One interesting point is that during the development of AMG ONE’s powertrain, there was minimal influence from the F1 side of HPP, despite the ongoing development of the racing PU. The ICE and associated systems were effectively frozen at the 2015 specification and later developments were not incorporated.

However, there was one key exception: the MGU-H. During the 2016 Formula 1 season, Lewis Hamilton suffered MGU-H failures at the Chinese and Russian Grands Prix. Those failures were traced to a turn-to-turn short, believed to be from a production difficulty in the winding process. “We had fundamentally made it very, very hard to make right,” says Allsopp. “We were too aggressive on the engineering and on how the coils were wound and interacting, so it was not a sufficiently robust, repeatable process.”

Using HPP’s comprehensive fault-management process, a thorough fault analysis followed each race failure, which extended to examining the behavior of everything associated with the motor, including the silicon carbide switches in the power electronics, their switching frequency and the potential effect of that on the coil insulation under extended running. Fundamental design changes were made for the 2017 season. When Allsopp took over the AMG ONE program, he was determined that the 275 production cars would carry the post-2016 design, not the unit that had failed in race conditions.

The battery pack has the same cell chemistry and design used in Formula 1, configured as the equivalent of four F1 battery modules in parallel. One significant difference from race use is that the AMG ONE must balance each of its cells on board.

In F1, the battery is removed from the car after each race and the voltage of each cell is checked and aligned. Clearly this is not practical for a road car, so the BMS needed its own balancing capability.

Bringing all the powertrain elements together from a software perspective, with full compliance to the required ASIL standards, was an undertaking in itself. “Looking at the complexity of the software, it was an area we underestimated,” says Allsopp. “We have the benefit in racing that the software is very open and we can architect solutions very quickly. With production controllers, it is not that simple.”

AMG ONE ended up running a blend of bespoke software solutions developed by HPP (and its partners) and standard road-car elements. Development engineer Adam Munday explains, “We did use some Bosch solutions where we maybe didn’t have the expertise – things like lambda sensor dew-point calculation and a lot of the OBD functions. They are areas where we are not experts, but for someone working on other road-car programs it’s a matter of adapting proven functions with some hardware-specific adjustments.”

The software integration required huge effort and coordination between the various parties within Mercedes, but the result was all of the control units working together harmoniously, tied in with a UI that would be familiar to any Mercedes road-car driver, and a powertrain operating to its full potential, reliably.

Hybrid development

The reliability requirements for the AMG ONE were rigorous: 5,000km between services and 50,000km between major powertrain services and refreshes. To put this in perspective, the 2015 PU had a total service life of around 5,000km.

Achieving these targets, not just for the powertrain but for the vehicle as a whole, required a blending of motorsport and production-car development approaches. In the motorsport world – particularly in F1, where track running is tightly limited – great reliance is placed on test-bench development, far more so than with road cars. For the AMG ONE, this entailed two dedicated test cells at Brixworth: one for calibration development, the other capable of full powertrain running, “Dyno seven was dedicated for AMG ONE use,” says Munday. “For durability running, it was especially useful to run the full car powertrain as a whole.”

Once an initial specification had been derived from the F1 PU, the team worked through multiple iterations, some more significant than others, to prove out each batch of changes. These test iterations “followed our F1 naming convention, starting with B1, 1.1, etc; we ended up at B2.3,” explains Munday.

According to Allsopp, as the project progressed “dyno running moved to 24/7. In F1, we track our long-run progress against time. We have a well-defined profile and drive its delivery hour by hour, day by day, relentlessly. All I did was take the same engineering approaches we used in F1, clarified the mission and shared my honest assessment that in reality we were a long way off track versus where we need to be. We then built an aggressive plan and worked tirelessly as a team to get our heads above water.”

This intensive cycle of iteration and running ultimately led to a roadworthy powertrain, though there were nuances in the process, again highlighting how the high-pressure environment of F1 drives creative and concurrent thinking. “We created several phases, because there were some changes we could implement more quickly than others – for example, those related to the NVH and emissions challenges – so we packaged them in phases to prove out the durability of those changes in a controlled manner,” says Allsopp.

Importantly, a second dyno was available in parallel to focus purely on combustion development. This ability to run combustion and durability programs simultaneously was essential to the compressed timeline. However, what the dyno or simulation could not replicate exactly were the many edge cases that the car would be subjected to in customer hands.

Once mule cars became available, an intensive program of track and road testing began. This encompassed running across a range of conditions, from the European Alps to Portugal and Spain, enabling refinement of the powertrain calibration under real-world conditions. The track-testing element also flagged up potential reliability issues. For example, a weakness was found in the quill shaft connecting the front motors to the front-axle gearbox. Pushed to the limit on track, specifically when running over curbs, it produced oscillating loads that were not captured in any of the previous simulation models.

Elements such as cold-start performance, handling variations in fuel quality, and the full span of duty cycles from slow urban driving to sustained full-performance operation were all worked through, with the findings fed back to the test-bench work at Brixworth.

It was during this phase that the teams at HPP and AMG took their collaboration to a new level, blending elements of the race team’s approach to testing with road-car practice. The contrasts are worth noting. For all its heat of competition, F1 is a relatively controlled environment; the teams know where the cars will run and how the drivers are likely to drive them. The myriad unknowns of road-car use were something of an alien environment. “There was quite a difference in expectation of what was done where,” says Allsopp, “and it was a really good conversation with AMG. We were challenging each other about what needed to be done, and actually the middle ground ended up being the right place.”

Bringing AMG ONE into reality was a protracted process. There’s was a reason no one had successfully tried to run an F1 powertrain on the road before: it’s unbelievably challenging. The first customer deliveries were not made until the end of 2022, which one might think would lead to dissatisfaction. But AMG did something unusual: it took its customers along for the ride. Rather than being shielded from the challenges of the project, customers were brought in early and given full visibility of the development process; they felt invested in it. “They became part of the journey and, later in the program, had great transparency of why there were delays and what we were doing about them. It gave them a unique experience,” concludes Allsopp.

It’s unlikely anyone is going to try anything similar to the AMG ONE any time soon; there are few manufacturers that could even contemplate such an undertaking. It was only by blending the huge resources of a company the size of Mercedes with the laser-focused mindset and almost unmatched engineering expertise of HPP in Brixworth that AMG ONE could become reality.

The post Tech Insider: Mercedes AMG ONE Pt.2 appeared first on Professional Motorsport World.

Until recently, no one had ever successfully built a road car around an F1 engine. There have been close tries, and engines from race cars have ended up fitted to road cars in modified form. Porsche’s Carrera GT took the base engine from the company’s RS Spyder LMP. Going the other way, BMW’s 1980s M12 F1 engine used a road-car block. But taking an unadulterated F1 engine and putting it in a road car had never been done, until Mercedes decided to do the unthinkable. The result? The AMG One.

The genesis of AMG One began in Mercedes’s dominant 2014 and 2015 Formula 1 seasons. The 1.6-liter V6 turbocharged hybrid power unit (PU) that powered Lewis Hamilton to consecutive Drivers’ World Championships was, by any measure, a generational piece of engineering. To celebrate and capitalize on this success, Mercedes and AMG began exploring the concept of a road-legal hypercar using the W06’s powertrain. The main questions: Was it even feasible and, if it were, how much of the F1 PU could survive the transition to the road intact?

Toward the end of 2015, a small group at Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains in Brixworth, UK – specifically what is now called the Advanced Technology group – began concept work, sketching out what changes would theoretically be required before the program formally launched in 2017.

Mercedes-AMG’s plan was to produce 275 cars, the highlight of which would be an essentially unmodified F1 PU: the 1.6-liter turbocharged V6 ICE, the MGU-H harvesting energy from the turbocharger, and the MGU-K recovering energy under braking from the rear axle, plus an additional pair of electric motors driving the front axle. The combined system would output over 1,000hp. Getting that package through European road-car homologation was far from easy and pushed even the team at HPP – a group well used to achieving the impossible – to the limit.

Powertrain preservation

Adam Allsopp, currently director of Advanced Technology at Mercedes AMG HPP, was deeply involved in the powertrain development. When the project began, he was engineering director on the Formula 1 program, but in 2018 he became increasingly engaged with the road car before becoming sole program lead in 2019. According to Allsopp, there was an almost single-minded pursuit of keeping the powertrain “pure” and only departing from the racing design where absolutely necessary.

“Wherever we were faced with difficult challenges, if the solution was going to move us away from what the regulation specified for that engine, that troubled me because it felt like we would be watering it down,” he recalls.

Changes to the fundamental ICE architecture were to be avoided wherever possible – a tall order, given that the F1 ICE was entirely optimized to produce maximum power and efficiency within the fuel-flow-limited constraints of the F1 regulations. From the oversquare bore to stroke ratio, injector position, spark plug location, intake port geometry and cam profile, everything was developed for top-end performance and efficiency. But AMG One would be a road car; it needed low-speed manners and, importantly, noise and emissions compliance.

The Advanced Technology team at HPP took the approach of augmentation rather than alteration. Where the F1 architecture created a problem, the team sought solutions that worked around the core design. “It was about protecting those attributes and then trying to work out how you enhance rather than remove,” says Allsopp.

The eventual addition of port fuel injection alongside the existing direct injection system is a prime example of that approach in action. Rather than revising the combustion chamber, port injection (coupled with some subtle changes to the intake port geometry) improved fuel atomization and mixture preparation at low speeds, and aided stabilization of combustion at idle and light load without touching the high-speed combustion strategy.

Also supporting low-speed running was a redesigned throttle, in which the original barrel throttles were replaced with more traditional butterflies. “At high speed, it’s still got the same combustion philosophy,” Allsopp says. The idea of implementing variable valve timing (banned in F1) was floated to reduce low-speed emissions. However, although this would undoubtedly have helped, it was rejected to protect the DNA of the ICE.

Another tool that could be called upon to help with low-speed emissions compliance was the MGU-K, used to load the engine at low RPM. By harvesting energy from the ICE and directing it into the battery at light throttle, the team could maintain engine load at a point where combustion quality was acceptable. A quirk of this approach is that AMG One will not run its combustion engine if the battery is full, because the MGU-K loading strategy requires somewhere for that harvested energy to go. “It sounds a bit weird and a little bit counterintuitive,” acknowledges Allsopp, “but really it was about using the tools at our disposal to work out how this over-constrained problem could be solved.”

Cold-start emissions were also addressed, partly through catalyst preheating using the car’s high-voltage electrical system, a solution made practical by the available battery capacity. What couldn’t be tackled at source was handled through exhaust aftertreatment.

Electrical hurdles

The purity of purpose applied to the ICE was carried over to the electric machines. Initially, the race- specification MGU-H and MGU-K were simply swapped into the production PU, with two MGU-Ks deployed on the front axle. However, the reality of producing a relatively large run of these motors and ensuring they were fit for road use presented a few challenges.

The rear-mounted MGU-K was kept exactly as on the race car, directly driving the crank. At the front, a pair of MGUs was packaged with reduction gears to create what is referred to as the MGU-Fs. The electric machines run at very high speed: 35,000rpm for the rear and around 50,000rpm at the front. The motors are oil cooled, with two separate cooling circuits; the rotor is cooled using engine oil (and gearbox oil at the front), and the stator by a second loop that also incorporates the inverters.

It was in the motors that one of the project’s biggest hurdles emerged: NVH. Jack Mowat-Maconochie, now head of supply chain for the Advanced Technology group, observes, “In 2018 we started the drive-by noise testing. We knew the engine to be loud, but the electric machines were incredibly loud as well.” So loud, in fact, that they would never pass muster for road use. A solution was needed, but the source of the noise needed to be pinpointed first.

It was established that there were two key culprits: the gears in the front-axle fixed-ratio gearbox, and the electrical characteristics of the electric motors. The first was relatively straightforward to overcome, with detail work on the micro- and macro-geometry of the gears bringing the noise within tolerable margins. A similar process had to be undertaken on the ICE, which features a gear-driven camtrain positioned directly behind the driver, and initially proved a little too aurally aggressive.

The electrical element of the noise problem proved more troublesome and required an almost total rework of the motor architecture. “I was fiercely against changing the motor,” says Allsopp, who felt that doing so would detract from the overall ethos of the car. But the decision was effectively made for the team: “It was actually some of the NVH experts from AMG who said, ‘Look, here’s the data. You might not want to do this, but you will not sell this car with this motor.’ It’s quite hard to argue with that.”

Again, the easy option would have been to move away from the constraints originally set by the regulations, transition to a larger-diameter motor, reduce the RPM and cut the power. Instead, HPP set about reengineering the motor to fulfill the same brief as the original, but in an NVH-compliant way.

The result was an electrical redesign within the same packaging space, moving from a six-slot to a 24-slot architecture, as well as changes such as replacing Litz wire with more conventional windings. Coupled with revised magnet selection, a revised casing and the gear improvements, the result was a system that retained the spirit of the F1 units while meeting the stringent road-car legality requirements.

The new electrical design was also transferred to the rear MGU-K. “They’re identical,” says mechanical engineer Mark Digby. “They use the same rotor, stator and winding setup. They’re just packaged in different external housings to connect to the engine block and front gearbox respectively.” The choice to maintain commonality front and rear was a pragmatic one. “It was done to try to maximize commonality, so we are not making lots of different types of rotors and stators, given we had to produce more than 900 of them,” notes Digby.

From an F1 perspective, a run of this volume counts as mass production and required HPP to find a more efficient manufacturing process than the painstaking, largely manual approach used on F1 PUs. To this end, the engine maker developed automated in-house production capability for the rotors and stators, enabling repeatable production of motors regardless of the quantity required. “We were hand-winding them initially, and that was just not sustainable,” recalls Digby.

Continued in part 2 … 

Related news, Mercedes-AMG One breaks its own lap record at the Nürburgring-Nordschleife

The post Tech Insider: Mercedes-AMG One – Part 1 appeared first on Professional Motorsport World.

The wing of a Formula 1 car has one main job: create a pressure difference. Bernoulli’s equation explains how the pressure below the wing drops as its shape makes the air flow faster beneath it than above it. This lower pressure pulls the wing down and pushes the car into the ground. The extra downforce loads the tires, giving them more grip so the driver can go faster through corners. The wing’s purpose is to manage the load on the four contact patches, each about the size of a human hand, which are the only places where these 1,000hp cars touch the track. Everything the aerodynamicist, structural engineer and suspension designer does is focused on those four patches: increasing load when the car needs grip and easing it off smoothly when the car needs speed.

What the wing must now do

A wing that generates downforce also creates induced drag – the lift/drag ratio, which is the cost of redirecting airflow. At low speeds in corners, where tire load matters most, this trade-off is worth it. At high speeds, the reverse is true.

With the current rules, both the front and rear wings have movable elements. In straight-line mode (known as X-mode), these rotate to lower the angle of attack, which reduces downforce and, consequently, drag. In corner mode (also known as Y-mode), they move back to generate maximum downforce. Unlike older drag-reduction systems, moving both wings at once maintains balance between the front and rear, keeping tire loads more even and the car more stable.

“The magnitude of downforce defines the envelope the driver can explore, and it sets the outer limit of how fast they can go through a given corner,” explains former F1 aerodynamicist Jack Chilvers. “But what drivers are actually most sensitive to is balance. Where is the aerodynamic load sitting relative to the front axle versus the rear? In our experience, drivers prefer a slight front bias of just over 50% because it gives them the bite into the corner on entry. They want to feel the nose commit. So when you have a step change in the transition back to corner mode, it is not just the magnitude of the returning downforce that matters. The question is whether the front and rear returns occur at the same rate and in the same proportion. Any asymmetry in that transition shifts the balance at exactly the moment the driver needs most confidence in the car.”

The transition window lasts up to 400ms, which is the maximum allowed by the rules. During this time, the car’s total aerodynamic load changes substantially, and so does the load on the suspension. As the straight mode is engaged, the downforce drops, the suspension extends, the car rises and the ride height increases. When the wings switch back to corner mode, the aero pushes the car down again. Ride height is critical. As the gap between the floor and the ground changes, the speed of air under the car changes too, which affects the pressure drop and the center of pressure under the floor. If the car is pitching during this transition, the pressure field under the floor also changes, leading to fluctuating tire load and thus grip.

The structural consequence

As aerodynamic load increases, every wing will bend to a degree. This is normal for any elastic structure under stress, and it is a characteristic that can be made beneficial, particularly with a wing made from carbon composites. If a wing skin is designed so that bending and twisting are linked, it will twist as it bends under increased load. That twist alters the angle of attack as the leading edge rises relative to the trailing edge, reducing downforce and induced drag as the load increases.

In aeroelastic terms, this is known as washout: a deliberate structural response that reduces the aerodynamic loading on the wing as it deflects. The concept is not new. The first controlled application of structural washout was demonstratedin a high-performance aircraft called the X-29, which featured a forward-swept wing where fiber orientations in the composite skin were specifically arranged to induce nose- down twist under bending load, preventing aerodynamic divergence. The principle has been refined continuously since, and in Formula 1 it has been exploited for decades despite the best efforts of regulators to limit its effect.

The washout effect grows with the square of speed, so it happens most when it is most needed. Even in the era of active aerodynamics, harnessing this passive, speed-based structural response alongside the active system remains valuable. The moveable parts rotate when commanded, but the composite skin starts to unload the wing before that rotation is complete, smoothing the entire transition.

“If you go from straight-line mode back to corner mode, the car sees a large and rapid increase in downforce,” Chilvers notes. “The suspension is going to respond to that, and in extreme terms, it will try to slam the car down. As the cars  are pitch sensitive and ride-height sensitive, that load change does not just add grip; it shifts the peak pressure distribution beneath the floor as the ride height changes. If the composite structure softens that transition – as in, if the load builds more progressively before the full actuation arrives – you give the suspension a much more manageable input. The ride height settles rather than oscillates. And an oscillating ride height is an oscillating aero balance, which is the last thing a driver needs when they are already asking everything of the tires.”

The tire is where this all comes together. “Think about what that contact patch is being asked to absorb,” Chilvers continues. “You go from a relatively low-load condition in straight-line mode to full corner mode in 400ms. The tire has to respond to the increased vertical load while simultaneously generating lateral and longitudinal forces for braking and turn-in. That is a significant ask in a very short time. If the composite structure is doing any part of that work in advance, starting to bring the load back before the actuation fires, smoothing the gradient, then the tire has a more manageable transition. There is a meaningful difference between a load arriving as a wave and a load arriving as a wall.”

A team using this setup can also run the car lower during cornering. Because the passive aeroelastic response starts to unload the wing before the car reaches its highest straight- line speeds, there is less risk of the vehicle being pushed into the ground under peak load, which could wear through the required plank and risk disqualification. Running lower increases airflow velocity under the floor, deepens the pressure drop at the diffuser entry, and boosts downforce in corners, where grip matters most.

The material that makes it possible

Carbon-fiber-reinforced polymer is anisotropic, so its properties depend fundamentally on direction. A single unidirectional ply of intermediate-modulus carbon is more than 30 times stiffer along the fiber axis than across it, a degree of directionality that no metallic material approaches. But not all carbon-fiber material is selected for the same reason, and in a structure as load-complex as a front wing, that distinction matters considerably.

“From a fiber perspective, they generally fall into two categories,” explains Jamie Wheat, industry process expert at Dassault Systèmes and former head of FEA tools and strategy at Red Bull. “That’s stiffness-related or strength-related. Whether you’d use something like a T1000 or an M55J or M46J depends on the scenario you’re looking at.  In something like a front wing, in the strength-critical areas, you would use a strength-dominated fiber rather than a stiffness-dominated one. And in the areas where you want stiffness, and you’re not necessarily worried about strength, you would use the stiffness-dominated fibers. It’s not uncommon to mix and match depending on what  that region of the structure needs to do.”

Resin selection follows the same logic of matching the material to the environment. The front of the car runs cooler than the rear, and a resin system curing at 135°C provides a good balance between ease of manufacture and thermal resistance for most aerodynamic surfaces in free airflow. Components operating in higher-temperature regions – near brake ducts, for example – migrate to bismaleimide systems curing around 177°C, retaining stiffness where a standard epoxy would begin to soften.

The fibers themselves are delivered in pre-preg form: pre-impregnated with partially cured resin in controlled quantities. A front wing cannot be built from unidirectional (UD) tape alone. “You’ve got to have woven in there to take the shear loads, among other reasons,” Wheat notes. “Formula 1 teams have experience in terms of how many UDs in a stack they can use between woven layers, and they’ll stick to that relationship.” Woven fabrics in the 150-240g/m² range handle the complex, curved surfaces of aerodynamic components without misaligning the fibers. Spread-tow fabrics, where fiber tows are opened flat before weaving, to eliminate crimp, can achieve areal weights as low as 43g/m², meeting stiffness and coupling targets at reduced mass. Every gram saved can be redeployed as ballast, adjusting the car’s center of gravity and the front-to-rear tire load distribution.

Stack multiple plies at different angles, and the laminate’s mechanical character becomes a designed property. How it responds to forces and bending is described by three matrices: A for in-plane behavior, D for bending and B for the coupling between them. The bend-twist response that produces the washout effect is driven primarily by unbalanced laminates, which are those where the fiber angle distribution is not symmetric about the laminate’s reference axis, or by rotating the primary stiffness axis of the laminate relative to the wing’s own axis. This is a subtle but important distinction: it is not laminate asymmetry through the thickness that generates bend-twist coupling in the way most commonly understood, but rather the angular relationship between the dominant fibers and the structural axis of the wing. The bend-twist response emerges from the aggregate of every ply angle through the thickness, and particularly from the off-diagonal terms in the A and D matrices that arise when the laminate is unbalanced in this sense.

Designing the response

Choosing the right ply angles to achieve a target aeroelastic behavior is an optimization problem, and the simulation environment used to solve it has become considerably more capable than it once was. In the approach used by engineering teams today, CAD and structural simulation share a common data model, where a design change made in the geometry automatically propagates to the finite element model and reruns the analysis. What would previously have required a manual handoff between software packages now happens within a single connected environment, allowing engineers to iterate rapidly through laminate configurations and observe the structural consequence of each change in near real time.

The starting point for the structural simulation is the aerodynamic load field from CFD. A Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes simulation resolves the pressure distribution across every surface of the wing, including upper skin, lower skin and the slot regions between elements. That pressure field becomes the boundary condition for the finite element structural model. The solver calculates how the wing deflects, which updates the aerodynamic geometry, and the coupled simulation iterates until the airflow and structural solution converge. “The stiffness response of composites is fairly well defined,” Wheat notes. “It’s a complex material but it’s a fairly simplistic problem to solve. So if you’ve got confidence in either wind tunnel or CFD, then developing a wing to do something specific in terms of aeroelasticity should be relatively straightforward.”

The aerodynamicists, however, define the limits within which the composite engineer works. The wing’s external geometry, which is known as its wetted surface, belongs to the aerodynamics department, and changing it to suit the structural design is not generally an option. “So the only thing you can do is change the layup and the construction to incorporate the behavior at the load cases you’ve been given,” Wheat explains. “Typically, you would simulate several load cases, including high speed and low speed, to see what the wing does under those conditions, and then talk to the aerodynamicist about whether the level of back-on or back-off is what they’re looking for to change the aero balance between those two conditions.”

This back-and-forth between laminate engineer and aerodynamicist, mediated by a simulation environment that can predict the structural outcome of any laminate configuration, is how the wing’s aeroelastic response is arrived at. Optimization tools within the simulation environment can automate the exploration of laminate configurations against target displacement outputs, and AI-assisted design tools allow engineers to visualize the impact of design decisions in near real time, compressing an iterative process that once took weeks into something that can be explored in hours. Studies using this approach on F1-scale rear wings have confirmed that extension-shear coupled laminates, optimized through lamination parameters using response surface methodology, produce measurable induced drag reduction at high speed while cornering downforce is maintained at low speed, and that the gradient of the load change matters as much as its magnitude.

From model to measurement

Simulation establishes that the design is physically coherent. Wind-tunnel testing confirms that the structure built to the specification behaves as the model predicted, in a real aerodynamic environment where material variability, manufacturing tolerances and changing airflow are all present. But the confidence in the simulation itself has to be earned before either of those steps can be trusted.

That confidence begins with material characterization. “Teams would do specimen testing, developing their own material samples, and they might do batch-to-batch variation tests to calibrate materials,” Wheat notes. “If you’re trying to do anything complex, like coupling bend and twist, you would produce specific test items and take those ideas forward at a relatively small scale before moving to larger components.” The mechanical properties extracted from those specimen tests become the material data embedded in the simulation model. When the model predicts one behavior and the physical part delivers another, the investigation that follows is about understanding which assumption was wrong, not simply adjusting the design. “You’d want to know why there was a difference, rather than just reacting,” Wheat observes. “If you understand where the differences come from, you have a chance of capturing the same differences next time.”

Wind-tunnel testing contributes a great deal to the aerodynamic development of a Formula 1 wing, but its role in validating aeroelastic behavior specifically is more limited than it might appear. Tunnel testing is limited to 60% scale models and wind speeds up to 180km/h, meaning it is extremely difficult to simultaneously match both the aerodynamic load distribution and the structural stiffness of the full-size part. A component that replicates the scaled aerodynamic geometry will not replicate the scaled structural response, and a component tuned to match the stiffness scaling will compromise the aerodynamic fidelity. In practice, the parts that go into the tunnel are often machined aluminum or 3D-printed components rather than hand-laminated carbon, both for the speed of production that wind-tunnel testing demands and because a fully laminated composite part built to the correct ply schedule would be too slow and costly to manufacture at the pace of tunnel development cycles.

What the tunnel does deliver with confidence is the aerodynamic force data, including lift, drag and pitching moment across the speed range, along with the pressure distribution that feeds back into the coupled CFD-FEM model. That data is invaluable for refining the aerodynamic load field the structural model is working from. The structural response itself is validated through a different and more fragmented process.

Pre-season testing provides the most direct window into real full-size composite wing behavior under realistic aerodynamic loads, and it is here, with the car running at track speeds on representative surfaces, that teams can observe actual deflection behavior and compare it against simulation predictions. Strain gauges and on-car measurement systems capture load and deformation data that the simulation environment can then be correlated against. The result is not a single clean validation event but an iterative process of simulation, track observation and model refinement that builds confidence in the coupled CFD-FEM approach over time and across development cycles.

The manufactured wing

The aeroelastic response depends on the lamination parameters, and the lamination parameters are only realized if the finished wing matches the designed ply angles. A consistent angular error across several plies shifts the coupling terms in B and D away from their targets, changing the passive twist response and delivering a load gradient that the suspension was not set up to manage.

Plies are cut to net shape by CNC machines from digital flat-pattern data and hand-laminated into female composite tooling under clean-room conditions, often with the aid of laser projections for positioning, with vacuum de-bulking applied at intervals to consolidate each stage. The autoclave typically cures the part at around 7 bar at the specified resin temperature, achieving a fiber volume fraction of 55-65%. Sandwich constructions where thin CFRP skins are formed over aluminum or Nomex honeycomb cores are processed in staged cure cycles, with the outer skin cured at full autoclave pressure and subsequent stages at lower pressures that the core can tolerate.

Precision on placement

The simulation environment extends into this manufacturing process. Producibility analysis tools allow engineers to simulate how fibers actually orient themselves during a hand layup on complex-curved tooling, identifying where fiber paths deviate from the theoretical and what that deviation does to the structural properties the model specifies.

“We have the capability of simulating a hand layup component and looking at where the fibers actually go rather than the theoretical,” Wheat explains. “While the person in the clean room must make it as you’ve simulated it, that reliance is managed through close collaboration between the laminator, the composite designer and the simulation engineer, working together in real time on the shop floor. Where the layup deviates from the simulation, the conversation between those three disciplines resolves it on the spot, feeding the adjustment back into the model so that the as-built part and the predicted behavior remain aligned.

“It is a genuinely collective process, and the fidelity of the finished wing to its designed aeroelastic response depends as much on that collaboration as it does on the quality of the simulation or the skill of the individual laminator. Whenmaterial calibration is thorough and that collaborative discipline is maintained through the layup, the simulation earns its status as a reliable design instrument, and any remaining discrepancy between predicted and physical behavior points the engineering team toward a specific and addressable cause rather than an unexplained gap.”

The system thinking behind the wing

When the wing is fitted to the car, it becomes part of a system where aerodynamic surfaces, suspension and tires all work together to manage the vertical load on the tire contact patch. The wing creates this load, the suspension transfers and adjusts it, and the tire converts it into grip, which lets the car change speed and direction quickly.

The active system switches the wing between modes. The composite skin begins that transition on its own, smoothing the load before the actuated elements have finished moving. The suspension accommodates this gradual input and keeps ride height more stable, maintaining a consistent pressure field beneath the floor. With a load that rises and falls as a wave rather than a wall, the tire holds its grip and gives the driver confidence to go faster.

The wing tips tell their own part of the story. “The wing tips can twist back and drop away at speed, and it’s not just about the load on the wing itself,” Chilvers notes. “The vortex shedding position changes with the wing geometry. As the tip twists and the center of pressure shifts, the shed vortex weakens because the load that generates it has decreased. A weaker, repositioned vortex at high speed that strengthens and returns to position as the car slows into a corner is a passive aerodynamic response to operating conditions, built entirely into how the composite was constructed.”

Everything from fiber type and resin chemistry to ply angles, lamination parameters, coupled CFD-FEM optimization and wind-tunnel validation is made with the goal of ensuring the wing delivers load to the tires as consistently and controllably as possible at every moment of every lap. The simulation environment that connects every step of that process, from first design intent to validated physical behavior, is what makes the aspiration achievable in the development timescales Formula 1 demands. “The key,” Wheat says, “is always learning and capturing the engineering knowledge that comes out of that process, so it’s accessible when regulations change, when the design evolves and when the next set of problems needs to be solved.” In the end, a Formula 1 wing is a tire load management system, built from carbon and resin and tested in the digital world long before it turns a wheel, and oriented precisely to give the driver the confidence that the car will respond exactly as needed, right when it’s needed.

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UK-based simulation specialist Dynisma has unveiled the DMG-S, a compact driver-in-the-loop simulator that brings the company’s proven motion platform to a broader range of motorsport and driver training applications.

The DMG-S shares the same core motion architecture found in Dynisma‘s engineering simulators, which have proved popular with F1 teams and other high-end motorsport outfits, delivering low motion latency and motion bandwidth above 50Hz. The differentiator is a more accessible price point and a much smaller footprint than the company’s DMG-1 and DMG-360XY systems.

According to the company, the performance envelope allows the platform to faithfully reproduce the transient cues that matter most to drivers: curb strikes, weight transfer, grip variation, tire degradation and oversteer onset. PMW tested the new system at Dynisma’s headquarters, and the fidelity and realism of the feedback, despite the compact platform, were impressive.

The system fits within a 2.5 x 2.5m footprint, making it viable for even the smallest workshop or the back of a truck. It requires only a single-phase 32A supply, obviating the need for dedicated electrical infrastructure. Two seating configurations are available to cover the primary vehicle categories: low heel point for GT and touring car, and high heel point for single-seaters.

Display options include triple 77in screens or VR/XR headset integration. Software compatibility spans Assetto Corsa as standard, with support for iRacing, F1, Le Mans Ultimate and professional vehicle modeling environments, making it straightforward to integrate into existing simulation workflows.

Ash Warne, founder and CTO of the company, framed the engineering rationale as follows: “A simulator becomes valuable when the driver can trust what they feel through the platform, from changes in grip and surface detail to weight transfer and vehicle balance at the limit. DMG-S applies the same engineering philosophy in a more compact format.”

In related news, Cadillac Formula 1 Team selects Dynisma simulator for vehicle development and driver preparation

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JCB, the UK-based manufacturer of excavators and other off-highway equipment, is to return to the Bonneville Salt Flats 20-years after securing the world land speed record for a diesel car with its Dieselmax streamliner. Back in 2006 its LSR adventures were to prove out its in-house diesel engine technology, in 2026, it looks to repeat the feat with hydrogen power, using the all-new Hydromax streamliner.  

JCB has been working on the development of hydrogen ICE engines for the past five years and has now introduced them into production. It will be these engines that form the basis of the Hydromax’s powertrain.  “It’s incredibly strong and incredibly robust,” says chief engineer, Lee Harper. “So, when we’re chucking very high boost pressure at it, it’s great because it will take it all day long. It’s built to last forever.” This is fortunate as the output of the engines will be increased from around 85bhp to 800bhp, with the JCB team working in conjunction with Ricardo on development, which has focussed on increased boost (via bespoke, single stage turbochargers) and combustion improvements.  

Impressively, the stock block, crank and even most of the valve train is retained. “The valve train dynamics have been excellent, and no issues at all with life. In fact, we haven’t changed anything drastically in any of the valve train, which is where the typical risk areas are. That has kind of surprised us and delighted us.” 

The engines will be housed in a streamliner body built around a tubular steel chassis, developed in conjunction with Prodrive, with a pair of six-speed transmission provided by Xtrac, mated to JCB bellhousings and, surprisingly, JCB clutches. The engines are laid flat, to reduce frontal area with dry-sump oiling to handle lubrication. A water/ice cooling system will be used, as radiators would carry too great a drag penalty and the car will use around 250kg of ice per record run come August.  

The team has drawn heavily on the experience with Dieselmax, and though consideration was given to using the old chassis, it was deemed that an all-new build would be a better approach. As a result, though the general layout is similar, the new car is longer and has a more driver-forward setup, alongside considerable refinements to the aerodynamics and, most importantly, the tire package.  

In 2006, the available tyres from Goodyear were only rated to 300mph, with further testing – aided by NASA – proving they were sound up to 350mph, which became the hard limit for the record run. In a major move, JCB has worked with Goodyear to develop a new LSR tire, and although its maximum speed rating has yet to be revealed, it is well in excess of the old rubber.  

With testing of the car due to commence in the UK at the start of June, JCB plans to make its record attempts during Bonneville Speed Weeks in August. It’s stated aim so far is purely to ‘match’ the performance of Dieselmax, to prove the validity of its H2 ICE technology. However, it is well documented that the old car had the potential to run well over 350mph, and with greater power and lower weight, there is every chance Hydromax will eclipse its performance.   

Look out for a full feature on the JCB Dieselmax streamliner in an upcoming issue of PMW magazine

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Volkswagen has confirmed plans to enter the 24h Nurburgring in 2027 with a dedicated racing version of the current Golf R in partnership with long-standing collaborator Max Kruse Racing. A show car previewing the project will be unveiled to the public on the Ring Boulevard at the Nurburgring.

The program marks the 25th anniversary of the Volkswagen R brand, and carries particular symbolic weight given the name itself is derived from ‘racing’, an activity VW has somewhat shied away from since it left the WRC in 2016. The Golf R 24H will be built around an all-wheel drive configuration engineered to handle the demands of the Nordschleife, though Volkswagen has stopped short of disclosing technical details at this stage.

It also signals a new chapter for Volkswagen at the race. The brand previously contested the event across three editions with the Golf GTI Clubsport, with Max Kruse Racing involved throughout. Team co-founder Benjamin Leuchter will lead the new program, combining his role as program manager with his existing responsibilities as a test and development driver for Volkswagen’s performance road car models.

“The 24h Nurburgring is the toughest test for us under real competitive conditions,” said Reinhold Ivenz, head of Volkswagen R. “The Nurburgring is also our test and development track, and we will meet people at the 24h race who share our passion for performance, which is why the project is a perfect match for Volkswagen R.”

Ivenz added that the show car makes the team’s 2027 vision tangible at an early stage, and promised “the most spectacular Golf R to date” when the full racing car is revealed.

Further technical details are expected as development progresses ahead of the race  entry.

Related news, McLaren unveils 2027 LMDh contender and limited edition track car

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McLaren has officially revealed the MCL-HY hypercar that will contest the World Endurance Championship and the Le Mans 24 Hours from 2027, alongside the track car variant MCL-HY GTR, which will be offered to VIP clients through its exclusive Project: Endurance program.

Built to the LMDh regulations, the MCL-HY features a Dallara chassis and is powered by a twin-turbocharged V6 race engine, developed in conjunction with Autotecnica Motori and paired with the series’s spec MGU system, delivering up to 520kW (707ps) to the rear axle. Minimum weight is set at 1,030kg.

The car was presented in a 2026 test livery inspired by the McLaren M6A, nodding to the lineage that stretches from Can-Am dominance in the late 1960s through to outright Le Mans victory with the F1 GTR in 1995. On-track testing begins this month, with works driver Mikkel Jensen joined by DDP drivers Grégoire Saucy and Richard Verschoor, plus United Autosports development driver Ben Hanley.

According to the team, the program also marks a first-of-its-kind collaboration between McLaren Racing and McLaren Automotive – the GTR track car derivative is powered by the same 2.9-liter twin-turbocharged engine but without the LMDh hybrid system, producing around 730ps at a lower dry weight. Deliveries are scheduled for late 2027.

Homologation of the MCL-HY is expected in winter 2026 ahead of the team’s WEC debut.

Related news, FIA and Formula E debut Gen4 car with major gains in performance, speed and sustainability

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Honda has returned to F1 as a works partner of Aston Martin, with the new partnership’s season getting off to something of a rocky start. However, the abilities of Honda’s teams in Sakura City in Japan and Milton Keynes in the UK should never be underestimated, as its comeback in the last rules cycle to provide a multiple championship-winning power unit proved.

PMW Magazine gained an exclusive audience with Honda Racing’s Shintaro Orihara, trackside general manager and chief engineer. Speaking in Bahrain pre-season, he was under no illusions as to the difficulties the new regulations present to a power unit manufacturer.

Top of the list of challenges is handling a 350kW MGU-K with a relatively tiny energy store. “The MGU-K power is massive, but the battery volume is the same as the last regulations,” Orihara explained. “It has become much more difficult to manage the energy, so we need to harvest as much as possible and deploy as much as possible.”

The resulting demands on the energy store, and the management of its energy content, are therefore much greater than before. “The battery SoC swings a lot and also, the power difference between MGU-K on and off is a huge difference. Where we deliver max power, that is a very difficult point,” he said.

Of course, none of this is news, and Honda has been working extensively off-track to nail this balancing act, but it was only once cars were on track in Bahrain that the subtleties became apparent. “We learned this is a very unique regulation through this winter testing. So now we are learning a lot in terms of energy management, that is most challenging for us. The lap time sensitivity [around energy management] is much higher than last year.”

Orihara said that athough much preparation work was undertaken prior to the power unit’s track debut at the Barcelona test, “discussion and actual operation is quite different”. However, he was happy that both parties are approaching the development of the trackside and operational relationship with an open mind.

Works relationship

As a works partner, Honda has been closely integrated with the Aston Martin F1 Team through the build-up to 2026. So how has this working relationship developed, particularly given the presence of Adrian Newey, a designer known to place great importance on tight packaging of the powertrain for aero performance?

According to Orihara, Honda’s in-house development work began back in 2023, with the Aston Martin partnership getting underway soon after. “The power unit has been developed with the team, because the power unit design comes from the car demand,” he explained, with the caveat: “Adrian Newey had a lot of requirements and Honda was keen to listen to those demands and meet those demands as much as possible. We have spent three years [on this] and I think the relationship is quite strong.”

But how do you balance the design intent of someone like Adrian Newey and the practical realities of producing a reliable power unit with the correct performance?

“It’s a good question,” mused Orihara. “It’s important to find the compromise point. But Adrian Newey is the best designer, and if the demand comes from Adrian Newey, Honda will respect that demand as much as possible. Sometimes, if it is impossible from a reliability viewpoint, we may say no. But, if we see a negative performance effect but total [car] performance is increased by the demand, we will respect the demand. It [power unit design] is defined by lap time demand, but also by Adrian demand.”  

Combustion challenges 

Looking at the ICE side of the power unit, Ohirhra singled out the loss of the MGU-H as “a complete game changer”. Previously, he said maximising H performance was everything, as increased output enabled longer deployment of the MGU-K throughout a lap. “If we increased engine performance but that meant we lost MGU-H performance, then we couldn’t use that technology,” he said. “With the new regulations, and no MGU-H, we only need to focus on improving engine performance.”

Ohirhra also pointed to the still-present challenge of maximizing combustion efficiency with the added complication of working with 100% sustainable fuel: “The performance mainly comes from combustion, and for combustion performance, it is important that we can burn the fuel correctly, how we get energy from the fuel.” While there has always been a close relationship between power unit manufacturers and fuel partners, the ties are closer than ever before.

“It is not only doing the testing, but we also need a very open mind to show them our dyno data,” Ohirhra said. “For example, normally on the dyno, we measure combustion pressure, which is super, super confidential, we are [now] sharing that type of information.”

Related, F1 2026 tech hub

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Honda rejoins Formula 1 this year as a power unit supplier with the Aston Martin team. Heading up its trackside operations is Shintaro Orihara, who has been the Japanese manufacturer for over 20 years.

You’ve worked at Honda for decades now, why did you want to join the company in the first place?
When I was in junior high school, I watched F1 on TV and something that stood out were the McLarens with their Honda-powered cars. From that moment onwards, I knew that I wanted to join Honda and be a part of this incredible sport. I started there in 2003 and, for the first 10 years, I worked on road-going projects. Despite this, my love and passion for F1 didn’t fade and the hard work paid off. In 2013, I transferred to the racing side of the business and reached my dreams. During this time, I could learn the tricks of F1 engineering and live some intense moments of adversity but ultimately some glorious memories and wonderful times. I can confidently say that Honda and F1 are a part of my life.

What are your responsibilities as F1 Trackside General Manager and Chief Engineer?
My role is vast and varied but, ultimately, I make the final decisions at the track relating to the power unit. I also manage all the trackside members from Honda Racing Corporation from a management viewpoint to make sure that our power units are ready.

Before departing for the race, we have a series of meetings with our colleagues in Sakura in Japan to check the situation and plan for the event. Usually, we travel early in the week so that when we arrive at track, the engine conditions after maintenance can be checked. On site, I will fine tune the plan with the engineers for the weekend, evaluating our options and scenarios depending on the conditions. Once we’ve done this, there’ll be a meeting with Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team engineers to go through every detail, ensuring we’re fully integrated.

When the sessions start, the car’s PU is mainly operated by other Honda personnel. It’s my job to look at the big picture and what is happening overall. I will be making the decisions and communicating with the team via radio.
At the end of each day, we’ll hold an internal PU meeting on site and with our colleagues in the control room in Sakura. We will review what happened and put countermeasures in place if we encountered any issues. This is then reported to and discussed with the team, to make sure we’re aligned.

The Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team is a key component in Honda’s Formula 1 activity. What work do you do with them? What are the targets?
2026 is the first year that we’re learning with Aston Martin Aramco at the track. Although the partnership was announced in 2023, everything has been based on theory and simulations, so there is a lot of anticipation for testing.

So, the first target is to build the fundamental relationship between the two parties trackside and second is to accumulate mileage and gather data, understanding how the RA626H power unit works in the AMR26.

What are your thoughts ahead of the first official F1 test in Bahrain?
It’s been a long time coming, quite frankly speaking. Years of development and hard work culminates with this. Sakura, HRC UK and Aston Martin Aramco have been working tirelessly to develop, plan and build.
The Barcelona Shakedown was a pivotal moment in our relationship and a good step in the right direction. Our next target is to accumulate mileage with our power unit to confirm engine reliability and to check all functions.
We’re looking forward to seeing how the package behaves – car and power unit – as one machine.

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