Mercedes V10 F1 Engine - Picture Thread

[stevesingo]

The approach was exactly as it is today, (with today's engine formula). That is to 'extract' as much power as one could. First comes the quest for maximum power. That is something that had never changed.

i fully agree , like already written above .

you can say that the basic approach on anything always was and always will be to win the race .

engine rules by FIA always were made to keep the power outputs at an acceptable level for safety reasons while the engineers tried and will try to reach more power out of given rules.

in the V10 era the basic rule to 'limit' the output was a maximum permitted displacement on an atmo engine . since many other things were not regulated it resulted in heavy developing , enourmous costs and engines reaching power outputs which started to leave the comfort zone of FIA in relation to safety concerns as well to the costs .

trying to limit further increase in output and also costs things like rev limiting and minimum mileage out of an engine were introduced.

today , with if course the same goal to have the best engine and car - to win the race - we have sonce 2014 a new approach to control power output levels and costs : limit the amount of fuelflow .

since there are physical limits what an piston engine can extract in useful power out of the overall energy stored in a droplet of petrol fuel you could leave everything else free .

the only reason its a 1.6litre V6 is to spec it to a common basic design for every team and prevent very costly different approaches how to extract the most power out of the overall energy stored in the fuel.

I find it funny that you state cost twice as a reason for limiting the freedom of the rules. (not mocking you BTW)

In F1, teams and PU manufacturers will spend every penny they gan get their hands on. Regardless of the rules, they will spend it in the areas where they will get best lap time improvement for their buck. Tighten one area of the rules, they will divert R&D to the next best VFM area of R&D.

When the 3000cc V10s became too powerful the FIA screwed up royally by switching to 2400cc V8s. It opened a development race for more rpm and just reset the spend to learn all over again.

What they should have done then was ban pneumatic valve control (and still should). Pneumatic valve control has zero relevance outside of racing and banning it would have pegged V10 peak rpm to 13-14k rpm if steel valve springs were mandated, thus reducing power. Sure, they would have switched R&D to other areas (combustion efficiency, friction reduction etc), but the expense would have been less than a complete new architecture.

[Hoffman900]

Absolutely not.

NASCAR teams and the cam companies working with them spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to make valve springs work in those applications. Pneumatic springs are actually cheaper and more reliable, but if the rules makers wanted to cap rpm, all they have to do is impose a rev limit via the engine or a gear rule (how NASCAR went about it).

The NHRA Pro Stock racers wanted them to save costs and Del West developed a system, but the NHRA didn’t budge... this is around 2001.

The NASCAR money has made metal valve springs better for every other series that mandates them, so there is that.

[PlatinumZealot]

What they should have done then was ban pneumatic valve control (and still should). Pneumatic valve control has zero relevance outside of racing and banning it would have pegged V10 peak rpm to 13-14k rpm if steel valve springs were mandated, thus reducing power. Sure, they would have switched R&D to other areas (combustion efficiency, friction reduction etc), but the expense would have been less than a complete new architecture.

If they scrap pneumatic springs then the money would have been spent on some even more expensive other kind of spring!
v10 have almost zero relevance outside of F1 anyway. And that partly has do with why they scrapped the High rev NA formula for turbo hybrids!

Look at the turbo hybrids. They only see about 12k rpm in practice and they are still equipped with pneumatic springs. this is saying the benefits are not just get more rpms.

[e36jon]

Great article documenting the NASCAR valve spring revolution: https://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/a ... r-6643778/

I struck out on finding an image of a valve spring glowing red-hot at high rpm... (I've seen several, just couldn't find one.)

[63l8qrrfy6]

The reason they glow red hot is because they require ungodly amounts of damping (friction and hysteresis) to control coil oscillations, all of which is power loss.. No such problems with pneumatics.

[Hoffman900]

The glowing spring would just be a bench test. NASCAR has run flooded / partially flooded valve covers for decades now. 1) It cools the spring 2) it provides another dampening effect.

[saviour stivala]

Since its developments and availability in the 1990 Kobe (valve) wire steel KHV10N with 2200MPa tensile strength, with fatigue strength 1.4 times higher than that of SAE9254, and later (2006) developed KHV12N super high strength alloy was universally used by racing valve springs producers.
The 3.5-litre Honda V10 of 1989 had a stated weight of 151kg, the rival Renault V10 of 141kg. The Renault RS01 engine had an aluminium structure, although its sump was magnesium – whereas years later the F1 sump would be made from a heavy metal, so as to form part of the ballast making the car up to the minimum weight limit while minimizing centre of gravity height. The Ilmor V10 introduced in 1991 was more compact and weight 130kg – a weight which rivalled that of the contemporary Cosworth V8, at the same time the Mugen-Honda V10, derived from Honda’s successful V10 of 1998
/90, was closer to 150kg. By 1997 the weight of the Ilmor V10 was down to 111kg, whereas the Ilmor 2.65-litre V8 Indy car engine weight 123kg (without its single turbocharger). The downsizing from 3.5 to 3.0-litres for 1995 had helped V10 designers a bit, but bore sizes were soon as large as ever due to increasing engine speeds. Nevertheless, over the years V10 engines became notably more compact as well as lighter, the reduction in external dimensions naturally assisting the quest to save weight. To some extent the gains came though making components increasingly multi-functional, for example incorporating pump housings into the block casting. To some extent the gains came through taking more risks – for example, shallower water jacketing for the head made it more compact. Mainly it was through careful design and re-design, at the same time the scope was taken to reduce crank axis height as the clutch manufactures made their units ever smaller in diameter. For example in 1997 Renault not only moved from its original 67 degree bank angle to 71 degree, it also took advantage of the latest 4.5-inch (plate diameter) clutch to lower the height of its crankshaft axis relative to the base of the sump. Overall it attained a 12kg weight saving. Together with a 14mm reduction in engine centre of gravity height.

[coaster]

If you go to the original posts twitter feed source there is a picture of the wet liners, machined as one piece.
I was once a toolmaker and machining involved to create this is mind boggling, my mind is blown.
The outer profile would have to be wire cut, then lapped to fit the block, very time consuming.
Just wow.

[coaster]

Off topic, a german college has obtain several Toyota f1 cars fully functioning.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bOsxSWlFADM
Just a few videos in German, could not find any text or photo gallery.

[Brian.G]

Nobody ever shows off the pneumatic valve assemblies....

Wouldn't be a fan of the followers hung in single shear but I'm sure somebody said it was ok,

Brian,