The low-down on the P83 F1 engine.. WILD!

[Alex Mc]

Facts and figures on BMW's F1 engine
Mind-boggling specs & information on the P83



BMW engine at work !

It packs more than 900 bhp, weighs less than 90 kilograms and has a maximum engine speed of 19,200 rpm. The BMW P83 engine with which the BMW WilliamsF1 Team is pitching for the 2003 Formula One World Championship title will be put out to pasture after the final race – the Japanese Grand Prix – in three weeks’ time.

Up to now, no more than broad skeleton data on this power pack from the Munich Formula One factory have been released. Ahead of the last two races of the season in Indianapolis (28 September) and Suzuka (12 October), its profile is now fleshed out.

Who would have guessed, for example, that 1,950 CAD drawings were made for this engine? Printed out and laid end to end, they would cover a distance of 1.3 kilometres.

Facts and figures:
# Output of the BMW P83 is over 900 bhp.
# Maximum engine speed is 19,200 rpm.
# In a race, engine speed is limited to 19,000 rpm.
# Idle speed is 4,000 rpm.
# The engine weighs less than 90 kilograms.
# It completes a distance of 500 kilometres before undergoing revision.
# Total production of the BMW P83 is 200 units, ten of which the team takes to each race.
# Before being phased out the engine will have received 1,388 upgrade modifications.
# It comprises around 5,000 individual components, 1,000 of them different.
# The air intake volume is 1,995 cubic metres per hour.
# Maximum piston acceleration is 10,000g.
# Piston speed peaks at 40 metres per second and averages 25 metres per second.
# Exhaust temperatures of up to 950 degrees are reached.
# Maximum air temperature in the pneumatic system is 250 degrees.
# The ultra-high-speed 130R turn at Suzuka with its lateral load of 4g poses the greatest challenge to the oil system.
# The BMW P83 endured the highest full-throttle proportion on the Monza circuit at 73 per cent per lap.
# At the Monaco Grand Prix, the transmission and engine have to withstand an average 3,100 gear changes.
# The engine block and cylinder head are made of cast aluminium and are manufactured at the BMW Formula One foundry in Landshut using a special thin-wall casting method.
# BMW Munich handles, among other things the manufacture of the crankshaft (steel), camshaft (case-hardened steel) and camshaft covers, as well as processing of the cylinder head and crankcase. The oil system and engine electronics also stem from BMW Munich.

BMW 83 engine timeline from concept to culmination:
# Concept: November and December 2001
# Design: January through May 2002
# Model construction at the BMW foundry in Landshut: March through May 2002
# Components manufacture: April through July 2002
# Initial assembly: July 2002
# First bench test: 31 July 2002
# Test phase development stage 1: August 2002 through January 2003
# First deployment in car: 18 September 2002
# Development to race readiness: October 2002 to mid-February 2003
# Further development: mid-February to season’s final in October 2003

In the meantime the test phase for the BMW P84 engine was launched. Following successful bench tests, it was already being tested on the track in its 2004 season specification at Monza on 4 September 2003.

Press release
BMW Motorsport


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For all you Math majors, my dad did a quick run of the numbers and calculated the bore/stroke of the P83 to be roughly 80mmx60mm.. which is wild compared to the 90-somethingx43mm that the P90 ran.

Also, contrary to popular belief, the S54 DOES NOT have higher piston speeds than the P83.

At 19,200 the P83 would be running 7874 feet per second, while an S54 at 8000rpm would be 4776 feet per second.

Thus, the P83 does in fact have piston speeds about 65% higher than the S54's.

Now let's hope it can help JPM beat out Schumi!

[TomM]

Great info.

I guess I am wrong about the piston speed. I'll ask my dad about it again tommorow.

[Alex Mc]

Well, relative to rpm they are higher.. if the S54 was turning 19,200 rpm its piston speed would be about 11,328 feet per minute. That is, the pistons exiting the head via the hood would be moving about that fast hahaha..

[TomM]

LOL

I'm not questioning what you said, but I just called my pops and he is just checking it out with the engine guy, because I know he is as interested about the F1 motor as you are. So I'll see what he says about all that.

What values did you use for the Bore/Stroke of the S54?

[Vitolo]

Incredible. The manpower(no pun intended) behind these engines is staggering. To think it will all be obsolete in 2 months is downright ridiculous

Once again, great post Alex! But you and I know those rev limits are a little conservative. After all, last year BMW was shutting off the publicized telemetry at the USGP about 3/4 down the front straight and it was 19k rpm

[BLACKTAPE]

will it fit an e36?

[Alex Mc]

Tom, 87x91mm...

And the redlines actually are lower this year due to the increased life the motor must see. Engines cannot be changed between qualifying and race day, so they can't run them as hard. As Mario Theissen, BMW F1 Tech Director, said - with the new rules, its like the engine is a marathon runner who is asked to run a sprint race right before the marathon.

So, yeah- we saw 19200 last season, but this season they're only using 18800-19000.

[Vitolo]

well, im a dick and i stand corrected!

[Sulax34]

Thanks alot for the awesome write up! What an amazing engine.....can't wait until its road going derivative gets to the M5. By the way, what kind of materials are used in it to make it so light?

[Alex Mc]

The write-up is actually from a press release from BMW Motorsport.. we build race engines, but i'm not exactly privy to F1 details

Anyway, the M5 V10 should be hot, but of course it will be nothing like the F1 motor, not to say it won't use principles and lessons from the F1 design. Too bad we won't be seeing any pneumatic valve-trains for a while At 19,000rpm, valve springs can't move fast enough!

The motor is all-aluminum with probably titanium rods. Crank and cams are steel.. i'm sure the crank is a feather though with tiny counterweights. Of couse, anything that's not metal is CF/Kevlar.. but to be quite honest with you- I have absolutely no f*cking clue how they make a V10 weigh under 200lbs. My US S50 weighs 420! And its a 6! Baffling...

[E30mademepoor]

Crazy! Thanks for the info Alex, I love this kinda stuff
-Ted

[klasic]

Originally posted by Alex Mc
# Piston speed peaks at 40 metres per second and averages 25 metres per second.

At 19,200 the P83 would be running 7874 feet per second, while an S54 at 8000rpm would be 4776 feet per second.

[/b]

Ok, I really hate to nit pick you alex, but I have to......

I know you meant to say 7874 feet per min, not per sec, because at 7874 feet per sec those pistons would be accelerating to nearly 6000 mph 19,200 times per min, and as much as I would love to see the motor that could do this, breaking the speed of sound inside a motor would probably not work out for the best.....

But the pistons are accelerating to 89 mph during each revolution... and if the piston continued to accelerate at that same rate for 1 full sec (yes i know this is impossible it would be traveling 28,000 miles per hour..... Crazy stuff.... F1 motor technology is very impressive indeed.....

[Alex Mc]

Ian- thanks for the correction! I did mean to type feet per minute, not feet per second!

But you're right, piston speeds of Mach 10 would own. haha

[mrsha007]

you guys ahve to remeber that this piston is only about 3.25 inches across, and it only has to travel about 2 inches. thats NOTHING. plus it is made of space age metals, this is the only reason it can move as fast as it does. BTW, a high powered hunting rifle fires a bullet at about 7000 ft/second. the piston is faster , so i guess a bmw is faster then a bullet

edit: btw, alex, you always have great info on this stuff. i enjot reading it.

[Alex Mc]

Thanks for the props.. i try to keep everyone entertained. I love F1 and i love sharing the cool shit i come across.