The Ilmor company was founded by Mario Illien, Paul Morgan and Roger Penske in 1984. It quickly became successful in Indy car racing and progressed to competing in Formula One in the early 1990s, winning the world championship with McLaren in 1998 and 1999.
After success in diverse racing series, in late 2002, Mercedes-Benz elected to begin a phased buyout of Ilmor. This began to stifle opportunities for special projects and so by the end of June2005 a new Ilmor was born and now possesses its own independent facilities employing 60 staff. The main business is the development and production of racing engines – from conception through to trackside.
CRP and Ilmor have known each other for a number of years, both being protagonists in F1 world, as well as hi-tech partners and suppliers.
CRP Technology has been an active partner with many motorsport teams for more than 30years and is ISO9001:2000 certified. The company has four major departments that all work towards a single goal – to support a partner throughout an entire project, including the manufacturing process.
This means that CRP works with its partners on R&D, rapid prototyping, CNC machining, engineering and design – an interface for racing teams and constructors.
CRP’s R&D Department has also developed Windform materials for laser sintering technology that allow the creation of high-end functional prototypes and production parts.
However, while CRP is highly focused on motorsport and automotive applications, particulary high performance structural parts, suspencions corners of racing cars and uprights; the Windform range of materials from CRP suits other applications including aerodynamics, electronics, wind tunnel parts and engine oil ducts and sumps.
For the development of this brand new MotoGP project the innovative technologies based on the use of Windform, a high performance material of CRP’s development and ownership, applied to the rapid prototyping, were very useful.
As the racing teams do not have to be concerned regarding lateness or quality, and just have to receive a perfect part, assemble it on the racing car or bike and utilise the part.
CRP further committed itself to widen the collaboration range, in order to develop the brand new Ilmor GP even faster and in a more innovative way.
After the dyno test, there are the first notes coming from Ilmor engineers about the innovative project. They explain whatever we need to understand, therefore we just report their exact words.
First let us remind ourselves what we are speaking about.
The camshaft cover is the structural part that supports the bearing of the camshaft (camshafts seats, the camshaft usually runs at more or less 19000rpm), directly applied on the 4stroke 800cc engine head. Inside there is also the lubricant oil.
Every material has a temperature limit above which it is recommended not to go. Mechanical properties decrease when the working temperature increases. The recommended limit for WindformXT is 130/140°C, but in some case 150–160°C also can be reached. The limiting factor comes from the thermoplastic base that melts around 180°C.
At a track like Bahrain or Dubai, even if the ambient temperature is significantly higher than the average at other circuits, the working parameters of the engine (ie water and oil temperature) must remain under the limits imposed by the manufacturer. There are usually specific radiators and special aero configurations to ensure a better cooling of the engine.
The improvements this project achieves are as follows:
* Lightness (of the engine head cover. Being on top of the engine, each saved gram means better rideability of the bike, allowing to lower the centre of mass [31percent]).
* Reliability.
* Fast modifications and production (the possibility to change during the season some features of the part).
* Better cooling of the engine.
The result is a composite part where the different materials have a specific function or structural competence.
Around a main-frame in metal-ceramic matrix (aluminium MMC), a shell made by carbon fibre filled resin (WindformXT), was created. The shell is therefore, the result of powder sintering using high performing CRP developed material (WindformXT), directly from a mathematic model in a few hours.
The main areas of the part (camshaft seats) are made by a series of simple cutting and welding processes, while the prototype shell has the complex shape. In fact, being made by selective laser sintering, any complex shape can be obtained without undercut problems (a typical limit of CNC machining process) or supports (a typical limit of other rapid prototyping technologies).
The existing SLS technology also allows to make engine components such as intake trumpets, water pump covers, oil pump covers, airbox and sump scrapers. It obviously varies from engine to engine.
Ian Watson, Ilmor Senior Designer, explains, about the dyno test: “The engine ran with the cam cover. It only did something like the equivalent of 100km, but it was all full speed power run testing. There was absolutely no problem at all – no leaks, no performance difference and judged to be a complete success.
“On disassembly all the internal head components appear to be in normal condition, there is no sign of any distress or any potential problems.
“However, the bond between the aluminium bearing straps and the WindForm has failed. The straps are still in place but it is possible to move them by hand. I’m not sure why this has happened. There is no sign of any movement (no fretting visible), so I think that whilst it was clamped up it was perfectly okay. Perhaps the differential expansion is the culprit.
“I am not too disappointed by the glue failure. I think that the situation we have is that we have enough evidence to say that it would be possible to consider designing ‘major constructional components’ with both the material and the process.
“However, this will only be completely successful if the component and surrounding components are designed from the outset with the process and material in mind.
“I think you have done a fantastic job with the cam cover, however, I think that the difficulties with situations like the aluminium/WindForm bond are somewhat artificial in that in this case it became a necessity due to the overall design of the cylinder head with regard to the relative positioning of the cam bearing straps, etc.
“If I were to design the engine again and wanted to have a structural WindForm cam cover (rather than separate cam caps/ladder and a cover just to seal the oil), I would look at a different stud arrangement, the camshaft spacing and the camshaft bearing size to allow the cover to be one-piece with a plain bearing shell. Maybe we would still need to have some inserts to help with distributing the clamping load, but such things would be relatively easy to organise.
“I think that the whole subject of making things by ‘rapid’ processes is very exciting and opens the door to loads of things that are not currently considered. But, in the same way that all through the design process of a cylinder head (for example) the designer currently is making decisions based on the knowledge that it is going to be produced as a sand casting, the process needs to be considered with an open and fresh mind to take the whole design forward to new ground. I think that this is a point which came across at the Loughborough conference but is something a lot of people seem to have difficulty with, perhaps because it threatens their current ‘comfort zones’.”
A promising consideration for next generation of engineers: it does seem that the only limit is the design process and therefore designers’ knowledge. For open-minded technicians a new path is ready to be pursed.n
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Ing Gabriele Tredozi is the former CRP Racing Special Projects Senior Technical Director and former Minardi F1 and Scuderia Toro Rosso Technical Director; Ing Franco Cevolini is CRP Technology Technical Director, CRP Technology srl, Modena, Italy. www.crptechnolgy.com. the article was written in collaboration with Ing Ian Watson, Ilmor Senior Designer.
