What is interesting is that Mercedes came up with the split turbocharger only in the first race - in preseason winter testing, they were running a more traditional turbo charger.
Now that we've seen the split turbocharger with the turbine at the back, the compressor at the front and the motor-generator unit in between on top of the engine block it seems all too obvious. But coming up with this is ingenious, and making it work on such short notice is quite a feat of engineering.
I can't wait to have this in my road car, 40% fuel saving with only a little drop in performance.
I think the hard part wasn't coming up with the configuration, it's making it work without inducing immense turbo lag. The software controlling the motor/generator has to be impressively precise considering the forces and timings it is working with.
Yes, the article did say that and I found it a bit odd. While they probably have been working on the power unit for two years, the split turbocharger was first seen at the first race.
Of course, my knowledge is based on media reports, it is possible that none of the media have seen it in Jerez and Bahrain tests but it was first reported by Craig Scarborough during the Australian GP weekend.
The split turbocharger was most likely identified by interested journalists at the first race. The power train was homologated for the season at the end of February, so the design was finalised prior to the third pre-season test. It's most likely that the turbo was in this form a while ago.
I don't follow F1, but surely with anything that's going to give a team a big competitive advantage, a.) there always has to be a line between "haven't used" and "have now used" and b.) to delay other teams efforts to copy, the later that point comes the better.
Now that we've seen the split turbocharger with the turbine at the back, the compressor at the front and the motor-generator unit in between on top of the engine block it seems all too obvious. But coming up with this is ingenious, and making it work on such short notice is quite a feat of engineering.
I can't wait to have this in my road car, 40% fuel saving with only a little drop in performance.