OK so I was thinking about the effects of limited fuel flow with a cap at 10,500 rpm.
Here's a picture of power output vs rpm (pulling it totally out of my, erm, imagination)
Apparently the engine have a pronounced power peak at 10,500 rpm. There is a question where the slope would be steeper, I hope some more knowledgeble people can enlighten me on the subject.
The driver will have option of upshifting at the power max so the engine would work at "Band A" rpm band, or after the max "Band B" (and of course somewhere in between).
These two options would present a driver with different engine behavior and one or the other may be benefcial for a given set of conditions.
Here are some of my thoughts:
Speed and gear
- at lower speed the acceleration is limited by traction, so the driver want a more "progressive" engine. Shifting within "band A" would allow to limit wheelspeen and use more throttle earlier.
- at higher speed the acceleration is limited by power available, also it is beneficial to accelerate faster to spend more time at higher speed on the straight. So the driver would want max power possible as early as possible which makes shifting within "band B" more likely.
Qualifying vs race
- with limited amount of fuel shifting within the "band A" gives opportunity to save fuel, so in the race probably the drivers would tend to shift more within the "band A". In qualifying they would probably shift more in the "band B" then in the race.
I think fixed ratios and engine with a power peak would allow much more different strategies for extracting the maximum performance, and we would likely see much higher disperity in how the drivers use their engines.
Looking forward for that!
PS leaving the implications of HERS out of the picture completely which may add another dimension.