* crank rotation my calculations still come up with enough time to flow the correct amount of fuel for the given HP on the 6 cylinder?

[WhiteBlue]

IMO I believe this was the main reason they went with the 6 cylinder format.

No, this wasn't primarily a technical issue it was a marketing issue for Ferrari who used their political muscle to black mail the FiA. Ferrari are not interested in four cylinder engines for their road cars and they would have faced competitors doing in line fours simply for the reason that they would generate superior power with limited fuel supply. It would have forced them to do a four pot in F1 as well. They did not want to do this because it would have impacted very negatively on their road car marketing program. High cylinder count is still very much a parameter of luxury cars. If F1 had gone to four pot engines a huge marketing advantage of Ferrari would have gone out of the window. At least that was the perception in Maranello. They vowed never to build a four cylinder car ever. And historically they have never done it for the last 60 or seventy years.

Besides the Ferrari marketing issue there was also the basic conservatism of the chassis engineering side. A V6 isn't such a radical departure from a V8 as an L4 is. It could have given another opportunity to Ferrari and Merc by comming up with a superior chassis integration. This was the reason why Red Bull supported the move to V6. Newey was dead against it.

[Tommy Cookers]

@pgfpro
sorry, no
Ferrari had brought Michael May for the DI work on the V6 (but then they went V8)
he had invented a winged car in 1955, but the officials wouldn't let him race it
he sold his high turbulence lean burning head to Jaguar (used as an option on the V12)

[oldtony]

Interesting, I always thought that head was developed at Ricardos.
Was the Ferrari "blackmail" so effective that the V6 format became fixed.
My understanding was that it was as much "F1 marketing" as "Ferrari marketing".
Fan forums, and the Bernie factor seemed to get their nghties in Knots about the sound and the implcation that 4 was not technicaly advanced enough for F1.
Now if anyone could come up with a list of very interesting and high development technologies that have been specifically banned by F1 over recent years it would read like opportunity lost.

[piast9]

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?

2014 regulations say (p. 5.8.3) that the flow of the fuel supplied to the injectors has to be measured. So the measurement will be taken after the pump, at the high pressure line to the injector. Since liquids are practically non-compressible I don't think that such "buffer" is possible.

[WhiteBlue]

The whole control system which obviously comprises the fuel flow measurement is standardized and FiA controlled spec. I see very little opportunity to cheat with this system unless you want to fundamentally mess around with sealed technology. The teams typically don't do that. The last guy who was known to do such things was Briatore (manipulated refuelling rig) and he got a life time ban for for instructing Piquet jr. to crash in Singapore 2008. I don't think anybody else would risk to fool around with the fuel system.

[Tommy Cookers]

the teams do typically burn 2 or 3 kg of oil in the engines cylinders in a race
engine power comes from that oil burning

[pgfpro]

Tuning with after market EFI engine management systems it still surprises me how accurate the fuel mileage mode of these systems today are. I'm sure the rule makers will also be keeping a close eye on these systems also.

the teams do typically burn 2 or 3 kg of oil in the engines cylinders in a race
engine power comes from that oil burning

Something I never thought of. Every little bit helps;)

[langwadt]

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?

2014 regulations say (p. 5.8.3) that the flow of the fuel supplied to the injectors has to be measured. So the measurement will be taken after the pump, at the high pressure line to the injector. Since liquids are practically non-compressible I don't think that such "buffer" is possible.

you just need to have an "air bubble" or bladder with compressed gas, say nitrogen, in the buffer tank. that is how hydraulic buffers work

but I'm sure all those parts will be strictly controlled

[langwadt]

The whole control system which obviously comprises the fuel flow measurement is standardized and FiA controlled spec. I see very little opportunity to cheat with this system unless you want to fundamentally mess around with sealed technology. The teams typically don't do that. The last guy who was known to do such things was Briatore (manipulated refuelling rig) and he got a life time ban for for instructing Piquet jr. to crash in Singapore 2008. I don't think anybody else would risk to fool around with the fuel system.

think what would come closest was Toyotas clever restrictor bypass http://homepage.virgin.net/shalco.com/tte_ban.htm

[noname]

Since liquids are practically non-compressible I don't think that such "buffer" is possible.

They are, and the amount is not negligible. It's just the matter of doing enough work on the system.

[WhiteBlue]

Since liquids are practically non-compressible I don't think that such "buffer" is possible.

They are, and the amount is not negligible. It's just the matter of doing enough work on the system.

I have yet to be convinced.

Lets assume you cannot cheat the system on an ongoing basis because the flow control really works. All you can do is temporarily stash away some fuel at a time when you are not utilizing the full flow rate. And then at the peak demand you utilize that cleverly stowed away fuel to achieve greater peak power than your competitor.

I can theoretically envision such a system but I still fail to find any meaningful numbers that would motivate me using it.

[piast9]

you just need to have an "air bubble" or bladder with compressed gas, say nitrogen, in the buffer tank. that is how hydraulic buffers work

There's no such thing as "air bubble" at 500 bar. I've quickly checked several gases and they are either liquid or supercritical fluid at 500 bar at normal temperature.

The regulations say that flow "supplied to the injectors" has to be measured, not supplied to the bladder or something else. And the injectors have to be homologated by FIA. I really see little room for "clever" solutions.