Ferrari Power Unit Hardware & Software

[kalinka]

Just a quick possibility without thinking too much over it ( so there may be no benefits if looking at it in more detail )>

What if they have 2xES, the larger one dedicated to K, and the smaller one dedicated to H. They can be in a same "box", but treated as different packs electronically. This way they can run them independently and/or in a more flexible way.
Since the H is more "unregulated", they can design the dedicated part let's say to have smaller capacity but higher output rate, or any other parameter combination that is more suitable for the H.
They can still retain the possibility to power K or H from any of them by having a slightly more complicated and heavier control electronics. Of course the direct H->K pathway is also possible.
Just a quick brainfart. Don't take it too seriously.

[dfegan358]

If the FIA seemed Ferrari battery/software/ERS to be fully legal in Monaco, why are they continuing to put monitors/sensors in place on the ferraris in Montreal for Canada GP?

[LM10]

If the FIA seemed Ferrari battery/software/ERS to be fully legal in Monaco, why are they continuing to put monitors/sensors in place on the ferraris in Montreal for Canada GP?

This article from motorsport.com might answer your questions (in particular the highlighted parts):

Formula 1 race director Charlie Whiting is confident that new software will make it easier for the governing body to monitor Ferrari's ERS system, which has been questioned by rival teams.

The FIA has been looking at the Ferrari ERS and unique twin-battery arrangement since the Azerbaijan GP, and Whiting confirmed after Thursday's running in Monaco that he was now satisfied with it.

Contrary to earlier reports, Whiting says no extra sensors were fitted to the Ferraris in Monaco, and instead the FIA had to pursue a more complicated process to check how the system was operating.

The new software, which will be used from the Canadian GP onwards, will streamline that process and allow the FIA to continue to keep a close watch.

"Via a complex routine we were able to be satisfied that the Ferrari was OK," said Whiting. "But we don't want to have to go through that all the time in order to make sure, so we would rather additional measurements are made.

"What we will have for Canada will be a better system which will help us get things done much, much quicker, because it's taken us a couple of races to get to the bottom of it.

"We want them to put extra monitoring on, but at the moment we're having to do it in a painstaking way. It takes a little longer than we would like. We'll arrive at the same conclusion, I would imagine. In Canada they will be providing a change of software.

"What we're trying to do is to monitor exactly what the differences between the two halves of the battery are. That's the crux of the matter.

"Other systems treat their battery as one. Ferrari, it's one battery, but they treat it as two. That's the fundamental difference, I don't think it's a secret I'm giving away there."

Whiting says it would not be easy to fit sensors.

"It's not simple, because these things, not only are they sealed, because they only have two if them for the season, it's not just a straight matter of plucking a sensor off the shelf, and putting it on. It needs better integration for that.

"I'm not sure when any more additional sensors can be fitted. Probably not until next year, if the truth be known."

He admitted that it had been a complex problem for the FIA to address.

"We really have been trying to get to the point where we are entirely satisfied that the power being delivered to the MGU-K is correct.

"It was difficult to explain exactly what we were seeing, that's what we kept going through with Ferrari, because it's a very complex and totally different system to anybody else's.

"And in much the same way as we do with other bits of the car, we have to understand these things, it just took us a bit longer to understand what was going on.

"Their duty is to satisfy us that the car complies, as you know, but they were finding it hard to satisfy us.

"I think it's wrong to say that Ferrari didn't communicate, because they've been very helpful the whole way.

"It's just been very painstaking and detailed work to try to get to the bottom of how their system works, and hence give us the comfort that we need."

[dfegan358]

so do we expect 15-20 BHP boost from the new engine in canada?

noticed in other thread - renault engine upgrade worth 10-12 bhp gain - despite claims of renault that they would close the deficit to ferrari/mercedes with their montreal update. it may end up they are further behind with their engine after montreal.

[Muniix]

I understand what you're saying, but I think there are bigger gains elsewhere. No need to cheat for such a small gain.
I think there is enough energy during Q for supercharging mode if they use motorgenereting + extra harvestand and also hot blowing.
I believe huge amount of energy is deployed during Q lap.

You may be right. Have you run any numbers on your theory?

What is hot blowing?

My aim was to try to make sense of the reports we are seeing. My use case may not be the only one in which an extension of the SoC would be useful.

I have not done any numbers, but if I had to make a guess, I would say 10MJ+ during Q3 lap deployed by K and H. (I can't remember what was estimated power consumption of compressor. 60kw?)

Hot blowing example, during corner run ICE at full throttle, but delay spark, so ICE makes very little power at the crank, but sends lots of energy to the turbine so it can be harvesters by MGU-H.

It was done before in F1 during eighties to keep the turbo spinning during corner,
and also during v8 engines to keep EBD diffuser "powered" also while cornering.

Hot blowing when operating in a ultra lean mode of TJI supports dual mode, that is injecting additional fuel at or near, shortly after LPP crank angle location of peak cylinder pressure of the initial pre-mixed combustion. Cylinder heat and turbulence vaporise and mix the fuel which combusts with the additional oxygen available from ultra-lean operation.
This will give additional exhaust enthalpy for the MGU-h as well as additional crankshaft torque with a slight reduction in the expansion ratio that is part compensated due to improved crank/rod angles where cylinder pressure is increased and it's interaction with side thrust force and the interrelated piston friction effects. A second LPP is possible.

Blowdown is the only real concern for efficiency, the gasses move out of the cylinder before BDC with similar cylinder pressure.

Advanta

[Muniix]

I would think Ferrari use twin ES each with its own energy and power density optimised for short and longer term storage.
Different thermal behavior maybe even a hybrid energy storage solution I've had to employ due to the constraints of Li-ion by super capacitors reducing thermal load on chemical energy storage when you've got higher energy density graphene super capacitors in a small volume with little mass.
Splitting them for thermal management greater surface area. The design challenges would suggest this is a logical solution.
You can't be pushing and pulling electrons though Li-ion at high duty cycles they will go exothermic with energy density not far behind Dynamite.
The electrolyte wants to do this.

[PlatinumZealot]

According to the article it is one battery but treated as two by the software. The fun part is figuring out what is there to gain from doing this.

I feel it is done to increase reliabilty. Analogous to solid state hard drives, there is a small amount of space allocated for maintenance.

[Big Tea]

According to the article it is one battery but treated as two by the software. The fun part is figuring out what is there to gain from doing this.

I wonder if they can access banks of cells separately? Would Computer controlled storage and use spread over a set sequence save heat etc? ~They could then cool one section more efficiently for the short term storage and 'shunt' some into a section for later use with maybe not so efficient cooling.

(yes, I am probably talking nonsense)

[Jejking]

According to the article it is one battery but treated as two by the software. The fun part is figuring out what is there to gain from doing this.

I feel it is done to increase reliabilty. Analogous to solid state hard drives, there is a small amount of space allocated for maintenance.

Also they could balance the load, in SSDs the software would make sure data would be distributed across basically the whole SSD, so that all cells would be used evenly. This lengthens the lifespan. I'm starting to think that by dividing the load, it would be a way of temperature control. In the V8 era the manufacturers would split the engine duty on the grid by software too, with the left bank ticking over and then the right. The other side therefore had time to 'cool off', or at least not get hotter with no airflow. So I suspect this is either lifespan or temperature control.

[turbof1]

According to the article it is one battery but treated as two by the software. The fun part is figuring out what is there to gain from doing this.

I feel it is done to increase reliabilty. Analogous to solid state hard drives, there is a small amount of space allocated for maintenance.

Also they could balance the load, in SSDs the software would make sure data would be distributed across basically the whole SSD, so that all cells would be used evenly. This lengthens the lifespan. I'm starting to think that by dividing the load, it would be a way of temperature control. In the V8 era the manufacturers would split the engine duty on the grid by software too, with the left bank ticking over and then the right. The other side therefore had time to 'cool off', or at least not get hotter with no airflow. So I suspect this is either lifespan or temperature control.

This sounds quite plausible, but not something the FIA and the other PU manufacturers would make a fuss about.

Maybe they have a different number of power cells allocated to the MGU-H and the MGU-K? What else would be the point of splitting the ES in 2 other than the 2 motor generator units that interact with the ES.

Is there anything possible with the conversion from AC to DC?

EDIT: also what are the actual FIA mandated sensors? I know about the fuel flow sensor, but I can't seem to find info on other sensors regarding the power unit. Specifically I have to know if there is a mandated sensor between the MGU-K and the ICE/crankshaft.

[kalinka]

Is there anything possible with the conversion from AC to DC?

Not much IMO, there are already electronic components out there for years now, with you can almost do 100% efficient AC->DC conversion. The technology is using Silicon-Carbide power MOSFETs. I have worked only with moderate-power ones, but you can find commercial products already in 600+ Amp region, so a very high power converter can be built easily with F1 resources.
https://www.semikron.com/innovation-tec ... MwEALw_wcB

[henry]

According to the article it is one battery but treated as two by the software. The fun part is figuring out what is there to gain from doing this.

I feel it is done to increase reliabilty. Analogous to solid state hard drives, there is a small amount of space allocated for maintenance.

Also they could balance the load, in SSDs the software would make sure data would be distributed across basically the whole SSD, so that all cells would be used evenly. This lengthens the lifespan. I'm starting to think that by dividing the load, it would be a way of temperature control. In the V8 era the manufacturers would split the engine duty on the grid by software too, with the left bank ticking over and then the right. The other side therefore had time to 'cool off', or at least not get hotter with no airflow. So I suspect this is either lifespan or temperature control.

This sounds quite plausible, but not something the FIA and the other PU manufacturers would make a fuss about.

Maybe they have a different number of power cells allocated to the MGU-H and the MGU-K? What else would be the point of splitting the ES in 2 other than the 2 motor generator units that interact with the ES.

Is there anything possible with the conversion from AC to DC?

EDIT: also what are the actual FIA mandated sensors? I know about the fuel flow sensor, but I can't seem to find info on other sensors regarding the power unit. Specifically I have to know if there is a mandated sensor between the MGU-K and the ICE/crankshaft.

The energy flows and power are controlled by TWO DC sensors, @mudflap suggests they are these, https://www.isabellenhuette.de/fileadmi ... t_1.20.pdf.

They are connected so that one measures ALL the energy into and out of the ES and the other measures ALL the energy into and out of the MGU-K. The power at the MGU-K sensor is allowed to be higher than the specified 120kW to allow for conversion losses. The correction factor is 0.95.

According to the regulations there are not separate connections for the MGU-H and MGU-K to the ES. So to have two batteries each storing the energy for a specific MGU they need to split the DC on the ES side of the sensor.

To allocate one “battery” to each I think that to do that they would have to synchronise the measurements of the two sensors. That is likely to appear complex.

[63l8qrrfy6]

The only mandated sensor is the IVT between the ESS and inverter. Any improvement in the efficiency of the inverter, motor and even HV cables is free power.

Even though there are no mandatory sensors between crank and MGUK I know that most teams choose to monitor the torque between the two for reliability purposes. My brother in law works at torquemeters (http://www.torquemeters.com/applications/automotive/) and at the start of the V6 era they were supplying all engine manufacturers.

[turbof1]

The only mandated sensor is the IVT between the ESS and inverter. Any improvement in the efficiency of the inverter, motor and even HV cables is free power.

Even though there are no mandatory sensors between crank and MGUK I know that most teams choose to monitor the torque between the two for reliability purposes. My brother in law works at torquemeters (http://www.torquemeters.com/applications/automotive/) and at the start of the V6 era they were supplying all engine manufacturers.

So the FIA has no direct means of reading the MGU-K power output on the crank. I assume they can do so by calculations based on readings elsewhere? Because the mgu-h can deliver power through the mgu-k to the crank as well without going through the battery first.

[henry]

The only mandated sensor is the IVT between the ESS and inverter. Any improvement in the efficiency of the inverter, motor and even HV cables is free power.

Even though there are no mandatory sensors between crank and MGUK I know that most teams choose to monitor the torque between the two for reliability purposes. My brother in law works at torquemeters (http://www.torquemeters.com/applications/automotive/) and at the start of the V6 era they were supplying all engine manufacturers.

So the FIA has no direct means of reading the MGU-K power output on the crank. I assume they can do so by calculations based on readings elsewhere? Because the mgu-h can deliver power through the mgu-k to the crank as well without going through the battery first.

They don’t measure MGU-K power directly using a torque sensor, they do measure it using a single electrical sensor connected to the CU-K. they allow a maximum power of 126.3 kW at this measurement point. (120 / 0.95)

Measuring power would appear to be much more straightforward than measuring the energy flow. In the latter case the FIA want to measure flow between ES and MGU-K and somehow have to ignore the flows to/from the MGU-H.

Maybe the regulations are incomplete but as it is documented (page 105 of the 2018 regulations, dec 2017) they only require two sensors to measure all of the electrical flows.