F1technical.net

Good read from F1 Racing magazine on the Cosworth F1 engine in its last year in the sport.








via F1 Racing Mag

Surprising that they found 40hp since 2010. They also said they lost ~4hp over it's engine life but apparently the Cosworth was by far the worst on the grid in that respect.

the article says that from 2006 they routinely fired all 8 cylinders on the overrun to assist with braking balance

isn't that is before KERS was introduced ????
managing overrun torque relative to speed variation of DF/DF distribution ????

With rules limiting virtually every factor of the engine design, making more HP requires making tiny improvements in every single engine part. This also would include optimizing the engine to work with the rest of the car's systems, such as aero and brakes.

Tommy Cookers wrote:the article says that from 2006 they routinely fired all 8 cylinders on the overrun to assist with braking balance

isn't that is before KERS was introduced ????
managing overrun torque relative to speed variation of DF/DF distribution ????

The problems with braking balance are a direct result of the uneven torque in the powertrain from the sequential layshaft gearbox shifts on deceleration.
When the driver had control over the downshifts and could decide which gear to select and when, there was a proper condition of driver control and skill.
As DF increased driver control has been replaced to a greater and greater extent by electronic control.
A modern F1 car could not be manually controlled at anywhere near the same skill level as years ago.

Owen.C93 wrote:Surprising that they found 40hp since 2010. They also said they lost ~4hp over it's engine life but apparently the Cosworth was by far the worst on the grid in that respect.

4 hp loss over 2400km is bad ... about 0.5%...

are you kidding me?

thats better than most road cars if you assume a road car unit has to last 150K miles for its full life and this has to last 2400km for its full life

350matt wrote:

Owen.C93 wrote:Surprising that they found 40hp since 2010. They also said they lost ~4hp over it's engine life but apparently the Cosworth was by far the worst on the grid in that respect.

4 hp loss over 2400km is bad ... about 0.5%...

are you kidding me?

thats better than most road cars if you assume a road car unit has to last 150K miles for its full life and this has to last 2400km for its full life

Yeah I'm suggesting that figure was bullshit.

There was also a feature (about 25pages) on the CA F1 V8 in the Race Engine Technology for thoese interested.

The part of the article about how difficult it was to design an aluminum piston suitable for the large bore, high rpms and mandatory service life was interesting, even though there were few details provided. The piston in a modern F1 engine must be incredibly lightweight, which combined with the large bore and single compression ring likely makes heat transfer away from the crown quite difficult. If the center of the crown gets too hot from combustion it will reduce fatigue life of the piston.