The story of the RS26 in numbers

You already know how many points it scored, how many laps it led this season, and the total number of laps completed, but what about getting to know the real RS26? Here’s a portrait of a special world champion…

An engine represents… months of work to understand the regulations and optimise the answers to its problems, to obtain the best performance/reliability compromise and to install the beast seamlessly into a chassis designed 500km away. It’s quite a challenge that the 250 women and men of Viry-Châtillon have to face. And once again, they met that challenge in a virtuoso manner, as the results of the RS26 demonstrate in the first season of the V8 regulations!

The RS26 is, as the regulations specify, an 8-cylinder engine with an angle of 90° between the two banks of four cylinders. It displaces 2.4l, and has a minimum imposed weight of 95kg. But beyond the rules, this engine required than 4000 components in more than 20 metal alloys. In total, more than 100 suppliers contributed to a manufacturing effort that produced around 1,500,000 components for track, dyno and research engines combined!

Every RS26 engine required nearly two weeks of assembly by two highly-skilled technicians. The closest comparison is the work of a watchmaker, where every component must be assembled with minute precision. The objectives are simple: zero defect and 100% performance and reliability.

A, B, C, D, E… That’s the range of different specifications that were used by Fernando and Giancarlo during their championship-winning run. The RS26 was developed throughout the season until the final race, a decisive race in conquering the double-double title success.

Most significantly of all, success in 2006 confirmed Renault’s technological expertise. The company was the final world champion of the V10 era, and the first world champion of the V8 era. It’s the kind of success that illustrates perfectly the know-how and competitive spirit that go into every Renault engine!