I’m reminded by the quote in Beast (Ilmor 265E) about Honda struggling when they first got into Indy Car in 1994. They leaned on their F1 experience with NA engines and the V6 Turbos, but totally missed the mark in dealing with methanol. Their previous experience was dealing with high volatile bespoke gasoline in F1.Scalexf1 wrote: ↑27 Dec 2021, 07:10It’s easy to look at the numbers and suggest the addition of ethanol will increase power, however it does not quite work like that.
The ethanol will burn hotter, increasing the combustion problems that are already evident with the current spec engines. Whoever can master this first will probably match their current performance levels.
Mercedes (Ilmor staff) and Honda / RedBull have a lot of previous experience with alcohol based fuels now, so I suspect they’ll (as always) be a step ahead. Remember, Honda learned a lot about alcohol fuels from partnering with Ilmor for almost a decade before going it alone (presumably to save money).