Oilpressure

First of all, thanks to all for the personal texts and e-mails I received over the past couple of days. I think when I said I had COVID, others were a lot more concerned about it than I was. My biggest concern was having to burn time-off from work. As my friend Paul Dalbey said – personal time off should be time spent at a race track, and not in bed.

I was never in any grave danger, just tired and sleepy with a bad cough. I bounced back quickly, though. My fever is gone, the cough has mostly subsided and I actually feel 100%. For those who were worried I would give it to Susan, she actually got it shortly after Gateway and was sick with it over Labor Day. Now we’ve both had it recently, bounced back fully and shouldn’t have to worry about it for a while. Now we’ll move on to a more interesting topic besides my health.

Thursday and Friday were testing days at IMS for the new hybrid component to be added to the current car for next season. Four drivers from four teams – Alex Palou, Alexander Rossi, Will Power and Colton Herta – all took to the track to try and answer questions. I’ve been curious to see how a hybrid works on the high-speed oval where braking is minimal.

Some may appreciate this post and find it educational, while others will be bored with it.

I surprised myself a couple of years ago, when I bought a hybrid vehicle. I never once in my life thought I would ever own a hybrid, but a little over two years in – I actually love it. One thing that surprised me however, is how little most people know about hybrids.

On October 1, 2021; I bought a 2022 Honda Insight. It’s built on the Civic platform, but shares no sheet metal with the Civic except for the roof. What’s the biggest difference between the Civic and the Insight? The Insight weighs over 900 pounds more than the Civic – strictly due to the weight of the hybrid batteries that are stored under the back seat.

I didn’t buy it to save the planet. In October of 2021, we were seeing signs that gas was about to go through the roof. It did in 2022, before coming back down. My old Honda Civic got about 33 mpg on the highway, and about 25 mpg in-town. The Insight claimed to get about 45 mpg on the highway and up to 52 mpg in-town.

Hybrids get much better mileage in-town than regular internal combustion engine (ICE) cars, due to the regenerative braking – recapturing energy coming off of the brakes and putting that energy back into the battery. Even if I don’t hit the brakes, every time I back off the throttle, it is replenishing battery power from both the engine and through the transmission.

One thing that surprised me was the amount of questions I got from people who are normally fairly knowledgeable about cars. How often do you have to plug it in? Where do you plug it in? Did you have to get a special power outlet added to your garage? Are you able to plug it in at charging stations? The answer to those questions are; Never, I don’t, No and I don’t need to.

As is usually the case, I don’t get quite the advertised mileage – but I do normally get about 42 mpg on the highway and around 48 mpg in-town; which is almost double the in-town mileage I got on my old 5-speed Honda Civic Coupe. Every week, I drive 50 miles one-way to Clarksville, TN on a winding up-and-down two-lane road. It is not unusual to get over 50 mpg on that trip, simply due to the terrain and hitting my brakes constantly.

Different manufacturers develop their hybrids differently. For the Honda, the primary purpose of the 1.5 liter, naturally aspirated engine is to charge the battery. The secondary purpose is to help power the car when the electric motor needs help. Many people are surprised to find out that it’s not an either/or thing with the ICE and the electric motor. Much of the time, they are both running at the same time. A lot of times, only the electric motor is running. Surprisingly, the transition from one to another is very seamless and hardly noticeable. For a very good explanation on how the Honda hybrid unit works for their passenger cars, here is an excellent video.

My primary reason for buying a hybrid was for great fuel mileage. I had low expectations for the power at my disposal, so I was pleasantly surprised at the torque and power of the electric motor. No one will mistake it for a Ferrari, but it is more than adequate and more than I expected. But I’m also not trying to win the Indianapolis 500 with my car.

I don’t think the top goal for the IndyCar hybrid is fuel economy. It may be a nice side-effect, but the number one goal is power. My worst fuel mileage comes on the interstate on flat terrain. Whenever we drive from Nashville to Indianapolis, the portion from Louisville to Indianapolis through southern Indiana, offers some of the straightest and flattest section of road you will find anywhere. I never hit the brakes or coast downhill. Consequently, my gasoline-powered engine runs a lot more to keep the battery charged up. If I stop for gas in southern Indiana, from when I get back in the car to the track, I’m doing good to get 34 mpg – pretty much the same as my old Civic on the interstate.

I see how the batteries for the hybrid power plant will stay charged at places like Long Beach, where speeds reach 180 mph and quickly slow down to 35 mph under heavy braking; or at Road America and Barber, where massive elevation changes will keep the battery charged when needed for that extra burst of power. But how will it work at Indianapolis, where there is no elevation change; and the brakes are rarely, if ever, touched except for pit stops.

I have paddles behind my steering wheel to activate and de-activate regenerative braking without ever touching the brake. I understand that there will be something very similar in the Indy car cockpit next year. I’m having a hard time understanding how this is going to work, because whenever I activate the regenerative braking from the wheel on my car, there is a noticeable slow-down effect. Are drivers expected to purposely encounter drag on the straightaways at Indianapolis, in order to charge their battery so that they can have an added boost when needed? It seems to me that doing nothing at all, may be better than adding drag and slowing down to give yourself added boost at some time in the future. It seems like the only beneficial time to use the re-gen paddles would be during a caution, when you are in no danger of being passed.

It is certain that this adds an extra layer of strategy, when to regenerate energy and when not to – but this doesn’t sound like anything the fans will see or be aware of. Will Power chose his words carefully last week when he simply said “…you’re going to be pretty busy…”

One of the main issues I’ve noticed about my own hybrid is that the batteries don’t like extreme temperatures. They seem to like a sweet spot of 60° to 80°F. Any temps too hot or too cold, and you can expect the energy stored in the battery to dissipate a lot quicker then normal. In September, I could start my car, back out of my driveway and get down the road a bit before my engine ever turned on. Now that we are in cooler weather, it starts up about halfway down my driveway. In another month or so, it will come on and run the second I start the car. It’s even worse in hot weather, when the windows are left rolled up and te batteries get too hot. Whether it’s hot or cold, it takes a while for the batteries under the back seat to reach room temperature, where they operate the best.

I imagine cars in the Indianapolis 500 will be affected pretty much the same way. May can be very cold and very hot. The entire month will be a completely new learning experience next May.

I don’t know how much weight will be added to the car for next season, but it could be substantial. If the hybrid component adds over 900 pounds to my car, what does that translate to on an Indy car? I don’t know the answer. But when you combine it with the added bulkheads for strengthening the original DW12, then the added weight at the top of the car for the aero screen – the drivers in 2024 will be driving a much heavier car than they did in 2012.

I read something over the weekend where a fan suggested only installing the hybrid component for the road/street courses and only using the pure ICE power for the ovals. I’m no mechanic, but that does not sound feasible. It seems to me that there would be so much to uninstall and reinstall between races, that it just wouldn’t be possible.

I don’t know what next year’s Indianapolis 500 will look like, but my bet is that the cars will be much slower. The drivers seemed measured in their comments, but the reviews seemed very mixed. I’d say there are more questions than answers after last week’s hybrid test.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on October 18, 2023 at 4:04 am and is filed under IndyCar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.