Honda Power Unit Hardware & Software

[Sieper]

Ferrari has made very small gains, after loosing 50/60 hp in the winter. PU power delivery is very important to the on track speed of that I remain convinced.

[_cerber1]

That's what I was talking about. Looks good if Honda can keep that reliability with a significant power gain for next year. They don't have to be better, but they have to be there to push the Mercs to a point they can't turn down the PU middle race. Then we will see the real strenght of Honda Vs Merc. Because the Honda PU's have been pushed to the edge, and no terminal failures like the other manufacturers, and no penalties. I think, and it's only my opinion, but the Merc PU package on the works team id always designed to be in clean air, and when it's not the case, it starts overheating... And Honda PU seems to not be bothered with heating issues (Albon usually was on the midfield pack)

In my opinion, you are not fair about the motors of the MB factory team. They drove 1000 km more than the RB motors and won the championship. Perez was also all the time in the fight with McLaren and Renault, which cannot be said for AT.

Look at the statistics and think about the operating conditions of the motors.

[GhostF1]

That's what I was talking about. Looks good if Honda can keep that reliability with a significant power gain for next year. They don't have to be better, but they have to be there to push the Mercs to a point they can't turn down the PU middle race. Then we will see the real strenght of Honda Vs Merc. Because the Honda PU's have been pushed to the edge, and no terminal failures like the other manufacturers, and no penalties. I think, and it's only my opinion, but the Merc PU package on the works team id always designed to be in clean air, and when it's not the case, it starts overheating... And Honda PU seems to not be bothered with heating issues (Albon usually was on the midfield pack)

In my opinion, you are not fair about the motors of the MB factory team. They drove 1000 km more than the RB motors and won the championship. Perez was also all the time in the fight with McLaren and Renault, which cannot be said for AT.

Look at the statistics and think about the operating conditions of the motors.

Ok put it this way. Racing Point and Williams, the two teams that had several Merc Power Unit failures totaled less distance than both Alpha Tauri and Red Bull (Williams 19km more than RB). They are also fighting in the midfield and more than likely maxxing it for longer.

The point that is being made is that Mercedes factory team being able to control the pace and run in clean air more than likely had a beneficial impact on PU life. The idea here is that if RBR can take the fight to them in 2021, they won't be able to reduce the PU performance and cruise to victory to conserve, they'll be forced to run harder far more. This is where we may see issues arise in the factory team.

[godlameroso]

That's what I was talking about. Looks good if Honda can keep that reliability with a significant power gain for next year. They don't have to be better, but they have to be there to push the Mercs to a point they can't turn down the PU middle race. Then we will see the real strenght of Honda Vs Merc. Because the Honda PU's have been pushed to the edge, and no terminal failures like the other manufacturers, and no penalties. I think, and it's only my opinion, but the Merc PU package on the works team id always designed to be in clean air, and when it's not the case, it starts overheating... And Honda PU seems to not be bothered with heating issues (Albon usually was on the midfield pack)

In my opinion, you are not fair about the motors of the MB factory team. They drove 1000 km more than the RB motors and won the championship. Perez was also all the time in the fight with McLaren and Renault, which cannot be said for AT.

Look at the statistics and think about the operating conditions of the motors.

Honda is the only power unit besides Mercedes to win this year, and did so at the temple of speed. Roughly half of the performance of the car comes from the power unit, perhaps slightly more than half. The rest of the performance comes from the chassis.

If Mercedes is 10/10
Honda was 9.3/10
Renault was 9.1/10
Ferrari was 8/10

Ferrari is said to bring 30 hp next year, which would put them ~9.2/10

But teams aren't standing still,
Mercedes will likely be 11/10 next year.
Honda needs to be at least 10.5 to mount a serious challenge.

[63l8qrrfy6]

Honda is the only power unit besides Mercedes to win this year, and did so at the temple of speed. Roughly half of the performance of the car comes from the power unit, perhaps slightly more than half. The rest of the performance comes from the chassis.

If that was the case Williams would be right up there with the best teams not 2 seconds behind Mercedes.

The laptime difference between best and worst engines is still dwarfed by the difference between the best and worst chassis/aero.

That's exactly why I keep making the point that freezing or even equalizing engine performance will not make racing closer. Williams would still be 2 seconds off factory Mercs and even further behind their closest rivals.

[godlameroso]

Honda is the only power unit besides Mercedes to win this year, and did so at the temple of speed. Roughly half of the performance of the car comes from the power unit, perhaps slightly more than half. The rest of the performance comes from the chassis.

If that was the case Williams would be right up there with the best teams not 2 seconds behind Mercedes.

The laptime difference between best and worst engines is still dwarfed by the difference between the best and worst chassis/aero.

That's exactly why I keep making the point that freezing or even equalizing engine performance will not make racing closer. Williams would still be 2 seconds off factory Mercs and even further behind their closest rivals.

Why is Williams behind, is it just aero? Or do they have higher cooling requirements as well because their engine covers aren't as efficient increasing drag? If they had more money they'd be able to cut a lot of drag from the car, as the cooling requirements account for roughly 30% of the drag. Also the difference between Williams and Mercedes is ~3%. So if the car has 10% more drag, 10% less aero, and worse suspension kinematics(tire usage), that's your 3% right there.

Look at the Ferrari, the chassis has more drag but is much faster in the corners, and yet it's slower than last year by over a second. The engine has a huge influence in performance, the chassis gained 2% but they lost 4% from the engine. ~40hp.

[63l8qrrfy6]

Honda is the only power unit besides Mercedes to win this year, and did so at the temple of speed. Roughly half of the performance of the car comes from the power unit, perhaps slightly more than half. The rest of the performance comes from the chassis.

If that was the case Williams would be right up there with the best teams not 2 seconds behind Mercedes.

The laptime difference between best and worst engines is still dwarfed by the difference between the best and worst chassis/aero.

That's exactly why I keep making the point that freezing or even equalizing engine performance will not make racing closer. Williams would still be 2 seconds off factory Mercs and even further behind their closest rivals.

Why is Williams behind, is it just aero? Or do they have higher cooling requirements as well because their engine covers aren't as efficient increasing drag? If they had more money they'd be able to cut a lot of drag from the car, as the cooling requirements account for roughly 30% of the drag. Also the difference between Williams and Mercedes is ~3%. So if the car has 10% more drag, 10% less aero, and worse suspension kinematics(tire usage), that's your 3% right there.

Look at the Ferrari, the chassis has more drag but is much faster in the corners, and yet it's slower than last year by over a second. The engine has a huge influence in performance, the chassis gained 2% but they lost 4% from the engine. ~40hp.

It doesn't matter why they have extra drag, it's not because of the engine.
Wherever the drag comes from it is chassis/aero related and will not go away regardless what engine they fit.
Actually Merc is most likely the most efficient engine hence it has the smallest heat rejection.

[godlameroso]

If that was the case Williams would be right up there with the best teams not 2 seconds behind Mercedes.

The laptime difference between best and worst engines is still dwarfed by the difference between the best and worst chassis/aero.

That's exactly why I keep making the point that freezing or even equalizing engine performance will not make racing closer. Williams would still be 2 seconds off factory Mercs and even further behind their closest rivals.

Why is Williams behind, is it just aero? Or do they have higher cooling requirements as well because their engine covers aren't as efficient increasing drag? If they had more money they'd be able to cut a lot of drag from the car, as the cooling requirements account for roughly 30% of the drag. Also the difference between Williams and Mercedes is ~3%. So if the car has 10% more drag, 10% less aero, and worse suspension kinematics(tire usage), that's your 3% right there.

Look at the Ferrari, the chassis has more drag but is much faster in the corners, and yet it's slower than last year by over a second. The engine has a huge influence in performance, the chassis gained 2% but they lost 4% from the engine. ~40hp.

It doesn't matter why they have extra drag, it's not because of the engine.
Wherever the drag comes from it is chassis/aero related and will not go away regardless what engine they fit.
Actually Merc is most likely the most efficient engine hence it has the smallest heat rejection.

What about the MGU-K MGU-H ERS heat exchangers? Those are part of the power unit as well. If your chassis doesn't let you have the same heat exchanger layout as the works team, just that alone will hurt you. Because maybe you have to make chassis compromises to accommodate your layout.

[63l8qrrfy6]

What about the MGU-K MGU-H ERS heat exchangers? Those are part of the power unit as well. If your chassis doesn't let you have the same heat exchanger layout as the works team, just that alone will hurt you. Because maybe you have to make chassis compromises to accommodate your layout.

Same compromises are made by the factory team, RP and from next year McL. None of them seem terribly concerned about packaging PU heat exchangers.

Williams have been a Merc customer for quite a few years now, they can't have been surprised by the cooling requirements in these last couple seasons, particularly when said requirements have gone down year on year.

Secondly the ERS side is extremely efficient compared to the ICE. Combined with the fact that the electric motor power is relatively small, the heat rejection of the entire ERS is tiny compared to the charge air cooler+water+oil ICE heat rejection.

To put things into perspective if the total ICE heat rejection to fluids was only 10%, the heat rejection rate would equal the MGUK power.

[godlameroso]

What about the MGU-K MGU-H ERS heat exchangers? Those are part of the power unit as well. If your chassis doesn't let you have the same heat exchanger layout as the works team, just that alone will hurt you. Because maybe you have to make chassis compromises to accommodate your layout.

Same compromises are made by the factory team, RP and from next year McL. None of them seem terribly concerned about packaging PU heat exchangers.

Williams have been a Merc customer for quite a few years now, they can't have been surprised by the cooling requirements in these last couple seasons, particularly when said requirements have gone down year on year.

Secondly the ERS side is extremely efficient compared to the ICE. Combined with the fact that the electric motor power is relatively small, the heat rejection of the entire ERS is tiny compared to the charge air cooler+water+oil ICE heat rejection.

To put things into perspective if the total ICE heat rejection to fluids was only 10%, the heat rejection rate would equal the MGUK power.

If your fluids are running at 105c, that may be fine for the engine but the MGU-K may be required to have fluids at 70c, so even though the MGU-K cooling requirement is smaller than the engine, it may require more robust cooling to achieve the desired temperatures. Whereas Mercedes can combine MGU-H and turbine cooling on one circuit and reduce packaging, perhaps Williams cannot due to budget.

[etusch]

merso uses higher working temperetue this year. With my level of knowledge I can say that they are doing it for getting faster combustion by keeping h efficiency alive.
My question is about those mgu-k with higher performance to detuned style this race, it means to me that still there is room to reach 4 mj level with mgu-k at one lap, or? If they could reach that level earlier, they have to be more reliable, haven't they ?

[etusch]

"Fundamentally today, we didn't have the best car," said Shovlin after the race.

"We need to look at whether we could have got more out of it, whether it was an issue with where we positioned it in terms of set-up or whether it's something to do with this circuit that's suiting the Red Bull.

"There's a lot there that simply we don't understand right, and that's just going to sit on the job list of things for us to get stuck into over the next week or so.

"We didn't have a difference in car pace, so in a way, it was lost yesterday, which was a close battle, but looking at it today, unless we had a car on pole, I think we would have struggled."

trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin

Mr Shovlin your team's fans don't think in that way

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/hami ... n=widget-1

[63l8qrrfy6]

If your fluids are running at 105c, that may be fine for the engine but the MGU-K may be required to have fluids at 70c, so even though the MGU-K cooling requirement is smaller than the engine, it may require more robust cooling to achieve the desired temperatures. Whereas Mercedes can combine MGU-H and turbine cooling on one circuit and reduce packaging, perhaps Williams cannot due to budget.

The cooling package is still part of the chassis/aero. If they can't get it right because of budget limitations no engine will change that.

To say that Williams are slowest because of very special Merc ERS cooling requirements is plain speculation and clutching at straws.

[63l8qrrfy6]

merso uses higher working temperetue this year. With my level of knowledge I can say that they are doing it for getting faster combustion by keeping h efficiency alive.

No, they are doing it to reduce radiator area.
If they wanted to increase combustion temperature for whatever reason all they had to do was decrease charge cooling.

[etusch]

If your fluids are running at 105c, that may be fine for the engine but the MGU-K may be required to have fluids at 70c, so even though the MGU-K cooling requirement is smaller than the engine, it may require more robust cooling to achieve the desired temperatures. Whereas Mercedes can combine MGU-H and turbine cooling on one circuit and reduce packaging, perhaps Williams cannot due to budget.

The cooling package is still part of the chassis/aero. If they can't get it right because of budget limitations no engine will change that.

To say that Williams are slowest because of very special Merc ERS cooling requirements is plain speculation and clutching at straws.

Isn't merc went engineer for teams. At least they send all requirements for engine usage and maintanence and loosing an engine because of cheaper cooling system is more expensive.