2015 Japanese Grand Prix - Suzuka

[godlameroso]

It's such an insanely difficult track, a lot of the places have gravel runoffs, like the Degner curves which are so balls out. The hairpin is preceded by an off camber slight curve and the turn has strange grading, but because of how the track is configured you have to brake as late as possible or you lose time, more than if you brake early and make the apex. The spoon curve is almost like the inverted mirror of the two degners, with a downhill off camber exit. In the wet the real skills of the drivers are pushed to the absolute limit.

*

[WaikeCU]

Mercedes really do have to bounce back from Singapore and Suzuka should be the perfect place. Fast flowing high speed circuit. It surely suits the Mercedes. I think we could also expect lots from Williams and Toro Rosso.

What worries me more is Mercedes having two consecutive race weekends suffering PU issues. Should I say sh*t happened or do they really have to work harder in bringing faultless cars on the grid. I think Suzuka is going to be an exciting race!

[NathanOlder]

Mercedes really do have to bounce back from Singapore and Suzuka should be the perfect place. Fast flowing high speed circuit. It surely suits the Mercedes. I think we could also expect lots from Williams and Toro Rosso.

What worries me more is Mercedes having two consecutive race weekends suffering PU issues. Should I say sh*t happened or do they really have to work harder in bringing faultless cars on the grid. I think Suzuka is going to be an exciting race!

Mercedes are fine, Rosbergs engine was 1 more than the team wanted to do and if you were pushing an engine into 1 extra race id imagine Monza would be the last place you would choose to do it.
As for Lewis in Singapore, it was one of thos freak incidents that only every happen once. So I doubt it will happen again.
I wouldnt be too concerned about their reliability.

[iotar__]

Mercedes are fine, Rosbergs engine was 1 more than the team wanted to do and if you were pushing an engine into 1 extra race id imagine Monza would be the last place you would choose to do it.
As for Lewis in Singapore, it was one of thos freak incidents that only every happen once. So I doubt it will happen again.
I wouldnt be too concerned about their reliability.

There was also the first one for Rosberg in Monza which may or may not be usable and may force him to take grid penalties. They are planning to test it in practice in Japan so nice engine failure in practice later in the season is still a possibility. So no, Merc are not fine at all with the engines, Hamilton is because those failures and point losses are not comparable. To add more content Chester (Lotus) track:

You can't run maximum downforce in Suzuka - as you will end up a little too slow on the straights - so you need to give the driver sufficient downforce to give confidence in the fast twisty bits whilst not clipping their wings down the straights. This is part of the reason why Suzuka is such a driver favourite, as drivers can be absolutely on the limit without the car totally stuck to the ground through maximum downforce. It's not just having sufficient downforce, it's ensuring that this is delivered in a balanced nature. Getting the suspension set-up spot on is essential here too. You need to extract all the grip that's possible from the car.

Reason for small surprises from time to time.

[NathanOlder]

Well id say they are okay. Nico had 2 engines do 11.9 races, on tracks with huge straights. Monza Spa Malaysia Shangai, then add the likes of Canada and Silverstone.
With 6 races to go they have 1 old engine still running, engine 3 that is unproven at the moment and engine 4 that has done Singapore.
Id say that the number 6 car is in a better position than over 75% of the grid in terms of engines.

Anyway it looks like more Mercedes eggs are in the 44 basket, so looks like your favourite driver is sitting pretty.

[WaikeCU]

Well id say they are okay. Nico had 2 engines do 11.9 races, on tracks with huge straights. Monza Spa Malaysia Shangai, then add the likes of Canada and Silverstone.
With 6 races to go they have 1 old engine still running, engine 3 that is unproven at the moment and engine 4 that has done Singapore.
Id say that the number 6 car is in a better position than over 75% of the grid in terms of engines.

Anyway it looks like more Mercedes eggs are in the 44 basket, so looks like your favourite driver is sitting pretty.

Depends if the PU has improved in performance due to putting all tokens to use and/or has it dropped in reliability area.

[siskue2005]

Well id say they are okay. Nico had 2 engines do 11.9 races, on tracks with huge straights. Monza Spa Malaysia Shangai, then add the likes of Canada and Silverstone.
With 6 races to go they have 1 old engine still running, engine 3 that is unproven at the moment and engine 4 that has done Singapore.
Id say that the number 6 car is in a better position than over 75% of the grid in terms of engines.

Anyway it looks like more Mercedes eggs are in the 44 basket, so looks like your favourite driver is sitting pretty.

Depends if the PU has improved in performance due to putting all tokens to use and/or has it dropped in reliability area.

i think Merc's have done a master stoke here, you can change the engine part/parts IF there is any reliability problems
Merc upgraded there engine which would give them performance, but if there is any reliability problem..they can use that as a token to change their engine (even if you dont have any tokens left)

[ripper]

But those changed can be vetoed by other manufactures right?

[3jawchuck]

But those changed can be vetoed by other manufactures right?

Yeah, but the other manufacturers will be very unwilling to do that for fear their reliability requests are vetoed. Of course they will veto the most obvious attempts to abuse the reliability upgrade system.

[godlameroso]

2013 pole lap was a 1:31.847, last year it was 32.506, who thinks we'll see high 30's?

[Sevach]

2013 pole lap was a 1:31.847, last year it was 32.506, who thinks we'll see high 30's?

1:30.9 for 2013 actually.

[Juzh]

[Phil]

If it is going to be wet, it's not even going to be close...

[henra]

1:30.9 for 2013 actually.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFipQSV17hg

Interesting!
in the fast sweeping Corners the 2014 car was ~15km/h slower than 2013, on the Long straights ~15km/h faster. That's a 15% higher lateral acceleration at 200km/h. Assuming comparable tyres this would be about 15% more Downforce than the 2014 cars. Will be interesting to see this year's values. The sweeping turns in Suszuka are ideal for such a comparison since especially in the middle sweepers there is no benefit of taking a different line for better acceleration out of the turn vs better carrying through of speed. Therefore different traction behaviour does not spoil the comparison.

[mcalex]

That RB had GRIP !!!!