F1: The Tech Behind Ferrari's Engine Renaissance

One of the biggest headlines of the 2022 Formula One season has been the resurgence of Ferrari. Through pre season testing and the first race Ferrari has proven to be strong. So strong that are Bahrain, the Scuderia roared back to 1-2 in the race and even in qualifying Messers Leclerc and Saina managed P1 and P3. But it wasn't just Ferrari, its customer teams which had been at the back end of the grid P9 and P10 last year - Alfa Romeo and Haas had done incredibly. Magnussen returning after a year long hiatus from F1 stormed to P5 while Bottas in his first race as an Alfa Romeo driver came P6 and rookie Guanyu Zhou managed P10 in the points in his F1 debut. Even Mick Schumacher in the Haas was P11 outside the points and could've done better had it not been for Esteban Ocon crashing into him in the early phase of the race.

Ferrari had gone through a torrid period in the last two years after the FIA issued technical directives around fuel flow rates and sensors which hobbled its power unit at the end of the 2019 season. In 2020, it lost its power advantage massively and even though 2021 there was a semblance of recovery, it seems that now Ferrari has the most devastating engine in F1, that too when there is an engine development freeze for the next four years. In 2026, there will be a new engine formula, and to enable new engine manufacturers like Red Bull Powertrains and potentially the entry of a Volkswagen group brand as an engine manufacturer, this development freeze and enabled the Ferrari solution to be the class of the field.

Leclerc's Ferrari showed impressive engine performance in his duel against Verstappen

1. It was revealed that the Ferrari engine wasn't being utilised at full tilt at the Bahrain GP, while the F1-75 ran a lot of wings which gave the Red Bull powered cars a slight edge in peak straight line speed. So what's really changed here that out of no where the Scuderia has conjured a new engine that has been able to out-do what Mercedes, Alpine and Honda developed. There could be more coming from Ferrari especially at Saudi Arabia which is the fastest street circuit in the world and has average speeds rivaling Monza.
2. The biggest area of gains Ferrari has made is thanks to the introduction of the E10 ethanol mix in the entire fuel. There is 10% ethanol based fuel in the mixture. Mercedes has noted that this change forced it to make the biggest change to the turbo hybrid engine since the inception of these engines in 2014. So this begged for a rethinking of the engine as this fuel also caused a loss in performance. Both Mattia Binotto and Toto Wolff have suggested that there could've been a 20bhp power loss from last year. Ferrari revealed that it worked very closely with its fuel partner Shell to recover this performance. Shell and Ferrari have been partners for more than 90 years and now this year onwards Shell is its innovation partner. Clearly, Shell and Ferrari have worked closely to make this recovery, which Mercedes and Honda haven't managed with their respective fuel suppliers Petronas and Exon Mobil.
3. Developed under Wolff Zimmerman, Ferrari has opted to not split the turbo and the compressor, something which every other engine on the grid does as of 2022. Mercedes pioneered the split turbo format in 2014 and then adopted by Honda in 2019. In 2022, Renault also adopted the technology for the Alpine, but Ferrari has continued to go the traditional way, which could also be because of the introduction of the E10 fuel. This format could also have some cooling benefits and the huge sculpted side pods on the Ferrari could also make this format work better as the Ferrari engine didn't break a sweat.
4. The new ERS system which is the hybrid element was introduced last year, which had an upgraded 800 volt energy store. This upgrade was introduced in the Russian GP in 2021 which is what enabled Ferrari the prance ahead of McLaren for P3 in constructor's in 2021. This system has been brought forth to the new 2022 engine and perhaps later in the year when the ERS system will be humiliated by September - it could get one more major update before everything is frozen.
5. Ferrari has worked on the combustion system on this new engine which has been internally dubbed "Superfast". Ferrari has created an innovative inter cooler, which is one of the biggest advances in internal combustion engine technology. It enables a super fast ignition which is combined with a more turbulent intake mixture that allows the flame to spread to the edges of the combustion chamber more quickly. This way, Ferrari is also taking advantage of the 500 bar fuel pressure limit enforced by the FIA. This is what enables the rapid acceleration the F1-75 had in its duel against Max Verstappen's Red Bull which had more peak straight line speed in Bahrain.

What's interesting is that Binotto has revealed that the 20 bhp deficit Ferrari had been more or less gone. Compared to last year, it seems Ferrari has gained 25 bhp overall, while the Red Bull branded Honda engine had been struggling with the recovery of performance that was lost with the E10 fuel, but it seems to be doing better than even than the Mercedes engine which has been the class of the field largely since 2014. The E10 fuel is also running warmer which is something that can impact the reliability of the engine and in pre-season testing the Ferrari F1-75 did the most laps without having reliability issues. Even in the race in Bahrain, the Ferrari engine was rock solid while three Red Bull cars including the AlphaTauri retired. While the Red Bull cars retired due to an unknown issue which could be either related to the fuel pump or the E10 fuel, the AlphaTauri had its engine blow up and the car was on fire or a barbecue in the words of Pierre Gasly.