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Rundown: The Power and The Passion – A Ferrari Story 00:02 Formula One is becoming leaner and greener. Rules being introduced by 2013 will see fuel consumption per gallon halved in the following five years. As race engineers strive to produce maximum fuel efficiency from fewer and smaller engines 00:38 Measures are already in place to lower the sports carbon footprint by 13% by 2012. The key to delivery of the efficiencies required will be the relationships between the race teams and their technology partners. This program looks at just one of them, the sport’s most enduring, as both partners come to terms with the changes introduced this season and the challenges they face together in the next. 01:13 When Formula Ones Teams revealed their new cars at the start of 2010 it was not without some trepidation. As well as introducing the new fuel specification the sport’s governing body (insert ‘the FIA’) had decreed that the cars could no longer be refuelled during races. 01:30 Fuel efficiency, weight, and volume became key considerations. Along with their rivals teams like Scuderia Ferrari were forced to redesign their car and chassis, and rethink their race strategy. Theirs was not the only reputation on the line. Long-term partner Shell would also have to revise its approach, to produce fuel and lubricant that delivered just as much power but even greater efficiency. The drivers had their own concerns. What effect would enlarged fuel tanks and a longer wheel base have on the handling of their cars? With winter testing hours restricted and the first Grand Prix of the season in Bahrain fast approaching, they had just a few weeks to find out. 02:27 In anticipation of the new regulations, Formula One’s fuel formulators had begun their painstaking work several months previously. But before they could burn the midnight oil, they first had to find the right one. 02:40 Original sound: Mike Evans, Shell Formula One Fuels Development Project Leader, English “The art of fuel formulation gets the best power and the best efficiency. So we work very, very hard to understand all the chemical elements that go into a fuel to make sure we select the right one. So this is where we take a lot of different refinery streams from around the world and mix them together to make the fuel for the formula one car.”>>02:58 03:04 Original sound: Mike Evans, Shell Formula One Fuels Development Project Leader, English “We have to understand the way that the compounds react, how quickly they burn. The engine is doing 18,000 rpm so we’re looking for compounds that burn really quickly and give it the best in efficiency.”>>03:16 03:18 More than 200 individual components had to be modelled and analysed. But for 2010, power and efficiency were not the only considerations. 03:29 Original sound: Dr. Lisa Lilley, Shell Technology Manager for Ferrari, English “Something that a lot people may not realize is that the fuel is actually going to get a lot hotter inside the car. Which normally when you refuel, 2 or 3 times during the race you are refuelling with cool fuel, so without that cooling effect, and obviously having such a large fuel tank sitting next to a very hot engine, the fuel itself is going to get hotter.”>>03:41 03:46 Original sound: Dr. Lisa Lilley, Shell Technology Manager for Ferrari, English “One of the ways to get around this is actually in the fuel formulation itself. We’re designing the fuel to be able to deal with these hotter temperatures and not to vaporize in the fuel tank, you can get vapour lock issues. One of the other problem is you can get air bubbles in the fuel. This can cause what’s called cavitation. And if you’ve got the most extreme circumstances, the fuelling system would be damaged beyond repair.”>>04:11 04:12 Then there were two further factors, the new fuel’s weight and volume. 04:17 Original sound: Mike Evans, Shell Formula One Fuels Development Project Leader, English “You’re talking 20% of the weight of the car at the start is made up of fuel so we’ve put a lot of effort into the fuels for this season to give them the best fuel efficiency on a weight basis. Conversely, if you’ve got a tank on a car that’s a bit small you want good fuel efficiency on a volume basis so we’re having to cover both angles.”>>04:35 04:36 Original sound: Dr. Lisa Lilley, Shell Technology Manager for Ferrari, English “We had all these challenges, and I have to say, the initial reaction was probably: ‘oh god’!”>>04:42 04:48 Original sound: Mike Evans, Shell Formula One Fuels Development Project Leader, English “We’ve got the density down as low as we can, as I said to Alessandro before, the last one looks the best…”>>04:55 04:56 Mike Evans first batch of candidate fuels for the 2010 season are being tested in Maranello. 05:03 Original sound: Dave Salters, Scuderia Ferrari Head of Engine Development, English “You can see from our measurements that the fuel economy that’s predicted is exactly what we’re seeing so that should give us a good advantage.”>>05:11 05:12 The cooperation between team and technical partner is close and continuous, not least in 2010 year, when both are climbing a steep learning curve. 05:21 Original sound: Dave Salters, Scuderia Ferrari Head of Engine Development, English “The emphasis used to be on power, power, power, now fuel economy is coming into it and we’re all learning.”>>05:26 05:27 Original sound: Luca Marmorini Scuderia Engine & Electronics Director, English “When you develop a fuel and an oil, you cannot just take a good fuel, put it in an engine, and expect it to work. Engine and fuel, and lubricant have to be developed together.”>>05:37 05:38 After exhaustive modelling at Thornton, the most promising formulations are made up in small batches and tested for performance and reliability during long runs on static engines at Maranello. It’s a measured and methodical approach. 05:53 Original sound: Dave Salters, Scuderia Ferrari Head of Engine Development, English “You have to understand what you’re doing. Just throwing ideas is not good enough, we need to do the genuine research work to understand what happens in an engine working at ridiculously high loads of speeds. Thorton’s research environment is invaluable to us because we have a continuous development program of fuels and oils which needs bespoke resource and needs bespoke people and also needs to be very reactive because we need to keep an advantage over the competition.”>>06:22 06:23 Evans and his colleagues are regular visitors to Maranello where their every effort and each new development is rigorously scrutinized then fast tracked or side-lined. Their partners demand for improvement is incessant and infinite. 06:40 Original sound: Aldo Costa, Scuderia Ferrari Technical Director, English “Yeah, we normally apply a lot of pressure but they know us so they accept this pressure because they are part of the team, they are part of the game.”>>06:48 06:49 Original sound: Mike Evans, Shell Formula One Fuels Development Project Leader, English “Dave is the team leader. He’s English, he knows how to ring me up and challenge me and say I like this fuel or I want this fuel. He’s always pushing for development. Alessandro Rossetti is the combustion side of the engine, combustion efficiency. He gives you a really good insight into how the fuels are performing so a rewarding part of the job is coming over here and chatting with the guys”.>>07:11 07:15 Formulation and testing complete, the new fuel for the first four races in now subject to ratification by Formula One’s governing body, the FIA. 07:25 Original sound: Dr. Lisa Lilley, Shell Technology Manager for Ferrari, English “When we design the fuel and we send it off for approval we clearly want to be as close to the limits as possible, so if we get one or two error messages telling us we’re right on the limit, that’s a good thing. You want the engine to last for 2500 kilometres and at 2501 kilometres you want it to fail because otherwise you’ve over engineered it and it’s the same with our fuel. we want it to come back telling us we’re right on the edge of the formulation space because otherwise we’ve not really exploited all the opportunities.”>>07:46 07:49 When approval is granted, production of the fuel finally begins in large quantities. One consignment will be dispatched to clear customs in time for the first Grand Prix of the season. While another is prepared for the more imminent challenge, Formula One testing in Spain. 08:11 At Jerez, car and fuel come together for one of the few remaining occasions before the Formula One championship begins, speed is still king, but the significance of fuel efficiency is not lost on the drivers. 08:27 Original sound: Felipe Massa, Scuderia Ferrari F1 Driver, English “Let’s say your engine uses a bit less fuel than another engine. Maybe you can do the whole race with 10 or 15 kilos less fuel than another car, which is lap time.”>>08:38 08:39 While many factors lie beyond their control fuel consumption is, to some extent, in their own hands.

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