© F1i
FAST BUT FRAGILE
The fastest cars on Saturday, both Silver Arrows suffered technical issues on Sunday.
Valtteri Bottas' car suffered a hydraulic leak. The leak resulted in a pressure drop across the entire hydraulic system, which controls major parts of the car, as explained by Craig Scarborough: steering, throttle, clutch, transmission, "brake-by-wire ", the differential, the DRS, the wastegate, etc.
As for Lewis Hamilton's car, it experienced a drop in fuel pressure "related to the fuel system" in the words of Toto Wolff, not to the engine itself.
The pressure required for the fuel flow happens in several stages in Formula 1. The fuel is first raised from the bottom of the tank by a collector, before being routed to the two direct-injection pumps (one for each cylinder bank). Driven by the camshafts, these pumps (indicated by the yellow arrows above) deliver 500bar of pressure to the injector.
