Red Bull and Renault give their V8 one last blast

2013 Brazilian Grand Prix

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Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber helped Red Bull and Renault to send off their final V8 engine with one last blast.

Webber personally fired up the Renault RS27 in his chassis, glowed white hot as it screamed away at maximum revs with its limiter disabled.

Lotus and Caterham added to the cacophony of noise in the pit lane after the Brazilian Grand Prix as Formula One said goodbye to the V8 engine formula which has been in service since the 2006 season.

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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65 comments on “Red Bull and Renault give their V8 one last blast”

  1. Pretty cool … giving the V8s a proper send off to the scrap yard.

    1. I was actually wondering why? Don’t they fit in something else? Like a normal car or a motorcycle?

      1. @phil9079
        A Clio V8 perhaps? That would be quite something!

        1. Will it fit in a Twizy?
          I loved the Espace they built with Williams.

        2. they aren’t blowing the V8’s up are they? Cause why then? If you could put the V8 in the Clio…

      2. you’re not seriously asking that question, I assume. Or, if you’re new to F1, the answer is those engines are short-life and purpose built for the current F1 sporting regulations. Those engines would serve no purpose in other racing categories or in the “real world”. There was a time when F1 tech did trickle into production automakers – VVTi/VTEC, turbo intercoolers, dual-stage turbos, multi-clutch “automatics”, etc… but those V8’s will only be seen in Vintage Races from now on, unfortunately.

        1. Except that those technologies didn’t come from F1, but ended up being developed outside of F1 and then used for the sport.
          Variable valve systems were being developed as early as the 1920’s for the aviation industry, whilst Honda’s own system (VTEC) came from its production motorbike division in the early 1980’s, but wasn’t used in F1 until the early 1990’s. Intercoolers, meanwhile, are similarly old tech – again, the aviation industry got there decades before F1, as did marine engine manufacturers. Dual clutch technology, meanwhile, conceptually dates back to the 1940’s (whilst the modern system we are used to comes from an independent transmission manufacturer), with gear pre-selection technology dating back to the 1930’s. It may be cited as being the technological vanguard of motorsport, but in reality both motorsport and F1 are not actually that efficient a method of developing technology as you might imagine.

        2. I’m not new to F1, and it was just a question. I was just wondering if they could recycle the engine. If so, then I seriiously hope they don’t destroy it…

      3. That engine would shoot the clutch through the hood right into the estratosphere. Trust me.

    2. @tmf42
      Definitely not the last time. We’re probably going to see them at least at Goodwood, not to mention Red Bull demo runs.

  2. What was it revving to as you mention the limiter was removed?

    1. I doubt they took the limiter off. If that engine detonated at 18k+ RPM it could kill someone in that room. There used to be rules that you couldn’t go above 12k (I think that was the number) in the garages. Still cool to see/hear.

      1. Why can’t you? As long as you don’t rev too high without the wheels unloaded(And I’m guessing they’re in neutral?)

    2. They have a hard limiter and a soft limiter, possibly the latter was disabled.

  3. Good bye V8’s! How can we be so emotional about this stuff? Maybe we are driven by the fact that we are never going to see or hear V8’s again? I hope that I’m wrong but according to V12 and V10’s history that is the most likely scenario. But than again we already had low capacity turbo’s in F1 and they somehow dispirited, didn’t they? Let’s hope that the economy get well soon and instead of going full electric the engineers come up with a smarter solution for F1 engines with high noise. Hydrogen fueled for example?

    1. I do agree (and personally think the v10’s sounded amazing) but this doesn’t give you chills? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTeZRlpVweo

      1. That is just pure awesomeness – but incredibly ineffective compered to today. I suppose there’s just now way around the fact that awesome sound was a positive side effect of simpler technology. Sad but true.

        1. 100 agree with you, but we forgot about emotions by going rational, which is true but sad fact isn’t it?

      2. That was great. That’s what F1 always sounds like in my head!

    2. I fully agree with what you’re saying, though you do know hydrogen fueled cars would be electric to :)

      1. I was think about something like this mate :) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_Hydrogen_7

  4. SaturnVF1 (@doublestuffpenguin)
    25th November 2013, 14:38

    I heard many teams were doing this but this is the only video I’ve seen. If anyone has others please post them here.

    1. This is a video from Caterham:

  5. So Renault engines won the first and last race since the V8s were reintroduced. Alonso Bahrain 2006, Vettel Brazil 2013. Button finished 4th in both races as well.

    1. @david-a

      I think you can actually stretch that statistic a bit further!
      Renault won both the first 3 and the final 3 races of the V8 era.

      Bahrain 2006, Malaysia 2006, Australia 2006
      Abu Dhabi 2013, USA 2013, Brazil 2013

      1. @david-a and @kingshark Renault also pointed out that they won the last race of the 3.5l engine formula too (1994 Australian GP).

        1. @geemac
          Renault also won both the first and the last race of the V10 era (Brazil 1995, China 2005)!

          1. I have a funny feeling they’ll win the first of the 1.6l V6 ERS era too….

  6. who every watches this video is not experiencing the true sound of a F1 V8 engine. being there in person hearing them scream is one of the best noises I have ever heard…its damn near beautiful!

    I hate no longer hearing them. turbo engines r really not the future in F1. V8 supercars r outdoing F1…REALLY!?!?!?!?!?

    1. remember people said the same thing about the v10 era, and how they werent looking forward to the “puny” v8’s

    2. @scuderia_fan85

      V8 supercars r outdoing F1

      In terms of cylinders in the engine, yes. But that’s hardly the point. If you wanted absolute power and speed, we’d all be watching at Santa Pod and the NHRA. F1 is the trying to reassert itself as the pinnacle of technology in Motorsport (Admittedly, I don’t think they’re there yet).
      We’ve still got faster cars, lighter cars, and more skilled drivers than V8 Supercars. In fact, the only Motorsport series (4 wheels, not 2) I can think of that has at least a similar standard of racing drivers across the board is the WEC, and a fair few drivers have done both.

      V8 Supercars won’t be ‘outdoing’ F1 any time soon.

  7. There was a video on twitter of Caterham doing the same thing yesterday evening, that had better sound and less light so the exhaust was more impressive. Unfortunately the engineer removed the tweet, has anyone seen a copy?

    1. It was on YouTube this morning but only had 4 views for some reason. But yea, that was a more impressive video

  8. Bloody party team.

  9. I don’t think I’ve ever heard modern F1 engines with the limiter disabled before. Awesome.

    1. To be honest the audio quality is pretty poor and I don’t know if I’m listening audio clipping or the engine, there must be a video somewhere recorded with a better mic.

  10. The engines sound absolutely ridiculous at absolute full revs! Almost like they are trying to explode!

    I wonder how much hp they would be producing and indeed how high the revs were. 22000? More?

    1. The output power is proportional to average indicated pressure in cylinder x piston surface x stroke x number of cylinders x revs. If nominal power at 18000rpm is 700bhp we can consequently calculate power at 20000 as proportional increase in revs, roughly ;-)
      However, this technical masturbation delivered by RS is disgusting to me for a simple reason of Grosjean’s engine failure.

  11. …and, I don’t believe that engine supplied to RBR is the same as the one in Lotus.

    1. Both are by Renault.

      1. Yeah, you’re right. I think they should go for Honda engine. Regretably, they have other issues to solve. Hopefuly, they’ll make it after all.

  12. Just a quick question: Since the Airbox is already removed, where does the engine does get its air from?

    1. SaturnVF1 (@doublestuffpenguin)
      25th November 2013, 18:30

      The flat surface seen on top of the engine is the air filter. The injectors and intakes are just below. The airbox channels air from the roll hoop inlet to the air filter.

  13. I thought the engines were 18000 maximum with no limiter? Maybe a few years ago they had a limiter but why would they make an engine with the extra available revs, surely that isn’t optimal.

    1. F1 rules are that engines are limited to so many rev’s by the ecu.
      The higher the rev’s the engine can do before obliterating, hopefully the longer life it has at lower revs.

    2. Limiters exist mainly to ensure the engine doesn’t over-rev and tear itself apart. The last thing you want is loads of tiny holes where the valves punched through to freedom :-)

      1. Yes but it doesn’t seem to make sense to keep building an engine that can reach higher revs then just stick a limiter on it. The only way it makes sense is that there is more reliability at lower revs even if it can rev higher than what the FIA has allowed.

        1. The current engines have a rev limit of 18,000 rpm. I very seriously doubt the rev limiter was removed for this video; it’s probably incorporated into the engine electronics. Also, why would an engine manufacturer make an engine that could run at (from a previous post) 22,000 rpm when the limit is 18,000? Really, guys, the increase in revs leads to an enormous increase on the forces on the piston rod, as well as issues with piston speed (m/sec) in the bore. Get real. This was simply a demo, in a closed room, of 18,000 rpm with an unloaded V8 engine and the noise it can make. As a previous poster noted, the sound in real life is incredible and in fact almost unbelievable.

          A very cool demo, with lots of great noise, but of no other significance. And it wasn’t above the rev limit. Go to a race.

          1. The rev limit is designated by FIA – 18000rpm. The vehicle in this demo just completed the race and met all the regulations. That means: rev limit for this engine was 18000rpm. Unless people from Renault played with ECU.

          2. I think they could probably reach about 18200 without the limiter. But some clarification would be nice on this.

          3. Over the last few years I have heard from several sources that the engines are capable of 21-22K RPM (I think Honda and Cosworth both were capable of 21K in 2006) and I don’t find that hard to believe. However, how reliable it would be over 18K is the real question, not if it can reach it with no load. I agree that the sound even at ‘only’ 18K is unbelievable…only other motorsport sound that is so intense is a 10,000HP top fuel V8. The sound and feeling you get being around one of those simply cant be explained.

  14. @ Dave. F1 engines have rev limiters to limit their power; this rpm limit is set by the regulations. Prior to this formula revs were approaching 22,000 rpm. Horsepower (kw) is a function of torque X rpm. By limiting rpm the formula limits horsepower and hence speed.

  15. That has to be….(and its very disheartining to say this)…the only cool thing i’ve seen all season besides vettel’s first series of doughnuts in India. Such a dull dull season, god willing all the driver/team changes will make next season better…the real change they should have implemented is to ban DRS and go back to the days when passing was down to driver skill alone

  16. haha this is epic. I used to do this….only with my Nitro R/C cars every time I got a new motor lol..

  17. I think that was Webber’s best start of the season

    1. You, kind sir, win the thread. Well done.

    2. Gordito Huevon
      29th November 2013, 2:31

      so true, but also sad.

  18. Why destrioy it ?? Isn’t this particular car going to end sold at some auction in the future, and then also be more special/expensive than other chassisses because it was the car in which the champ raced in the last V8 race ?!?!?! Something like, the most valuable car of the 2013 ?

    1. I wonder if the engines need to be returned to Renault, but perhaps ‘dead or alive’.

  19. Cool!!
    My go kart motor Iame x30 revs to 16200 rpm lol 18,000 isnt that much

  20. Never heard an F1 car make that sound before – that was a cool video. I can’t stand RBR but that car looks totally beast with the engine cover off. Nice one.

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