
Mercedes Is Owning This Formula 1 Season - x43b
http://www.wired.com/2014/04/mercedes-f1-turbo
======
cc439
The cool part of this innovation is that it can directly benefit consumers.

Trick engineering in F1 usually just tricks the regulations or the kinds of
physics that only apply to racing prototypes. An example of tricking the
regulations would be the double-deck and blown diffusers that were just clever
interpretations of the rulebook. Tricking physics is a bit more interesting, a
good example would be McLaren's F-Duct which used fancy fluid dynamics to turn
a driver's leg into an on/off switch for drag on the rear wing. They basically
ran a duct from the front of the car all the way to the wing, with a hole cut
into it by the driver's leg. Cover the hole and pressure sucked air through to
the wing, smoothing it's profile and reducing drag. Very cool, except I don't
know many family sedans that need over 1 ton of downforce at 150mph.

The timing of this innovation in turbocharging couldn't be better. Every
manufacturer is trying to gain efficiency with small, turbocharged engines.
Small displacement engines are efficient but consumers don't want to trade
half their horsepower for 5-10mpg. So companies like Ford and VW are slapping
turbos onto these engines and cranking boost levels through the roof. The
Fiesta ST runs 21 lbs of boost off the showroom floor. That kind of boost
means a lot of heat (the same issue Mercedes' F1 engineers were faced with) so
engineers are using every trick in the book to keep temperatures in control
(direct injection, temporary overboost, expensive aluminum intercoolers).

What Mercedes' has done isn't so much about the innovative layout, it's that
they've made it work without turbo lag. Bring whatever technology they've
developed to combat the weight of the turbine shaft to the road and you've
made it possible to operate on lower octane fuel while making more power from
even smaller displacements.

This is what I like to see from motorsport.

~~~
xd
I'd love to know how they are running the shaft from the turbine to the
compressor .. these things spin at something like 100,000RPM if I'm not
mistaken. Normally this would be handled by a few bearings with direct oil
intake at high pressure with the bearings being only a few centimeters apart
if that .. but to span an entire engine is some special kind of precision
engineering.

edit: special because any imbalance in the shaft would rip the bearings apart.

~~~
cc439
Some Garrett turbochargers can spin up to 280,000 rpm according to their site:
[http://garrettbyhoneywell.com/turbo-fundamentals/how-a-
turbo...](http://garrettbyhoneywell.com/turbo-fundamentals/how-a-turbo-works/)

The motor/generator sits in the middle of the two turbines so that can help
keep shaft length down but gearing 280,000 rpm down to something that wouldn't
blow up the motor creates a whole new world of complexity. All I know is that
this is very impressive engineering and that there are tons of unique
innovations needed to make it all work together.

------
ntkachov
I'm loving the direction F1 is going. Sure, for the hardcore fans, the noise
just isn't the same, and the cars aren't going as fast anymore, but I love
that they are trying to force the manufacturers to improve their lower spec
engines. Maybe the next rule change we'll have CVT as a requirement instead of
a gear box.

~~~
antr
As an F1 fan, it isn't the noise, and speed that are making this championship
"boring". It's the fact that Mercedes is so superior that you really have to
ignore them in order to enjoy the "real" racing / fights behind them. (It's
true that the Hamilton-Rosberg fight in Bahrain was also fun to watch)

Mercedes' dominance is ridiculous - and I don't want to take engineering
credits away, but there are no fights to watch at the top. Just take a look at
the 22 second difference they managed to create in just 11 laps, the laps left
after the safety car at Bahrain went in the pit lane. The fun was behind,
Force India vs Red Bull vs Williams (vs Ferrari, sigh). Lets hope that other
teams can catch up.

~~~
enko
> there are no fights to watch at the top

Were we watching the same race? The last 11 laps were an epic battle between
Rosberg and Hamilton, and the mob contending for points was no less thrilling.
I thought it was a great race, at least at the end.

And have you already forgotten 2013? Red Bull won every single race in the
second half of the season. Yeah, Mercedes is on top, for now, it's not like a
constructor has never been dominant before.

~~~
antr
Please read my entire comment:

> (It's true that the Hamilton-Rosberg fight in Bahrain was also fun to watch)

My point is: this year looks like the last years' championships with RBR...
same dog, different collar.

~~~
ollyculverhouse
Not exactly. Webber vs Vettel wasn't really close. Rosberg and Hamilton will
be a lot closer.

------
Theodores
The Mercedes F1 team appears to be one team that makes cars with engines that
they also supply to other teams. However it is not quite like that. The
engines part of the business has been going for a long time with McLaren since
the mid 90's and before that they were 'Ilmor'.

Then, five years or so, Mercedes bought what was the Honda/Braun constructor
team. Both the engine business and the car constructor part of the empire are
in the UK albeit geographically separate.

It would be unsporting for Mercedes to supply their on-track rivals with
lesser engines, particularly since they pay top money for them. So the
official PR story for this is that the separate constructor part of the
business came up with this innovation all on their own for packaging reasons,
i.e. a more aerodynamic car.

~~~
gsnedders
They cannot within the rules of the sport supply power trains of different
designs to the different teams — all Mercedes power trains are identical.

~~~
mwg66
Indeed but McLaren and Williams manufacturer their own gearbox.

------
frik
This article is already dated. Today's race was one of the most thrilling
races of all time. "Hamilton defeats Rosberg after epic duel":
[http://www.formula1.com/default.html](http://www.formula1.com/default.html)

F1 2014 is more exciting than season 2013 where Red Bull was superior (and '12
& '11) - that was boring.

~~~
stevenwei
Aw, a spoiler warning would have been appreciated there.

~~~
enko
The article title might have given it away ...

~~~
stevenwei
Mercedes has been dominant the past two races as well so it's not necessarily
a spoiler to say they have been owning the season. On the other hand today's
race ended a few hours ago and I didn't expect to run into race results on HN
of all places. Oh well.

~~~
corin_
To be fair to him, a thread all about which team is dominating F1 is the kind
of place on HN that I _would_ expect to see races discussed. Not sure that
shouldve taken you by surprise! Anyway, sounds like the race was good enough
for you to enjoy anyway.

------
exDM69
What is interesting is that Mercedes came up with the split turbocharger only
in the first race - in preseason winter testing, they were running a more
traditional turbo charger.

Now that we've seen the split turbocharger with the turbine at the back, the
compressor at the front and the motor-generator unit in between on top of the
engine block it seems all too obvious. But coming up with this is ingenious,
and making it work on such short notice is quite a feat of engineering.

I can't wait to have this in my road car, 40% fuel saving with only a little
drop in performance.

~~~
encoderer
Didn't the article say they were working on this for 2 years?

~~~
exDM69
Yes, the article did say that and I found it a bit odd. While they probably
have been working on the power unit for two years, the split turbocharger was
first seen at the first race.

Of course, my knowledge is based on media reports, it is possible that none of
the media have seen it in Jerez and Bahrain tests but it was first reported by
Craig Scarborough during the Australian GP weekend.

~~~
beamso
The split turbocharger was most likely identified by interested journalists at
the first race. The power train was homologated for the season at the end of
February, so the design was finalised prior to the third pre-season test. It's
most likely that the turbo was in this form a while ago.

------
atmosx
> But those teams–McLaren, Williams, and Force India–haven’t been testing
> these new V6s as long as the official factory team.

Finally Hamilton's choice to leave McLarren paid dues. I remember him saying
last year that " _I have the change to run for a team that builds the car
piece by piece, from the engine to the tiniest screw, the only other team that
can do this is Ferrari_ ". But although the car was fast last year, it was not
consistent, too many breaks. This year seems to be the good one.

Also I have to say that I admire Hamilton for not applying any first-second
driver policy on Rosberg. After the all he is without doubt the star-driver
for Mercedes. I wish him good luck, he deserves another championship, after
all the fist one he got was kind of obscured by the McLaren scandal[1].

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Formula_One_espionage_cont...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Formula_One_espionage_controversy)

------
cl8ton
I have been a fan of F1 since the days of Nigel Mansell and I have got to say
I am no fan of the new direction of Formula 1 present day.

To me Formula 1 represents the pinnacle of engine/chassis engineering
uninhibited by any green standard of the day. For once just let the creative
minds of auto engineering have their day at the track and let the best team
win.

There is nothing more sexy to a car guy than hearing a V10 scream down the
straights at Fuji Speedway at 21k RPM and nothing more exciting than seeing a
V10 engine detonate at 21k RPM. I certainly miss the days of Schumacher and
Alonso battling in the final days of the V10 engine.

Mercedes may be currently winning it by the years of preplanning for this day,
but the race is already over by using today’s standard.

EDIT: In case you never heard a V10 engine
[http://youtu.be/MGEqlNU30Tg](http://youtu.be/MGEqlNU30Tg)

------
emmelaich
How much does anyone know about the details of this engine?

I'd like to think some of the immense amount of research and development that
went into the Bishop Rotary Valve for Mercedes F1 has not gone to waste.

    
    
       http://home.people.net.au/~mrbdesign/PDF/AutoTechBRV.pdf
    

That innovation was killed by article 5.1.5 of FIA:

    
    
       "Only reciprocating poppet valves are permitted"
    

Seems a bit arbitrary. Though I have heard it the BRV was killed by the limit
of certain metals seen as poisonous -- also dubious considering the danger is
in the manufacture, not racing.

------
gahahaha
Why would it be bad to put hot air into the engine?

For blast furnaces you want to preheat the air going in so that it does not
cool down the furnace. Is it just about cooling the engine down, or is it
something else?

~~~
sbierwagen
All three of the replies to your comment are true, but they don't cover
everything.

Car engines are heat engines, they extract mechanical work from differences in
temperature. Heat engine efficiency is n = 1 - sqrt(Tcold/Thot)

If Tcold, the cold end, isn't cold enough, then you lose efficiency, and thus
horsepower. A badly overheating engine loses a lot of power. If you can cool
the compressed air back down to ambient, then your engine produces more power.

~~~
grogers
This seems orthogonal to me. Tcold for the efficiency is the exhaust temp, not
the intake.

For pure efficiency, it is actually beneficial to capture waste heat in the
exhaust to heat the intake air. But it destroys your power density, for the
reasons already mentioned (hot air has less mass at the same pressure). I
believe some automotive engines actually do this under light load conditions,
but you wouldn't see it in F1.

------
_s
For those interested - it's not just the engine; you'll find plenty of
teams/drivers also struggling with the new brake-by-wire as outlined here:
[http://www.racecar-
engineering.com/articles/2014-f1-explaine...](http://www.racecar-
engineering.com/articles/2014-f1-explained-what-is-brake-by-wire/)

It's among a myriad of new tech introduced this year, and Mercedes just happen
to have the most complete package available.

------
ukdm
Today's race was the first time we got to see just how fast the Mercedes is on
low fuel with new tires. This innovation is worth 2 seconds per lap, which is
massive in this sport. The championship is theirs to lose this year. Teams
don't make up such a time gap over a season, and Mercedes won't stop
developing.

------
vermontdevil
And now Ecclestone is hinting at mid-season changes that FIA should pursue to
_wink_ protect the other teams.

I say tough. They will catch up eventually. But there should be no drastic
changes that hurt all the work Mercedes put in.

------
contingencies
Did anyone else cringe at the grammar of the title? It's the McDonaldsization
("I'm _x_ -ing _object_!") slash subcontinental present continuous
affectation.

------
edoloughlin
Interesting article. Depressing to see the word 'boffins' still in use.

~~~
mikeash
I wasn't aware there was anything wrong with that word. Is it derogatory?

~~~
FatalLogic
It's generally used by non-scientists to refer to scientists. People don't
tend to use it to refer to themselves (though a few might, in a humorously
self-deprecating fashion).

It might have a dismissive or mocking connotation, depending on the intention
of the person using it. I guess in the worst case, its use could be described
as 'othering'

[https://google.com/search?q=define%3A+othering](https://google.com/search?q=define%3A+othering)

~~~
atmosx
English is not my mother tongue. When I reached the word _boffins_ I stopped
and opened the OSX dictionary which gave the right perspective... Because I
instantly related _boffins_ with _buffoons_ which has a totally different
meaning and didn't make any sense to call F1 engineers buffoons ?! It's okay
if it comes from Archimedes, Francis Bacon and another 10-15 fellas I guess
because it's kind of _relative_... But if I were an F1 engineer, I would had a
hard time accepting such a degradative term from anyone else!

ps. Funny how fast all these vivid thoughts crossed my mind in less the 2
seconds.

~~~
KC8ZKF
Hey, the same thing happens with native English speakers. I just heard a radio
spot where someone was reprimanded for using the term "pussyfoot" at a
meeting.

That's nothing, though, compared to this:
[http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/media/1999_02_02_newy...](http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/media/1999_02_02_newyorktimes.html)

