Red Bull exceed fuel flow limit, Ricciardo DSQ at Australian GP

[iotar__]

It took five hours to make a decision about D.R., Marussia would have been excluded in 5 s and Lotus before completing the first lap and that would be the end of it. No one would ask a single question about actual fuel flow.

It all doesn't make sense so it's:
- not the end of controversy with fuel, if we push this sensor thing (question it) our competitor might lose 0,5 s and we only 0,35 through some trickery, that's 0,15 of gap closed worth losing 18 points, or some other way of gaining advantage
- Red Bull now can't win so they want to turn early part of the season into legal controversy or another crusade like tyre lobbying in 2012-2013 to force changes, with Ecclestone backing them up.

Hopefully FIA will show some character and finish this circus as quickly as possible.

[dans79]

I think the real issue is RBR is trying to shift the limelight off how poorly they are doing compared to lat year. It's all about the egos in the team, and the fact they have now been knocked down a few steps.

[astracrazy]

+1

the fuel thing will be an excuse for them all season (regardless of what happens here). We will prob always here that the fuel sensor is now restricting them because its inaccurate so they are having to run with less power. (a bit like the tyres were restricting them last year and they had to run less downforce).

[Blackout]

I don't disagree with what you're saying, but don't ignore the politics. Bla bla

BS.

[Jano11]

I think the real issue is RBR is trying to shift the limelight off how poorly they are doing compared to lat year. It's all about the egos in the team, and the fact they have now been knocked down a few steps.

Actually Red Bull finished this year's Australian GP higher than last year.

[dans79]

]Actually Red Bull finished this year's Australian GP higher than last year.

And all indications are if they had dialed back fuel flow like the FIA told them to (all the other teams did), the would have been fighting with Toro Rosso.

[dans79]

If this is true, RBR have no shot of getting the DSQ overturned.

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2014/03/19/f ... -boullier/

The FIA issued a technical directive on March 1st, the penultimate day of the final test, stating that its homologated sensor will be “the primary measurement of the fuel flow and will be used to check compliance”.

[Juzh]

If this is true, RBR have no shot of getting the DSQ overturned.

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2014/03/19/f ... -boullier/

The FIA issued a technical directive on March 1st, the penultimate day of the final test, stating that its homologated sensor will be “the primary measurement of the fuel flow and will be used to check compliance”.

Changes nothing.

[dans79]

If this is true, RBR have no shot of getting the DSQ overturned.

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2014/03/19/f ... -boullier/

The FIA issued a technical directive on March 1st, the penultimate day of the final test, stating that its homologated sensor will be “the primary measurement of the fuel flow and will be used to check compliance”.

Changes nothing.

You realize that technical directive are "rule clarifications" right? In short 2 weeks before the race the FIA said the sensor is the definitive measurement device.

[seinfeld]

also regarding this fuel flow limit.
My simple Math tells me. that if 100kg was put into the car. and the max fuel rate allowed is 100kg of fuel /per hour
that would mean that if the said 100kg of fuel made te warm up laps/ got to grid. did the race, then also parade lap and then made it to parcferme. which the total race time was 1:32:58.710 . That kinda means the avg fuel flow rate was.... (carry the 1. subtract the..) was well under 100kg/hr

[beelsebob]

also regarding this fuel flow limit.
My simple Math tells me. that if 100kg was put into the car. and the max fuel rate allowed is 100kg of fuel /per hour
that would mean that if the said 100kg of fuel made te warm up laps/ got to grid. did the race, then also parade lap and then made it to parcferme. which the total race time was 1:32:58.710 . That kinda means the avg fuel flow rate was.... (carry the 1. subtract the..) was well under 100kg/hr

This is wrong for many reasons.
1) They don't just put 100kg in, they need 100kg from lights to flag, that means they can (if they want) have more than 100kg to get to the grid, and to do the parade lap.
2) The requirement is not to hit an average 100kg/h, it's to hit a maximum 100kg/h at any point during the race.

If they go over 100kg/h for even 2/5th of a second (that's double the sampling frequency of the fuel flow meter), or even less, depending on how it meets up with a sample, they will be disqualified (unless the FIA happens to be kind, and warn them first).

[forty-two]

I know that others on here have suggested this before, and done so much more eloquently than I, but I have to suggest:

Is there a chance that RB knew there was something up before the race, knew that all eyes would be on SV, so for his car, they used the FIA mandated amount of fuel. Some issue they're having with their power unit (engine, MGU, etc) meant that at that level of fuel supply, SV's car needed to retire.

They took a different approach on DRs car, in the belief that he'd be a few places away from 1st, and therefore slightly less likely to be scrutinised.

When SV retired and DR was doing so well, they thought something along the lines of "if we turn his fuel flow down, he'll also have to retire" (due to the "issue" I alluded to earlier), so they decided to take a chance?

Don't bash me for proposing (actually repeating) an idea - it's just a theory...

[turbof1]

I know that others on here have suggested this before, and done so much more eloquently than I, but I have to suggest:

Is there a chance that RB knew there was something up before the race, knew that all eyes would be on SV, so for his car, they used the FIA mandated amount of fuel. Some issue they're having with their power unit (engine, MGU, etc) meant that at that level of fuel supply, SV's car needed to retire.

They took a different approach on DRs car, in the belief that he'd be a few places away from 1st, and therefore slightly less likely to be scrutinised.

When SV retired and DR was doing so well, they thought something along the lines of "if we turn his fuel flow down, he'll also have to retire" (due to the "issue" I alluded to earlier), so they decided to take a chance?

Don't bash me for proposing (actually repeating) an idea - it's just a theory...

I really don't believe they used DR's car as a means to test this out.

First of all, there isn't more or less chance a particular car gets scrutinized. ALL cars were constantly monitored by the fia. If anybody goes above the limit, the fia will pick that up inmediately.

Second, if DR was a test bed of some sorts, or as some maniacs even suggested that they sacrificed him to get SV further up, then there was absolutely no reason anymore to do so after SV had to forfeit the race. Given that was very early, I'll assume red bull still had the chance at that point to lower DR's fuel flow.

I'm pretty the reverse neither is true that burning less fuel leads to failures. SV had the problem from the beginning, and I can't see how this correlates to one, and only one, cylinder malfunctioning. Remember, they can't continually burn 100kg/h anyhow; at some point it has to drop much lower in order to finish the race.

I'm sure that if vettel finished the race, he would have been excluded as well.

Not going to bash you of course. I've seen this idea a couple of times. I argumented why it isn't likely at all.

What I do believe is that red bull tried to seek an advantage over its competitors. Everybody knew the issues with the fuel sensors, and everybody knew what the stance of the fia was. There was very little room for interpretation. But red bull tried anyhow to try to get a higher fuel flow, knowing very well the other teams would limit themselves to fuel sensors with a deviation of 4-6%. Probably red bull's measurements would have been more accurate, I can agree with that, but they tried to gain that 4-6% over their competitors by trying to weezle out of the ruling.

Red Bull's primary motivation wasn't that the fuel sensor was incorrect. Red Bull's primary motivation was to get a higher fuel flow then their competitors. I honestly hope they'll get further punishment for unsporting behavior. Although the fia should also be pointed with the finger. They partially did create this situation with the fuel sensors being so much off.

[thomin]

Well, we have heard from Red Bull that Vettel's problems in qualifying stemmed from a Software change that was made necessary in order conform with FIA fuel flow numbers. Ricciardo didn't have that constraint as he ran a faulty fuel flow meter (FFM) on Saturday, so the FIA allowed Red Bull to go to their fallback fuel monitoring method.

So I think it does sound reasonable that Red Bull may have lacked the experience with the engine in order to adapt the software on the fly.

While this ultimately comes down to speculation, I do believe that Red Bull couldn't run the Renault engine with the specs the FIA demanded. They tried it with Vettel and failed. With Ricciardo they ran the illegal spec, hoping to be able to get away with it after all the back and forth regarding the FFM on his car. When the FIA contacted Red Bull during the race, in order to warn them, Vettel was already out of the race and they suspected that Ricciardo would suffer the same fate, should they bow down. So they took their chances, having nothing to lose.

Again, pure speculation, but it fits in neatly with all the info we have.

[turbof1]

Well, we have heard from Red Bull that Vettel's problems in qualifying stemmed from a Software change that was made necessary in order conform with FIA fuel flow numbers. Ricciardo didn't have that constraint as he ran a faulty fuel flow meter (FFM) on Saturday, so the FIA allowed Red Bull to go to their fallback fuel monitoring method.

So I think it does sound reasonable that Red Bull may have lacked the experience with the engine in order to adapt the software on the fly.

While this ultimately comes down to speculation, I do believe that Red Bull couldn't run the Renault engine with the specs the FIA demanded. They tried it with Vettel and failed. With Ricciardo they ran the illegal spec, hoping to be able to get away with it after all the back and forth regarding the FFM on his car. When the FIA contacted Red Bull during the race, in order to warn them, Vettel was already out of the race and they suspected that Ricciardo would suffer the same fate, should they bow down. So they took their chances, having nothing to lose.

Again, pure speculation, but it fits in neatly with all the info we have.

It's thought-out and reasonably argued, but forgets a very critical part: you only have 100kg. You can't run 100kg/h or higher the whole race, so ricciardo eventually had to lower the fuel flow. The fact, yes that is a fact, that he did and didn't result in a DNF means it defeats the argument.

For the record, this hasn't anything to do with software, specs, whatever. Everything they ran on DR's car was legal, software and hardware. It's solely about the fuel flow. Running a higher fuel flow during a certain period means you have to lower it during much more during other periods. That's effectively what DR had to do.