Stuttgart. New engine for the successful large van from Mercedes-Benz Vans: since the end of last year, the Sprinter Panel Van and the Chassis Cab variant with rear-wheel drive are available with the powerful and efficient OM654 four-cylinder diesel engine from the powertrain portfolio of Mercedes-Benz Cars. This autumn, the switch for all the other versions will follow. This significantly improves driving comfort in the Sprinter 2021.

More comfort with lower fuel consumption: the OM654

Whether on the construction site, for shuttle operations or as the base vehicle for motorhomes: with the OM654 the Sprinter promises even more comfort from autumn 2021 in all its versions, both on and off the road – from the Chassis Cab and Traction Head variants to the Panel Van and the Tourer, with rear-wheel, front-wheel or all-wheel drive. And they will all enjoy lower fuel consumption, too.

The OM 654 engine generation, which conforms to the Euro VI-E and Euro 6d emissions norms, offers further improved noise and vibration characteristics. This means it is pleasantly quiet inside the Sprinter and disruptive vibrations have been reduced. The combination of an aluminium housing with steel pistons, the stepped recess combustion process and the NANOSLIDE® cylinder wall coating for reduced in-engine friction, together with the dynamic multi-way exhaust gas recirculation and the in-engine exhaust gas aftertreatment, facilitate lower consumption as well as low emissions. Due to its near-engine position, the exhaust gas aftertreatment works with little heat loss and in optimum conditions.

The OM654 engine is available in four output categories for the Sprinter, depending on the drive and body variant selected: 84 kW (114 hp), 110 kW (150 hp), 125 kW (170 hp) and 140 kW (190 hp).

As a further innovation, Mercedes-Benz has combined the modern 2.0-litre engine with the 9G-TRONIC automatic transmission for the rear-wheel drive Sprinter too. The 6-speed manual transmission remains unchanged in the range.

Further details on the OM654 in the Sprinter will be available in the autumn for the sales launch.

Lewis Hamilton

I did everything I could at the start with temperatures and clutch position but I still suffered wheelspin on the line so we’ll dig deep to understand what happened. I think it was great for F1 to try something new and even if the race wasn’t particularly exciting after the first lap for myself, there are definitely learnings we can take from today. 

This season it’s been a struggle with certain elements of the car but we’ve done such a great job to get to the performance level that we had yesterday - Valtteri did a great job too and we’re definitely getting closer. The Red Bull is really difficult to follow on track and from yesterday’s high, it feels like a bit of a down but we’ll turn it around to find the positives and come out fighting tomorrow for the race.
Valtteri Bottas

Choosing the Soft tyres, we thought we might have a small advantage at the start but I couldn’t gain any places through the first few corners and from then on, it was important not to kill my tyres because the Softs are much more sensitive than the Mediums. I suffered some blistering but I could manage it well and I’m happy we tried something different.

It was nice to have another race today, obviously not as meaningful as tomorrow, but I hope the fans enjoyed it, even if personally I prefer qualifying to the sprint. Tomorrow will be an open race, it’s cool that we’ve got free choice of tyre compounds so we’ll see a mix of strategies which should make things interesting.
Toto Wolff

That was a pretty flat out first sprint race – it was a frustrating for Lewis to lose a point to Max this afternoon, but we saw that we had the pace to make it a very close race tomorrow. We will need to take a closer look to understand what happened at the start for Lewis – and I think if we had held the lead, we had the pace to finish in P1 as well because it wasn’t easy to follow. But it’s set up an interesting Grand Prix: there are two teams close on pace, we have Lewis and Valtteri in the mix at the front, and it looks like tyre strategy can play a big part in these temperatures as well. So we will be aiming to fight back strong in the Grand Prix proper.
Andrew Shovlin

It’s not ideal to have lost a place with Lewis off the start but we can take some encouragement in the car pace which is hopefully enough to put Max under pressure tomorrow. We also have two cars at the front which will open up some strategic opportunities. After the first lap there wasn’t much that we could do; on the same age tyres it was hard for Lewis to get close enough to attack and for Valtteri, he was doing a bit more management to cover for the fact he was on the Soft tyre.

Having the sprint race today does make it a little easier to plan for tomorrow as you’ve got a clear idea of everyone’s pace and how the tyres are behaving so we have a bit of work this evening to take the maximum learning from that. Our goal was to come here, to win and to close the gap in the Championship and I think from what we’ve seen over the last two days, that’s still an achievable target.

Toto Talks Great Britain

We head to Silverstone for a weekend with a full house of 140,000 passionate F1 fans and in the middle of a hard-fought championship. The circuit is just ten minutes from our home in Brackley and 45 minutes from Brixworth – and it will be a huge boost to be racing in front of so many enthusiastic supporters.

The first weekend with the new sprint qualifying format brings a fresh challenge for all teams. With just a single one-hour practice session ahead of the Friday qualifying session, and the cars’ configuration fixed from the beginning of standard qualifying on Friday, whoever can get up to speed quickest will carry an advantage through the weekend. We will be adapting our approach and running plans to ensure we are best prepared for every aspect of the new challenge.

This year we’ll be racing on the Hamilton Straight for the first time, which will be a special moment for Lewis and the whole team. I can’t think of another example of an active driver being honoured in this way by a circuit – it’s testament to what Lewis has achieved in this sport so far in his career. But I know come Saturday and Sunday, his only focus will be fighting for maximum points in this colossal championship fight.

Valtteri enters this weekend full of confidence: he performed strongly in both races in Austria, with two podium finishes, and is eager to continue making up ground in the drivers’ championship table.

Silverstone is an incredible track, fast and flowing, and one that we hope should suit our car better compared to Spielberg. We also have a few small updates on the car, and we look forward to seeing how they perform. We know we need to give Lewis and Valtteri the car to perform at Silverstone and everyone at Brackley and Brixworth is working flat out to deliver it.

Featured: What Are F1 Sprint Qualifying Races?

The British Grand Prix weekend format looks different to normal, due to the introduction of the Sprint Qualifying Race. This is the first of three planned races where this new weekend schedule will be used, with a novel way of deciding the grid for Sunday’s race.

On Friday, teams have just one 60-minute practice session to tune the car, before heading into the standard three-part Qualifying format we are all familiar with. The result of the normal Qualifying session decides the grid for the Sprint Qualifying Race.

On Saturday, there is a second and final 60-minute practice session, before the new, 100-kilometre Sprint Qualifying Race begins. At Silverstone, this will be a 17-lap sprint to the flag to determine the order for Sunday’s main event.

The new format has been introduced by F1, the FIA and the teams to spice up the weekend, add a few new variables and bring an extra challenge to the weekend. It is one that all of the teams face together, so is a step into the unknown for everyone…

The modified schedule means there is less practice time for the drivers and teams to fine-tune the car set-up. FP1 on Friday will be the only real chance to try low-fuel runs for the Qualifying session later that day, because FP2 on Saturday will be focused on higher-fuel running, to get the car ready for Sunday’s race.

How does the new format impact the team from an engineering perspective?

It does have quite an impact, with one of the key factors the engineers must account for being that the cars go into parc fermé after the opening practice session on Friday. Once the car is in parc fermé, there is very little we can change as it is effectively locked-in for the weekend.

As a result, there is significant pressure on that first practice session to figure out the set-up for both the low and high fuel runs, plus considerations on the Power Unit and brake cooling. If you get those parameters wrong, it could be a painful weekend from that point onwards – as the car specification has to be fixed for the standard Qualifying session and beyond.

There is also a much shorter amount of time to work on the car, due to parc fermé rules coming into force, so the mechanics and engineers have just three and a half hours to carry out work on the car. Some of this time will be spent with the FIA checking the legality of the car and making the necessary scrutineering checks. We will get the car back on Saturday morning prior to FP2 for another three hours.

On a typical race weekend, the team has seven and a half hours on a Friday evening to work on the car. So timeframes will be more condensed under the new format and there will be additional pressure on the mechanics and engineers to fit a lot of work into less time.

Does it also impact the way the team will work trackside?

It will impact how we work at the track and how we work with the drivers. It’s a very different race weekend, one we haven’t seen before, so teams will have looked at the whole thing afresh -  from how analysis work is scheduled, to re-programming their simulation work leading up to the event,  and of course, their mechanical work on the cars around the sessions. Everything will shift to adapt to the new schedule.

Again, one of the key points is the pressure to get the spec of the car right in a much shorter space of time, with just one practice session before Qualifying. After the first event at Silverstone, it’ll then be about sitting down, discussing what worked well, what didn’t work well and involving the drivers in those discussions and decisions too, so we’re well prepared for the next one.

From the driver’s perspective, how will the weekend change?

In terms of less practice, it means you either find the flow and the set-up direction, or you don’t. There isn’t as much time to react and trial set-up tweaks, if you haven’t found the right set-up, so if you find it quicker, that will give an advantage.

This means there could be more variability, particularly in the Qualifying order. “The usual format has been pretty standard apart from a couple of weekends where there has been less practice, so it will be nice to try something different and see if it is going to really mix up the weekend,” said Valtteri Bottas. “I guess it can go really against you or for you, but we will find out.”

Drivers love racing and the Sprint Qualifying format means some extra racing, so that’s no bad thing. Valtteri adds: “More to follow for the fans and more racing for us so once we do it in Silverstone and hopefully in two other Grands Prix, I am sure we can draw a good conclusion if that’s the way to go forward in the future in some races or not.”

The start and first lap is one of the riskiest moments for a driver and sets the driver up for the race they have to come, so having two standing starts to contend with, firstly in the Sprint Qualifying Race and then the standard Sunday event, will add extra drama and pressure. Losing out in the Sprint Qualifying Race will have a big impact on the main race, and could make your Sunday very tricky.

Stuttgart – In the latest episode of his podcast Transportation Matters, Martin Daum, Chairman of the Board of Management at Daimler Truck AG, speaks with EU Commissioner for Transport, Adina Vălean. Together they discuss the way forward towards climate neutrality – a topic that is of the highest relevance for both the transportation industry and society as a whole.

The EU is to be climate-neutral by 2050. This new objective of the EU Green Deal gives both citizens of the EU and companies the legal security and scope to plan which are necessary to shaping the transition to climate neutrality. "Climate neutrality" means that the emitted greenhouse gas must not exceed the amount that can be absorbed by nature.

The podcast discussion looks at the right technologies and instruments that can contribute to accelerating the transition to CO2-neutral transportation. It also examines the position of the EU in comparison with other regions in the world with regard to decarbonisation.

“The transport sector is under pressure to cut its emissions, and the clock is ticking: the European Green Deal sets the target of reducing transport emissions by 90% by 2050.
As our Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy makes clear, hitting this target means greater operational efficiency. It means having viable alternatives available. And it means the massive deployment of sustainable, alternative fuels and the cars, lorries, planes, ships, trains that will use them,” says Adina Vălean.

Martin Daum adds: "We are all agreed on the goal: all of us – politics, businesses and society want to fight climate change and we all want to achieve climate neutrality. Now the question is what is the correct way to achieve that? We urgently need to come to an agreement about that, in the transportation sector in particular: what new technologies should we rely on and what kind of regulatory framework do we need so that the greatest number possible of CO2-neutral trucks and buses is put on the roads as quickly as possible? We at Daimler Truck have a very clear idea of that and I am delighted to be able to discuss the way forward for us in detail with EU Commissioner, Adina Vălean, in our podcast."

Stuttgart/Vienna. Österreichische Postbus AG will be using nine new Setra S 531 DT double-decker buses (photo 21C0372_001). The vehicles of the Setra 500 model series will be used on behalf of the Verkehrsverbundes Ost-Region (VOR) transport company on the so-called inter-city weasel bus routes. Each bus offers 20 standing places and 72 seats with height-adjustable comfort head restraints.
The buses also bear the symbol of a weasel symbolising their rapidity, and each has a space for wheelchair users, as well as a folding ramp on door 2 at the rear, a closed driver's cab, a passenger counting device, three TFT monitors for passenger information and a winter-proof toilet.
In all, Österreichische Postbus AG has procured 115 Setra buses for its fleet over the past ten years. The Vienna-based company connects up a total of 1700 communes all around Austria with the public transport network. In more than a third of such municipalities, buses represent the only type of public transport available.
The VOR network is the biggest public transport network in Austria and, since 1984, its more than 40 rail and bus partners have been delivering comprehensive mobility and services for all of its passengers in Vienna, Lower Austria and Burgenland.