Honda Power Unit Hardware & Software

[Edis]

This might not be a populair view, but I would like to express it anyway:

Mclaren-Honda should stop making excuses.
...
Renault was very effective with the use of their tokens last winter, it can be done.

To me this 40 token requirement in order to become competitive sounds like another excuse. For so long, they have argued that there was nothing wrong with their PU architecture, Size Zero, the turbo size, or since 2016 their ERS systems. Now they need 40 tokens.

I generally agree, but you should know that Renault has problems with a very small portion of the engine - ice (combustion chamber, injectors,...),.. their ers and general architecture of the engine seem to be ok. And they also used last year's tokens to install larger turbo,.. Honda seems to require large engine architecture redesign and thus large amount of tokens.

That said, it seems Honda wasted last year's tokens for far too small gains. They used them for combustion chamber modification (and some other things??? - can't remember), but they still seem to be a long way behind in this department. I wonder, wouldn't it be wiser to spend last year's tokens right at the end of the year and combine them with this year's tokens. This way, they would have more tokens left for modifications through this year. Last year was a flop anyway.

In order to fit a larger turbo and MGU-H Honda first had to make more space by redesigning the plenum and variable length inlets and change the layout of the cylinder head ancillaries, and there wasn't enough tokens to do all that in 2015.

Instead Honda appears to have used the tokens they had left late last year to improve the bottom end of their engine, which won't do much for power output but should improve reliability.

It seems Honda have underestimated both MGU-H power requirement (60-70 kW vs 90 kW of last years Mercedes) and the air requirement of the engine, which have caused them to fit a turbo/MGU-H that is too small. Once they have discovered this, fitting a larger system isn't a simple modification due to the packaging.

[namao]

HONDA SET TO USE ALL ENGINE TOKENS BY SPA
http://www.grandprix247.com/2016/05/23/ ... ns-by-spa/

[GoranF1]

"I think there is some learning for 2017 if they can change some stuff in the 2016 engine.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.ph ... -2017-step

Compressor out of V ?

[Logie]

I think this is where Merc cracked it right

"The complexity is how to improve the harvesting without deteriorating the power. If one goes up, the other goes down. You need to have both together.

But why would they try improve the current PU in prep for 2017 when they plan to move the turbo as im guessing that is going to change a lot of things that are irrelevant on the 2016?

What happens if they say make changes which carry to 2017, move the turbo and it doesn't work?

[diffuser]

I think this is where Merc cracked it right

"The complexity is how to improve the harvesting without deteriorating the power. If one goes up, the other goes down. You need to have both together.

But why would they try improve the current PU in prep for 2017 when they plan to move the turbo as im guessing that is going to change a lot of things that are irrelevant on the 2016?

What happens if they say make changes which carry to 2017, move the turbo and it doesn't work?

It will work...they'll test it first!

That's one of those odd things with the token system. Definitely would have saved money if they could just skipped to next years design. unfortunately that's not possible.

Not sure why they made the RULE change for 2017 and NOT effective immediately. They're kind of in no man's land

[godlameroso]

I'm not convinced you HAVE to move the turbo out of the V, there's ways to increase space, particularly in the way the cylinder head is designed, and the internal geometry of the compressor. They still have the problems of last year, namely they cannot generate enough electrical energy. They may be recovering 70-80kW of power, and that's the number that gets thrown around here, I contend that the number they should be aiming at is ~140kW. It's a stretch but not an unrealistic number, there's at least 180kW that's available in the exhaust gases if everything is perfect, Mercedes claims 95% efficiency of the electric and turbo machinery so it's not impossible to think that they're self sustaining mode delivers 120kw to the mgu-k but also charges the battery simultaneously.

[j.yank]

I'm not convinced you HAVE to move the turbo out of the V, there's ways to increase space, particularly in the way the cylinder head is designed, and the internal geometry of the compressor. They still have the problems of last year, namely they cannot generate enough electrical energy. They may be recovering 70-80kW of power, and that's the number that gets thrown around here, I contend that the number they should be aiming at is ~140kW. It's a stretch but not an unrealistic number, there's at least 180kW that's available in the exhaust gases if everything is perfect, Mercedes claims 95% efficiency of the electric and turbo machinery so it's not impossible to think that they're self sustaining mode delivers 120kw to the mgu-k but also charges the battery simultaneously.

No one knows what exactly are their problems or what are the actual numbers of their deficit in different parts of PU but speaking only from very generic point of view (only possible in our situation), they have 3 options: a) moving the compressor in front, b) to the back or c) to stay where it is now. Option a) means unchartered territory and one more wasted year trying to emulate approach of competitor that already have several years of experience in this territory. Option b) means to copy the approach of other two competitors that struggle to catch the leading PU for already three years without success. Option c) is most logical to me: you build on something that you already know all pluses and minuses. IMO I don't think that they will take the compressor out of V for 2017.

[Tommy Cookers]

......I contend that the number they should be aiming at is ~140kW. It's a stretch but not an unrealistic number, there's at least 180kW that's available in the exhaust gases if everything is perfect, Mercedes claims 95% efficiency of the electric and turbo machinery so it's not impossible to think that they're self sustaining mode delivers 120kw to the mgu-k but also charges the battery simultaneously.

surely there is about 95% efficiency available in the electrical machine and about 80% in the turbine ?

[diffuser]

I'm not convinced you HAVE to move the turbo out of the V, there's ways to increase space, particularly in the way the cylinder head is designed, and the internal geometry of the compressor. They still have the problems of last year, namely they cannot generate enough electrical energy. They may be recovering 70-80kW of power, and that's the number that gets thrown around here, I contend that the number they should be aiming at is ~140kW. It's a stretch but not an unrealistic number, there's at least 180kW that's available in the exhaust gases if everything is perfect, Mercedes claims 95% efficiency of the electric and turbo machinery so it's not impossible to think that they're self sustaining mode delivers 120kw to the mgu-k but also charges the battery simultaneously.

If i remember what Wazari wrote ..He said something along the lines that the space restrictions caused the compressor design to be an odd shape and difficult to tune ...

It was just one maybe two weeks ago over in the team thread I believe.

[gruntguru]

They may be recovering 70-80kW of power, and that's the number that gets thrown around here, I contend that the number they should be aiming at is ~140kW. It's a stretch but not an unrealistic number, there's at least 180kW that's available in the exhaust gases if everything is perfect, Mercedes claims 95% efficiency of the electric and turbo machinery so it's not impossible to think that they're self sustaining mode delivers 120kw to the mgu-k but also charges the battery simultaneously.

Don't know where you got the 180 kW but assuming that is correct - as Tommy said, turbine efficiency is about 80% at best leaving 144 kW turbine power minus 80 kW to drive the compressor leaving 64 kW for the MGUH.

[godlameroso]

180kW is roughly the total net potential power that the mgu-h can generate, this is after everything is taken into consideration. Power loss to crank, power to drive the turbo, pumping losses, heat losses, friction, etc. Clearly no one is getting 180kW, it's impressive, and not impossible with current technology to generate in the region of 140kw net, certainly in bursts of a few seconds per lap.

[NL_Fer]

I think what they did this year was already maximize the size what is possible within the V. And there are enough hints that next year will outside the V, because except for size where seems to be more benefits like cooling and stuff.

I judt wonder if the have it right from the start of 2017, or would they need more time to finetune the new configuration.

[gruntguru]

180kW is roughly the total net potential power that the mgu-h can generate, this is after everything is taken into consideration.

I still have no idea where you got the number. Do you?

[Abarth]

180kW is roughly the total net potential power that the mgu-h can generate, this is after everything is taken into consideration. Power loss to crank, power to drive the turbo, pumping losses, heat losses, friction, etc. [...].

How on earth do you come to this conclusion?
Do you have hard data?

Gruntguru quite some time back posted calculations about turbine and compressor power, and they surely have been roughly in the ballpark.

[godlameroso]

No hard data, just an estimate based on what I know is theoretically possible, I'd say this is an extreme upper limit. Honda is getting probably 70-90kW from the mgu-h at any given time, but to get that 90 is costing them too much at the crankshaft. I guess their .3 seconds comes from finding the best compromise, maybe getting 80kW with a ~10% crankshaft power penalty. Achieving this simply by optimizing the power unit settings based on testing results.

But to think that Mercedes is pulling 110-140kW from the mgu-h with a smaller penalty to the crankshaft from better combustion would be insane. Again I'm just guessing from what I know is possible with generators and the available energy.