Ferrari leads both Formula 1 world championships after a very brilliant start to the 2022 season: one victory, two second places and a third. Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz have always been on the podium, both in Bahrain and in Saudi Arabia.
The F1-75 with its sidepods carved into the upper part attracted the attention of observers, demonstrating that the group of technicians coordinated by Enrico Cardile was able to make a change with the new regulations that led to the introduction of ground-effect single-seaters, erasing two dark years in the history of the Maranello team. Part of the credit for the recovery must be attributed to Enrico Gualtieri’s engineers: the power unit named 066/7 represents an important step forward that allowed the Racing Department to close the power gap with Mercedes and Honda.
We must recognize the courage of Mattia Binotto who put his confidence in Wolf Zimmermann’s “Superfast” project: the internal combustion engine created by the German designer represents a clean break with last year’s unit. There is a new fuel system that allows the combustion chamber to ensure a bursting phase with very rapid ignition times.
The 066/7 also gave wings to Ferrari’s customer teams, namely Haas and Alfa Romeo, who had the opportunity to collect very important points right away. Combustion has been improved thanks to turbulent motions that positively influence the flame propagation speed, giving more homogeneity to the air-fuel mixture and to the bursting phase.
The Scuderia’s engine showed great acceleration qualities out of the corners, enhancing the excellent traction of the F1-75, while not giving up maximum power values. Observers wonder how it is possible that the Ferrari engine is efficient both below and above: there is not only one answer, but one of the innovative aspects concerns the intake system: inside the box there are ducts with variable geometry quite long and if you look upstream of the plenum you can see a sort of… carbon “snake” that appeared for the first time on 066/7.
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These are composite pipes that are not part of the approved engine and that can be modified both in design and in length, to “tune” the 6-cylinder according to the characteristics of the track where the Ferrari F1-75 car is racing. It should not be surprising, therefore, that Ferrari has a power unit which impresses for its ability to be ready to adapt to the different circuits of the world championship.
One last important note: several press outlets have indicated that the 066/7 is an engine converted to the separation of turbo from compressor, following a concept launched by Mercedes in 2014 and taken up over time first by Honda and now also by Renault. That’s not true, the Ferrari architecture has remained classic. Even if the choices adopted are innovative.
