Quote:
Originally Posted by David
I wonder how much if any input the F1 race engine shops have with their namesake company? I assume Ferrari is pretty tight with their street car factory simply because their street cars are so close to race cars, but does Honda really work with the F1 engine department or is it run like a completely different company?
Or does Mercedes have much to do with Ilmor building their F1 engines or do they just right the checks?
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Most F1 engine shops are separate to the road car engine shops but the F1 shops will use more of the road car engines shops facilities ie manufacturing, inspection, etc than visa versa
Honda F1 engine designers and engineers are often seconded form the road car side of the business and after they have experienced F1's accelerated learning (school of hard knocks
) they go back to using this knowledge improving the road car engines or chassis
For many years my Ferrari day started with a walk through the engine shop, great way to start a day, loved the oily smell but clinically clean workshop. This was a separate engine shop inside the F1 factory to the road cars but F1 would use some of the road car engine production facilitates
Mercedes don't write Ilmor checks they have a a big F1 engine shop that does everything, located a few miles from the F1 chassis factory
Redbull are building a huge F1 engine factory right next door to the F1 chassis factory, this won't come on line fully until way into next year
A F1 engine shop is not really a 'shop' as such but an engine factory that does everything ie design, stress analysis, simulation, manufacturing, machining, assembly, dimensional inspection, non-destructive testing, metallurgy inspection, dyno testing, durability testing, failure analysis etc, etc Some more specialised manufacturing processes such casting, metal treatments etc maybe done outside with suppliers
Big F1 teams like Ferrari and Mercedes have around 2000 people working on their F1 teams, that's not enough people as they also use numerous outside manufacturing suppliers