How Shell play it cool in hot conditions

Inside a Formula One engine, this is happening for two hours at a time. 10 pistons zip up and down in a Formula One car three or four times faster than an average road car for up to two hours. Too much heat in an engine will cripple it. Metal components will begin to distort and this will usually cause them to run off their true line or to cause excessive wear in another part of the engine. The results are generally spectacular and expensive as the engine disassembles itself in a matter of a few smoky seconds.

Working to prevent this and to protect the engine are the Shell engineers. Just as with your hands, oils between the moving metal protect the engine. In fact, not only does engine oil protect, when properly designed, engine oil will dissipate the heat generated in the engine, taking it to the oil radiators for cooling.

“Logic dictates that to protect an engine, the thicker the engine oil is, the better. As a rule of thumb this is true,” explains Shell’s Trackside Activity Manager Tobias Tasche. “If we provide Ferrari with a very thick or viscous lubricant for the engine or gearbox, we could significantly improve the engine’s lifespan. Also thicker oils deal more effectively with the heat in the engine than a thinner version.”

But whilst a viscous oil in the engine is generally beneficial to engine longevity and cooling, it also has its disadvantages. “The perennial problem is that the thicker the oil is, the slower the engine can turn and as such, the engine may be safer, but will be down on power,” continues Tasche. “A thinner, or less viscous oil allows the engine to run faster and harder and therefore gives the car a speed increase, but then we arrive back at the starting point of needing to protect the engine.”

“Thinner oil will generally also have less heat transfer qualities than a thicker variant. In other words, we would need to use more of it. More oil implies a weight increase (something all car manufacturers are keen to avoid!) and necessitates larger oil radiators to cool the liquid.” In aerodynamic terms, the radiators need to be as small as possible, further complicating this procedure. Considering all the influences on the design of an oil therefore, it is clear that the ideal solution is a compromise.

Shell must provide Ferrari with oil that is thick enough to protect the engine and to transfer the engine’s heat, yet thin enough to allow the engine to run freely and not restrict power. “Different circuits make different demands on the engines, and to an extent, we can reflect this in the oil we provide the team,” explains Tobias. “At Monza, the speeds are high and there is no shortage of air through the radiators. Although the engines are running hard for two hours, cooling is good and allows us to use a slightly thinner oil. In Hungary for example, the ambient temperature is high and the cooling often restricted due to the close running of the cars (running close to another car restricts the air flow to your radiator) so we tend to bear this in mind when developing an oil for this part of the season.”