2017 Mclaren F1 Team - Honda

[GhostF1]

I'm confused at the "no indication" part. Reading only race results does not give you a clear picture. Neither does suggesting a completely different party such as VW who for all we know, be worse than Honda if they attempt this formula suddenly. All that I have seen from Honda is an impressive development pace, yes to state the obvious, their MGU-H this year is rubbish and has caused all this drama, and again they say they have the fix ready and waiting for the next component install (everyone likes to ignore this and choose the slagging route though).

Please provide us with reliable quotes for this, because since Bahrain tests the "countermeasures" had been applied. And right after Monaco GP Hasegawa states that the MGU-H can only last two races.So where is this fix?

Please help yourself: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/129810

Again, if you´re kind enough please quote where does Hasegawa or any other Honda official states that the MGU-H problem is effectively solved?

Before Canada where McLaren spoke their mind, there were pages of commentary regarding their improvement with each race constantly closing the gap every GP, noticeably so. But yeah, no indication of improvement whatsoever.. This hardware is essentially what we had in Australia bar some intake updates and mapping improvements as the data comes in, so I'm confused as to why everyone changes their mind each GP

.

Coming from what ever you want to call our winter tests performance (To say the least); of course theres been "improvement"! I mean, you couldnt get a lower base for expectations after such a nightmare of pre season.

Yes the car is "more" reliable and drivable. Yes Honda is working hard...since 2014. But the big picture is that: So is every other team and manufacturer on the grid! No one stands still in F1. It´s the 3rd year of Honda in this formula, and does it seem to you that things are getting any better? The problem for fans and Mclaren staff, especially talents like Peter Prod and Alonso, is that Hondas development-improvement timeline is not meeting expectations. Talent starts leaving Mclaren and the team becomes weaker overall. Whats even worst, Honda is not providing a deadline for when things will/should get better. So how will you keep your engineering talent motivated and hungry? Hold your hands, sing kumbaya and have patience and a nice pay check? Sorry, but thats not how real life works.

We knew the update was not coming until around Baku and that's all we were told by Honda, so the only change has been the media and their various spins on it.

Until about Canada, Baku, Silverstone, Spa..."somewhere around summer" if you go by Hasegawas statements on december 2016 enterview. Pundits and forum insiders speculated aprox 6 month timeframe for "initial solutions". Good news is, as per Hasegawas latest interviews, that thanks to Canada ICE failure on Alonsos car, they will "dare" to introduce a new spec for the ICE-Turbo-MGU-H. But the point remains: It was not planned nor expected to debut here in Baku.

Yes they have zero points, please say it again it's my favourite, yes McLaren are pissed, yes Honda are embarrassed, but the facts have not changed. New engine incoming, will they be more competitive this year? Most certainly. With each engine iteration over the last couple of years they have picked up significantly as the season progressed.

When? The 100M € question! And you know what Hasegawa san answers been to this: We´re working hard (duh!) and as soon as we believe an upgrade is ready we´ll introduce it..." Yeah but When!? "As soon as its ready" ™

Are there more advantages to staying or leaving Honda? None of us can answer that accurately, neither can McLaren who will only say "we'll have to see how we are over the next 4 races" so how any of us can be sure on their situation is beyond me. Have Zak, Eric & Mansour spoken with Mercedes?of course they have, what company of this size, in this business doesn't have probably at least 3 backup plans, does that mean they've thrown their contract with Honda out because of some coffee meetings with Lauda? Laughable. Anyway, we'll have to endure the tirade of media insanity until post-Hungary where the decisions are made real and public and in the meantime I'll be weeding through the rubbish propaganda and unprofessional, sensationalist media tat looking for Hasegawa, Zak and Eric's direct commentary.

The irony of it all is that neither Zak, Eric, nor Mansour had to be having plans A, B, C to Z if Honda have been up to standards or done anything resembling a decent job for this years PU. When I say decent Id say at least slighty better than 2016 or something able to be fighting for 4th-3rd package. But no; things are worst than 2015!

Finally, I really wouldnt label a meeting by non other than Mansour Ojjeh and Zak Brown with Lauda and Wolff in the Mercedes 2nd floor area as a "coffee meeting"

All we can do is HOPE, Honda makes some breaktrough in the following weeks and that PU gets a decent amount of performance and reliability. IMO, its the only way that rumors will die down, plans will be put on hold, and most importantly give a well deserved positive outlook for the team as a whole for the remainer of the season.

Ok, so how about we move forward about 3 weeks from that article you linked and chat about this one from 3 days ago (there is about 4 or 5 different articles from various outlets with their spin on it but how about we focus on the direct quote from Hasegawa):

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/130115

Here is an excerpt for you. That came after McLaren suffered yet another MGU-H failure in Friday practice, with Stoffel Vandoorne forced to revert to one in his pool of used parts.

"We have the countermeasure part but we didn't introduce it in Canada because we would get a penalty," said Hasegawa.

So before insinuating I'm talking rubbish, let us chat more recent happenings..

As per the coffee meetings, that's a mere term and please, I don't think the F1 Paddock motorhome is where a done deal is sorted, chats, most certainly, multi million dollar, multi-year deals, no, very doubtful. Lets talk again when Brown is seen outside AMG HQ...

Everything else you are saying is littered with grief that Honda hasn't personally emailed you an exact implementation date or something. NO Manufacturer has publicly stated "oh wait until Spa guys, oh wait until Austria guys, no we mean Suzuka guys, we'll have a new engine on this date..." Honda gave a vague timeframe which was towards the European Season/Summer break and lets face it the race date introduction will change based on strategy as well, we are getting close to this region of time yes, but that's it. You want actual dates.. it won't happen publicly until they drive the car out for practice.
And yes it is year 3, and I'm not ignorant of the fact that effective updates need to roll in, and pretty quick now for all of this to go away, agreed on that front for sure.

[ringo]

Mclaren can beat mercedes with the merc engine over a season. Its not a natural law that it cannot happen.

[makecry]

Mclaren can beat mercedes with the merc engine over a season. Its not a natural law that it cannot happen.

They did that for 3 years anyways. 2010,2011,2012. It's after 2013 that they dropped the ball massively but in current formula,I don't know how easy or difficult that would be.

[OviJohn]

Ok, so how about we move forward about 3 weeks from that article you linked and chat about this one from 3 days ago (there is about 4 or 5 different articles from various outlets with their spin on it but how about we focus on the direct quote from Hasegawa):

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/130115

Here is an excerpt for you. That came after McLaren suffered yet another MGU-H failure in Friday practice, with Stoffel Vandoorne forced to revert to one in his pool of used parts.

"We have the countermeasure part but we didn't introduce it in Canada because we would get a penalty," said Hasegawa.

Sir, you forgot to add this tiny, yet important extra bit:

"If we're confident with the countermeasure, strategically we may choose some circuits to introduce it.

"We don't want to have a failure on the circuit and take a penalty."

So whatever happened to the "When its ready, we´ll introduce it"™ ? Worried about penalties at this stage, you buy that one?

Those same quotes confirm that Hasegawa is not sure if the countermeasures back at base will work , which is understandable considering they thought they had it pretty much solved after Bahrains tests.

The major problem is the whole dyno to track correlations.The article itself, gives more weight to the thought that Honda is lost. If you have dyno to on track correlations you cant plan ahead or be sure if w/e you´re working on its going to work. Hence, the delays and lack of commitment with dates/deadlines for upgrades, not to us mortal fans or the media, but to their partner Mclaren.

So before insinuating I'm talking rubbish, let us chat more recent happenings..

Not rubbish sir, but do bother to put every piece of information into context. All "recent information" points out that Honda is having big time issues back at base and that explains most of the problems and delays as well as unforseen failures since winter testing.

As per the coffee meetings, that's a mere term and please, I don't think the F1 Paddock motorhome is where a done deal is sorted, chats, most certainly, multi million dollar, multi-year deals, no, very doubtful. Lets talk again when Brown is seen outside AMG HQ...

We shall then.

Everything else you are saying is littered with grief that Honda hasn't personally emailed you an exact implementation date or something. NO Manufacturer has publicly stated "oh wait until Spa guys, oh wait until Austria guys, no we mean Suzuka guys, we'll have a new engine on this date..." Honda gave a vague timeframe which was towards the European Season/Summer break and lets face it the race date introduction will change based on strategy as well, we are getting close to this region of time yes, but that's it. You want actual dates.. it won't happen publicly until they drive the car out for practice.

You know, the thing here is that the other manufacturer with "pending homework" is Renault. Mercedes and Ferrari customers dont need to be worried about dates, updates, etc etc because everything is working as intended from their side of business. Renault on the other hand, has even thanked our Honda misery because otherwise, the pressure would be on them. (And rightly so!)

So lets say Mclaren has taken a page or two out of RBR playbook and somehow created the expectations that "major update" was due also at about Canada/Baku GPs. You know what Renault actually had the balls to say?

http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/story/_/id/196 ... pdate-2018

End of the discussions, no more drama nor false expectations, no more pressure...adios RBR, suck it up. So can we consider that as Renault giving out a date?

But maybe they can afford this approach because at least their PU, although not yet on par with Ferrari and Mercedes, is able to have a decent performace at races.

And yes it is year 3, and I'm not ignorant of the fact that effective updates need to roll in, and pretty quick now for all of this to go away, agreed on that front for sure.

Time is running out, and until they solve the dyno to on track issues...is even harder to grasp for hope.

[isullivan]

Three years in since they are back in F1 and probably another year or two of development, and Honda still can't fix the essential problem with the MHUG no matter what else they improve on the engine the cars are still gonna run out of power halfway down the straits.

[etusch]

Three years in since they are back in F1 and probably another year or two of development, and Honda still can't fix the essential problem with the MHUG no matter what else they improve on the engine the cars are still gonna run out of power halfway down the straits.

Can you say that this mgu-h is under development for more than 3 years?

[FW17]

James Allan says.........

McLaren wants to keep taking Honda money for the next few years but also a supply of Merc engines while Honda develops the engines at Sauber.

[Vasconia]

James Allan says.........

McLaren wants to keep taking Honda money for the next few years but also a supply of Merc engines while Honda develops the engines at Sauber.

This would be perfect for McLaren but I guess Honda won´t accept it.

[etusch]

James Allan says.........

McLaren wants to keep taking Honda money for the next few years but also a supply of Merc engines while Honda develops the engines at Sauber.

This would be perfect for McLaren but I guess Honda won´t accept it.

Who would accept this ? I am very suspicious about James Allan mental system works. For sure it works worse than Honda mgu-h.

[ronanharris09]

James Allan says.........

McLaren wants to keep taking Honda money for the next few years but also a supply of Merc engines while Honda develops the engines at Sauber.

This would be perfect for McLaren but I guess Honda won´t accept it.

So . . . A rebranded PU might be an option ? Maybe that's the reason why MCL COO visits Honda HQ yesterday?

[FW17]

That would be the worst marketing idea to be suggests by Brown and heard by Honda

[diffuser]

Three years in since they are back in F1 and probably another year or two of development, and Honda still can't fix the essential problem with the MHUG no matter what else they improve on the engine the cars are still gonna run out of power halfway down the straits.

They didn't have MGU-H problems last year. Its the moving of the compressor to the front of the PU that has resulted in a longer distance between the compressor and the turbine (with the MGU-H in the middle) that they haven't quit figured out.

[f1universe]

James Allan says.........

McLaren wants to keep taking Honda money for the next few years but also a supply of Merc engines while Honda develops the engines at Sauber.

If they successfully pull something like this they deserve an award =D>

[FW17]

I think James deserves an award too for the dumbest idea by a journalist

[Vasconia]

That would be the worst marketing idea to be suggests by Brown and heard by Honda

For some reason it has worked for Renault and Red Bull.