Horsepower vs Torque vs Revs

[ISLAMATRON]

Power = torque * rotational speed

this is why it would be so simple to limit all 2009 engines to the same power output. you just have to have a torque sensor. rpm is already measured. and all the sudden teams would fight for every ml less of fuel consumption. Isn't that what the FiA wanted. and it would be perfectly fair for all.

It would be much easier to limit the fuel allowed and allow the teams to try to maximize that fuel for maximum power. And lower the fuel alocation accordingly. If they truly want an engine freeze, to save the money that would be poured into ICEs then leave the engines alone and lower the amount of fuel... the teams would have to make up for the power lost by way of KERS & HERS which is the tech of the future. They need to stop pouring money into these old tech(yes the current engines are of a late 90's era design) ICEs. The money saved from the engine freeze is then put toward KERS & HERS. The only monety spent on ICE's should be on a new engine forula for something like 2011 or so. 1.5 to 2.0L 4 or 6 cylinder turbo, Direct injection with no pneumatic springs(must have conventional valvetrain), must run on cellulostic bio-gas, no exoctic alloys and should last 5 to 6 races or so.

[Jersey Tom]

Torque sensors aren't as easy as you would think.

[xpensive]

This depends on the application of course, but as an engineer, I have worked with torque measuring devices on different sorts of rotating machinery within the heavy process industry. A few steps away from F1, I agree, but a possibility nevertheless.
The intriguing part is the ability to monitor the torque wireless, on-line so to speak.

[ISLAMATRON]

torque sensors are extremely noisy and not at all accurate. Measuring fuel is extremely simple.

[WhiteBlue]

Torque sensors aren't as easy as you would think.

there is no doubt that it is feasible.

http://www.abb.com/product/seitp331/0df ... country=DE there are even products that fit or come very close to what you need.

http://library.abb.com/global/scot/scot ... 1_-001.pdf The ABB product fits F1 reportedly.

This is a perfect solution to the mess of the frozen engines where teams are now looking for equal engine performance. to do this on the basis of physics and promote energy efficiency is a good opportunity.

[xpensive]

Teriffic documentation WhiteBlue, this is perfectly in line with my previous experiences from other areas of machinery.

Certainly not noisy either, thanks!

[Shaddock]

But a short stroke engine has lower values than a long stroke engine of comparable displacement.

No, the old “for a given displacement short stroke means less leverage hence less torque” is a false myth, for a given displacement the amount of peak torque is pretty much independent by the bore/stroke ratio. To be more precise, there are secondary effects, but they aren’t directly related with the leverage, they are related with the shape of the combustion chamber, over a certain value of the bore/stroke the shape could be very poor and cause a reduction of the combustion efficiency, hence of the mean effective pressure, that is proportional to torque.
Same goes for the myth of “a V8 has more torque than a V12”, simply false, or, as Marmorini once said with notable brevity : “balls”.

Why do they not just use a higher compression ratio? This would achieve a greater density of air/fuel in the cumbustion chamber, would it not?

Compression ratio has nothing to do with the amount of air (hence mixture) entering in the engine, CR is the ratio between the volume with piston at BDC and the volume with piston at TDC. The influence of the CR is on the thermodynamic efficiency of the engine, but efficiency doesn’t growth linearly with CR, the slope of the curve actually decreases with CR, so above a certain value there’s little to gain.

The problem arises when the compression ratio becomes so high that the fuel/air mixture within the combustion chamber detonates uncontrollably

Detonation was certainly a huge issue during the turbo era but at current F1 rpm isn’t, there’s no time enough to have it. In the current F1 engines the CR is in the order of about 13, limited mainly for geometrical reasons. If you consider that for a unitary displacement of 300cc the combustion chamber volume at such CR is little more than 20 cc, with a bore of little less than 10cm you rapidly understand that the combustion chamber volume at TDC is largely formed by the hollows for the valves on the piston upper surface and these also depend by valves size and lift. Further reducing the volume of the hollows would limit the valve design, the reduction of the volumetric efficiency would likely offset the increment of thermodynamic efficiency.

There was a rumour - myth that a straight six produced less torque that a V6 of a comparable size. I'm not sure if clever ECU's and variable timing has overcome this in issue in modern engines.

I did read that one of the reasons why short stroke engines suffer from low torque at lowish rpm was because of a poor burn in the combustion chamber. The fuel can literally drop out of the air and doesn’t atomise due to lack of ‘suck/swirl’ (mixing) on the short down stroke together with an uneven spread throughout the chamber results in an uneven burn.

[xpensive]

Why torque is in principle independent of the bore and stroke ratio on an engine with a given displacement, is theoretically rather simple to explain.

Torque is force times lever, where force is, again in principle, propotional to the piston area. If the stroke is increased for an expected higher torque, piston area will have to decrease proportionally to retain the given displacement.
All in all, torque-wise, bore and stroke is a constant sum game.

Again, all in principle, when a shorter stroke means larger valve area etc, but this belongs to what Shaddok referred to as secondary effects, or so I imagine.

[snoro]

wow i never that that ABB was able to do that kind of thing for automotive industry maybe i should go try to work for them,they have a plant 15 min away from where i live

Back to thread:i didnt read every post so sorry if someone already said that but also having a higher rev limits can also helps you alot for conering performance since you have to shift gear less than another engine with less rev and this mean you loss less performance everywhere and especially in corner cause if you have to upshift in a corner,you will lose alot of performance.Combine higher rev limit with a flat horsepower and torque curve and you have the best engine you have to shift less in corner and in straights and also when you downshift or upshift you dont lose too much performance.

[riff_raff]

torque sensors are extremely noisy and not at all accurate. Measuring fuel is extremely simple.

Measuring a "controlled fuel" is simple. But unless the fuel's chemical and physical properties are controlled, it's not so easy. Remember how the F1 teams got around the volumetric fuel rule limits back in the '80s by using 80% tolulene fuel mixtures?

Accurately measuring engine torque is actually not too difficult. A pair of hall effect sensors can measure angular deflection (or acceleration) of the crankshaft or flywheel in real time. Once calibrated, these sensors give a very accurate measurement of instantaneous engine torque.

[xpensive]

This is really interesting, when both peak revs would be limited and even on-line monitored by Charlie whiting, focus should turn to having the flattest torque-curve within the usable rev-band?
This way optimizing the engine's power output between gear-shifts.

[Conceptual]

My question is this:

With the ABB system that White-Blue posted, is that just like an integrated dyno? I could imagine that this would open the doors for better performance.

And the links show F1 cars in the papers, so have any teams actually adopted this already?

Maybe Scarbs can ask around???

[WhiteBlue]

Power = torque * rotational speed

this is why it would be so simple to limit all 2009 engines to the same power output. you just have to have a torque sensor. rpm is already measured. and all the sudden teams would fight for every ml less of fuel consumption. Isn't that what the FiA wanted. and it would be perfectly fair for all.

It would be much easier to limit the fuel allowed and allow the teams to try to maximize that fuel for maximum power. And lower the fuel alocation accordingly. If they truly want an engine freeze, to save the money that would be poured into ICEs then leave the engines alone and lower the amount of fuel... the teams would have to make up for the power lost by way of KERS & HERS which is the tech of the future. They need to stop pouring money into these old tech(yes the current engines are of a late 90's era design) ICEs. The money saved from the engine freeze is then put toward KERS & HERS. The only monety spent on ICE's should be on a new engine forula for something like 2011 or so. 1.5 to 2.0L 4 or 6 cylinder turbo, Direct injection with no pneumatic springs(must have conventional valvetrain), must run on cellulostic bio-gas, no exoctic alloys and should last 5 to 6 races or so.

This would be another exercise of severe restrictions. I am convinced that the best way is to free up design and limit the power, whatever engine they use. This would automatically lead to engine design, that minimises fuel use. It is the only option to increase performance through lower carried fuel weight and saving of refuelling time. They could reduce the flow rate of the refuelling units to emphasise the effect. Initially teams would just maximise the torque curve but very soon they would start working on efficiency. The power allowance can even be adjusted each year as power from the KERS increases.
This could also avoid a very restrictive new engine formula and save a lot of jobs in the engine R&D. Of course the cost issue has to be settled by a price cap for customer engines. The automotive companies would do something usefull with their excess cash. everybody is happy.

[xpensive]

This opens for another possibility, allow me to stretch out a little bit here.
By monitoring Torque and Rpm, there would be no need to limit either, only the resulting power, right?.

So, why not liberate eveything else, anything from screaming 1500cc V12s to 500 cu.inch, mammoth-torque, push-rod V8s, what a show!

Ooops, afraid that fantasy and wishful thinking got the better of me there...

[WhiteBlue]

This is exactly what I meant. Design freedom but power limited.