95 - 02 F1 Tech
Discussion
GreatCornholio said:
Simple non-engineering question from me.... Which of the engines you look after was the most powerful whilst still racing? And how many bhp did it have?
Thanks, great thread
Probably the A spec EF15. We don't run it anymore as the tub, various bits of suspension etc. was getting past it and to be honest it's a bit old school for us but rumour has it (and I have no reason to believe otherwise having worked with it) on ELFs special brew it was exceeding 1000bhp in qualifying spec. For the NAs we generally run different mapping and fuels to what was run in original competition but all our 3 litre NA cars are still north of 700bhp.Thanks, great thread
petop said:
Really good thread. I went around the Lotus Renault F1 factory last year and the scale of everything that goes into putting these cars on to the grid was immense. The static suspension tuning bay where the operator said when Alonso was going around the "old" Renault setup he could watch the car on the mountings replicating the surface on a track and could tell them which track it was simulating. We also saw a couple of the older cars like the RS26 and the like.
This is actually a really good point and one I should touch on. We are basically the build and race team when compared to a modern F1 team - in that we assemble the cars from parts and support them during running. In a modern F1 team this "bit" of the business is actually the small bit in terms of floor space and budget with the R&D and engineering departments making up the bulk of any modern team. We do have some R&D/Test facilities in that we have a basic sim, gearbox dyno etc. but no where near the autoclavy, 20 seat CAD department goodness a modern team has
It's one thing I find quite funny for want of a better term as our "shop" is way above that which you would find in even a BTCC team or good privateer LMP team but to the F1 guys we're the bit out the back where engines get bolted to tubs 
dr_gn said:
It's not quite as simple as that
Boeing have had an involvement with Enstone for a while, although it's not that well publicised. Here's a picture I took in the paddock at F1 testing at Silverstone back in '08:
Can you spot the - very subtle - link to Boeing?
I can spot the not so subtle nod to the fact that modern F1 teams have military level processing power that for all intense and purpose is free of the restrictions or expected visibility one may find in a heavily goverment involved organisation. Want to model part of something without having to fess up to it, ever? Find an outside contractor Boeing have had an involvement with Enstone for a while, although it's not that well publicised. Here's a picture I took in the paddock at F1 testing at Silverstone back in '08:
Can you spot the - very subtle - link to Boeing?
As above it's certainly not impossible to start a car without a laptop. Given enough knowledge of where stuffs supposed to be and an IR pyro it's not difficult at all. The issue is making changes to the car without one, you really do need to tweek them for each use so without one you'd be stuck. Anyone trying to run one of these with only one laptop on the go is asking for trouble though. We generally have four per car a "master" which an image is taken from and then stored safely for future use/abuse and three "on the go". Generally we use IBM/Lenovo and Panasonic as these are readily available with serial ports, parallel ports and PCMCIA slots.
Vintage IT is definitely where it's at with these cars though, you've no chance of running any of the kit we need on a modern £350 from Tesco job.
It's not just laptops either, I had need to fire one the "rigs" up the other day so I could set some gearbox stuff up as all the hardware dongles are wired into the back of it and I didn't fancy taking it apart to try and make it go on a suitable vintage laptop
With the season fast approaching as well we've had cause to start sorting out what spares need freshing up or sourcing. First up was picking the best two sets of dampers we have left from this lot and refurbing them. Luckily we have shed loads of damper spares so accident damage aside we have enough to keep us going pretty much forever.
Same with clutches really, pick the best, refurb and fit. The "old" one then gets refurbed and put back into spares and into the use rotation. Anything worn beyond use goes in the bin. Again we have sufficent stock of cluthces, spares, shims etc. to keep us going pretty much indefinitely.
And again with Moog valves (which control the various hydraulic actuators on the car). At £1700 to refurb one and £3500 for a new one you don't really want to be buying them too often! We try to bias use across the spares to keep them all at around the same level. We have some at 10,000+KM and still going strong! Although at that age we try not to use them and they have a test before and after use.
The uprights are always a work of art and with the last crack test work going on last week I thought I'd grab a couple of photos and write a bit up on them. These are 2000 era hollow cast titanium items. The wall thicknesses are surprisingly thin and the webbings which support the bearing carrier are always a cause for concern. We use a dye penetration crack test system with them as it highlights failures in the casting extremely well, it's not so good for fabricated units as they surfaces are generally rough and the weld lines can hide cracks in the surface.
This one is at the end of the process, any cracks would show up as defined red lines in the white coating. Here it is pre test:
And a closer look:
The webbing not only reduces the weight of the upright massively but also provides a path through the centre of the upright for brake cooling air flow. The disc bell sits over the webbings and air flows into the bell and out through the radial holes in the disc.
Finally a few sensors need checking and refurbing prior to use, including the laser ride heights we run on a couple of the cars:
Here we have front, rear and spare. They're very clever and measure a 200mm range between 100mm and 300mm. They work by directing a laser onto the ground below the car and measuring its reflection. Response time is around 10ms so coupled with pots on the dampers and load cells on the pushrods we have a pretty good idea of what the body of the car is doing and what each corner is doing at the same time.
Busy times for us at the moment so apologies for not updating sooner!
Vintage IT is definitely where it's at with these cars though, you've no chance of running any of the kit we need on a modern £350 from Tesco job.
It's not just laptops either, I had need to fire one the "rigs" up the other day so I could set some gearbox stuff up as all the hardware dongles are wired into the back of it and I didn't fancy taking it apart to try and make it go on a suitable vintage laptop
With the season fast approaching as well we've had cause to start sorting out what spares need freshing up or sourcing. First up was picking the best two sets of dampers we have left from this lot and refurbing them. Luckily we have shed loads of damper spares so accident damage aside we have enough to keep us going pretty much forever.
Same with clutches really, pick the best, refurb and fit. The "old" one then gets refurbed and put back into spares and into the use rotation. Anything worn beyond use goes in the bin. Again we have sufficent stock of cluthces, spares, shims etc. to keep us going pretty much indefinitely.
And again with Moog valves (which control the various hydraulic actuators on the car). At £1700 to refurb one and £3500 for a new one you don't really want to be buying them too often! We try to bias use across the spares to keep them all at around the same level. We have some at 10,000+KM and still going strong! Although at that age we try not to use them and they have a test before and after use.
The uprights are always a work of art and with the last crack test work going on last week I thought I'd grab a couple of photos and write a bit up on them. These are 2000 era hollow cast titanium items. The wall thicknesses are surprisingly thin and the webbings which support the bearing carrier are always a cause for concern. We use a dye penetration crack test system with them as it highlights failures in the casting extremely well, it's not so good for fabricated units as they surfaces are generally rough and the weld lines can hide cracks in the surface.
This one is at the end of the process, any cracks would show up as defined red lines in the white coating. Here it is pre test:
And a closer look:
The webbing not only reduces the weight of the upright massively but also provides a path through the centre of the upright for brake cooling air flow. The disc bell sits over the webbings and air flows into the bell and out through the radial holes in the disc.
Finally a few sensors need checking and refurbing prior to use, including the laser ride heights we run on a couple of the cars:
Here we have front, rear and spare. They're very clever and measure a 200mm range between 100mm and 300mm. They work by directing a laser onto the ground below the car and measuring its reflection. Response time is around 10ms so coupled with pots on the dampers and load cells on the pushrods we have a pretty good idea of what the body of the car is doing and what each corner is doing at the same time.
Busy times for us at the moment so apologies for not updating sooner!
Been searching for some parts today and in the process assembled this:
That's every F1 dash/cockpit from 1986 to 1996 for a certain team You can see the development as displays got more complex with more data available, the latest one is the small screen behind wheel dash from 96, in 97 the screen moved to the wheel and ever since more and more control and functionality has migrated there. We really need to dispose of some of this stuff though, as lovely as it is to have around it doesn't half get tiring sifting through box after box because you need a spare dash display!
That's every F1 dash/cockpit from 1986 to 1996 for a certain team
You can see the development as displays got more complex with more data available, the latest one is the small screen behind wheel dash from 96, in 97 the screen moved to the wheel and ever since more and more control and functionality has migrated there. We really need to dispose of some of this stuff though, as lovely as it is to have around it doesn't half get tiring sifting through box after box because you need a spare dash display!dr_gn said:
So does the Minardi Ferrari still have a Ferrari engine? My personal favourite was the M189 - looked right in the black/yellow/white livery. I'd love one of those in the garage, or a Dallara 191. Not too exotic, but presumably a bit more affordable than the 'names'?
It does indeed. The Lamborghini Minardi is still rocking Lambo power too. M189 is a lovely bit of kit and a personal favourite of mine too. That and the 198 and 02.
Mellow Yellow in action here http://youtu.be/hsou22xMkgE
Edited by poppopbangbang on Saturday 18th January 23:09
Vaud said:
Ah yes, thanks.
Out of interest, what route does stuff take if it is damaged beyond repair? Sold to 3rd parties for ebay to recover some costs? I always fancied a wing/end plates on my study wall; lots for sale in perfect condition but battle scars never bothered me...
If it got damaged at the time it usually went straight in the skip at circuit. No point paying to ship broken bits around! Hence why so many on e-bay etc. are mint as they would have been the ones that survived the season. Out of interest, what route does stuff take if it is damaged beyond repair? Sold to 3rd parties for ebay to recover some costs? I always fancied a wing/end plates on my study wall; lots for sale in perfect condition but battle scars never bothered me...
I can do you a whole floor at a good price. They make a lovely desk when turned upside down
outnumbered said:
This is a fascinating thread... and it's quite amazing that it's still possible to keep these bespoke machines, built out of obsolete bleeding-edge technology, running.
With enough budget, stubbornness, refusal to admit defeat and a team of people who are quite honestly the most amazing bunch to work with there is you can keep anything going outnumbered said:
I guess the pull of owning an actual F1 car must be pretty strong for some people, as I'd have thought that you could go as quickly, and for less money, in a more modern "off the shelf" single seater ?
Not really, some things are as quick through a corner, somethings are as quick on a straight but even a late 90's car is a bloomin rapid bit of kit. Current GP2 cars are as quick as our F1s but that's 1.5 million for a seat minimum. World Series cars are a step down from there and again better aero than our stuff but no where near the poke. They are realistically the fastest things out there you can own privately. An F1 car is as a rule of thumb a decade ahead of "accessible" race technology so even when you stick a 2001 car in 2014 it doesn't really "feel" out of date 
willthisnamework said:
small correction the latest WSBR car is faster around the bendy bits now than a GP2 just more draggy and 80 bhp down. Now renault have updated the aero and gave it more power the wishbone are cracking a lot quicker. Whats pretty unheard of on a modern single make series especially dallara's
2013 GP2 Fastest Qualy laptime at Spa (Dry)- 1:56.957.2013 WSBR Fastest Qualy laptime at Spa (Dry) - 1:58.428
And like you say 80bhp down and more draggy. I'm sticking with my statement they're a step down from a GP2 car
For comparison 2000 Minardi M02 at old Spa (shorter start/finish straight mainly compared to new Spa with an overall track length of 4.3179 miles vs new Spas 4.351 miles) qualifying time 1:54.680. The old girls are still quick
Krikkit said:
A bit closer to topic, what a fantastic thread. As an engineering nerd, this is right up my street. Any more details about gearboxes in this era poppop? Or do you send boxes away to manufacturers for rebuild/inspection? By that I mean the internal shifting mechanisms and gear layouts/casings etc.
Nope we do all the gearbox work in house. We have a gearbox dyno/test rig with it's own hydraulic system and a dyno set of Moogs/valveblock etc. with a spare STEP 8 ECU to run them which allows us to setup the box post build e.g. gear positions etc. which we then export to the car ECU. 
All the boxes we work with are Xtrac internals, the casings, oil systems etc. were all designed in house by the team. We have pretty big stocks of gearbox bits and with regular attention we get surprisingly good life from the internals with the shift times reduced from max attack a little.
On the subject of casings they are a total work of art. This is a 2K era box which is thin wall cast titanium with carbon crash structure/casing brace. The clutch is internaly mounted in the bell housing, again a total work of art.
We'll be building one up shortly to test as a potential upgrade for an earlier car with a magnesium gearbox. Be interesting to see how that goes as 1) it gives us loads more spare boxes so we can turn the shifts back up and 2) it weighs 11KG less.
Justaredbadge said:
Was it the 04 BAR that had a cf gearbox casing?
What would be the deal with lifing a component like that?
We had a fairly rigorous lifing schedule for the Hewland stuff I've worked on, but some of the stuff would have been useable for about 3 times the miles that it actually did.
Arrows did it first in 99 if I remember correctly. Generally we run the cases until bits come through the side.... With an occasiona crack test on the suspension mounting points etc. The CF boxes would be no different apart from the difficulty in crack testing them. What would be the deal with lifing a component like that?
We had a fairly rigorous lifing schedule for the Hewland stuff I've worked on, but some of the stuff would have been useable for about 3 times the miles that it actually did.
banx22 said:
Excellent thread. I'm fascinated. What a cool job to have.
Whats the deal if one of these things was to crash heavily? are you able to repair the tub or is it written off?
We have the tooling for most cars, including tubs, so we'd just manufacture another if the budget was there to do it. To be honest you need to have a massive, massive impact to damage the tub - we've not had a written off tub yet!Whats the deal if one of these things was to crash heavily? are you able to repair the tub or is it written off?
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