What goes into an Eff Wun engine?

F1 race engines are probably taken a little for granted. We expect them to deliver several corrals of horses, and be absolutely bullet proof. When we see one blow up on TV, we say rude words about the engine’s manufacturer (but probably not half as rude as the words the drivers and team managers say). So here’s a little piece on the background to a race engine, in this case, the ones in the tails of the BMW Williams, known as the P83.

This engine was on paper as a concept from November to December 2001, and having been approved was then designed in four months. 1,950 CAD drawings were made for this engine. Printed out and laid end to end, they would cover a distance of 1.3 kilometres.

BMW Williams F1

Between May 2002 through to July 2002, all the components were manufactured and it first fired a shot in anger on the test bench on 31 July 2002.

The engine was then put through a series of tests, including running in a race chassis, right through from September 2002 to mid-February 2003, when it was considered to be race-ready. This development has been continuing all this year, and this engine, the P83 will be phased out after the Japanese GP on October 12.

In the meantime the test phase for the new BMW P84 engine has already been launched. Following successful bench tests, it was being track tested in its 2004 season specification at Monza in September this year.

The total production of the BMW P83 was 200 units, and the BMW Williams team take 10 to each grand prix. Each engine has around 5,000 individual components, with 1,000 of them completely different. During its racing life of eight months, the engine has received 1,388 upgrade modifications. Each engine also does 500 kays before being stripped down and rebuilt.

BMW race engine

The engine delivers more than 900 bhp and weighs less than 90 kg. This weight figure is reached by using many alloy components, with a special thin-wall casting done at the BMW foundry at Landshut. The maximum revs from this V10 is 19,250, though during the race, the limiter is set on 19,000 rpm. For interest sake, the idle speed of this engine is 4,000 rpm, an engine speed at which your average family Japanese shopping trolley is starting to get breathless going down Sukhumvit Road!

An Eff Wun race engine is also subject to some high stresses. For example, the ultra-high speed 130R turn at Suzuka (Japanese GP) with its lateral load of 4G poses the greatest challenge to the oil system. The last place you need your oil is splattered up the inside of the crankcase! (This was the reason the external oil tank and ‘dry sump’ oil systems were designed. These are de rigeur on race engines, but rarely seen in road engines, other than in cars such as the Porsche 911 series.)

How long do you think you can run an engine like this on full throttle? The Monza circuit sees the engine at full noise for 73% of the entire lap, and neither Montoya or Gene had a problem, while at the Monaco GP, the transmission and engine have to withstand an average 3,100 gear changes.

Other interesting snippets for the engineers - the air intake volume is 1,995 cubic metres per hour. Maximum piston acceleration is 10,000G. Piston speed peaks at 40 metres per second and averages 25 metres per second. Exhaust temperatures of up to 950 degrees are reached. Maximum air temperature in the pneumatic system is 250 degrees.

The engine block and cylinder head are made of cast aluminium. BMW Munich handles the manufacture of the crankshaft (steel), camshaft (case-hardened steel) and camshaft covers, as well as processing of the cylinder head and crankcase. The oil system and engine electronics also come from BMW Munich.

Perhaps now you can see why these F1 engines are so horrendously expensive!

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