Arthur Doyle70 said:Listen, it all feels a bit overcomplicated, doesn't it? I can't help but wonder—did Williams even bother testing that system in an F1 car?🤷
As far as I can tell, not really. It’s nothing complicated, is it?
So, I’ve been chewing on this concept lately—the idea of mounting an electric motor/generator directly onto the shaft, with the wiring running straight to a flywheel that houses its own identical motor/generator setup. It’s one of those technical puzzles that seems simple on paper but really makes you wonder about the practicalities once you start digging in. I mean, isn't there something almost poetic about that kind of closed-loop symmetry? You have the power generation and the mechanical load essentially dancing around each other on the same axis. But then, of course, you hit those inevitable engineering hurdles. How would you manage the heat dissipation in such a tight configuration? And what about the sheer complexity of the wiring? It’s a fascinating thought experiment, really. Does anyone else find themselves spiraling down these kinds of mechanical rabbit holes?
It’s all pretty much the same as any other KERS setup you'd see out there, really. The only real difference is that instead of relying on batteries, they're using a flywheel system to get the job done. Is it more efficient? Who knows, but it certainly changes the dynamic.
The real issue with a gearbox is that, unlike a battery pack, you don't exactly have the luxury of deciding where it goes. You can't just spread the weight around wherever it suits your design best, can you? It’s a fixed piece of hardware that dictates the layout, rather than something you can distribute strategically like you would with cells in a battery. 🙂
