Engine Unfreeze

[Mesteño]

Ren and Fer hope Merc will be chasing diminishing returns. They hope to move 2 big steps forward while Merc make 2 small steps.

Merc might be agreeing to an unfreeze because they've secretly uncovered a huge step that will widen the gape even further.

It's a game of poker, who's bluffing who?

I'd think you are correct, Merc must be damned close to the max theoretical efficiencies that can be gained from the current PU rules and Renault and Ferrari if allowed to should be able to catch up based on what they've learned running their PU's this year. I'd be very surprised if any of the teams could make a big leap past where Merc PU is now.

And what about Honda here? I think they are in the worst position then.

[ian_s]

Merc might be agreeing to an unfreeze because they've secretly uncovered a huge step that will widen the gape even further.

if they've already uncovered it they would be able to introduce it in the off season, surely? i think this is why Merc is willing to compromise on this, they are pretty sure that an extra few months of development wont actually help renault and ferrari.
i think it will help Honda a lot, giving them extra time to respond to any teething problems with McLaren, but Merc have insiders at McLaren who have reported that the honda engine is not up to scratch, and McLaren dont know how to get the best out of what they have now so wont get the best out of the new engine either.

[FoxHound]

Either way it's a ridiculous state of affairs.

To freeze or to defrost....

I read that between Renault and Mercedes, they have spent 500 million between them on developing and supplying engines.
20 million is the fee for purchasing a seasons worth.
Most of the supplied teams have complained about the cost of engines this year.
And in light of Caterham and Marussia's imminent demise, this could be plausible but for the elephant in the room.

Force India have a budget of 130 million euros, 20 million of which goes to Mercedes to supply engines.
The situation as it stands for next year is that there is a defrost of the engine side(something that should never have been frozen in the first instance).
Mercedes will foot the bill for anything over 20 million euros.

So effectively, Force India retain their 110 million budget on the rest of the car.

Now I'm no all seeing sage by any means, but why is F1 not addressing the real issue of aerodynamic expenses which is likely the single most expensive discipline in F1, and by some margin too.
Departments holding 350+ aero staff alone, Windtunnels, CFD.
If we look at Red Bull, they don't pay Renault for engines and still manage to spend 300+ million euros.
McLaren? 220 million euros once engines are paid.

If we had an Aero freeze, engines could be defrost and customer teams could spend 50 million on engines, with change to spare for some fancy parties.

Rarefied air this aero stuff.

[MOWOG]

Rarefied air this aero stuff.

Don't know if you meant that to be witty, but it is goddam funny!

[FoxHound]

Quite intentional Mowog.

[GitanesBlondes]

Heh...I've always said the aero sh*t show is what has made costs worse than they ever have been. The inability of small teams to survive in F1 really took off in the mid-90s. The switch from wide track cars to narrow track cars in 1998 was the beginning of the end. Eddie Jordan and Jackie Stewart made a go of it for a small window of time then, but they couldn't sustain what success they did find over the long haul.

Employing these ex-aerospace guys but the hundreds is what will suck a budget dry in no time.

Small teams could compete when team staffs were maybe 12-15 guys working out of a sole garage 40 years ago.

When you have 200 and are trying to compete against 600+, it's unlikely to work out in your favor assuming the larger group is utilized properly.

[FoxHound]

Detractors could apply the same to engines though.

However, you cannot buy Red Bull spec aero with updates throughout the year for 20 million.
Imagine that!

Maybe this would kill the air benders expensive pursuit and bring F1 back to a fiscal terra firma.

[GitanesBlondes]

Detractors could apply the same to engines though.

However, you cannot buy Red Bull spec aero with updates throughout the year for 20 million.
Imagine that!

Maybe this would kill the air benders expensive pursuit and bring F1 back to a fiscal terra firma.

They could, but realistically, most of the detractors were the same ones whining F1 had to switch to these engines to be relevant to the outside world. Aside from the face that F1 never has been road relevant, if you're wishing to portray that myth as fact, the best way to do it would be to focus on engine engineering to see where they go over the course of each season. Would be fascinating to watch.

But yeah, the air benders as you put it, are what drove all of this out of control.

Not that I'm advocating a spec chassis, but the past few years of IndyCar showed how cheap it can be to field a team when you don't have guys trying endless front wing designs and the like. We'll see how that works out in 2015 now that GM and Honda are designing aero packages. It sounds like they are already copying some of what F1 does sadly, so I suspect the costs will be going up there as well.

[FW17]

It was believed that, with engine makers already able to hand in 'tokens' to the FIA in exchange for updating up to 48 per cent of their 2014 engine designs, the agreed compromise will involve an extension of the homologation deadline from February next year to July.

But it now emerges that Ferrari and Renault may not be satisfied to stop just there.

"The two (Ferrari and Renault) made such big mistakes in their power unit concepts that 48 per cent is not enough to come up to Mercedes' level," Germany's specialist Auto Motor und Sport quoted a mutual development partner of the two Mercedes rivals as saying.

The report said Ferrari and Renault want to ramp up the 48 per cent figure to 67 per cent.

But Auto Motor und Sport said Wolff and team chairman Niki Lauda are refusing to budge on the 48 to 67 per cent proposal.

[Harsha]

It was believed that, with engine makers already able to hand in 'tokens' to the FIA in exchange for updating up to 48 per cent of their 2014 engine designs, the agreed compromise will involve an extension of the homologation deadline from February next year to July.

But it now emerges that Ferrari and Renault may not be satisfied to stop just there.

"The two (Ferrari and Renault) made such big mistakes in their power unit concepts that 48 per cent is not enough to come up to Mercedes' level," Germany's specialist Auto Motor und Sport quoted a mutual development partner of the two Mercedes rivals as saying.

The report said Ferrari and Renault want to ramp up the 48 per cent figure to 67 per cent.

But Auto Motor und Sport said Wolff and team chairman Niki Lauda are refusing to budge on the 48 to 67 per cent proposal.

I think you also know what they said if Merc didn't agree for the engine unfreeze

[bhall II]

At this point, I think the sport should transition to something a bit more agricultural and develop an engine that runs on bullshit. Lord knows there's enough fuel in the paddock.

Wolff: "A defrost will crippled the smaller teams!" + 25bhp
Mattiacci: "We need more tokens to catch up!" + 25bhp
Ecclestone: "I'm not Satan!" +100bhp

[MOWOG]

According to grandprix.com this morning, changing the rules for 2015 requires a unanimous vote of the teams. BUT.....changing the rules for 2016 and beyond requires only a majority vote of the teams.

Do the math.

[Juzh]

According to grandprix.com this morning, changing the rules for 2015 requires a unanimous vote of the teams. BUT.....changing the rules for 2016 and beyond requires only a majority vote of the teams.

Do the math.

That's old news.

[astracrazy]

They said on sky in quali that rumours are merc have found another 60hp.

[Harsha]

Departure from V6 Turbo's on cards
http://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/form ... 5885.html/