F1 and Hybrids

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(DBM @ Jun 23 2006, 02:57 PM) [snapback]276012[/snapback]</div>

I watch F1 religiously on SpeedTV. Maybe Peter Windsor will ask Max about his hybrid engine idea this weekend at the Canadian GP. There have been many recent changes to the regulations that none of the teams were in favor of.

F1 cars pull a ridiculous number of Gs during braking, like over six. Anyone want to do the calculations and figure out how many amps of current that would be at 500 volts to decelerate a 1200lb car and 150lb driver at six Gs? I'm gonna guess that it's over a thousand amps.

I did a little Googling - peak braking in an F1 car disspates 1.5MW - that's right, megawatts. So that's three thousand amps at 500 volts.

 

There was a time in F1 that they used no petrol at all; the late 80s 1.5L turbo era saw chemical fuels more akin to TNT and rocket fuel than gas.

Back then they did not refuel and the fuel cells were frozen; the garage guys looked like they were dressed for Chernobyl

 

Mr Mosley, president of the FIA, is almost universally considered an idiot and acting like a petty dictator. He is in the process of destroying the sport by his constant manipulation of the rules. I feel that there needs to be major control over the 100s of millions of dollars that the major teams spend but any discussion of regerative braking or hybrid technology is gigglesville and Mosely should be at his tailor being fitted for something with straps to keep him from hurting himself. :wacko:

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(priusenvy @ Jun 23 2006, 06:59 PM) [snapback]276046[/snapback]</div>

How much of that can a 20kg system capture and then release at a similar rate? The F1 cars certainly wouldn't have to store the regenerated energy long. Would capacitors or hydraulics have a better charge rate & discharge rate to mass ratios than chemical batteries?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(theorist @ Jun 30 2006, 09:27 PM) [snapback]279533[/snapback]</div>

I'm hardly an expert, but my guess is that it would have to be a mechanical system, like gas pressure. There have been regenerative braking systems that stored energy in the form of pressurized air, and then released it to provide motive force. This article even says that the advantage of the hydralic pressure accumlator is that you can get energy into and out of storage at a much higher rate than if you were using a battery.