The engine is the heart of every racing car. It is the part that can't be without, and one of the more complicated ones, if not the most complicated.
In Formula 1 the engines have passed through all steps of evolution and they have been constantly changing through evolution or regulations change
An F1 engine consists of more than 5000 parts, with 1500 of them being moving ones. The regulations limit the total cubism of the engine to 2,4 liters and allow only V8 engines. The total horsepower output of these engines today is more or less around 750 BHP.
Just a few years ago, when the 3lt engines were allowed, some manufacturers had reached the "magical" number of 1000BHP with their 3lt V8 rotating at over 20,000rpm. This had become dangerous, according to the FIA officials, so the RPM is also limited to 19,000rpm along with the cubism restrictions.
We have to remind you here that about 20 years ago when the turbo era was finishing in F1, BMW had presented its 1.5lt turbo charged engine, which reached (in the test lab) 1500BHP.
This era is long over, however. Todays engines are more "driver friendly", they last longer and they are far more reliable.
Having said about the horsepower output it is time to say some things about the fuel consumption. Today a Formula 1 engine on full torque in race conditions consumes around 60 - 70lt/100km. This number also used to be greater when the 3lt or 3.5lt engines were allowed. There was a time when a 3.5lt engine could use 1lt of fuel to cover 800m (125lt/100km).
Someone can say that these are some tuned motors. Well they are, in a way, but they are nothing like what normal people or street racers call tuning. They are designed and built from scratch with only one goal: To be a state of the art motor engine, and give maximum performance with the best efficiency. Even the last screw on such an engine is being tested and designed specially for one and only purpose.
Some technical information
The Volumetric Efficiency of the engine is the only thing that is close to the engines we use in our every day cars. Volumetric efficiency (VE), is the percentage of the cylinder's volume that fills with the mixture of fuel and air. If the cylinder is completely filled with the mixture in atmospheric pressure, then we say that the VE is 100%. Only turbocharged engines can have a VE of >100% as the turbocharger compresses the air, thus increasing the Volumetric Efficiency. A typical VE for a normal engine is anywhere between 80% and 100%.
Another engine metric is the Thermal Efficiency. In internal combustion engines the best part of the energy produced is being wasted mainly due to thermal losses. Chamber design, thermal coatings, ignition timing are just some of the factors here. In plain words most of the energy produced is being lost in the form of heat. A normal street engine has a Thermal Efficiency of 0.26 (26%), while a high tech racing engine can reach 0.34 (34%), which in the end can mean 30% more power.
The last efficiency metric is the Mechanical Efficiency of the engine. From the total energy finally produced, a part of it is being used up by the engine to run itself. It depends on the weight of the moving parts and also on the RPM the engine is running. The greater the RPM, the bigger the amount of energy needed to move it. This means limiting internal engine friction can generate a large surplus in horsepower, and where in F1 the stress is on power, on the road it is also on fuel consumption.
Optimizing such an engine is the biggest headache for the mechanics. The engine has to produce the biggest horsepower possible, but still has a logical fuel consumption and last for about 800Km (2 races plus qualification sessions). What we see after the optimization is a true F1 engine.
