AMG Project One powertrain
Mercedes’ quest to build a road-going F 1 car is coming to fruition, as the recent reveal of its hybrid power train demonstrates
MERCEDES ’
hotly anticipated F1- based hy percar took a step closer to reality at the Nürburgring 24 Hours race in May. Celebrating its 50th birthday, AMG’S ‘gift’ to the assembled media was a close-up encounter with the hybrid powertrain of its 275-off, 2.3million- euro, 1000bhp-plus Formula 1 car for the road. It wasn’t disappointing.
The car is named ‘Project One’ for the time being, and AMG was keen to clarify that everything to the rear of where the seats will go isn’t ‘ inspired’ by F1, doesn’t take specific elements from F1 and shouldn’t be referred to as ‘F1 transfer’. It is F1 in the literal sense. With a few alterations to ensure an engine rebuild isn’t required every time you pop to the shops, it’s the very same EQ Power+ unit that has dominated the championship for the past three years. And at the front? Hefty additional tug delivered and intelligently vectored by an electric motor in each wheel.
We’ll come to that. Let’s start with the game-changer at the back. As with the current Mercedes F1
Everything to the rear of where the seats will go isn’t ‘inspired’ by F1; it is F1 in the literal sense
car, the rear wheels are driven by a turbocharged 1.6-litre petrol V6 with direct injection and, for the sake of longevity, an 11,000rpm red line. That’s eased down from the 13,500rpm Lewis has to play with but still vaguely nuts compared with anything even the driver of the most hyperactive hypercar is used to.
A strategically tamed motor from the latest, W08 F1 car, then? Not exactly. AMG calls it a ‘bespoke unit’ that marries elements from W06, W07 and W08. The engineering is exactly the same, though. Air is fed into the engine by a combined mechanical and electrically driven turbocharging system, with the exhaust turbine located near the exhaust and the compressor near the roof-mounted air intake. They’re joined by a long shaft, to which is connected an 80kw (107bhp) electric motor. This primes the turbocharger to eliminate lag and, according to AMG, gifts the V6 faster responses than a naturally aspirated V8. The electric motor also recovers waste exhaust energy that can then be used to replenish the hybrid battery block or directly drive the MGU-K.
MGU-K? It stands for Motor Generator Unit Kinetic – another electric motor positioned on the side of the crankcase and directly connected to the crankshaft. It can either drive the crankshaft, adding 120kw (161bhp) to the power tally, or be driven by it. AMG claims that the combined petrol-electric elements working as a complete unit achieve an unprecedented thermal efficiency of around 40 per cent against a norm of 30-32 per cent. It’s as close as you’ll get to guilt-free 1000bhp-plus motoring.
Sitting behind the engine is an all-new eight-speed single-clutch transmission and, above that, the exhaust system, which unlike the F1 version has a silencer and catalytic converter but retains the single tailpipe.
Project One has four-wheel drive thanks to the two additional electric motors at the front axle, each delivering 120kw (161bhp) – and each with a tiny gearbox to permit torque vectoring. The battery cells, their configuration, connectors and direct-cell liquid cooling are all a direct lift from F1. The 800-volt system (contained in two battery housings) has four times the capacity used in F1. The higher voltage level reduces voltage losses, not least in the cables. It also allows significantly shorter charging times with a constant current level.
The Project One’s driving programs will even have an allelectric mode, with just the front axle driven, giving a range of up to 25km (15 miles). The most extreme mode, Dynamic, will apparently adopt settings used in F1 to achieve the best possible lap times in qualifying. It wasn’t strictly up for discussion on this ‘ powertrain reveal’, but the suspension system will use race-car-style horizontally packaged pushrod dampers, and there will be a carbon tub, carbonceramic brakes and, of course, active aero.
Perhaps most remarkably of all, AMG reckons Project One owners will be able to drive their cars for 50,000km (31,000 miles), rather than for a brisk trip around the houses in Monaco, before the first revision is needed. ‘ Revision’ is a polite word for rebuild, and it will entail removing the engine and transmission and taking them apart to see what’s been going on, just like with a race car. But given the evidence that hypercars tend to accumulate quickly covered miles at a leisurely rate, the 50,000km day can probably be put off for a couple of years at least.
No prototypes have been built yet – Project One is still undergoing fine-tuning in simulation phase. But there were some intriguing parting comments from our hosts. Project One will have better traction than a Mercedes F1 car. ‘Good for perfect acceleration and record lap times, especially the Nordschleife,’ says Mercedes.
As we write this, the car’s interior styling is being finalised, and a Project One very close to the finished article will be unveiled at the Frankfurt motor show in September. Deliveries are scheduled to begin in 2019.