Cosworth, Xtrac and Ricardo win engine tender

[Belatti]

Am I alone in thinking that Bernie/FIA are intent on selling mere spectacle - sizzle rather than steak? ...

No, you are not.



Once, a smart one arround this forum said history doesn´t repeat itself, but certainly rhymes. Well, let predict a rhyme that may happen, but without the exactly rhyming words, I´m not that good on poetry as the one arround this forum

You can fool some people sometimes, but you cant fool all the people all the time.

Basically, when the people finds out its oppressed by dictators they rebel. Shall the revolution begin.

[timbo]

I remember metal suspension in 1994 when the Imola accident happened. Perhaps they did titanium at that time which would also be ok. I believe that they started composite around the turn of the millenium. It is a terrible waste of labour to recertify those things for every race. I cannot imagine that it is really significant in terms of weight saving. At least titanium you can use a whole season.

So, you don't think that suspension was part of the accident? I think carbon suspension struts are much more safe, and going back to metal would be a step back.

[xpensive]

Konowing that I am repeating my self endlessly here, but anyway, here we go.

After reading Ciro's posting yesterday regarding FIA's tender for a standard engine, I cannot see why Cosworth's offer would have to be a 3.5 l petrol V8?
Said tender asks for 500+/- 50 kW (610 to 750 Hp), turbo or not, which is a very nice description of Cosworth's far and away biggest seller, the 2.6l methanol Turbo V8, in 2007 used in the now defunct CART series.

I's basically the same physical size as today's F1 engines, they already exist in large enough numbers and would thus be quickly available and provide an enormous cost reduction, they are "green" and could with its lower rpm's easily be made to last six races.

Asfor those not so happy with a Cossie in the back (Mercedes, Ferrari,Toyota and BMW), they all have previous experience of building similar units. Porsche too, by the way.

Oh I'm sorry, not BMW, but the gallant people of Bavaria are quick learners, or so I hear anyway.

[WhiteBlue]

I know you love the idea but I see low probability in that move. If the FiA would make that engine the reference and force all participant on that fuel it would deliberately alianite the five manufacturers. They would invite all kinds of trouble with equalization which we have been through when V8 and V10s were competing and turbo and naturally aspired engines were competing. Why would they do this if they have a simple solution in hand?

Believe me Mr. Mosley may have unusual sexual preferences but he is no fool. As certainly as the sun will go up and down two times until the WMSC meets in Paris I expect them to use the same engine that the manufacturers have. I have read a comment by Mario Illien reported by Auto Motor und Sport's Michael Schmidt that Cosworth have mainly won the tender because they had the 2006 F1 V8 2.4L ready in the drawer while he had to design something from scratch. HERE.

I believe that Illien must know what he is talking about. He was party to the tender and must have pretty good intelligence about his competitors. According to AMuS he also supplies 70 engines to the IRL presently. So he knows what engines are on the market in the US. How could a move like the 2.65 L V8 have escaped a person so deeply involved?

[xpensive]

One can of course speculate over the specific reasons why Cosworth won the tender, prize is one obvious parameter, while the ability to credibly supply five teams already by 2010 another, is possibly even more important.

I am naive enough to believe that the latter held the key here. In theory, the winner of said tender could have to supply ten teams by 2010, something Ilmor or Mechachome don't have any experinence of, while Cosworth indeed do.

With the methanol burners, they could do it today.

[Ciro Pabón]

so what will be the point of watching then?

a series that costs 100times more than IRL wiht steel suspension and some greenie gimmicks slap on to turn even slower lap times?

Flyn, I've lost the count of the many times I've bursted in laugh at the first sight of your posts. Thanks, man, I'm still laughing after a minute or so.

I think you're right on the money.

On the other hand, people around this site, maybe, don't fit the regular fan profile.

Besides, you know I see all this brouhaha about gas ICE as irrelevant, in the long term.

For example, according to Treehugger and The Sun (not the best sources) Mercedes won't use engines that run on fossil fuel beyond 2015.

Expensive (and beautiful) planned obsolescence


Treehugger Mercedes: ugly as an ugly second-cousin-once-removed, I think


Thanks for all the nice comments, but c'mon, be realistic, nothing substitutes hands-on experience, like the one scarbs, Reca, flynfrog, riff_raff, green power dude reloaded, donskar or Belatti have. Besides, as WB hints, what matters is not a quick reading of what FIA asked, but a thorough reading of what Cosworth answered and that's not available, that I know.

Final: donskar, yes, at first sight the "0.5% parameter band" seems to be the "poison-pill" clause. Who knows, manufacturers haven't talked yet. 0.5%?

"You aren't gonna say you have a bad feeling about this, are you? I hate it when you say that" -- Han Solo to Luke --
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsVsBwLNPpo[/youtube]

... wake me up inside!

[WhiteBlue]

Expensive, I don't need to speculate. We have a quotation by Mario Illien referring specifically to the 2006 V8. I have given you the source of that quote. It is a motor magazine with excellent reputation of 62 years in business with a million copies per month. Schmidt has been in F1 for ages and is very well reputed. He would never misquote someone on such an essential matter.

[xpensive]

One thing I have learned tru life, WB, is that nothing ia safe but death and taxes.
and not necessarily in that order either.

[Ciro Pabón]

Well, WB, I noticed that the link you gave is written in german. Could you quote in english the relevant parts?

I think that Mr. Illien theory could be wrong. I call it a theory because I don't think he had access to his competitor's proposals before the tender was awarded: he's swiss, that says it all. If he were colombian...

Besides, Mr. Illien has been known to make mistakes (unlike me). For example, I can quote him saying:

"Ilmor... is the frontrunner should Formula 1 become a single engine formula"

"... the ideal engine for an imminent standard formula would be an approximately 3-litre V8 with about a 14,000-rev limit."

So much for Mr. Illien never being mistaken. So, let's speculate, using my infallibility (donskar's style: no mistakes in the last five minutes).

I can understand his/yours point of view, as Cosworth is allegedly providing what Mr. Mosley calls "a current Formula One engine", which leads us to assume that it’s the already homologated V8 last seen running in the back of a Williams at the end of 2006.

The letter that states this phrase is incredibly transparent, at least compared with NASCAR, a series that doesn't even publish its own regulations.

It's even signed "Yours sincerely, Max Mosley", but I second flynfrog in his doubts about Mr. Mosley's sincerity (check the video I posted three posts before, which sums up nicely my point of view). I wouldn't say that Mr. Mosley is a despicable compulsive liar that lives a double life that even his wife doesn't know about, but I might (hey, I just said it ).

- However, I can point to Cosworth itself saying about the CA 2006:

"The 2008 FIA Technical and Sporting Regulations included some very significant changes with respect to engines... These regulations significantly limit the scope and potential performance gains associated with ongoing engine development." That doesn't sound like "current" to me.

CA 2006, 2398cc, 755BHP, 20,000rpm, the envy of BMW: is this what 2010 will bring us? Keep reading: as usual, I have an outrageous theory


- Second however: I don't subscribe to xpensive's point of view, either. Cosworth quotes no one less than Gordon Kirby saying: "“The venerable Cosworth XFE turbo V-8 that will power each and every Champ Car in the 2007 season, sounds even better this year.” Venerable. That's not a synonim for "current", at least in my country, even if, hypothetically, that engine could be running on regular gas.

Is xpensive right on the mark? Cosworth XFE, the engine that gave instant credibility to Champcar (not to mention better lap times at Laguna Seca than Toyota's F1 cars... at 5 million dollars less per car )


- Third however: this is when this post really gets thick.

I read a couple of months ago, at our sister site, Racecar Engineering, a great article, containing the following (in a really small-font image title):

"Cosworth's last V10 engine was the TJ, introduced with Jaguar Racing in 2003. It replaced the LK, the engine that gave Giancarlo Fisichella his win at Brazil that year with Jordan Grand Prix.

"Following significant developments, the TJ (itself a 90-degree V10) included many of the elements that would have allowed Cosworth to simplify its transition to V8.

"However, the FIA had decreed other requirements too, including a minimum crank axis and centre of gravity height. With this in mind, and with progress it had made on combustion and piston design, Cosworth decided to take the opportunity of the rule change to produce a completely new engine.

"The TJ had not taken full advantage of the rules on bore diameter, falling short of the maximum at only 95mm. So, during its development, the company experimented with various bore sizes but, as the aspect ratio of the combustion chamber changed with increasing bore size, the combustion processes suffered.

"Since then, much work has been done on single-cylinder test engines to develop mixture preparation, combustion chamber and injector design to make the larger bore size effective."

Last known incarnation of Cosworth engines. CA 2006 on the left, TJ 2005 on the right. Nice room!



Mmmmm. Could Mr. Illien have been taken by surprise by the "much work" done at Cosworth? That's was my first thought when I read Mosley's letter. After all, Mercedes had all the aces up its collective sleeve. Why didn't they win? I'll be there, I promess. Give me one minute more.

Fourth however: race nuts will love this part. Posts here rarely get weirder than this part, let me tell you.

I got a PDF by Alan Lis some time ago and I read it from top to bottom, twice. Recommended, btw. I quote the relevant parts:

“We learned a lot from that engine,” says principal engineer James Allen. “We had a target from the beginning of running to 20,000 rpm, which we did with that engine, and so we were able to explore the torsional vibration behaviour across the whole speed range. It’s such a big speed range for an F1 engine that you encounter all sorts of problems and go through all sorts of different resonances."

We learned a lot. Aha. It continues:

“The progress Cosworth has made in terms of reducing losses has been significant,” says Simon Corbyn, head of F1 race engineering. “It is the cumulative effect of numerous detail design changes including reduced oil flow, bearing development, finger follower valve actuation and low friction coating technology. All of those things have added up together to give us the results we have now. The motored friction of a 2006 CA at 19,500 was the same as a 1996 JD at 16,500 if you normalise it for the reduced number of cylinders, and think that has been achieved in 10 years, that is pretty impressive.”

Frankly, I posted the previous paragraph for flyn only: c'mon, mate, it's not that bad. Aren't you interested already? It's truly (from the technical point of view) such a loss that kind of engine? You, better than anyone (except maybe Belatti) know how friction creates heat and thermodynamics go to hell, so...

Finally, I get to the point (phew!): for that, I have to go back to Racecar Engineering article again. I quote:

"Since 1999, Cosworth has used a 'beam head' design on its F1 engines. This concentrates metal in a tall, slim beam projecting up from the head along its entire length. The advantage is it gives the engine the maximum structural strength as a chassis component in the car with the minimum amount of material.

It was an effective way of retaining stiffness, while lowering the overall weight and the centre of gravity of the engine. When introduced, Cosworth was able to boast having shaved 30kg off the weight of the whole engine, making it probably the lightest in F1 at the time."

CA 200?. The magic is in the beam over the cylinders. Civil engineers will love that. Finite element analysis at its utmost. Check the seals of the pistons: that's what I call elegance


Is all that there is? No.

"However, in 2006, the new rules mandated a minimum centre of gravity height and minimum weight, plus carbon cam covers were banned, all of which drove head design in a different direction." I give this as an assignment: read in the article all what they had to do, but notice that they don't say they stopped development.

Final design in 2006. What has happened at Cosworth since?


So, my conclussion, for the few brave souls that made it to this point:

It's not that simple. Cosworth hasn't remained stationary. They probably have a new design that takes in account all they learned during 2006, there are too many clues. Take in account that is not Mosley the ones that checks the technical part of the tenders. They never gave up: they have kept developing an F1 engine, knowing that sooner or later they would have a chance. That's the way of the brave: keep moving and have faith in your own, unique style (hey, that's a motto I could take for myself).

So, I bet that the new engine we will get in 2010 will not be named CA2006, and if its name is CA2010, it will be a different beast. Besides, they have a full year to design it in its entirety and a brand name to defend. Tremble, Ferrari.

Oh, and take that, Mr. Illien.

Cosworth DFV: ain't Cosworth's works a beauty? People at Cosworth should be dancing (if britons could dance) around it, after winning the tender.


NOTE: All the above is pure, wild, latino-style, totally "Cirish" speculation. No engines were harmed during the writing of this post.

[xpensive]

Hats off Ciro, such an excellent review of a great engineering company.
After this, I am even more convinced of the methanol-turbo alternative.

[WhiteBlue]

Nice piece of work Ciro and kudos for getting such excellent material from inside sources.

You probably noticed that Illien was awarded with the contract for IRL. So its no big surprise that in the run up to the deal he suggsted that detuned engine format for F1. Btw, I'm not at all saying that he is allways right in what he says. I just say that he should better know than us what Cosworth quoted to the FiA. There were negotiations conducted and such things are never done without some insider information crossing over. Besides the information was probably exchanged after the contract was awarded and prior to publication. From the AMuS publication it is clear that Illien had underestimated the capability of Cosworth to come back from the severe personnel cut backs they had to do in 2006. Please forgive me for not translating all that stuff because it it rather tedious. I am prepared to give bullet points and URLs for people to check if they know the language.

Regarding the comment by Cosworth on the CA 2006.

These regulations significantly limit the scope and potential performance gains associated with ongoing engine development."

That most probably relates to the rpm reduction to 19.000 rpm which ran contrary to the 20.000 rpm achievement they claimed for the last race.

We do agree in our estimate that the 2010 Cosworth will be based on CA 2006 technology. It remains to be seen if the FiA will allow development beyond detuning the CA 2006 to make it fit for 4-5 race weekends. If they are fair they must allow the same kind of limited modifications to all engines.

In my view developments like internal friction reduction should not be impeded at all. All engine manufacturers should be encouraged to make any modification that improves the energy efficiency of the engine provided they are all on the same power output.

I must say that I'm extremely pleased if we get Cosworth back into F1 with a solid customer base. The story how they lost out in 2006 is very sad. If they become the hammer to force engine supply at resonable prices their return will do F1 a world of good.

[Belatti]

NOTE: All the above is pure, wild, latino-style, totally "Cirish" speculation. No engines were harmed during the writing of this post.

jejejeje... you enginehugger

[donskar]

Ho-hum, YAWN, just another GREAT POST from Ciro!

Thank you!

Maintaining friction level while increasing revs by 3,000 is a super achievement and just underscores what a great engine house Cosworth is and has been. Ferrari may have to bring back Paolo Martinelli and lure back Marmorini from Toyota!

Bottom line appears at this point to be that F1 will be blessed with a very fine power source. But is it not moving in the direction of becoming a Super Formula Ford?

Some of us will remember the great Cosworth DFV which (in various forms) remained competitive through THREE decades of F1 competition (late 60's to early 80's). We enjoyed good racing, great drivers, lots of variety AND technical innovation. Effective aero, carbon fiber tubs, automatic transmissions - all came during the DFV era. Now. however, it seems the window of innovation is a mere slit.

We'll see . . .

[WhiteBlue]

When I look at the poll I see that for every positive vote for output regulated engines we have three people being against it. This strikes me as somewhat irrational!

If we go 20 years back in time to the 3.5L engines we see a constant struggle to gain performance by getting more and more power out of the engine. At the same time we witness regular cut backs in power by going to 3L in 1995, to 2.4L in 1996 and by cutting revs from over 20.000 back to 19.000 in 1997. Now the talk of the FOTA is about a 1.8L engine for 2011.

The whole of the R&D effort to raise power is negated in regular intervalls in order to maintain an acceptable level of track and car safety. Those power cuts are as unavoidable as spring follows winter while the earth rotates around the sun. By now everybody ought to have learned that lesson.

What is that vicious circle doing to the cost of competing and the spread of competitiveness over the teams? Every cut back and new start ties up huge capital resources at the manufacturers of drive trains. At the same time it opens a gap between the performance of rich teams and poorer teams. This is because the rich teams can afford to start from scratch and redo every single component of the chassis and optimize it to the new weight distribution and aerodynamics that necessarily come with the power discontinuities.

If this is not bad enough you also have secondary effects during the intervalls of constant engine capacity. Because everybody knows how bad a power cut is they tried to delay it as long as possible. During the longest intervall (1995-2006) the performance and particularly the cornering speed increased at such a steep rate that massive safety requirements were forced on track owners and chassis contructors to avoid a fatalities. Run offs were increased, grand stands removed from the tracks, barriers upgraded and gravel pits turned into huge asphalt areas. The passive safety requirements for front, side and rear impact were jacked up in several steps, HANS was made mandatory, high cockpit walls introduced and wide cockpit templates all in an attempt to cope with ever increasing cornering speeds.

While I write this up it looks pretty mad to me that nobody spotted the nonsense in this. There is no sensible strategy in the sport. This is what lemmings do. They continue their behavioral pattern right into the abyss. So why is it so hard to understand that F1 needs a fixed level of power to do much better in the future? The main ingredient of motorsport is the competitive gain of performance in order to win. Sure, you can do that by ever increasing power and energy budget until safety forces a cut. But why not keep the power fixed by regulations and let the performance develop by increasing efficiency?

It may not have been possible in the past because they did not have the sensors to effectively control the power of an engine. For some years such instrumentation isn't a fundamental problem any more. So by fixing the available power at least the secondary knock on effects of the performance race to chassis designers and track owners could be avoided.

Fixing the power would also have a beneficiary effect for the power train manufacturers. If the total power of the engine plus the regenerated power from KERS and HERS is kept constant, every performance gain must come from efficiency improvements. This is what they desperately need to find for their core business in this day and age.

Because power is fixed there would be a continous downgrading of ICE power and fuel consumption. This would require a constant efficiency development of the combustion engine, the KERS and HERS. Whith long life engines and non manufacturer teams pooling their development contributions to an independant power train supplier the manufacturing teams could be given much more design freedom to innovate. There would be constant change without big readjusting steps that shake up the competition landscape.

In my view such a system could be much simpler in terms of regulations and control. The benefits to all stake holders of GP racing could be massive. And this brings me back to my question from the top. Why are the knowedgeable people of this board not seeing the opportunities of such a strategy? I still do not understand it!

[donskar]

First, I'm harried. Forgive typos and possible abruptness! No offense meant!
Second, a semi-apology: I could not read past your opening statement:

When I look at the poll I see that for every positive vote for output regulated engines we have three people being against it. This strikes me as somewhat irrational!

Well, it could be said that you are irrational for assuming that a very clear majority of very interested, involved, and knowledgeable persons is not rational.

Look, it's simpler than you make it out to be. KERS, HERS, BMEP, kW, HP, cD are all secondary to the primary subject - auto racing. That's when two men (usually) or groups of men build a car with the purpose of going faster than the other guys. From the very beginning, through European roads and around converted US horse-racing ovals, one central goal was MORE HP. Of course, brakes, suspension, and (later) aero were important, but MOST racing enthusiasts would agree with Enzo - the engine is the heart of a race car.

You can go on and on and I'm sure you will, but you will remain in the minority (and that's perfectly OK). MOST fans of the "pinnacle of motorsports" are opposed to stifling regulations -- especially regulations that impose a power limit. That smacks of FF and similar formulae.

We now have restrictions or proposed restrictions on suspension, brakes, transmissions, aero, engines, fuel, wheels, tires, and whatever I've missed. And I feel confident in saying that the majority of enthusiasts do NOT accept the tradeoff of "green" initiatives for all the restrictions besetting F1.

We (enthusiasts) want exciting engineering and close racing. The spectators (who are more important to those in power) want spectacle. There's no "spectacle" in an electric motor. And all the restrictions listed above make it difficult to foresee much exciting engineering.

Bottom line: F1 cars ("the pinnacle") are forbidden from using much of the technology found on my wife's Camry and my daughter's Tundra. That is a shame and a disgrace that no amount of argument can overcome.