Awesome insight on starting a Formula One Ferrari

This is a cool article. I had no idea what it took to get an F1 car started. Very interesting....


http://www.carpages.co.uk/news/csma-...;echo=54570438

JL

This story reminds me of how we fire up the Lola T70 at the race shop (750 HP 350 CID Chevy). 45 minutes before startup, the oil heater is turned on and we wait for the oil to reach 140dF. Then we pump the warm oil through the engine with a pump on an electric drill until the pressure comes up to 50 PSI. Then the tennsi balls are removed from the velocity stacks and the fuel pumps turned on. When the pressure gets to 60 PSI a small squirt of gas is added to each velocity stack, and then the engine is turned over for the first time.

THere is an old story about starting a pre WW2 Alfa, that goes roughtly like: A) drain oil, B) heat oil to 100 dC, C) install starting spark plugs, D) turn block heater,...start engine, warm up engine, shut off engine...reinstall racing spark plugs.

Engines built this close to the edge require a lot of care a attention over their reletively short lives.

Very interesting Mitch. I had no idea!!

I did the math and that comes out to just over $300 per mile... WOW!!

"I did the math and that comes out to just over $300 per mile... WOW!!"

That only includes the engine. Add in the cost of gas, labor to remove and reinstall the engine; the gear box is rebuilt as often as the engine; add up transportation, lodging, food; and it ends up reminding me of the old dialog:

"Want to end up with a small fortune after racing"?
"yes"
"Start with a big fortune"

"RACER" magazine did a story on a F1 test day stating that after one day of testing, they toss out all the internal parts in the gearbox as "timed out parts" Cost of the parts in the gearbox was listed at $40,000.

I must admit I was surprised that Ferrari did not have Heaters built in !!!

Pouring Boiling Water Over The Engine to WARM IT UP sounds a bit??? ...sounds a bit???:.....sounds a bit???....Uhhhhh.....well...???

Could that be why they had a 13 yr hiatus on the podium???

Think they've reverted back to the pouring boiling water technique??? I guess with a 3 yr waiting list who gives a hoot.....if they will wait..we will build it eventually..and improve it later!

ps: & short the supply stream on parts..

Built in heaters = weight. Not pouring water over, but pumping it through the system. Like Mitch, we too heated the oil.We have heating strips on the dry sump tank. Very common, most race cars today do this. My Trans-Am deal cost was well over $300 per racing mile. I am sure F1 costs are in the thousands per mile if you include all the people, "tajmahal"shops, travel,high tech cnc tools, They say the budget is over 90 millon pounds per year. Way above the top Nascar and Indy teams at $20 million USD per year. When you get to the level of F1, things change. Maclaren's new shop has a large lake in front of it.Very pretty, but of what use? Ha! F1, they use it to cool the air from the wind tunnel that they test in 24 hours a day. The air gets very hot traveling throught the tunnel and changes density. Also, they can heat or cool the other buildings with geothermo from the lake. F1 costs go way beyond just race laps.

Bob,

the pouring boiling water was totally 'tongue in cheek'!!

Very interesting about the Lake! Must admit that's quite good thinking!!

I read somewhere that Ferraris racing budget for one year is in the $400M range!

On my race engines I use a "Low Budget" electric blanket to keep them warm/warm them up, so I'm familiar with the process.

JRV,
Sorry, missed the tongue in cheek part. but I have seem some really dumb things done in racing. Done a few myself. Just life, I guess.
400 million sounds closer to what I would think is spent per year on a top F1 team. Anyone care to recalulate the cost per mile? Bob