FOTA is dead

[WhiteBlue]

@WhiteBlue ...
I read the mercedes AMG powertrains heads interview, and he is right in saying that an RRA on powertrains would be superfluous.
Why?
The restrictions on engines and development is so confined right down to materials and dimensions that it is a resource restriction in itself.

I think you are naive JET. The world is not black and white. One has to form a learned opinion about the statements of different sides in such disputes. And experience tells us that most times the differences are driven by the particular agendas of the teams. Seldomly one side is completely right and the other side is completely wrong.

So we better make an assessment based on reason and experience than believing in one side of the dispute. Both problems are real and need addressing. To think that restricted scope will contrain the engine cost race is silly IMO. It never has and never will unless you freeze development or define a control engine in the case of the new 2014 engine.

[raymondu999]

And how many Merc 4-cylinders are around?

Virtually all C and E class Merc (plus the equivalent BMW 3 and 5 series models) will have 4 cylinder engines, admittedly diesels.

Even the S-class is available with a four cylinder diesel. BMW will push 3-cylinders from next year.

I don't know much about C and E; but I know that my S is a V8; and you can even get them in V12. The 4-cylinder make is a relatively new thing though - it only came out with the W221 models in 2005.

[Raptor22]

actually the 4 cyclinder has been in Mercedes cars for a lot longer.
The 190E had a wonderful 4 cyclinder.
Then there was the 200E, 230 250, all 4 cyclinders, and then to mention the diesels

At the upper end of the exclusivity spectrum Mercedes places whatever size and number of cyclinder enginer they deem appropriate.

Doesn't change the fact that they sell more 4 cyclinder cars than V8's

[Richard]

Would it also be fair to say the Merc sell more V6 than V8?

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Would it also be fair to say the Merc sell more V6 than V8?

+1

Regardless of the cylinders though... It's Turbos the manufacturers want, as this is where makers are heading the next few years.

[Richard]

As I recall Mercedes only use turbos on diesel engines and don't use any turbos on petrol engines? They used to supercharge the petrol engines.

[Mr.S]

I think its a completele --- to freeze engine development. F1 is for me nothing without engine being a differentiator. I despise these days where all engines basically give almost the same performance. It's a joke really.

You spend 100 Million in aerdynamics & stuff & you dont want engine development. The whole mechanical side is horribly ignored too. It's all aero & it's stupid & has no relevance with Motor cars in general. This is Motor-racing after all.


Imagine the difference another 100 HP would make. Formula1 has to be a combination of the Engine & Chasis. Then you have the aerodynamical & mechanical side in the chasis & you cant sacrifice everything for aerodynamics.

[WhiteBlue]

I think its a completele --- to freeze engine development. F1 is for me nothing without engine being a differentiator. I despise these days where all engines basically give almost the same performance. It's a joke really.

You spend 100 Million in aerdynamics & stuff & you dont want engine development. The whole mechanical side is horribly ignored too. It's all aero & it's stupid & has no relevance with Motor cars in general. This is Motor-racing after all.


Imagine the difference another 100 HP would make. Formula1 has to be a combination of the Engine & Chasis. Then you have the aerodynamical & mechanical side in the chasis & you cant sacrifice everything for aerodynamics.

100% agree. =D> =D>

But you still have to limit engine resources to reach an equilibrium. Otherwise you end up with the opposite of what you have today.

[donskar]

I think its a completele --- to freeze engine development. F1 is for me nothing without engine being a differentiator. I despise these days where all engines basically give almost the same performance. It's a joke really.

You spend 100 Million in aerdynamics & stuff & you dont want engine development. The whole mechanical side is horribly ignored too. It's all aero & it's stupid & has no relevance with Motor cars in general. This is Motor-racing after all.


Imagine the difference another 100 HP would make. Formula1 has to be a combination of the Engine & Chasis. Then you have the aerodynamical & mechanical side in the chasis & you cant sacrifice everything for aerodynamics.

+111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

[Mr.S]

I think its a completele --- to freeze engine development. F1 is for me nothing without engine being a differentiator. I despise these days where all engines basically give almost the same performance. It's a joke really.

You spend 100 Million in aerdynamics & stuff & you dont want engine development. The whole mechanical side is horribly ignored too. It's all aero & it's stupid & has no relevance with Motor cars in general. This is Motor-racing after all.


Imagine the difference another 100 HP would make. Formula1 has to be a combination of the Engine & Chasis. Then you have the aerodynamical & mechanical side in the chasis & you cant sacrifice everything for aerodynamics.

100% agree. =D> =D>

But you still have to limit engine resources to reach an equilibrium. Otherwise you end up with the opposite of what you have today.

I would prefer the opposite than what it is now. Look this is a very grey zone. How do you really cap the costs for engine & stuff. Mercedes engine wing stuff is a whole different zone altogether. For big manufacturers there is a lot of exchange of staff among various teams.

It's weird. Suppose Mercedes supplies 100 Million of engine development & they only sell it to Force India. Mclaren have a contract for free engines & Mercedes have a separate team. Where will this 100 Million be accounted to??

Every-year there is a 200 Million cost limit & teams cant spend 20-25 Million each on engines which is supposed to one of the most vital parts of a car. The rules are already very VERY tight.


Look times have changed. Nowadays you dont have separate brand new engines for every practice,qualifying & race. There has been an almost complete freeze on development of engines.We are heading into a world where engines are being reduced to a non-significant parameter as is all mechanical stuff.

All we have is pure downforce & fancy aerodynamical parts changed every race. This cant really be the future of Formula One.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

But you still have to limit engine resources to reach an equilibrium. Otherwise you end up with the opposite of what you have today.

You want to limit more than what has already been ordained?


The engines in the back of all the cars have been around since 2007. Development costs have dropped hugely, so engine manufacturers have been reducing this area for years. There is no further need to do anything with the mechanical side of F1, as its regulated far more than aero.

Red Bull have every advantage near enough frozen in to the formula. Aero dominates the sport by an unfair advantage, it also has less relevance to cars than the mechanical side of F1. I agree wholly with Mr S regarding the need for F1 to minimise its over reliance of aerodynamics.

If Red Bull want a series so predominantly aero based, they already have one....The Red Bull air race series. Aero is relevant in that series!
FOTA is splintering, and eventually we will have the pro aero camp, and the pro mechnical camp. All wanting to reduce spend in the others area of expertise.

Engine makers cannot make the difference. And this is intrinsically unfair.

What chances the FIA step in to this mess? It needs to happen sooner rather than later, but with the concorde agreement nearing this whole situation is a god send for Bernie.

[Just_a_fan]

has no relevance with Motor cars in general. This is Motor-racing after all.

And who said F1 has to be relevant to cars in general? There are already series that are more relevant to cars in general. They are called touring cars.

F1 is an open-wheel, single-seat series and as such has precious little to do with road cars by it's nature. It's a niche formula which majors on aero. That's it big seller - high lap speeds by virtue of high grip brought by high downforce.

You want F1 cars to be road relevant? How about we have them run MacPherson struts at the front and multi-link rear axles? How about front wheel drive? That's good and relevant too. Perhaps we should have them fit at least one passenger seat too?

Sheesh! If you want road-car relevant racing cars go look at tin tops (touring cars) etc. F1 isn't road relevant - it's "fantasy car" racing. Stop trying to make it something it isn't!!!

[NonNewtonic]

But you still have to limit engine resources to reach an equilibrium. Otherwise you end up with the opposite of what you have today.

You want to limit more than what has already been ordained?


The engines in the back of all the cars have been around since 2007. Development costs have dropped hugely, so engine manufacturers have been reducing this area for years. There is no further need to do anything with the mechanical side of F1, as its regulated far more than aero.

Red Bull have every advantage near enough frozen in to the formula. Aero dominates the sport by an unfair advantage, it also has less relevance to cars than the mechanical side of F1. I agree wholly with Mr S regarding the need for F1 to minimise its over reliance of aerodynamics.

If Red Bull want a series so predominantly aero based, they already have one....The Red Bull air race series. Aero is relevant in that series!
FOTA is splintering, and eventually we will have the pro aero camp, and the pro mechnical camp. All wanting to reduce spend in the others area of expertise.

Engine makers cannot make the difference. And this is intrinsically unfair.

What chances the FIA step in to this mess? It needs to happen sooner rather than later, but with the concorde agreement nearing this whole situation is a god send for Bernie.

I don't agree with that in terms of potential there are much more to be explored in terms of aerodynamics which may contribute to future road cars which make it more efficient and it cost much more lesser if compared to mechanical as it take much more resources to fully utilise the mechanical part of the car by running it on the track like the time before the RRA where teams spent hundred millions of euros to perfect the mechanical of the car while aerodynamics you could just use CFD or the wind tunnel once in the while which cost much more lesser

[WhiteBlue]

How do you really cap the costs for engine & stuff. Mercedes engine wing stuff is a whole different zone altogether. For big manufacturers there is a lot of exchange of staff among various teams.

It's weird. Suppose Mercedes supplies 100 Million of engine development & they only sell it to Force India. Mclaren have a contract for free engines & Mercedes have a separate team. Where will this 100 Million be accounted to??

We know by experience that the freeze effectively limited the engine costs and that RRA effectively limited chassis cost. Now we will have unfrozen 2014 engines and naturally you need a proven concept to contain engine development cost close to the level that we have now. The sensible way to do it is also to apply resource restrictions combined with a fixed price for customers.

To express it for the Mercedes engine AMG brand (formerly known as MBHPE Ltd.)lets say that they are allowed to have an R&D department of 25 head count and a certain number of dyno hours. Their manufacturing and marketing isn't restricted. Support engineers to teams are also limited to three per customer. There is a total budget of €10m for external services related to powertrain development. All major sub supplied components like the turbo unit, the fuel injection or the battery are cost capped or supplied by an FiA approved single supplier. Any external consultation or R&D work has to be identified and covered by the budget.

I do not see why this cannot work for Merc, Ferrari, Renault or Cosworth. The engines are capped at €4m per team and year. Five units per year and car are available long term.

If you want to juggle resources between aero and engines you cut the respective budgets, the head count and the dyno/wind tunnel hours.

Every year two chassis and one engine maker is fully audited by an approved auditor. The teams and manufacturers are selected by ballot. If the ballot produces a name that has been audited in the previous two seasons the ballot is invalid and has to be repeated. The teams can request a special audit of any chassis constructor or engine manufacturer by simple team majority if there are allegations of cheating.

[CHT]

actually the 4 cyclinder has been in Mercedes cars for a lot longer.
The 190E had a wonderful 4 cyclinder.
Then there was the 200E, 230 250, all 4 cyclinders, and then to mention the diesels

At the upper end of the exclusivity spectrum Mercedes places whatever size and number of cyclinder enginer they deem appropriate.

Doesn't change the fact that they sell more 4 cyclinder cars than V8's

Merc are known around the world for the rock solid bulletproof engine, however they are never well known for fuel efficiency, just like Ferrari for the power and noise.

I am not sure how much of an impact fuel consumption have on F1, but I would say that among all the engine suppliers on the grid at the moment, Renault perhaps (with collaboration with Nissan) do look quite promising to develop the most efficient engine again.

btw, the turbo v6 engine is till about 2 years away, do you guys think there is a chance that we might see a new engine supplier between now and 2014