Honda Power Unit Hardware & Software

[ziggy]

Yes it is unfair to compare but I think it is easier for the second manufacturer to have a best engine than the first in the same timeframe. I mean if manufacturer A starts at 2000 and manufacturer B starts at 2003. I think it is easier for manufacturer B to have a better engine in 2008 than the 2005 engine from manufacturer A. Simply because the newer manufacturer can already have learnt something from the others mistakes from public sources (TC too small, pictures of the engine, layout etc) and can also poach some engineers and knowledge of the other engine. It is harder to pioneer

Just to clarify some things:

“Nikki Lauda recently told me that Mercedes started on their hybrid in 2007” begins Luca

http://www.grandprix247.com/2017/02/01/ ... ince-2007/

Still this isn't an excuse for Honda. They should have known better, where they were getting in to. That's what I'm saying all the time. This current technology is being developed for decades, not years. So if they were late to the party, it was at least 10 years ago. Pretty much around the time they quit F1 the last time...

A little offtopic: Porsche developed nearly the same tech and got it working. Again in pretty much the same time, 2014.

For decades? TJI on petrol engines is decades old? MGU-H is decades old? Complex PUs with one engine, one motor, two generators and one battery with an ECU controlling how everything work toghether are decades old? Can you please provide some source? No obviously you cannot, because this PUs are NOT decades old... It was previous V8s wich were decades old, literally, as the design was frozen.


Apart from the usual ranting we´re used to in this thread, I find it curious you provided a link confirming Mercedes is working on these PUs for around a decade, while Honda experiece is limited to half of that, but you still blame Honda for not competing with Mercedes in only three seasons?


It´s curious some of you take F1 as "hey you´re F1 engineers, you should be able to perform some magic", but you don´t concede the same to Mercedes... What if it´s Mercedes who did some magic and that´s the reason Honda (AND Renault, AND Ferrari) are struggling to catch up, specially when you take into account Honda only enjoy half their expertise?

It works both ways

Now read my post again and leave your emotions aside for 3 minutes. I didn't say the tech is decades old but that it was developed for decades. Thats a huge difference. Apart from that you clearly don't know what you are talking about. Furthermore you have all the info which I posted out on the net and from reliable sources. I won't search it for you (hint: some of those patents, which on top of it were posted in this thread, date back to 2005...).

And yes, F1 engineers are expected to do some "magic", as you call it. That's why every team is searching for the creme de la creme, a Newey, if you want it so. Lol, you really don't have a clue.



A big sorry to the mods for the offtopic...

[loner]

Don't know if anyone can decypher anything useful out of it, but this is from Today in Silverstone:

Picture by AMuS:
https://imgr4.auto-motor-und-sport.de/I ... 105276.jpg

i doubt they will show the current PU in Suzuka naked in a glass box like the previous two years its their 2018 big bet , some secrecy about the setup i smell

[ArcticWolfie]

Alonso will take his sixth internal combustion engine, eighth turbocharger, eighth MGU-H and sixth MGU-K ahead of final practice on Saturday.

As they all exceed his allocation, the change will incur a 25-place grid penalty.

That will be added to the five-place grid penalty that the McLaren driver received for taking a new energy store ahead of Friday practice at Silverstone.

It remains unclear whether the MGU-H Honda has fitted is current spec or a new part that includes a fix for the failure Alonso encountered in Austria.

More @ https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/alon ... en-930698/

Anyway looks like Honda figured something out, since it didn't look like Alonso's previous setup sustained major damage in previous race.

[Andres125sx]

Just to clarify some things:



Still this isn't an excuse for Honda. They should have known better, where they were getting in to. That's what I'm saying all the time. This current technology is being developed for decades, not years. So if they were late to the party, it was at least 10 years ago. Pretty much around the time they quit F1 the last time...

A little offtopic: Porsche developed nearly the same tech and got it working. Again in pretty much the same time, 2014.

For decades? TJI on petrol engines is decades old? MGU-H is decades old? Complex PUs with one engine, one motor, two generators and one battery with an ECU controlling how everything work toghether are decades old? Can you please provide some source? No obviously you cannot, because this PUs are NOT decades old... It was previous V8s wich were decades old, literally, as the design was frozen.


Apart from the usual ranting we´re used to in this thread, I find it curious you provided a link confirming Mercedes is working on these PUs for around a decade, while Honda experiece is limited to half of that, but you still blame Honda for not competing with Mercedes in only three seasons?


It´s curious some of you take F1 as "hey you´re F1 engineers, you should be able to perform some magic", but you don´t concede the same to Mercedes... What if it´s Mercedes who did some magic and that´s the reason Honda (AND Renault, AND Ferrari) are struggling to catch up, specially when you take into account Honda only enjoy half their expertise?

It works both ways

Now read my post again and leave your emotions aside for 3 minutes. I didn't say the tech is decades old but that it was developed for decades. Thats a huge difference. Apart from that you clearly don't know what you are talking about. Furthermore you have all the info which I posted out on the net and from reliable sources. I won't search it for you (hint: some of those patents, which on top of it were posted in this thread, date back to 2005...).

And yes, F1 engineers are expected to do some "magic", as you call it. That's why every team is searching for the creme de la creme, a Newey, if you want it so. Lol, you really don't have a clue.



A big sorry to the mods for the offtopic...

2005 is not decades back in my book, but ok I´ll not fall into semantics

And if you read my post properly, as you obviously didn´t, you´ll notice I´ve never disputed F1 engineers can do magic, what I said is it was Mercedes who did it and people should keep this in mind. The rest, including Ferrari and Renault, are chasing them.

Honda is far, ok, third season, ok, but considering their limited experience and the heavy restrictions wich tied their hands first two seasons I really think people is too harsh with them, not even those manufacturers with same experience can seriously fight them...

And I´ll repeat it, people, McLaren on the other hand is severly affected so they´re the ones who should be blaming Honda, if they don´t do it, I´ll second that

[Gatecrasher]

Honda are a large enough company with resources and racing heritage to fully understand what they signed up for. The engineers hands were not tied by tokens for reliability, yet the results speak volumes for their efforts. Revisions have been improving but are slow to come and are not meeting their own published deadlines. All other teams are not standing still so incremental improvements which should give them a boost are quickly wiped out by competitors. If they made the exact same engine three years ago, under the same rules, this conversation would be very different.

Management at both Honda and McLaren are to blame here, not the individual engineers. Management at this level are the best engineers first and people/project managers second. From the quotes made by both sides in the press it is clear they are not aligned as one team. Until there is restructuring on both sides I don't see a good outcome.This does not need to be a firing squad, just a realignment of resources and ownership in decision making. I hope I am proved wrong.

[wuzak]

Between 14/15 they were allowed to change just over half the engine, 15/16 they were allowed to change a little under half iirc. They are also allowed to make changes without using tokens on the basis of reliability.

The token spend was due to fall in the second year, but given the deficit to Mercedes and/or the introduction of Honda it was decided to maintain the 32 tokens. Which gave them the opportunity to change approximately 47% of the engine.

[wuzak]

How Ferrari made such a big change with token system ? I remember that Hasegawa san declared he was surprised how Renault made a big step with only one token last year ?

Ferrari's power unit was fundamentally sound. It essentially needed reworking in some key areas, but nothing overly drastic.

To change the combustion design was 3 points.

To change to a new cylinder head was 2 points.

Pistons as well. 2 points.

To change the MGUH design was 2 points, its position 2 points and the associated control electronics 1 point.

Changing the turbocharger over its 4 different categories cost 6 points.

Another 7 points to completely change the MGUK.

1 point for the ERS wiring loom.

That's 26 points for an extensive overhaul of the power unit.

Reliability upgrades were also free.

[drunkf1fan]

Between 14/15 they were allowed to change just over half the engine, 15/16 they were allowed to change a little under half iirc. They are also allowed to make changes without using tokens on the basis of reliability.

The token spend was due to fall in the second year, but given the deficit to Mercedes and/or the introduction of Honda it was decided to maintain the 32 tokens. Which gave them the opportunity to change approximately 47% of the engine.

The token reduction was from 50% for 15/16 to 41% to 16/17 and 32% 17/18(had to look it up, no way I could remember that). Maybe the bigger issue was freezing certain parts, though they could still be fixed for reliability reasons afaik.

As your other post shows though, you could change massive parts of the engine within the token system. The bigger issue than tokens was the size of the changes required vs time. Honda tried to change far too much from apparently only August last year through to preseason, you simply can't design, and thoroughly test and iterate the design process for this kind of engine in that kind of time frame. Having more changes to make could arguably have been too tempting for Honda to do too much. Had they kept the semi reliable parts of the engine and just focused on changing the compressor location, size and the like for this year then made bigger steps next year with more time to test them.

Hell, Honda could have stuck with last year's engine with minor updates and started working for 2018 from August, give them a year and a half, with the much more reliable yet still not very competitive engine they would have far less in season fixing to do and could put a lot more resources towards a longer term new engine. This is why Honda are failing imo, they keep rushing into everything and causing them to be in the situation to never be able to test or design anything at the level required for F1(or frankly any top level motorsport).

[wuzak]

The original token schedule was:

Total number of Tokens: 66

Year...T1 T2
2015...32...61
2016...25...51
2017...20...51
2018...15...43
2019...3...3
2020...3...3

Where T1 = tokens that could be used
and T2 = tokens of items that could be changed

For the first few years the amount of changes that could be made were quite significant.

That reduced down to almost nothing by 2019/2020. The only things that could be changed by then were to be the wiring loom for the ERS, the exhaust layout from engine exhaust flanges to turbine inlet flange and certain engine mounted electrical components (e.g. wiring loom within legality volume, sensors, alternator).

[wuzak]

As your other post shows though, you could change massive parts of the engine within the token system. The bigger issue than tokens was the size of the changes required vs time. Honda tried to change far too much from apparently only August last year through to preseason, you simply can't design, and thoroughly test and iterate the design process for this kind of engine in that kind of time frame. Having more changes to make could arguably have been too tempting for Honda to do too much. Had they kept the semi reliable parts of the engine and just focused on changing the compressor location, size and the like for this year then made bigger steps next year with more time to test them.

Hell, Honda could have stuck with last year's engine with minor updates and started working for 2018 from August, give them a year and a half, with the much more reliable yet still not very competitive engine they would have far less in season fixing to do and could put a lot more resources towards a longer term new engine. This is why Honda are failing imo, they keep rushing into everything and causing them to be in the situation to never be able to test or design anything at the level required for F1(or frankly any top level motorsport).

I think that's what Ferrari did between 2014 and 2015 and why they campaigned to be allowed to use some of teh tokens through the year.

They upgraded the turbo, mguh, etc and gained some performance. But the big combustion upgrade was not ready and needed further reliability/performance testing before being introduced. It was then introduced when sorted, in the middle of the season.

I think the mistake Honda have made was to have all their upgrades in one go.

They could have done either the new combustion design or the new architecture first, but probably not all at once. And in consideration of the chassis integration the architecture should have been #1 with the major combustion update following later.

[Joseki]

[HPD]

No one can deny Honda's hard work..

Honda has been running with a revised MGU-H that features reliability tweaks in this weekend's British Grand Prix.

The Japanese manufacturer has suffered a string of failures with that particular engine component so far this season.

The latest failure in Austria was an upgraded spec part that had been introduced in Baku as a countermeasure to a previous issue that centred around the bearing.

Following investigations at Honda's Japanese base at Sakura this week, the engine supplier identified the problem and the fix required did not necessitate a penalty.

As a result, both Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne are running the latest spec MGU-H at Silverstone.

"There is a mechanical failure with the bearing," Honda chief Yusuke Hasegawa told reporters on Saturday.
"So we introduced a new bearing and we have a countermeasure to try and avoid the bearing wearing."

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/hond ... gp-931197/

[makecry]

No one can deny Honda's hard work..

Honda has been running with a revised MGU-H that features reliability tweaks in this weekend's British Grand Prix.

The Japanese manufacturer has suffered a string of failures with that particular engine component so far this season.

The latest failure in Austria was an upgraded spec part that had been introduced in Baku as a countermeasure to a previous issue that centred around the bearing.

Following investigations at Honda's Japanese base at Sakura this week, the engine supplier identified the problem and the fix required did not necessitate a penalty.

As a result, both Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne are running the latest spec MGU-H at Silverstone.

"There is a mechanical failure with the bearing," Honda chief Yusuke Hasegawa told reporters on Saturday.
"So we introduced a new bearing and we have a countermeasure to try and avoid the bearing wearing."

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/hond ... gp-931197/

I will believe it when I see it. This is the third time(?) they have had a reliability upgrade for the MGU-H. If the this one lasts for 4-5 races, then great or else it's a waste of time.

[fellowhoodlums]

Just looking up the rules about the summer break. Looks like Honda can keep working hard on developing the engine.

"All competitors must observe a factory shutdown period of 14 consecutive days in July and/or August, during which time their wind tunnels and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) facilities must not be used for Formula One activities."

[HPD]

Toro Rosso Honda 2018 (without confirmation)

That's why Toro Rosso-Honda makes sense

In Silverstone came a completely new variant. The driver radio reported: Honda is negotiating a technical partnership with Toro Rosso. What was initially only a rumor now seems to gain more and more truth. There is talked about in more than one motorhome behind the hand held. One can only hear from the participants: No comment.

A collaboration between Toro Rosso and Honda would make sense. Because it would be a win-win for both parties. Honda wants to be independent from the vagaries of the ever-dissatisfied partner McLaren and in the event that McLaren and Sauber lose both customers. Red Bulls B team would be a good base for technical and sporting purposes. This is better than to fill the sponsor gaps at McLaren and to listen to criticism.

Red Bull, on the other hand, could concentrate more on the title race against Mercedes and Ferrari. In the past, the group management was not always happy with the results of the sister team. Toro Rosso has missed the season goal place three times in a row. At the moment, the Red Bull pool does not have immediate talents, which could be trained at Toro Rosso. Red Bulls B team has grown up and could go with Honda its own way. A decision is still to fall during the summer break.

http://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/form ... 03730.html