Honda F1 project leader Yusuke Hasegawa has outlined a number of reasons why Honda has been struggling so badly in the beginning of the 2017 Formula One season. He confirmed that lots of problems were not discovered while running on the dynamo meter.
When it comes to the battery, is it fair to think that the performance advantage from the previous PU can be carried over?
“That’s what we believe—and what we hope. Even after the decision to end our activities, battery development continued, not limited to F1 alone. Because of that, it has evolved further, and it’s an area we’re confident in.”
What performance advantage? No one can look at the traces from last season and tell me Honda had better deployment than Merc.
It was a well known fact, across the paddock, the Honda had a distinct advantage in it's deployment and regen abilities. It had been mentioned several times by Merc personnel as well. While their battery had a significant lifespan advantage over the season.
2026 has banned split-turbos. So Merc and Honda have had to adjust. This plus the static compression ratio reduction, which nerfs their ability to use their rapid combustion technique, almost looks tailor-made to scramble any tricks/development breakthroughs anyone had found, to properly bring everyone down to square one again.
18:1 was only just enough, in combination with fuel composition work, to keep that combustion technique stable. Almost infuriating the FIA have introduced a regulation that directly reduces the efficiency of the ICE. Goes against their whole M.O for F1. In my opinion.
What performance advantage? No one can look at the traces from last season and tell me Honda had better deployment than Merc.
It was a well known fact, across the paddock, the Honda had a distinct advantage in it's deployment and regen abilities. It had been mentioned several times by Merc personnel as well. While their battery had a significant lifespan advantage over the season.
I prefer to go by what I can actually see in the telemetry, and there Merc clearly had more deployment on energy limited tracks. Whether that was down to the battery, or the MGU-H, or something else, I don’t know.
What performance advantage? No one can look at the traces from last season and tell me Honda had better deployment than Merc.
It was a well known fact, across the paddock, the Honda had a distinct advantage in it's deployment and regen abilities. It had been mentioned several times by Merc personnel as well. While their battery had a significant lifespan advantage over the season.
I prefer to go by what I can actually see in the telemetry, and there Merc clearly had more deployment on energy limited tracks. Whether that was down to the battery, or the MGU-H, or something else, I don’t know.
I appreciate that and that's all well and good. It just goes against what a majority are seeing.
It was a well known fact, across the paddock, the Honda had a distinct advantage in it's deployment and regen abilities. It had been mentioned several times by Merc personnel as well. While their battery had a significant lifespan advantage over the season.
I prefer to go by what I can actually see in the telemetry, and there Merc clearly had more deployment on energy limited tracks. Whether that was down to the battery, or the MGU-H, or something else, I don’t know.
I appreciate that and that's all well and good. It just goes against what a majority are seeing.
Classic case of belief perseverance. Look at recent evidence instead of what was true in 2022.
2026 has banned split-turbos. So Merc and Honda have had to adjust. This plus the static compression ratio reduction, which nerfs their ability to use their rapid combustion technique, almost looks tailor-made to scramble any tricks/development breakthroughs anyone had found, to properly bring everyone down to square one again.
18:1 was only just enough, in combination with fuel composition work, to keep that combustion technique stable. Almost infuriating the FIA have introduced a regulation that directly reduces the efficiency of the ICE. Goes against their whole M.O for F1. In my opinion.
Most team are having problems with the news fuels apparently because the got components in them that combust at different temperatures so i doubt that having a pu with high compression ratio is a good idea .it could easily lead to engine knocking.
Not yet along with what @AR3-GP mentioned, we have also had throttle bodies (1 per plenum, plenums within V), now that the variable length inlets have been banned and FBW throttle is a torque request there could be efficiency gains to be had in reducing the number of controlled orifices. It would surprise me to see an air-air intercooler mounted above it (where the plenum is located on the last generation of PU’s).
Perspective - Understanding that sometimes the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.
2026 has banned split-turbos. So Merc and Honda have had to adjust. This plus the static compression ratio reduction, which nerfs their ability to use their rapid combustion technique, almost looks tailor-made to scramble any tricks/development breakthroughs anyone had found, to properly bring everyone down to square one again.
18:1 was only just enough, in combination with fuel composition work, to keep that combustion technique stable. Almost infuriating the FIA have introduced a regulation that directly reduces the efficiency of the ICE. Goes against their whole M.O for F1. In my opinion.
Most team are having problems with the news fuels apparently because the got components in them that combust at different temperatures so i doubt that having a pu with high compression ratio is a good idea .it could easily lead to engine knocking.
Completely. And that seems to be the general consensus. Although wouldn't we rather let the teams, manufacturers, engineers determine what's possible? Without the suits slapping an arbitrary limit that restricts them even trying.
Most team are having problems with the news fuels apparently because the got components in them that combust at different temperatures so i doubt that having a pu with high compression ratio is a good idea .it could easily lead to engine knocking.
That conflicts with the comments we've heard from the people who ought to know.
Ben Hodgkinson
From a purely technical point of view the compression ratio limit is too low. We have the technology to make the combustion fast enough, so the compression ratio is way too low. We could make 18:1 work with the speed of combustion that we've managed to get, which means there's performance in every tenth of a ratio that you can get. Every manufacturer should really be aiming at 15.999 as far as they dare when it's measured.
