Honda Power Unit Hardware & Software

[ZakB]

Seems like McLaren is done with Honda.

"We were only told recently that we wouldn’t have the upgrade coming (for Montreal)...and we don’t have a definitive timeline, which is concerning because the pain is great and we can’t sit around forever.

"The executive committee have now given us our marching orders," said Brown, who is also chairman of the fast-growing Motorsport Network media group. "We’re not going to go into another year like this, in hope."

"I don’t want to get into what our options are. Our preference is to win the world championship with Honda. But at some point you need to make a decision as to whether that’s achievable. And we have serious concerns.

"Missing upgrades, and upgrades not delivering to the level we were told they were going to, you can only take that so long. And we’re near our limit."

"However, so far it hasn’t worked," he added. "A year in Formula One is an eternity. Three years is a decade. And you just can’t go on forever."

"When you actually look at the impact of loss of FOM (Formula One payments) money and loss of sponsorship, it starts to diminish the commercial benefits of what Honda brings to the table," he said.

"And when you start to net it out, it doesn’t have quite the commercial benefit it might appear from the outside."

[harjan]

If the Canada upgrade wasn't planned- why is McLaren is so fed up with Honda again failing to deliver?

And the fact that Honda are working on half of the resources of the others was already known since 2014. This was one of the main issues people had at the time with Ron Dennis. He brought/forced in Honda while he know that they wouldn't match the resources the competitors have.

So.. Considering the complexity of the modern PU, having half the resources of the competition and a company culture that's reluctant to buy knowledge but prefers to educate a young (inexperienced) internal team.. The current situation is to be expected.

All efforts McLaren/Honda puts in now is useless. By the time (if ever) they're really competitive the current engine regulations are gone. Honda better focus on the new rules, while McLaren goes with Mercedes in the mean time to salvage some of the damage done over the last years.

[ZakB]

If the Canada upgrade wasn't planned- why is McLaren is so fed up with Honda again failing to deliver?

And the fact that Honda are working on half of the resources of the others was already known since 2014. This was one of the main issues people had at the time with Ron Dennis. He brought/forced in Honda while he know that they wouldn't match the resources the competitors have.

So.. Considering the complexity of the modern PU, having half the resources of the competition and a company culture that's reluctant to buy knowledge but prefers to educate a young (inexperienced) internal team.. The current situation is to be expected.

All efforts McLaren/Honda puts in now is useless. By the time (if ever) they're really competitive the current engine regulations are gone. Honda better focus on the new rules, while McLaren goes with Mercedes in the mean time to salvage some of the damage done over the last years.

Is that actually true that Honda are working on half of the recources of the others?

[Thunder]

Please discuss the non technical Stuff in the Team Thread, that's why i posted it there in the first Place.

[PlatinumZealot]

My permanent residence is in the US although I still maintain a residence in Tokyo. Whether in the US or Japan, I would never turn down a glass of good sake.

In terms of developing a PU from a single piston/cylinder, design/mock up/working model, it's the only economically and expediate way. To build 3,4 complete prototype PU's would consume even more time to develop. The powers at be want everything yesterday. From concept to actual mass produced road car is a 7 to 10 year process. Trying to cut down that time frame by a factor of 5 requires a lot of money, manpower and unfortunately short cuts which always don't work out the first time.

Hey Wazari.

Question.. Know what they do now, i suppose Honda can apply the necessary modifications to their single cylinder model to make it correlate with a full V6 now?

I think people attack the one cylinder modelling in a knee jerk. Mercedes use one cylinder as well. So does porsche. I think it is just about applying the properly mechanisms and conditions to make the one cylinder correlate right?

[PlatinumZealot]

As an Engineer myself I very much agree with you. If it was me I would probably skip the single cylinder stage all together.

Oh I fully understand why they would spend so much time on the single cylinder.
But they spent too much time on it. That is obvious.

You're saying two different things here?

Put it this way. He is really let down by Honda! Lol

[PlatinumZealot]

Seems like McLaren is done with Honda.

That username though...

[gansaraku]

Hi to all! Can anybody post the rule about the motor communication until 15 may, and the rule appendix about change the motor provider? Thanks!

Enviado desde mi HUAWEI MLA-L11 mediante Tapatalk

[MrPotatoHead]

As an Engineer myself I very much agree with you. If it was me I would probably skip the single cylinder stage all together.

Oh I fully understand why they would spend so much time on the single cylinder.
But they spent too much time on it. That is obvious.

You're saying two different things here?

Put it this way. He is really let down by Honda! Lol

Absolutely! And I'm not the only one.

[MrPotatoHead]

As an Engineer myself I very much agree with you. If it was me I would probably skip the single cylinder stage all together.

Oh I fully understand why they would spend so much time on the single cylinder.
But they spent too much time on it. That is obvious.

You're saying two different things here?

No I was saying the same thing, just from two different sides. (Although I was up far too late and I think being tired made my posts grumpy )
If it was me - I would have moved onto full engine testing. But I was saying I can understand how you can get stuck in the trap of testing / developing something for too long. Especially if you keep seeing incremental gains.

At the end of the day Honda screwed up. They should have been testing on real engines much sooner.
They have no excuses when they could have slapped new cylinder heads on last years engine to test the combustion process in parallel with the single cylinder testing. And even if the heads would not mount on the new engine they could have learned a lot from that testing.

These engines are so complex that you must test the unit as a whole.
The list of things they cannot test on a single cylinder test stand is huge including but not limited to:
Block strength and integrity
Crankshaft strength
Crankshaft harmonics
Oil system
Cooling system
ERS Systems - Both K and H
Intake manifold and exhaust manifold tuning.

The list goes on.
Notice how most of the things on the list are things they have been struggling with?

I have a lot of involvement with many different engine builders and to test an engine you have to build and test an engine. Sure you can learn things on a single cylinder test stand, I don't dispute that but you can only learn so much that really carries over to the full engine.
I'm at a shop right now that builds some of the most powerful engines on the planet helping them with their head and block programs - and they test full engines. Not single cylinders.
Of all the race engine builders facilities I've personally been to I have never seen single cylinder testing except on a spintron - and that is a full engine with parts removed.

And in the real world you can turn around a new billet cylinder head for new testing in the space of a week including assembly. You don't need to make a new casting when you can develop in billet for faster turnaround.

If anyone disagrees with my thoughts on it that is fine. They can have a different view on it, but I see these things in the real world all the time. I even have parts I was involved with on cars that won 3 of the 6 races so far this season. Hopefully that's 4 after this weekend.

Hopefully Honda can start to make some real progress soon before it is too late.

[godlameroso]

Let's say it takes two weeks to build a head/pistons and test it(this doesn't include intakes, exhaust, turbine, etc), it's been about 16 weeks since the season started(winter testing), that means in all that time they could have tried 8 different cylinder head variants. Out of those 8 how many were duds, and made no difference whatsoever, out of those 8 which showed something promising. Then you have to develop them to see which ones have potential and which don't. Sometimes you learn something working on one that looks promising that turns it into a dead end, but gives you a step forward on an older design you felt was a dead end.

The point is that things are not so simple in the end, just changing the intake ports by .5mm can have profound changes to combustion, or altering the length of the exhaust runners 1cm. Shortening one, and lengthening another, all these things can influence combustion with unforeseen consequences.

[JonoNic]

If Mclaren and Honda divorce then what's going to be the next favourite PU forum? Renault? Nah!!

[MrPotatoHead]

Let's say it takes two weeks to build a head/pistons and test it(this doesn't include intakes, exhaust, turbine, etc), it's been about 16 weeks since the season started(winter testing), that means in all that time they could have tried 8 different cylinder head variants. Out of those 8 how many were duds, and made no difference whatsoever, out of those 8 which showed something promising. Then you have to develop them to see which ones have potential and which don't. Sometimes you learn something working on one that looks promising that turns it into a dead end, but gives you a step forward on an older design you felt was a dead end.

The point is that things are not so simple in the end, just changing the intake ports by .5mm can have profound changes to combustion, or altering the length of the exhaust runners 1cm. Shortening one, and lengthening another, all these things can influence combustion with unforeseen consequences.

I totally agree. All the more reason for not waiting until December to have the complete engine together and running.

[godlameroso]

If Mclaren and Honda divorce then what's going to be the next favourite PU forum? Renault? Nah!!

If McLaren dumps Honda, then I'll become a bigger Sauber fan.

Anyway, let's wait until Silverstone before we start pulling out the pitchforks.

I'll laugh if McLaren pulls the plug, and then the engine becomes competitive at the beginning of October when it no longer matters.

[etusch]

If Mclaren and Honda divorce then what's going to be the next favourite PU forum? Renault? Nah!!

If McLaren dumps Honda, then I'll become a bigger Sauber fan.

Anyway, let's wait until Silverstone before we start pulling out the pitchforks.

I'll laugh if McLaren pulls the plug, and then the engine becomes competitive at the beginning of October when it no longer matters.

Thinking same way and will be sauber fan. I like Honda more than Alonso and McLaren