Eli5: How can f1 1.6L engine produce high power and reach high speeds ?
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In the modern era:
1) The cars are assisted by an electric motor that recovers energy from the exhaust and when braking. The electric motor puts out 160HP in addition to the engine.
2) The engines are turbocharged. So the 1.6 L is a bit misleading. If they run at +2bar boost, it is (ELI5) equivalent to 3x the engine capacity ie like a 4.8L engine. (It isn’t clear what boost they use but most estimates are in that kind of range) A normal car engine, even turbocharged will rarely run more than +1 bar boost since this puts a lot of strain on the engine block.
3) The engines are tuned to run at very high RPM at least 75-100% more than a normal car engine (usually the average car max RPM is 6K to 7K at max whereas an F1 engine is optimized to run at 10-15K RPM). This means the engines don’t last as long BUT it means it can burn a lot of fuel per second and therefore develop a lot of power.
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