2021 AMG Mercedes F1 Team

[PlatinumZealot]

In other news. All indications are pointing to a Mercedes advantage at CoTA. Similar characteristics to Turkey on the tyre stress. High abbrasion should play towards Mercedes since tyre degradation has to be managed.

[atanatizante]

If Petronas are leaving the sport, then I would hope Mercedes has a contractual right to the specific details of the products developed by them for the Merc PU.

Though I can understand Petronas not wanting a competitor to gain access to their IP, would they be relevant outside of F1?

How advanced are chemical analysis methods? Could Aramco reverse engineer the same products anyway?

More to the point.... If this is true then we'll be seeing a change to the Merc livery!!!

If I remember correctly, the fuel and lubricants were developed exclusively for Mercedes in Germany and Petronas is just a namesponser.

Nope, Petronas has a state-of-the-art R&D facility in Turin in which they develop all the fuels and lubes:

[atanatizante]

McLaren is supported by Gulf Oil not Exxon. RedBull is supported by Exxon.

Refering to 2014 when they were sponsored by Exxon. McLaren reportedly used their own lubricants different from Petronas. The fuel was like Petronas though. McLaren could be seen hauling unbranded drums at the time if my memory serves so to me it was the same fuel.

RedBull on the other hand booked dyno-time to run their Renault engines on Total, at a time when the factory team were using Castrol.

Anyway. We have confirmation that the team will be staying with Petronas for at least 2025.

Exactly! Though they were using Mobil 1 fuel and lubes, Jenson Button said they were losing at that time almost 20HP compared to the Petronas.

Now regarding the 2020 rules (sorry for I`m not specific about that article in the rules), all customer teams must run the same spec PU with all the fuel, lubes, hydraulic fluids and so on. So even Aston Martin is having Ravenol - a German petroleum company - as a team sponsor, instead, they are using Petronas products on their cars. It's the same thing for Macca and Williams ...

On another note, there are rumours saying that the 3rd spec PU was built with an eye toward the E10 biofuel that should be used in 2022. Thus BOT`s 4th PU at Monza was run with special mapping in order to see had they could compensate some 65HP that they`ll lose with the new fuel ...

The same rumours are also saying that 2021 Merc PU having to cope with more races/km than last year was wear out at a faster rate towards their end of the duty cycle than it was designed for and the reason for that is the fierce battle between them and RB/Honda, which forced them to use more and more aggressive PU mappings in races, all coming with some negative consequences: they have found some issues at the crankshaft and valve seats ...

[atanatizante]

There is an article on the Formula1 site where Mark Hughes says it seems that Mercedes' improved straight-line pace is down to diffuser stall. Instead, there is still no news regarding the only one Petronas fuel and lubes upgrade allowed for this year :

https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/arti ... 8Apdf.html

[west52keep64]

There is an article on the Formula1 site where Mark Hughes says it seems that Mercedes' improved straight-line pace is down to diffuser stall. Instead, there is still no news regarding the only one Petronas fuel and lubes upgrade allowed for this year :

https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/arti ... 8Apdf.html

It mostly seems like a guess, or just a reason to write an article. None of what's written gives any insight in to how they are achieving this. Seems fairly typical for this kind of writer.

[adrianjordan]

I know that Shell and Exxon are no angels. But saudi company Aramco as main sponsor would be a PR disaster for Merc.
As Aramco wants to become more and more a petrochemical supplier – there would be big overlaps with Ineos one of the Mercedes F1 shareholders.
It’s a press canard. I’m sure

Regarding Ineos:

INEOS to invest $2bn in Saudi Arabia.

INEOS signs agreement with Saudi Aramco and Total to build it's first ever plants in the Middle East.
The three world-scale plants will produce the key building blocks for carbon fibre, engineering polymers and synthetic lubricants that are pivotal to economic growth in the region.
Saudi Aramco and Total are preparing the construction of a $5 bn petrochemical complex (Project Amiral) which will supply more than $4 bn of downstream derivatives and speciality chemicals units; the three INEOS plants will be part of them

Am I reading that correctly? Ineos are investing in a project along with Aramco, or at least that Aramco is involved with?

Would certainly explain the rumour.

[Jambier]

I know that Shell and Exxon are no angels. But saudi company Aramco as main sponsor would be a PR disaster for Merc.
As Aramco wants to become more and more a petrochemical supplier – there would be big overlaps with Ineos one of the Mercedes F1 shareholders.
It’s a press canard. I’m sure

Regarding Ineos:

INEOS to invest $2bn in Saudi Arabia.

INEOS signs agreement with Saudi Aramco and Total to build it's first ever plants in the Middle East.
The three world-scale plants will produce the key building blocks for carbon fibre, engineering polymers and synthetic lubricants that are pivotal to economic growth in the region.
Saudi Aramco and Total are preparing the construction of a $5 bn petrochemical complex (Project Amiral) which will supply more than $4 bn of downstream derivatives and speciality chemicals units; the three INEOS plants will be part of them

Am I reading that correctly? Ineos are investing in a project along with Aramco, or at least that Aramco is involved with?

Would certainly explain the rumour.

Indeed.

I think the rumor is coming from that huge investment from INEOS in Saudi Arabia.
It make sense to have Aramco replacing Petronas, but I don't believe that it will happen as soon as 2022

[PlatinumZealot]

I know that Shell and Exxon are no angels. But saudi company Aramco as main sponsor would be a PR disaster for Merc.
As Aramco wants to become more and more a petrochemical supplier – there would be big overlaps with Ineos one of the Mercedes F1 shareholders.
It’s a press canard. I’m sure

Regarding Ineos:

INEOS to invest $2bn in Saudi Arabia.

INEOS signs agreement with Saudi Aramco and Total to build it's first ever plants in the Middle East.
The three world-scale plants will produce the key building blocks for carbon fibre, engineering polymers and synthetic lubricants that are pivotal to economic growth in the region.
Saudi Aramco and Total are preparing the construction of a $5 bn petrochemical complex (Project Amiral) which will supply more than $4 bn of downstream derivatives and speciality chemicals units; the three INEOS plants will be part of them

Am I reading that correctly? Ineos are investing in a project along with Aramco, or at least that Aramco is involved with?

Would certainly explain the rumour.

Ineos need cheaper chemicals for themselves. And Aramco would love the extra sales not to mention R&D. Good deal if you ask me. Nothing much to do with Mercedes at the moment but could have some nice potential for the future.

Aramco is also invested in an opposed piston engine that runs on a virety if fuels. The prototypes have been in ford F150s racking up mileage. Oil use and reliabilty is the issues to refine. Exciting technology.

[Morteza]

[Marty_Y]

Bottas is taking another ICE, giving him a 5 place grid penalty, which pretty much guarantees Max 2nd if Lewis wins.

I thought it be hard for Lewis to win the WDC this year but expected Mercedes to win the WCC, but now with these reliability concerns I think that will be unlikely.

Also it sounds likely Lewis will also take another engine in Mexico.

[dans79]

Bottas is taking another ICE, giving him a 5 place grid penalty, which pretty much guarantees Max 2nd if Lewis wins.

I thought it be hard for Lewis to win the WDC this year but expected Mercedes to win the WCC, but now with these reliability concerns I think that will be unlikely.

Also it sounds likely Lewis will also take another engine in Mexico.

Look at the lap times right now, it doesn't look like it will matter where they start.

[Marty_Y]

Bottas is taking another ICE, giving him a 5 place grid penalty, which pretty much guarantees Max 2nd if Lewis wins.

I thought it be hard for Lewis to win the WDC this year but expected Mercedes to win the WCC, but now with these reliability concerns I think that will be unlikely.

Also it sounds likely Lewis will also take another engine in Mexico.

Look at the lap times right now, it doesn't look like it will matter where they start.

Hopefully those lap times are truly representative, but if they have to keep having to take new engines every other race I think it will be extremely hard to win anything this season imo.

I saw in the race thread you mentioned it could be for testing purposes and I hope you're right.

I'm probably just worrying about nothing but it shocked me that they would need another engine so soon and are talking about Lewis needing another one as well.

[dans79]

Hopefully those lap times are truly representative, but if they have to keep having to take new engines every other race I think it will be extremely hard to win anything this season imo.

The gap will for sure come down, but i don't see them pulling back nearly 1 second.

As Button mentioned during FP1, the speed differential in Budapest was 15 kph, that's not them pushing the engines harder, that's aero. As Button also mentioned that kind of speed differential would require an extra 80-100 hp.

I'm probably just worrying about nothing but it shocked me that they would need another engine so soon and are talking about Lewis needing another one as well.

Imo, That's the press being dramatic and click baity.

[214270]

Hopefully those lap times are truly representative, but if they have to keep having to take new engines every other race I think it will be extremely hard to win anything this season imo.

The gap will for sure come down, but i don't see them pulling back nearly 1 second.

As Button mentioned during FP1, the speed differential in Budapest was 15 kph, that's not them pushing the engines harder, that's aero. As Button also mentioned that kind of speed differential would require an extra 80-100 hp.

I'm probably just worrying about nothing but it shocked me that they would need another engine so soon and are talking about Lewis needing another one as well.

Imo, That's the press being dramatic and click baity.

If they’re testing, don’t they need to declare the specifics to justify a change on reliability grounds though? ie. RB would know and announce with glee to the world Merc’s engine troubles.

[atanatizante]

Bottas is taking another ICE, giving him a 5 place grid penalty, which pretty much guarantees Max 2nd if Lewis wins.

I thought it be hard for Lewis to win the WDC this year but expected Mercedes to win the WCC, but now with these reliability concerns I think that will be unlikely.

Also it sounds likely Lewis will also take another engine in Mexico.

If HAM will take another ICE/PU in Mexico then it`s most probably a real issue with the 3rd spec PU (mostly a mechanical issue) with also seeing that VET will have to change the whole PU here ... but had it`s just a BOT`s case then it`s crystal clear (at least for me) that they were working on 2022 PU since Monza and they are trying solutions on this 3rd spec PU just to cope with the fuel with 10% ethanol - E10 - that will be introduced next year ... if I`m not wrong, had they are caught with an illegal fuel in free practices they`ll have all the times deleted for that session, something that they don`t bother much both for BOT and the team aside...