2018 pre-season testing thread

[Vasconia]

Lastly, I'll leave you guys this this, James Allison has a long history making F1 cars that are gentle on tires. Kimi's owes the last win of his career to him. I'm thinking Mercedes will go longer on tires this year than any other team, and they'll have gotten rid of all of the mulligan circuits they struggled with last year. We won't have long to wait to see which way this turns out.

This sounds terrible, I hope its not true because if this case Mercedes would smash the competence in every single track.

[Thunder]

Nothing more to say..

First, let's take a look at the absolute top speeds. Mercedes leads the ranking with 334.3 km / h.

At the other end of the table is McLaren. We are used to that. But can not point to Honda with his finger. The papaya-yellow cars are powered by Renault engines. That leaves only the conclusion that the McLaren MCL33 is fully designed for contact pressure.

Fernando Alonso drove the peak of 317.6 km / h at the conclusion of his round of cheating when he shortened the chicane. In his fastest lap of 1.17,784 minutes Alonso was measured with 315.7 km / h. The Spaniard was traveling with open DRS. That's all his McLaren gave.

Toro Rosso landed with 324.3 km / h in good midfield. So bad can not be the Honda engine so. Also Pierre Gasly's 287.2 km / h on the finish line can be seen. Honda has not only made his drive more stable, but on stronger.

Therefore, we compared the two values of the four engine manufacturers on the lap in which the highest speeds were determined. As already mentioned, the delta is a good indicator of how much the electric drive contributes to overall performance. Ferrari won 56.7 km / h. More than Mercedes, which have brought it to 53.1 km / h.

Renault lies with a 54.5 km / h Delta in between. Readout at Verstappens record of Thursday with 327.2 km / h at the end of the home straight and 272.7 km / h on the finish line. That was more realistic than his Monday show. Even Honda is not miles away with a difference of 50.2 km / h. What proves: Electrically, the opponents of Mercedes have caught up.

More: https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/for ... isch%29%29

Your Point being?

If you Read the German Version they say that now Macca has the Renault Engine they went for full DF. Not what others may imply here.

[Big Mangalhit]

I'm reading a lot of conspiracy theories and unsubstantiated claims, not really the way to answer a question certainly not really a way to further a logical reason based discussion.

Last year's tire issue with Mercedes had everything to do with the FRIC suspension being banned before the beginning of the season. Mercedes clearly got around those issues to some degree in the second part of the season, but they still suffered in colder temps and in tracks that required high downforce.

If anyone thinks that Mercedes wouldn't have spent the entire development season coming up with ways to mitigate what proved to be the car's only flaw, you are underestimating the team's ability by a long shot.

Lastly, I'll leave you guys this this, James Allison has a long history making F1 cars that are gentle on tires. Kimi's owes the last win of his career to him. I'm thinking Mercedes will go longer on tires this year than any other team, and they'll have gotten rid of all of the mulligan circuits they struggled with last year. We won't have long to wait to see which way this turns out.

I'm reading a lot of conspiracy theories and unsubstantiated claims from you... Just because something doesn't fit your what you want to think doesn't mean it is not valid, nobody here as the answer so all that is plausible adds to the discussion, especially this case since the idea you don't like was also backed by one of the drivers that for sure as a better grasp than us.

And btw FRIC was banned in 2014 not last year. Funny how this stuff is repeated so much that it becomes true.

[f1316]

I've recently read an article, where Vettel was pointing out that Mercedes during the race simulation used only medium tyres and not two different types of tyres as mandatory in race. Isn't this something that should be represented in the analyses that tray to find the pecking order?

If you go back and look several of us took that into account with are calculations.

Kinda... in my view it skews the entire race sim though (it’s not actually a simulation of a feasible race structure).

The article in question here: https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/vett ... e-1014263/

He doesn’t seem too worried, if you ask me. Let’s see next weekend.

[Vettelswonmeover]

An interesting read. F1 Analisi Technica's analysis. http://www.f1analisitecnica.com/2018/03 ... cedes.html. They conclude that Merc is fastest and that Ferrari & RB are neck and neck. Ferrari do have 0.3 sec over RB but RB's Aussie GP upgrade package is worth 0.2 tenths. Its not known whether Ferrari will bring an upgrade package to Australia.
Ferrari have the potential but are limited by fuel consumption problems. Merc well poised for Aus GP 1-2.

[Just_a_fan]

And btw FRIC was banned in 2014 not last year. Funny how this stuff is repeated so much that it becomes true.

FRIC was banned earlier but last year a different type of "clever suspension" was banned, apparently because of a "clarification request" from Ferrari. That's what people are referring to. The very late ban undoubtedly affected Mercedes and RedBull. That Mercedes were able to go on and win the title even then, shows how much further ahead they would have been without the FIA's intervention.

[the EDGE]

An interesting read. F1 Analisi Technica's analysis. http://www.f1analisitecnica.com/2018/03 ... cedes.html. They conclude that Merc is fastest and that Ferrari & RB are neck and neck. Ferrari do have 0.3 sec over RB but RB's Aussie GP upgrade package is worth 0.2 tenths. Its not known whether Ferrari will bring an upgrade package to Australia.
Ferrari have the potential but are limited by fuel consumption problems. Merc well poised for Aus GP 1-2.

TBH that doesn’t sound very interesting to me, just more of the same

How do they know RB’s upgrade is worth 0.2? They dont happen to mention Friday’s winning euromillions numbers in the article too by any chance?

[Phil]

TBH that doesn’t sound very interesting to me, just more of the same

How do they know RB’s upgrade is worth 0.2? They dont happen to mention Friday’s winning euromillions numbers in the article too by any chance?

It’s not RBs upgrade. It’s supposedly down to rhe engine. Renault was running conservative during the winter test for reliability. Towards the end of testing, Renault upped the performance of the engine and plans to up the performance again by the same amount again for Melbourne if everything goes smoothly.

That’s a bit of an if though, as McLarens turbo issue might mean it wont happen for Melbourne yet.

I think the original source is from AMuS who interviewed Helmut Marko in the article i translated. There were no numbers quited though in that article.

It’s a few pages back in this very topic...

[Big Mangalhit]

And btw FRIC was banned in 2014 not last year. Funny how this stuff is repeated so much that it becomes true.

FRIC was banned earlier but last year a different type of "clever suspension" was banned, apparently because of a "clarification request" from Ferrari. That's what people are referring to. The very late ban undoubtedly affected Mercedes and RedBull. That Mercedes were able to go on and win the title even then, shows how much further ahead they would have been without the FIA's intervention.

100% in agreement with this, put it's nice to be precise when talking here like you just were. I would not be this pedantic if this was not the thousand time I see stuff like "Ferrari asked FIA to ban the FRIC". Because this sort of shared imprecise knowledge creates a lot of false information.

Nobody doubts that Mercedes is the best team, Dominant year after year even with a great rule change in between. Still I don't think the suspension ban hurt them as much as people claim. I think the oil ban mid-year hurt them (and Ferrari) more, that's when we saw RB getting relatively better no? I say this cause I remember them saying that because the car was overweight in the beginning of the year they would've not run the "clever suspension" anyway for that race in specific.

Here is the translated Amus article: https://translate.google.com/translate? ... t=&act=url

[Vettelswonmeover]

TBH that doesn’t sound very interesting to me, just more of the same

How do they know RB’s upgrade is worth 0.2? They dont happen to mention Friday’s winning euromillions numbers in the article too by any chance?

It’s not RBs upgrade. It’s supposedly down to rhe engine. Renault was running conservative during the winter test for reliability. Towards the end of testing, Renault upped the performance of the engine and plans to up the performance again by the same amount again for Melbourne if everything goes smoothly.

That’s a bit of an if though, as McLarens turbo issue might mean it wont happen for Melbourne yet.

I think the original source is from AMuS who interviewed Helmut Marko in the article i translated. There were no numbers quited though in that article.

It’s a few pages back in this very topic...

I doubt that its AMuS. They have done their own analysis. The site is a known Italian site for all things F1. Its details are probably something that we all know. Only at Melbourne will we see the true picture. Not even Melbourne, the first EU races of the season will tell the true pecking order.

[digitalrurouni]

I don't think oil burning hurt Mercedes as much is being mentioned. Didn't they switch the to the lower oil consumption engine mid season when the rule changed despite them still having the option to not do so right away and they still destroyed the opposition in qualifying?

[Big Mangalhit]

I don't think oil burning hurt Mercedes as much is being mentioned. Didn't they switch the to the lower oil consumption engine mid season when the rule changed despite them still having the option to not do so right away and they still destroyed the opposition in qualifying?

No it was the contrary, they brought the engine before the expected race so they didn't had to comply with the more stringent rules that would be introduced then. But that was already the second directive that year I think. Although they claimed that they would still comply with the new rules even tho they wouldn't need too, but then why introduce the engine before the plan I dunno.

What is relevant would be to know how much the oil burn is still in effect for this year. Indeed 0,6L/100km is a lot for a road car (except my old VW golf mk4, he would do just about this consumption) but what about a racing engine, anybody know how much oil did the pre-2014 engines drunk?

[digitalrurouni]

I don't think oil burning hurt Mercedes as much is being mentioned. Didn't they switch the to the lower oil consumption engine mid season when the rule changed despite them still having the option to not do so right away and they still destroyed the opposition in qualifying?

No it was the contrary, they brought the engine before the expected race so they didn't had to comply with the more stringent rules that would be introduced then. But that was already the second directive that year I think. Although they claimed that they would still comply with the new rules even tho they wouldn't need too, but then why introduce the engine before the plan I dunno.

Ah thanks! That makes more sense!

That said I don't think oil burning did impact race performance at all. Red Bull got better because they sorted out their aero and Renault were finding more performance. Red Bull does in season development quite well they just started off historically kind of late in the hybrid era - excepting this year. This year they seem to have upped their game at the season start quite considerably.

[TAG]

100% in agreement with this, put it's nice to be precise when talking here like you just were. I would not be this pedantic if this was not the thousand time I see stuff like "Ferrari asked FIA to ban the FRIC". Because this sort of shared imprecise knowledge creates a lot of false information.

Nobody doubts that Mercedes is the best team, Dominant year after year even with a great rule change in between. Still I don't think the suspension ban hurt them as much as people claim. I think the oil ban mid-year hurt them (and Ferrari) more, that's when we saw RB getting relatively better no? I say this cause I remember them saying that because the car was overweight in the beginning of the year they would've not run the "clever suspension" anyway for that race in specific.

So once you get off the stump you go on to stating things the way you want them to be.

Just because something doesn't fit your what you want to think doesn't mean it is not valid

In any case we won't have long to wait, just sit back and enjoy the show. I hope we get a competitive season, I really do. If for no other reason than to squelch the whining some.

In any case, feel free to offer your suggestions as to why you think they were doing rolling burnouts, might further the conversation.

[Big Mangalhit]

100% in agreement with this, put it's nice to be precise when talking here like you just were. I would not be this pedantic if this was not the thousand time I see stuff like "Ferrari asked FIA to ban the FRIC". Because this sort of shared imprecise knowledge creates a lot of false information.

Nobody doubts that Mercedes is the best team, Dominant year after year even with a great rule change in between. Still I don't think the suspension ban hurt them as much as people claim. I think the oil ban mid-year hurt them (and Ferrari) more, that's when we saw RB getting relatively better no? I say this cause I remember them saying that because the car was overweight in the beginning of the year they would've not run the "clever suspension" anyway for that race in specific.

So once you get off the stump you go on to stating things the way you want them to be.

Just because something doesn't fit your what you want to think doesn't mean it is not valid

In any case we won't have long to wait, just sit back and enjoy the show. I hope we get a competitive season, I really do. If for no other reason than to squelch the whining some.

In any case, feel free to offer your suggestions as to why you think they were doing rolling burnouts, might further the conversation.

It is a shame you refuse to read my posts. If you read the article I put you see that the statement you highlighted (I don't think the suspension ban hurt them as much as people claim.) was backed up and indeed Mercedes themselves said they didn't necessarily need to change their suspensions and indeed they would not want to use it anyway because they were already overweight in the early races and that whole hydraulic system had extra weight penalty bigger than the advantage...

I'm hoping for a competitive season as well but I think Mercedes at this point looks to be a step ahead of everybody a bit like... well every year it seems now.

My suggestion for them doing burnouts is very simple, they want to put heat on the tyres like every other team is doing and also how everybody does on the warm up lap just before they do the start. Not more not less.