2018 pre-season testing thread

[McHonda]

On the exhaust bracket, do we think it's a hangover from Alonso's excursion yesterday or just one of those things the QC department should've caught?

Considering that it's really unlikely for gravel to damage that part of the exhaust, as well as the fact that they most likely had the engine cover off during the night and would've definitely caught any damage done there, I don't think it's related in any way.

Yeah,good point.

[Xero]

On the exhaust bracket, do we think it's a hangover from Alonso's excursion yesterday or just one of those things the QC department should've caught?

I don't think yesterday had anything to do with it, was a fairly minor spin. Hard to say if it's something the QC department at McLaren would even think about, as it seems like a pretty trivial part. They'll improve the clip and it will be fixed for good and forgotten about, it's just one of those little things.

[GM7]

[BrunoH]

its not trolling unfortunately its reality . i love Mclaren, always have and supported, its boring for you but for the Team im sure they are not happy at all.... Knowing Fernando if this keeps up.. next team radio is GP2 team.... if they havent got a fix part for a broken exhaust bracket... then the team is in big big trouble... such a thing should not and cannot hold an entire day of testing hostage.... its bad management, someone form the top technical/ mechanical team is not doing a good job.. its as simple as that.. 2 days not having good running is time they already cant catch up to others.. so yes its a big deal already.. lets just hope that they can manage to do good within the rest of the test... test running is a premium in F1 these days... losing 25% ( 2 days ) of that is a lot by all means...

[Mansell89]

Any reason why McLaren would be using the hypersofts at this stage?

[DFX]

its not trolling unfortunately its reality . i love Mclaren, always have and supported, its boring for you but for the Team im sure they are not happy at all.... Knowing Fernando if this keeps up.. next team radio is GP2 team.... if they havent got a fix part for a broken exhaust bracket... then the team is in big big trouble... such a thing should not and cannot hold an entire day of testing hostage.... its bad management, someone form the top technical/ mechanical team is not doing a good job.. its as simple as that.. 2 days not having good running is time they already cant catch up to others.. so yes its a big deal already.. lets just hope that they can manage to do good within the rest of the test... test running is a premium in F1 these days... losing 25% ( 2 days ) of that is a lot by all means...

It may not be trolling, but it sure sounds like it. The conditions were far from ideal to gather useful data, its 2nd day of testing they encountered some issues in both days. You can pick any of these and more to justify the lack of running, but its far too early to start bashing mclaren like you did.

We dont know what kind of program they have in mind, they ran a lot of aero tests early in the day, after the problem they might have called the day, or maybe they didnt had the spare parts to fix it, maybe both.. it was snowing for god sake.

I dont think you know Alonso at all.

Chill out people, its still way too early to make any prediction of anything that is going on

[nevill3]

Probably using the Hypersofts due to the very cool track temperature

[GoranF1]

its not trolling unfortunately its reality . i love Mclaren, always have and supported, its boring for you but for the Team im sure they are not happy at all.... Knowing Fernando if this keeps up.. next team radio is GP2 team.... if they havent got a fix part for a broken exhaust bracket... then the team is in big big trouble... such a thing should not and cannot hold an entire day of testing hostage.... its bad management, someone form the top technical/ mechanical team is not doing a good job.. its as simple as that.. 2 days not having good running is time they already cant catch up to others.. so yes its a big deal already.. lets just hope that they can manage to do good within the rest of the test... test running is a premium in F1 these days... losing 25% ( 2 days ) of that is a lot by all means...

The exhaust burned some cables...this is what testing is for. It wont be the first time a team has many problems in testing then come to AUS reaible 100% and opposite whit others.
There are positive sides...it seems in this cold temp MCL33 is very fast on heating tyres, already by lap 2 or 3 its very fast while others need 5 to 6.
The only worry for me right now is Mclaren tyre choice for this test?

[f1316]

I honestly don’t buy that they have major issues at McLaren; trackside observers indicate the car looks like a decent base and, yes, i’d be surprised if Ferrari or Mercedes made the kinds of silly mistakes McLaren have so far but it it happens - and we see Red Bull having leaks - so these things are annoying but have no bearing on whether the aero package is good or not.

[etusch]

its not trolling unfortunately its reality . i love Mclaren, always have and supported, its boring for you but for the Team im sure they are not happy at all.... Knowing Fernando if this keeps up.. next team radio is GP2 team.... if they havent got a fix part for a broken exhaust bracket... then the team is in big big trouble... such a thing should not and cannot hold an entire day of testing hostage.... its bad management, someone form the top technical/ mechanical team is not doing a good job.. its as simple as that.. 2 days not having good running is time they already cant catch up to others.. so yes its a big deal already.. lets just hope that they can manage to do good within the rest of the test... test running is a premium in F1 these days... losing 25% ( 2 days ) of that is a lot by all means...

The exhaust burned some cables...this is what testing is for. It wont be the first time a team has many problems in testing then come to AUS reaible 100% and opposite whit others.
There are positive sides...it seems in this cold temp MCL33 is very fast on heating tyres, already by lap 2 or 3 its very fast while others need 5 to 6.
The only worry for me right now is Mclaren tyre choice for this test?

This is what being lack of F1 Fundamentals. And tests on track are not for that.

[GoranF1]

its not trolling unfortunately its reality . i love Mclaren, always have and supported, its boring for you but for the Team im sure they are not happy at all.... Knowing Fernando if this keeps up.. next team radio is GP2 team.... if they havent got a fix part for a broken exhaust bracket... then the team is in big big trouble... such a thing should not and cannot hold an entire day of testing hostage.... its bad management, someone form the top technical/ mechanical team is not doing a good job.. its as simple as that.. 2 days not having good running is time they already cant catch up to others.. so yes its a big deal already.. lets just hope that they can manage to do good within the rest of the test... test running is a premium in F1 these days... losing 25% ( 2 days ) of that is a lot by all means...

The exhaust burned some cables...this is what testing is for. It wont be the first time a team has many problems in testing then come to AUS reaible 100% and opposite whit others.
There are positive sides...it seems in this cold temp MCL33 is very fast on heating tyres, already by lap 2 or 3 its very fast while others need 5 to 6.
The only worry for me right now is Mclaren tyre choice for this test?

This is what being lack of F1 Fundamentals. And tests on track are not for that.

What do you mean? Mclaren lacks resources? Exhaust fail is not common for F1 testing? I dont get you at all.

[the EDGE]

The only worry for me right now is Mclaren tyre choice for this test?

I honestly don’t understand why that would be an issue

There is no possible comparison to be made to last year due to track resurface.
The track is no longer an abrasive tyre killer for the same reason.
It’s freezing cold so a soft choice would enable a much quicker warm-up which would give more consistent data back to team

For me, the surprise is other teams not going the same direction

I’ve said it before, but I think teams had to pre-order tyre requirements, McLaren simply went softer than others. It has no bearing on the chassis as McLaren were running the SS from the word go, it’s not as if they tried the medium and thought our cars no good, and it has no bearing on their speed, as all their doing is systems checks & aero correlation at given speed

[Gerhardsa]

This is the 1st time McLaren use/run Renault engines. Surely there are to be some gremlins with the packaging. Also, its only the 2nd day of testing.

I am sure that McLaren will be in much better shape come the 2nd 4day test. I've said it before....this is still early days, and it s testing. The point of this is to find issues now, fix them, as well as work on wind tunnel correlation.
The best time for things to go wrong and fix them is during testing)

[George-Jung]

Some people just expect this winter testing to be a competition on it self.

It is just testing; to see if everything works as it should- and incase it doesn’t to find solutions before the start of the season/championship.

[the EDGE]

The only worry for me right now is Mclaren tyre choice for this test?

I honestly don’t understand why that would be an issue

There is no possible comparison to be made to last year due to track resurface.
The track is no longer an abrasive tyre killer for the same reason.
It’s freezing cold so a soft choice would enable a much quicker warm-up which would give more consistent data back to team

For me, the surprise is other teams not going the same direction

I’ve said it before, but I think teams had to pre-order tyre requirements, McLaren simply went softer than others. It has no bearing on the chassis as McLaren were running the SS from the word go, it’s not as if they tried the medium and thought our cars no good, and it has no bearing on their speed, as all their doing is systems checks & aero correlation at given speed
[/quote]