At present, exhausts occupy a strange position in Formula One engine development and are treated very differently in the regulations from most components that make up these highly specialised engines. Along with the snorkel (air horn), they are the only components able to influence engine performance that are not deemed to fall within the 'sealed engine', inside which no development or design changes are allowed, except for clearly defined reasons such as cost-cutting or reliability....
As long as there is the pursuit for extra power there will always have to be a commitment to using more advanced and exotic materials. Exhaust design is no exception, and many exhaust systems - both classic and contemporary - provide us not only with engineering artwork but a technical challenge. One criterion expected of performance exhausts is their need to work at sustained elevated working temperatures, which has necessitated the use of more sophisticated and complex materials....
We have become accustomed to the fact that many race motorcycle exhaust systems are made from titanium. Owing to the fact that they are generally much better supported than on most racecar installations, the problems with fatigue and creep are nowhere near as serious. One company, Good Fabrications, with extensive experience of many types of exhaust materials has applied its knowledge of special high-temperature materials used in other race series with great success to motorcycle racing,...
In the world of motorcycle racing, in particular it seems, it has been common to find strange appendages on exhaust systems, on everything from single-cylinder motocross machinery to high-speed inline four-cylinder engines. They can take various forms, common types being: 1) Tubes linking certain primary pipes together; the link tubes being much smaller in diameter than the primary pipes they connect2) Larger-volume 'bottles' being used to link adjacent primary pipes together3) Pipes...
I recently spoke to Emmanuele Nicali of Lesto Racing at the Monza World Superbike races about the company's motorcycle race products. Lesto supplies both road and race motorcycle exhausts to a number of teams involved in various Italian national championships, including CIV (Italian Superbike championship) and the Superstock 600 and 1000cc series. It also plans to have its exhaust systems on race machines at the Isle of Man TT races in 2011. Fig. 1 shows a race system fitted to a race...