In a recent article for Motorsport Italia, Franco Nugnes wanted to clarify the situation surrounding the Ferrari engine for the 2023 Formula 1 season, “otherwise the data risk being distorted, creating a lot of confusion.” The subject is the Ferrari 066/7 power unit: it has been reported on several occasions that the Ferrari power unit designed by Wolf Zimmermann will have about thirty more horsepower in 2023.
Is this a realistic value, or have calculations been made that could lead one astray, perhaps even causing some doubt for the technical stewards of the FIA? We recall that the power units were approved in March and, barring problems related to reliability, must remain frozen until the end of the 2025 season. An increase in power of 30 horsepower would certainly trigger the reaction of other manufacturers, triggering a very dangerous mechanism in an attempt to match the performance of the engines.
At the start of the 2022 Formula One season it was commonly believed that the power unit nicknamed “Superfast” had made up for the power gap of previous years, proving to be if not the best engine, certainly in line with Honda and Mercedes.
Mattia Binotto had decided to homologate the most powerful version of the 066/7, despite knowing that the unit had not reached the life target of seven Grands Prix, which was needed to avoid penalties during the season. The former Maranello team principal wanted to focus on the most powerful engine, aware that the FIA rules would have allowed the possibility to develop the fragile parts that were less reliable.
And so it was, but we knew from the start of the championship that Ferrari, aware of its weaknesses, had configured engine 1 with less powerful mappings, leaving about fifteen horsepower on the dyno compared to the actual potential that the direct staff from Enrico Gualtieri was able to pull off.
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The events of the season with the repeated technical failures “advised” the Prancing Horse engineers to further limit the power unit to avoid the issues seen in Azerbaijan, Spain or Austria. The performance delta between optimal conditions and the effective power used rose to around thirty horsepower and, despite this, the 675 managed to score twelve pole positions with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz.
In the Abu Dhabi GP, after some updates aimed at improving the life and duration of the power unit, the 066/7 was able to once again show an engine with performance similar if not equal to those of the opening Bahrain GP.
The intervention on the spark plug with the pre-chamber that includes the fuel injector (part not frozen, but free by regulation) has allowed Ferrari to make an important leap forward, but in Maranello they have worked hard to be able to use in 2023 the power that Wolf Zimmermann’s engine on paper would be capable of expressing.
The recovery, thanks to the constant development carried out at the bench, will therefore be about fifteen HP and not thirty as has been reported, Motorsport Italia points out.
Not that 15 HP are few, on the contrary: compared to its predecessor, the F1-75, the 2023 F1 car will be able to count on an engine that this year’s challenger has never been able to benefit from. Some cells that were destined for the bench tests of 066/7 for the life tests have been switched off: budget cap requirements which will come into force from the beginning of 2023 also for the engines, but also awareness of having achieved an important and ambitious objective.
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