45% efficient F1 ICE engine ?

Hillhater

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Mercedes are saying that their latest hybrid F1 V6 engines are up at 45% - 50% efficient (from 30+ % previous best),
They state that this leap in efficiency is mainly due to the thermal energy recovery systems (MGU-H) enabling exhaust heat energy to be recovered and stored in battery and reused to add boost when best determined.
They also mentioned that this technology will be transferred to road cars very soon !
Note: this does not include the energy recovered via the kinetic recovery ( braking) or power contribution from the hybrid electric drive. ,
http://www.enginetechnologyinternational.com/news.php?NewsID=77881
 
I wont hold my breath !
They said the same about the horse a hundred years or so ago, but there are still plenty of those around, sometimes doing jobs better ( cheaper, more efficient, more environmentally, etc) than any other option.
ICE motors may well be replaced for most transport, but there will be situations where EV's just wont be practical.
 
Interesting that they are making these high efficiency claims with little known how they are getting there. Are they including the battery charge in the figures. Certainly can have a significant effect during a brief test. Battery powered turbo boost can add some significant catalyst to the reaction. Are they generating electricity from the waste heat yet? That would help for certain. Wondering what the fuel injection setup and compression ratio is.
 
They are quite clear that the bulk of the gains is from the MGU-H. ( motor/generator unit- heat recovery) which uses a turbine in the exhaust to drive a generator providing up to 120 kW's, intermittently , which is stored in a battery, and then reused to drive the same unit when needed to produce boost for higher ICE power.
And no, they dont include any initial charge in the battery !
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-N_Iy-GY19DE/UdVwCEPrPMI/AAAAAAAAJJ4/vwBpItZPBaQ/s640/MMarelli+Motorsport+F1+2014+ERS_Energy+Recovery+System.jpg
MMarelli+Motorsport+F1+2014+ERS_Energy+Recovery+System.jpg
 
What dont you understand about recovering energy from the exhaust that they have not been able to before , and reusing it at another point in the drive cycle ?
Detail design of the ICE is pretty irrelevent compared to recovering masses of otherwise lost energy.
 
ICE in all its variations is interesting from an engineering perspective, but EV tech is poised to eclipse it in terms of value to humanity. I tend to view all things ICE in a museum setting already. It just doesn't interest me much anymore.
 
gogo said:
?..... I tend to view all things ICE in a museum setting already. It just doesn't interest me much anymore.
Strange that you should bother to read a thread specificly about them in that case ?
But even if your only interest is electrical drives, you should be interested inthe technology being used in these "hybrid" applications, as they are some of the most advanced motor generator, inverter, and battery systems , being developed outside the aerospace sector.
 
The first time I saw this tech rolled out was a just a few years ago at the battery show which was sharing floorspace with the engine show. They were pitching this stuff at big rig trucks and were claiming a 6% increase in fuel economy. I too am suspicious of claimed double-digit improvement though with the deep-pocketed optimization possibilities in F1, it may be real.


Of course the ICE still has its place--you can use it to make electricity when you can't get it any other way! :D
 
Hillhater said:
gogo said:
?..... I tend to view all things ICE in a museum setting already. It just doesn't interest me much anymore.
Strange that you should bother to read a thread specificly about them in that case ?
But even if your only interest is electrical drives, you should be interested inthe technology being used in these "hybrid" applications, as they are some of the most advanced motor generator, inverter, and battery systems , being developed outside the aerospace sector.

C'mon now, you left out the first sentence. I wrote a school report about diesel engines when I was ten years old. I've been following ICE technology closely for 40+ years since. ICE used to be the shizz, but I'm sticking to my vision of it being relegated largely to museums soon.

My father was selling Elcar electric cars in the 70's and at that time I correctly predicted (when I was 13 mind you) that hybrids would be an important stepping stone in EV evolution. I do find hybrid tech interesting, but I have visions of it sitting in museums soon, too.
 
I would like to think battery tech will advance the several orders of magnitude to allow most ICE's to be replaced, but im not confident i will see it happen in my life time.
Even when the science is cracked, Business " economics" (greed !) will slow it down and make it financially unrealistic for many situations.
There will be situations for ICE's to remail practical for many years yet.
Its going to take some battery to enable the electric equivalent of a long haul commercial passenger aircraft !
 
I wouldn't like to speculate on the efficiency of an F1 engine, but for medium-sized stationary diesel engines the efficiency is usually based on a third of the energy of the fuel going to each of mechanical output, exhaust heat and jacket-water heat. So yes, if you can recover half the energy being wasted to exhaust you could boost efficiency by a large number like 50%.

On another note, that MGU unit is nuts! 120kW from something that looks about the size of a Coke can...
 
Hill, you lost me. It runs off the flow of exhaust gas from the piston engine. Nothing like a gas turbine with multiple fan compression section, combustion and exhaust sections. This is a piston engine with a turbo (single stage pinwheel fan), with a electric motor-generator between the exhaust and the intake sides. Calling this a heat recovery system is a bit of artistic language. I am sure it adds efficiency and possibly hits high numbers at some throttle and load settings, but do not buy the claims with out some proof. If it was this good every benz would be a hybrid with this type of system onboard.
 
The question is how exactly are they turning heat into electricity?

Steam turbine is not artistic language, it is indeed the heat making it go. There are two systems, one is using the pressure off the exhaust, this one the heat off the turbo. Both are on the F1 engines.

Dang this is a kewl subject. I used to talk about it here and elsewhere, always DOA to everyone else.

http://www.heat2power.net/

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2009/05/bmw-rankine-20090503.html
 
I'd guess this system is used in lieu of a waste gate, so that's one way they could recover otherwise wasted energy. In general, it should create optimum (higher) cylinder pressures across the RPM range.
 
The motivation to develop these systems is the competion rules have now restricted the maximum amount of fuel they are allowed to use during the 2 hour race. It is 35% less than previous limits, so they have to find ways of being more fuel efficient, whilst maintaining (or increasing) power output. Thermal energy recovery is a big oportunity to make improvements in addition to the kinetic (regen) energy recovery they were already using.
 
A combined Steam / exhaust turbine may be what they are doing in the latest motors. I can find no detail other then the claim they are additionally using the rankine cycle in the new motors. I can see something like this significantly increasing the thermal efficiency of a hot motor running wide open as in these cars. Not been able to confirm this, but that would definitely make the claimed eff. numbers realistic.

attachment.php

http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthread.php/exhaust-heat-recovery-simulation-rankine-cycle-system-29916.html
 
Punx0r said:
I wouldn't like to speculate on the efficiency of an F1 engine, but for medium-sized stationary diesel engines the efficiency is usually based on a third of the energy of the fuel going to each of mechanical output, exhaust heat and jacket-water heat. So yes, if you can recover half the energy being wasted to exhaust you could boost efficiency by a large number like 50%.

On another note, that MGU unit is nuts! 120kW from something that looks about the size of a Coke can...


Your numbers agree with the numberS I have read since my first brush with ICE efficiency in college physics in 1960. About 1/3 of the potential energy of the fuel goes to each of crankshaft power, heat into cooling, and heat thrown out in exhaust.

So potentially if somehow all the wasted heat was recovered at 100%, the ICE could output 3X its present power output at the crankshaft.

The device shown is somewhat clumsy and primitive looking, and so it is no surprise that it is only 45% efficient rather than the "standard" 33% or thereabouts.


GONZ
 
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