Honda Power Unit Hardware & Software

[godlameroso]

What strikes me as odd is that the turbos on these F1 power units are things you see on 1,300hp+ cars, yet the F1 ICE can't produce more than 850hp on it's best day. It would imply that these ICE's are running as high as 21:1 AFR's which is unbelievable.

Compare this to pictures of the turbos on these F1 cars, and minus the MGU-H they're more or less the same capacity.

[Nonserviam85]

What strikes me as odd is that the turbos on these F1 power units are things you see on 1,300hp+ cars, yet the F1 ICE can't produce more than 850hp on it's best day. It would imply that these ICE's are running as high as 21:1 AFR's which is unbelievable.

Compare this to pictures of the turbos on these F1 cars, and minus the MGU-H they're more or less the same capacity.
http://www.speednik.com/files/2014/11/a ... st-et1.jpg

I guess restricted fuel,fuel flow and weight might be the answer

[JonoNic]

What strikes me as odd is that the turbos on these F1 power units are things you see on 1,300hp+ cars, yet the F1 ICE can't produce more than 850hp on it's best day. It would imply that these ICE's are running as high as 21:1 AFR's which is unbelievable.

Compare this to pictures of the turbos on these F1 cars, and minus the MGU-H they're more or less the same capacity.

How far can these 1,300hp+ cars go with the amount of fuel that a F1 car uses in a race of 300km?

[godlameroso]

What strikes me as odd is that the turbos on these F1 power units are things you see on 1,300hp+ cars, yet the F1 ICE can't produce more than 850hp on it's best day. It would imply that these ICE's are running as high as 21:1 AFR's which is unbelievable.

Compare this to pictures of the turbos on these F1 cars, and minus the MGU-H they're more or less the same capacity.
http://www.speednik.com/files/2014/11/a ... st-et1.jpg

How far can these 1,300hp+ cars go with the amount of fuel that a F1 car uses in a race of 300km?

Considering this car has two stage fuel injection and 2,500cc's worth of fuel injection per cylinder, compared to ~900cc max in F1, I'd say F1 uses ~40% the fuel. Which isn't bad since you're making 300hp less using just over a 1/3rd of the fuel. It's actually pretty crazy when you see it in numbers you understand.

[PlatinumZealot]

The point of his post is that the size of turbocharger on the drag car above is made to flow enough air for 1300hp. That size is also similar to what is used in F1 except F1 cars only make around 850hp from the ICE. Therefore stoichiometric air for 1300hp / fuel for 850hp equals 1.5 times the stoic air fuel ratio. So 1.5 x 14 or thereabouts equals 21.

[Nonserviam85]

The point of his post is that the size of turbocharger on the drag car above is made to flow enough air for 1300hp. That size is also similar to what is used in F1 except F1 cars only make around 850hp from the ICE. Therefore stoichiometric air for 1300hp / fuel for 850hp equals 1.5 times the stoic air fuel ratio. So 1.5 x 14 or thereabouts equals 21.

I think everyone agrees by now that running so lean is key for this era of Formula1 power units.

[Singabule]

What the benefit of using machined valve cover and head ala merc compared to casted ala honda? I think machined head is overhype, no need to do that at all. Merc is doing germany, overengineered

[Craigy]

What the benefit of using machined valve cover and head ala merc compared to casted ala honda? I think machined head is overhype, no need to do that at all. Merc is doing germany, overengineered

Given that the whole thing is made in the UK I don't get the "germany" reference. Please do explain.

[Singabule]

What the benefit of using machined valve cover and head ala merc compared to casted ala honda? I think machined head is overhype, no need to do that at all. Merc is doing germany, overengineered

Given that the whole thing is made in the UK I don't get the "germany" reference. Please do explain.

I forgot that the engine is made in UK brixwotrh, it just stereotype being german manufacturer for me. Yeah, just wondering why in common sense machining is always better than casting.

[MrPotatoHead]

What the benefit of using machined valve cover and head ala merc compared to casted ala honda? I think machined head is overhype, no need to do that at all. Merc is doing germany, overengineered

There are many reasons why you would use machined billet parts over cast.
The first of which is that a machined piece is normally stronger than its cast counterpart, especially important in a fully stressed engine component.
Secondly casting is expensive to setup and time consuming - it's more for large production parts than short run parts.

But I'm betting the cylinder head on the Mercedes engines are not machined and are cast along with the engine block.
It's incredibly difficult to machine a billet head or block with coolant passageways as intricate as on an F1 engine.

Everything I engineer on F1 cars is made from billet.

[Zynerji]

What the benefit of using machined valve cover and head ala merc compared to casted ala honda? I think machined head is overhype, no need to do that at all. Merc is doing germany, overengineered

There are many reasons why you would use machined billet parts over cast.
The first of which is that a machined piece is normally stronger than its cast counterpart, especially important in a fully stressed engine component.
Secondly casting is expensive to setup and time consuming - it's more for large production parts than short run parts.

But I'm betting the cylinder head on the Mercedes engines are not machined and are cast along with the engine block.
It's incredibly difficult to machine a billet head or block with coolant passageways as intricate as on an F1 engine.

Everything I engineer on F1 cars is made from billet.

Do the F1 manufacturers not follow what BMW did with their 2.4l V8?

They cast the head and cylinder block as a single unit to get rid of the head gasket weakness... after reading the BMW whitepaper by Theissen, I figured all manufacturers would follow suit...

[MrPotatoHead]

What the benefit of using machined valve cover and head ala merc compared to casted ala honda? I think machined head is overhype, no need to do that at all. Merc is doing germany, overengineered

There are many reasons why you would use machined billet parts over cast.
The first of which is that a machined piece is normally stronger than its cast counterpart, especially important in a fully stressed engine component.
Secondly casting is expensive to setup and time consuming - it's more for large production parts than short run parts.

But I'm betting the cylinder head on the Mercedes engines are not machined and are cast along with the engine block.
It's incredibly difficult to machine a billet head or block with coolant passageways as intricate as on an F1 engine.

Everything I engineer on F1 cars is made from billet.

Do the F1 manufacturers not follow what BMW did with their 2.4l V8?

They cast the head and cylinder block as a single unit to get rid of the head gasket weakness... after reading the BMW whitepaper by Theissen, I figured all manufacturers would follow suit...

No not really because of the incredible difficulty of machining the valve seat pockets, seats and combustion chamber that comes with doing it this way.

And BMW only did that for one year during the development of the P85 engine which never raced because of rule changes that made engines have to last a lot longer.
You can read about that and the casting in the white paper you talk of here:

http://sd-2.archive-host.com/membres/up ... BMW_F1.pdf

[godlameroso]

Cast engines are machined as well, and If your casting process is good, the structure of your metal will be as good as any forging. The biggest advantage of a billet block over a mass produced block, is block architecture, not because a billet is inherently stronger than a cast part. If the billet is stronger than a cast part, again it's more architecture than alloy strength.

For example if you're making a billet engine version of a 2jz, or ej20, or 4g63, you can add cylinder wall or deck thickness, you can add ribs to strengthen a cylinder, or extra cooling jackets. In short billet is used to overcome structural limitations in cheap mass produced engine blocks. But if you're making one off engines with one off manufacturing methods, you can make a cast part just as strong. It all depends on the material being used, the process and block architecture.

[dren]

Wouldn't you just design that into your cast block, already?

[MrPotatoHead]

Of course a casting is machined after the fact. That's a given.

But I have to disagree with you on your other comments.

When you compare a casting to a machined billet more often than not the billet material has been forged to increase the material density and strength. The billet part is stronger as a result.
Even if it's not a specific near net forging the material is general forged and rolled into the billet.

Castings tend to be more brittle also as a result of the casting process.