Why F1's hard-to-love turbo-hybrid decade has been so important

By:

Jake Boxall-Legge

Sep 12, 2023, 11:00 AM

OPINION: F1's turbo-hybrid era got off to a rocky start in 2014, as unreliability and lack of noise figured among common complaints. But they've been an important cornerstone of modern F1, and should be admired - even if they'll never be truly loved

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When turbocharged engines returned to Formula 1 in 2014 after being outlawed for a quarter of a century, their new beginning was hardly an auspicious one.

The V8s that had been in use previously had been largely frozen in spec since 2007, albeit with a few modifications made on "reliability" (read: with performance-imbuing side effects) grounds, and had bordered on earning the descriptor 'time-tested'. By the end of their lives, the V8 engines had been reasonably low-cost and largely reliable and had just about sated those seeking aural pleasure in the grandstands. They couldn't deliver the V10's wailing falsetto or the V12's ear-splitting roar, but the 2.4-litre eight-pot units nonetheless had the ability to perforate a few eardrums along the way.

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Jake Boxall-Legge

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Jake studied engineering at university, as his original ambition was to design racing cars. He was bad at that, and thus decided to write about them instead with an equally limited skillset. The above article is a demonstration of that. In his spare time, Jake enjoys people, places, and things.