MCLAREN'S TOXIC ENGINE! The Story of the Mercedes Beryllium Alloy Pistons (1998-2001) 

Hey, my sister has that condition.

A.M. you remind me of the very capable historian James Burke .

They were visibly lacking power in 2001 and 2002, but they managed to recover it in later years. From 2005 onwards they had one of the most powerful engines. Reliability wasn't always great, though.

Using beryllium compared to other exotics is pretty dumb considering how dangerous it is and other aren’t.

@@warwickben untill you remember lead.

@@jwalster9412 And about half the other elements in the periodic table 😬

@@warwickben Beryllium has 150% the stiffness of steel at only 70% the density of aluminum and nearly the same thermal conductivity of aluminum. There aren't any other metals that can approach that combination of properties. For a mechanical design engineer, its a major problem solver for many difficult challenges. Cost aside, there is nothing dumb about it.

Same thing supposedly happened with the brake pedal too. But I dunno if it’s just “huuuurrrr Ferrari international assistance” or genuine.

my father always used to say that during schumacher era in ferrari, ferrari was free to do anything. because they had money, most influential people & best driver. why not destroy the competition

@@harshithsadhana7475 I get why people like to look rather fondly on that era, and it was probably indeed an incredible sight and sound to behold. However the type of dominance exerted by Ferrari must have been truly oppressive, that makes the Vettel-RB and hybrid-Mercedes eras look like childsplay.

@@lennoxbaumbach390 I am italian, and back then I used to hate Ferrari and Schumacher for killing the competition. It sounded and looked nice, but It was the most boring era ever.

@@Biondo30Hz Understandable, sounds about right.

the material also has a effect on sound probably more so as my sibling pointed out to me as there more of a jazz musician ( and a computer nerd and im not in electric stuff )( and not into cars as much as me ) than me so there ears 👂will pick up on things like quicker than me, go listen to different engines but have similarities but construction is different from each other and you will pick up on it one experience of mine is a 408 SBM vs 383-BBM vs 540-RB BBM vs 540 hemi BBM all really close sounds as there all in the mopar family but different and some don't know or can pickup on the difference but i can't unsee after having all of them idling next together in a row

also had a experience of more than one flat head iron vs aluminium pistons and yes it does change the sound a lot and the volume in DB levels

Fun fact, Ilmor sold their F1 branch. It's now Mercedes HPP in Brixworth.

@@richardprice5978 With a speaker driver i would agree. With a Piston sounding different depending on the material... Hmm not so sure about that one.

@@kaedeschulz5422 im not a music nerd but i like a good sounding system and music/VFX ect another words i notice's mono vs stario vs crappie full sound vs my proffered Hifi full rich sounds and experience form 6+placement's ect and is a common sense missing from modern 2010-up media and a pet peeve of mine, and my understanding is different people or company's build or rebuild speakers differently so think about it the cylinder and piston is what is hiting the air first as a sound wave just like in the speaker 🔊and the density or the change's ect can mess with what you end up picking up in your earshot of it

Im an engineer and if we even think about beryllium in a project we have to get 4 upper level signatures. Ive never actually gotten to use it because of that.

@@josephjones4293 The golf club manufacture used to use Berylium Copper in the putter heads

@mpetersen6 Ummmm… thanks? My old race engine had BC valve seats… I didnt say Ive never heard of it, I said i’ve never gotten to do anything with it due to regulation

It's marketed under the name of AlBeMet by Materion (formerly Brush Wellman) these days. Same company that made the beryllium mirror blanks for the James Webb Space Telescope.

Will never forget that sound at ims

@@kameransnyder9596 nothing like those V10s screaming around the banking

@Joe B Believe me the V12s sounded a lot better. I went to a number of GPs in the early 1990s and Berger and Alesi in Ferraris were quite often the first out on track. At tracks like Spa and Monza you could hear the shriek of the V12 as it went around the track.

@@simonkevnorris funny how this comment is about Mercedes v10s from the late 90s to early 2000s and you're here pointlessly and totally unrelated nostalgia bonering v12s Good God nobody cares at least keep your comment relevant, eh...

@@simonkevnorris they just think that the more high pitch = the more better. Wich is sad af

Wtf lol

Thats insane

beryllium IS exceptionally toxic to biological entities. Just google it. It has some wonderful physical properties, but it can kill you.

well nobody is sucking air straight from the wheel, It will be fine

Are you sure it wasn't the calipers (a part that isn't being worn), rather than the discs themselves? If it really was the brake discs, then that's clearly insane.

That will be beryllium-copper. Also in use for spot welding electrodes, thanks to its good strength and high electric conductivity. Still >90% copper though.

Used to work in a ceramics shop that had a beryllium dept. Sealed everything. Very scary stuff.

This would make sense, at the time there was 4 oil refineries within 7 mile radius of the machine shop mentioned in my post.

@@eriktempelman2097 we use beryllium copper in tool making. has great wear and heat dispersion qualities. great for molding components

C17200 Beryllium Copper is 2% Be. This is the most popular alloy of BeCu. Racers love it for use in valve seats for its combination of high thermal conductivity and hardness.

Might have been more to do with the fact they revved lower at that point. The late 90s/early 2000s note is more “pleasant” than the ones that were limited to 20k

Wasn’t that more to do with their exhausts (blown diffuser) though that caused that eargasmic tone?

I can only imagine the hearing loss drivers have from that era. I watched a race from the pits in the v8 era. I could feel the revs screwing with my heartbeat

@@DidierPeroni helmets and plugs go a long way

@@DidierPeroni they wore ear plugs. Still do.

Beryllium is also used in the drivers for at least one high-end headphone: the Focal Utopia.

*Warning for cats - Do not eat tweeter 🤣⛳

😅 my headphones have beryllium

It looks like both were used. But interesting to note.

They probably sounded different because of more stroke yet same rpm

Makes good valve seats too 😜

and springy copper parts in switches

I saw those in a tool catalog of a huge normal tool supplier. Ampco makes them. I phoned up and emailed that they should place a warning in the catalog and with the tools ordered not to grind anything in shape or size ( odd nut size ..just grind the spanner..) without right protection. They were like : grinding dust of be bronze toxic ???? Didnt know that Ok...we will do so.

My Ping Zing Beryllium Copper Irons were pretty nice too... until I gave up golf because my shoulder was trashed in a parachuting accident.

miss him on the F1 broadcasts here in the states, he's great

Don't tell me you smoked as well...

@@rkan2 If this person has managed to do all three and somehow NOT have cancer, I would strongly suggest for them to go to Las Vegas.

I worked in a automotive machine shop as well (NAPA) . I have replaced valve seats too. I was told it was just hardened steel inserts .

@@321CatboxWA You can get them made of many materials. Beryllium seats aren't as hard as tool steel or hardened steel seats which makes them nicer on titanium valves or something that is going to be slamming valves hard (big lift/high spring pressure). They also have great thermal dissipation. One day I'd like to see Vegas, although long way from Western Australia 🇦🇺

Hehe F1 Twitter

@@dhupee I was going to say that, you beat me to it

Sure, late turbo-era “rocket fuel.” Mostly Toluene, supposedly.

And Lemans. How would you like to be a tire changer on those pit stops? On another note, I have had contact with beryllium engine parts before. The manufacturer told everyone to NOT grind, sand or cut on them in any way. At least publicly. Privately they said if you just had to do it, do it under water.

@@wingracer1614 is it that dangerous? wow

@@harshithsadhana7475 Dust in your lungs is. Just holding it and handling it is no problem but breath in some dust and you could have serious issues.

@@wingracer1614 The people that supply Beryllium materials provide a handbook for working with them safely. Modern CNC machines are completely enclosed and use flood coolant to keep dust and chips out of the shop.

I own a yellow one. It is a lovely engine, but the best part of that car is the gearbox. 🙂

the f20c block is a unique alloy dont think its beryllium though

Interesting theory, but it doesn’t hold up Look at guns in the US, for extreme examples

@@jordanclark4635 guns are holding on by a thread. I think it's mostly an older generation that's keeping them as legal as they are. Plus there's an argument to be made that the world is safer with guns because of how many people's lives they save do to self-defense. A better example or should I say scarier example, as a driving enthusiast I'm terrified of the day AI gets good enough that they can have a self-driving car that's reliable be safe it won't have any accidents. Then what excuse will I have to drive my own car? How will I argue with them when they say here we have a system where no one will ever die in a car crash again why should we let you drive your own car? The only argument is because I want to and I don't know if that's good enough. At least with guns you can say it's a tool that can still be used to self-defend as long as there's guns out there to commit offense there will still be a need for guns for defense. The future is self-driving electric pods that take us place to place you probably schedule one with a app on your phone. No one will own their own car anymore unless you're super rich and can afford the massive amount of insurance it would take to operate your own 3400 lb of death machine on a private race track. And that's the future of the automobile enthusiast. It's like horses before the car everybody had horses once the car was invented horses just became a hobby for the rich same with sailboats and same with a car in the future. I don't like it anybody who's an automobile enthusiast won't like it but what's your argument against it other than you just don't like it? Especially when you have someone throwing the numbers in your face how can you argue that it won't be safer when I start telling you about all the lifes that will save it kind of paints you as a selfish ass hole.

@@robertstone9988 Agree 100% on the auto-driving cars. Another aspect which will come into force. Will be hailing a taxi via the app. Yet you could only go to a destination A - B no "scenic routes" Or hiring a cab "just for the ride" There would be a lock out in the navigation that the car would only do "necessary" journeys.. Sad times for us people growing up in a mechanical world... Us car enthusiasts will become the modern day luddites....... ... Another thought..what if you hire an auto "Jonny cab" to commit a crime. *Jonny cab:* Destination please *Passenger:* Take me to parliament I wish to blow it up. *Jonny cab:* crime in progress - divert to nearest police docking station.🤔

@@stuartd9741 most of the world are not automotive enthusiasts so most of the world do not care. To quote Natalie Portman in revenge of the sith "so this is how freedom dies to thunderous applause" people like my sister who hate driving and see it as a necessary chore will cheer on the AI driven electric pods. And the only argument people like me and you will have to confront them will be look I know it kills thousands of people every year and pollutes the Earth and congest the cities but I really like it. People only care when it comes for the thing they love. One day when the world is so overpopulated there is no more room for farms and it's way too in efficient to have a million acre cattle farms. (They've already started pushing this) and all your meat lovers will be in the same boat me and you are in right now. They'll come to him tell him it'll save thousands of lives every year people who die of high cholesterol fake meats just as good for you farms are bad for the environment you'll eat your fake me and you'll love it, and the only argument the people who want to eat real meat will have is yeah but I like real meat. The world changes with or without you I have a supercharged mustang and I plan on driving it like the road warrior until the last drop of gas is gone.

@@robertstone9988 Sadly agree. I own a mini Cooper S.(supercharged) Fun little pocket rocket. Any excuse to drop a gear to overtake and hear the charger whine...😁 And I do like me a steak.... What this world coming too Comedians can't even make jokes now for fear of offending someone. But I'll say. Have your steak, enjoy your mustang - while the fun lasts. That's all we can do. We'll look back fondly (and tell the grand kids) to the "good ol days of the 2020s " when we could drive out own cars how and where we wanted....

Imagine conditions in the engine: Spark eroding Hot gas blast Friction wear Pickup in the oil Grenading pistons Oxide formation

the pistons dont wear the rings do no dust is gonna escape the engine bia exhaust but treating the used oil as containing beryllium would be reasonable

It would have been fairly simple by taking a sample of the exhaust and putting it into a mass spectrometer. That way you could actually see if there is any kind of dust. Have it required to be tested after a certain number of miles, and boom. There you go.

I get your vitriol toward IMSA if you are a fan of AAR - but the fact is the GTP era Toyota dominated killed prototype racing interest in the US at that time......maybe IMSA should have done MORE to level the playing field. Ah well - eventually things did recover - DP and DPI are not as technically interesting as GTP but at least we have a competitive Prototype series in the US with enough teams to make it entertaining.

@@jimbosc My distaste for what IMSA did too AAR doesn't have so much to do with the fact the GTP category was "dying" at the time (it could easily be argued that the GTP class was already dead in '91 after Nissan left and jaguar/porsche scaled-down their participation in the division from works teams to customer only) as much as it was for the fact that they also did it to audi in 1992 because they didn't want to change the rules too allow for more technical experimentation with things like all wheel drive in the GTU category so their "solution" was too basically hobble them for the '91 season before just outright banning them in '92.

Sounds like how the Nissan Skyline was banned from racing in Australia, simply because it was too fast.

Unfortunately you missed all the good stuff. F1 is g a y now

But if you watched the video.....never mind...

Yes Iiked that too..👍

The actual metal isn't toxic on its own, just the oxide dust.

During the machining process is when it’s so toxic

So you’ll never listen to speed metal again?

@@Tacko14 Highly doubt the speed of those Beryllium diaphrams gyrating would be hot enough to create any toxic fume.

It’s also used to make brake callipers in F1 and more, and no one seems to have problems with that (:

That was normally BeO - a lot of 90's avionics was full of the stuff. It makes a lot of sense in high power RF circuits because it manages to be a very good thermal conductor while being an excellent electrical insulator. It also has very low dielectric absorption, which reduces losses at high frequencies. There was also typically a whole section in the manual filled with warnings about how to handle the stuff.

@@TrimeshSZ Yes, 4CX250's I use them even today in my lineairs. 2C39's also.

@@harrydelange1821 Pretty close - the specific part I had in mind was the 4CS250R - which is very similar, but conduction cooled - that had a solid Be alloy block that mounted to the chill plate and no fins, because they were typically installed in equipment that was in an unpressurized equipment bay and it wasn't practical to air-cool them. Certainly a lot quieter than the air-cooled parts like the 4CX250 :)

@@TrimeshSZ A friend of mine, also a radio ham build an amplifier with 2 of the conduction cooled types iin the early 80 ties. Very quiet and easely capable to deliver 400 Watts on 144 mcs.

@@harrydelange1821 I think that was a pretty common approach back in the day - my 2m amp was also a pair of 4CX250s with (noisy!) air cooling - I did get a pair of the 4CS250Rs and think about converting the amp to conduction cooled, but life and inertia got in the way. I also had a 3CX1500, but gave up on the idea of making an amp from it after hearing the blower in operation..

Be-Cu is also used as valve seat material for racing engines.

So is it totally safe then once it's fused?

@@AidanMillward Well its used in hand tools like wrenches and spanners for explosive/hazardous areas for its non-sparking properties. So I would say that is a good indication. Basically unless your machining it that would create fine dust particles that could be inhaled. Your good.

@@MiracleManMatt cool!

Yeah, hate it when people do that.