Formula One's Engine Crisis

[FoxHound]

This will be looooooong. Get a pipe, slippers and.......

Imagine 3 engine manufacturers using the same engine for 8 years in more or less frozen form.
All 3 engine manufacturers grew tiresome of the same engine and an inability to be able to make a difference with an important aspect of the car.

Unfortunately the sport is larger than just those 3 engine manufacturers. We have (customer) teams who were perfectly happy with frozen engines. Why give more weight to an attribute entirely outside their control?

Maybe because engines form part of the formula they entered? Nobody forced a gun to their head upon entry, the only exclusion to this would be Manor, whom entered into the frozen formula.

With this argument, you're demonstrating nothing but the point that every company/entity will do what is in their best interest: ......................................

Do you think it in the interest of F1 to have frozen engines for 5 years running? With my argument, I'm demonstrating clearly that there are more facets to F1 than just aero and chassis development. To freeze one, will invariably lead to the others being favoured. And that is exactly what happened for 4/5 years running 2009 to 2013. Each of those years was won by the best aerodynamic team. Brawn, Red bull x4. Engines were not allowed to make the difference in the traditional sense as development was frozen. By definition, that is anti competitive.... engine manufacturers were not allowed to compete using the tools they best know at their disposal, aka restrictive practices.

My only surprise is there was not a harder push by Renault, Merc and Ferrari to change things sooner.

It can not survive with Mercedes and Ferrari being the sole competitors with the rest of the grid showing up as a formality to "fill the grid".

It survived with Ferrari being the only "competitors" for 5 years. It survived Red Bull's stranglehold for 4 years. It has survived McLaren and Williams domination.
The only reason it's a "crisis" is because a specific team is not winning. Williams have shown a resurgence over the last 2 years, an independent team with no affiliation to engines. Do you hear them circulating contentious stories of "crisis"?
Force India? Next years Manor or Haas?

I suggest that a review the history of the sport as it has never had an era of "multiple competitors".


Equally, I do not think the current engine regs are good enough. I would like to see more of everything, greedy like that.
More noise, more power, more development.
The token system allied to it's reliability and cost clauses, need a slight tune up. The massive issue is the 4 engines per year.

This is what limits development, as it needs to be right straight out of the box or a wasted token which can only be rectified down the line with a reliability or cost upgrade. Also, what needs to be kept in mind here is that engine development can be a tardy business. 4 months just to make a crankshaft! But before that you need to research, design, develop and test your ideas....

But here is the thing, Phil. What is it going to cost the cash strapped teams to buy these engines? The big boys, including Mercedes(open to more engine development) get what they want, and the small guys are left with either a shitty 2015 engine, or 30 million dollar plus V6 turbo(open development WILL cost more).

And even then, with smaller teams falling further behind, or getting into deeper financial trouble, will there ever be a guarantee that anyone can match Mercedes or to a lesser(15bhp) extent Ferrari.
So what you are left with is an xpensive quagmire, with the very real possibility that nothing changes at all.

And then we reach the grand finale, and ascertain WHY some teams are unhappy with the engine regs.
As it stands, Mercedes and Ferrari are fairly happy with things but welcome development.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/32520314

The aero programme is performing strongly and these are still quite young aero rules, so I think we can expect more from it. Ditto the engine. And the whole situation with the tokens means it's a very different year this year compared with last year. Notwithstanding the gains we've made to date, we think we can bring a lot more during the year."

Williams
http://en.espn.co.uk/williams/motorspor ... 93647.html

There might be a little bit of individual tuning we do for our own cars but I'm very happy with the way we work with them.

Lotus.

Clearly Mercedes has the engine, we expect them to continue having it - they've just done a better job,
And we were one of the rare independent teams that could have access to that engine.
I think for the team it was the right choice. Not making that choice - a lot more people would ask questions if you have that opportunity.

Force India
Spongebob Fearnely: I think that looking at an alternative parity engine, using maybe a V8 with KERS that is much more affordable for the independent teams, has a lot of merit. Ours is about cost control and I think as long as we can get reasonable parity, I think it is a very good initiative. the manufacturers develop the V6 hybrid, but we need to look at the commercial aspects of it. And the commercial aspects are it is 50 per cent cheaper for an engine which gives the same performance."
Issue is not about the engines themselves, but the costs involved for the V6.

Sauber
Monisha KaltenbornIt: has been a very big improvement. They have really done a good job and I am pleasantly surprised. You need that kind of powertrain, it's never just a lone car, it has to be the right package.
While we fully understand as a customer that a manufacturer needs to showcase their core technology and latest technology, it should be at an affordable level,[/quote]
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/118152
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/118631
The issue of costs raised about the engine, but happy with the actual engine itself.

Manor

I am delighted to announce our new power unit partnership with Mercedes-Benz for the 2016 season and beyond. Although there were many factors governing our selection of an engine partner to help power us towards our long-term ambitions. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Scuderia Ferrari for their support for our team over the past two seasons. In 2014, together we shared in the momentous occasion of the team's first points and in 2015 Ferrari supported us to a degree that was above and beyond the requirements of our partnership agreement,

http://www.skysports.com/f1/news/17581/ ... 016-season
Manor plain happy.

McLaren Honda
Dennis unhappy with Honda, the rules, and life in general. Interesting too that McLaren ditched Mercedes by choice, stating that "customers have never beaten factory teams", conveniently forgetting Brawn kicking McLaren butts in 2009 :-"

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/formul ... Monza.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/34208407

But there was a marked improvement and the promise of more to come which has lifted spirits at woking...

Observers said the power unit had a notably different engine note, but the team decided to shelve it after practice so that Alonso could use it to best effect next weekend at Austin without the handicap of grid penalties.
Team boss Eric Boullier is quoted by Spain's El Mundo Deportivo: "This update performed better than expected.
It was a positive test -- above even what we expected," he repeated. "So if we did not use it in the race it was only because we believed that the design of the (Sochi) circuit did not suit our package."
Honda's Yasuhisa Arai agreed: "It (the new engine) responded better than expected, although the total performance is still not high enough."

http://www.f1-fansite.com/f1-news/mclar ... -expected/


Red Bull Renault and by proxy Torro Rosso
Mateshitz livid with Renault, the rules, F1, Mercedes, Ferrari, Pirelli. I'd hate to be this dude's cat right now.


Other than the sport finding a solution for Honda which does not escalate the costs of supply of engines, this "crisis" is reduced to 2 teams of which the owner owns both.
And I will remind you that we are barely 18 months out of using these V6 Hybrids.....The V8 engines were exorbitantly expensive too when first introduced. And even with development, the costs lowered incrementally year on year.
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/49650

So with all that's written, and if you still following, I agree a tune up is needed. Not a change, a tune up. A change now would be devastatingly expensive, but a staged plan with consensus which addresses cost and development needs to be made. And Red Bull have already threatened to throw a spanner in the works for that too.....

http://uk.motorsport.com/f1/news/red-bu ... ine-costs/

At the end of the day it will come down to market forces and market price. Is it just eight engines and a couple of mechanics, or is it dyno time and development? And what kind of level of support? At the end of the day you can either fly in economy or first class, and it's down to an individual team to decide where it wants to be placed.”

Again a staggering example of the arrogance Red Bull have, and the care it actually has for F1 and it's competitors in general.

[turbof1]

Well it's atleast better and wider then just red bull. I'd like to remain neutral in this debate, but +1 for effort.

[FoxHound]

Well it's atleast better and wider then just red bull. I'd like to remain neutral in this debate, but +1 for effort.

Enchante!
I like to think my width satisfied most people. And then the scope of my post too... :-"

But without tilting your neutrality, I don't see how Red Bull can justify their stance being one of "interests of the sport" when they clearly don't have the interests of the sport to heart. Would you concur Turbo?

[Phil]

Do you think it in the interest of F1 to have frozen engines for 5 years running?

Oh fox, I'm not sure now if you're talking to a wall or if that reply was directed at me, but I've never argued this point. In fact, I didn't take a stance on this specific point either way. Is an engine freeze in the interest of F1? Or not? The answer to that question is very complex and depends more on who you ask. As I said in my last post; From the engine manufacturers perspective, no an engine freeze does not make sense. For teams that don't develop engines who's main expertise is chassis and aero development, it is.

If it's in the interest of the sport as a whole - well, it's a very complex question to answer and if the answer to that was a simple No, we wouldn't have had engine freezes in place, nor would the sport as a whole come up with complicated tokens etc. So either way, I'm not pro RedBull, I'm not anti Mercedes or any other engine manufacturer, I'm simply arguing the merits of the pro and cons of both perspectives and the perspective of having a healthy competitive F1 while looking at the large picture.

With my argument, I'm demonstrating clearly that there are more facets to F1 than just aero and chassis development. To freeze one, will invariably lead to the others being favoured. And that is exactly what happened for 4/5 years running 2009 to 2013. Each of those years was won by the best aerodynamic team. Brawn, Red bull x4. Engines were not allowed to make the difference in the traditional sense as development was frozen. By definition, that is anti competitive.... engine manufacturers were not allowed to compete using the tools they best know at their disposal, aka restrictive practices.

As I've said previously, I'm not against an engine dominated formula per say. Never was. In fact, I like the change, especially from a technological aspect.

My main gripe with the current situation (and I appologise I've I'm repeating myself for the 10th time, but it seems this point is being overlooked time and time again) is;

We have 4 engine manufacturers, but we have 10 Formula 1 teams.*

* also important; From those 4 engine manufacturers, only 2 have competitive engines. Actually, depending on how we measure that, we might even only have 1 truly competitive one.

Why is that an issue? Because in a formula dominated by PU performance and the fact that there is a large performance differential between these 4 engines, the biggest performance differential is one that is outside of 6 teams control (actually 7 if we include McLaren).

I'll say it again; I'm all for an engine dominated formula, but then we need 10 engine manufacturers with 10 factory teams competing with one another - not 3 factory teams and 7 customers being forced to run behind because they are A.) not with a competitive PU, B.) have a B-Spec engine or maps to not rival the factory team.

This isn't a competitive field anymore. Not when there are teams that are limited artificially by their competing supplier. At least during the 2009-2013 season where we did have an engine freeze, we had 10-12 teams competing on aero and chassis. It was in their direct control.

I'm not sure how one could argue that it is good for any sport when a dominating engine supplier (in this case Mercedes) has by far the best engine and can effectively control who they supply and what they supply them with (to limit how competitive they are). This is referring directly to the situation that neither Mercedes nor Ferrari want to supply RedBull, a serious competitor, with an adequate engine. It can't be right that an engine manufacturer can make this crucial decision inside what essentially should be a open fair competition.

Now if we had 10 engine manufacturers competing with their own factory teams, this wouldn't be a problem, since every team would then simply concentrate on doing a better job (as has been the case when we had 10-12 aero/chassis F1 teams competing on those aspects).

Again; I'm not blaming either Mercedes nor Ferrari. They are absolutely within their right to refuse to supply a competitor for the reasons they are. I wouldn't supply RedBull either. The issue here extends beyond an engine manufacturers choice to do what is in their best interest - it is a problem that ultimately the sport needs to address, either by working on new rules that brings these engines closer together or open them up so that engine manufacturers who are not able to compete can develop their engines and close the gap.

[dans79]

The issue here extends beyond an engine manufacturers choice to do what is in their best interest - it is a problem that ultimately the sport needs to address, either by working on new rules that brings these engines closer together or open them up so that engine manufacturers who are not able to compete can develop their engines and close the gap.

The only issue is, everyone seems to be proposing penalizing the teams that did the best under the current rules, I can't even remotely express how I feel about this concept without getting banned, or insulting a bunch of people.

[Phil]

Well, I don't. I'm more taking on the position of looking or discussing possible solutions, that yes, will probably come at the cost of those that did well, but when two major teams threaten to leave the sport over the calamity it is in, it would be bad not to look at all options. I mean, from Mercedes perspective, how much worth is their success if they can actively influence the outcome of their championship in the future by not supplying a major competitor or supplying them with inferior engine? Or if RedBull and TR do leave, how will the sport survive? The sports needs competitors for 'winning' to have meaning.

I'm not at all happy about punishing those that did well. I do think however that the sport needs to react and much hinges on the future of a healthy F1 if engine suppliers can become competitive and close the gap.

[Andres125sx]

There must be something toxic in the air, because I´m going to defend FIA


F1 is a very difficult sport to manage. If you allow free development costs will raise too much and small teams will disapear. If you freeze development then it will be manufacturers who will complain or directly move out, so it´s needed some compromise between both scenarios

FIA tried both free development and frozen rules, and neither of them worked with too high costs and/or some team dominating way too much, or manufacturers complaining because they can´t do their job.

Now they tried some sort of balanced rules in between. Allow some development but not too much. The idea was good, but they failed on a point. If they´d have implemented this token system with old V8s it would have worked perfectly I think, as all manufacturers were pretty matched so the token system would have supposed no problem at all. But with new PUs the development margin is so high there are many posibilities that one manufacturer perform much better than the rest until the rest catch up

Maybe they should have allowed free development for some seasons until they reach the diminishing return point, when most manufacturers will perform similar, and then implement the token system, but in that case costs would have been too high those seasons, and with new PUs costs already are too high, so not an option really

So they tried a compromised solution, allow some development wich will decrease season by season. Not a bad idea on paper, but when somone do his job so much better than the rest, no rules will provide an exciting competition, they will dominate anycase.


I think FIA didn´t have any option. They couldn´t keep V8s because some manufacturers were threatening to move out so new engines were needed, they couldn´t allow free development because many teams were struggling to stay in F1 and costs would have been too high, and they couldn´t freeze development for obvious reasons, so they did the only thing they could, new engines with limited development.

Now we can blame the engines, the rules, or the FIA, but I seriously can´t see any other better scenario. With V8s Mercedes and Renault would be out so it would have been a Ferrari formula, no way. With free development to stop Mercedes half the grid would be out due to financial problems, and with frozen rules it would be groundhog day watching Mercedes winning race after race.

[turbof1]

I'm more taking on the position of looking or discussing possible solutions, that yes, will probably come at the cost of those that did well.

Not necessarily. I'll state right here and now I'm nowhere in favour of putting specific disadvantages at one party that has earned its advantage. I'm of opinion the solution has to be found in opening up development rules. Look at Honda: didn't get it right, and now they are almost literally bound by their hands and feet and cannot make significant changes during the year to correct the issues. That's what nobody wants.

If you allow some chances, some wild cards, to correct the mistakes to all the manufacturers, including Mercedes, then you will find that the manufacturers being behind will close the gap by a good chunk already. Even with Mercedes getting the same chances, they will make inroads due Mercedes being much higher up the curve.

Let the law of diminishing returns do the work, instead of locking everybody on their position of the curve. Open up the development rules in some way to allow a one or two time joker for enormous changes.

[FoxHound]

http://m.autosport.com/news/report.php/ ... t-for-2016

In season development agreement from all 4 manufacturers.

[turbof1]

http://m.autosport.com/news/report.php/ ... t-for-2016

In season development agreement from all 4 manufacturers.

All the proposals have to be agreed upon by the F1 Commission, which are expected to be a formality, before being rubber stamped by the World Motor Sport Council at its final meeting of the year in early December.

Hmm. I wonder why it is expected to be a formality. I was always under the impression that one of the small teams would vote against since it'll put them back with unequal material. What has been offered as compensation, I wonder?

EDIT:
http://www.formula1-dictionary.net/admin_force.html

Formula One Commission

Before 2008, this commission consisted of representatives from the all teams, race organizers, engine manufacturers, sponsors, tire manufacturers and of course the FIA.
From 2008, just six of the 12 Formula One teams have voting rights as part of the Formula One Commission, the FIA announced. The move, which leaves big names such as McLaren without a vote, is part of an overhaul designed to simplify major decision making within the sport.

The Formula One Commission is responsible for approving any changes to the sporting and technical regulations proposed by the Sporting and Technical Working Groups (both of which include senior members from all teams), and then putting them forward to the FIA's World Motor Sport Council for ratification.

In the past, all of the teams have had voting rights, along with engine suppliers, tire manufacturers, race promoters, key sponsors. However, following the announced changes, just six teams - each from a different country - will have a say, along with five race promoters, plus a representative each from Formula One racing's commercial rights holder and the FIA.

The full list of those elected on to the 2008 Commission following a vote of the FIA World Motor Sport Council is as follows:

Teams:
Austria - Red Bull Racing
France - Renault
Germany - BMW Sauber
Italy - Ferrari
Japan - Honda
United Kingdom - Williams

Race promoters:
Australian Grand Prix
Brazilian Grand Prix
Hungarian Grand Prix
Monaco Grand Prix
Spanish Grand Prix

What I don't get is why not all teams have to vote on this. After all, any rule change for a subsequent year made after March, needs unanimous agreement. Or is that only for technical regulations? Someone please educate me on that because your favourite moderator is making himself nuts on it.

EDIT2: Well it's apparently both a change to the sporting regulations and technical regulations.

The amount of tokens available will remain at 32, with the areas that were due to be blocked off for development - upper/lower crankcase, valve drive, part of the crankshaft, air-valve system and ancillaries drive - remaining open.

Do they need unanimous support from all team to get it through? Or only the teams sitting in the F1 Commission?

EDIT3: And to answer my question (I'm an idiot):
http://adamcooperf1.com/2014/10/10/f1-s ... pposition/

Rule changes for 2015 have to receive the unanimous approval of the F1 Commission, on which all teams are represented by their bosses, along with other key stakeholders, namely Ecclestone (as its chairman), Todt as FIA president, eight race promoters, Pirelli, two sponsors (Rolex and Marlboro), and an engine supplier (Renault).

So apparently the composition of the F1 commission changes from time to time. (Do note how Marlboro was/is in that commitee, and is named as a sponsor even though illegal to advertise. "That's not cigarette advertising on our car, that's the ferrari logo made by our earnest sponsor Marlboro.")

I'm probably right to say that the F1 commission in its current state has all the teams on board, Jean Todt, Bernie Ecclestone and Pirelli. The positions of the 2 sponsors, the engine supplier and the 8 race promoters could be fleeting positions. Anyway, note on how all of those have to agree. Either autosport knows something we don't, which is entirely plausible, or they are wrongfully calling it a formality.

All that being said, I'm moderately happy with these rule changes. I feel it is still quite restrictive since they don't have a chance to do any inseason testing of developments of the PUs, and introducing token updates means inserting a new allocation of the targeted component, of which you only have 4 during the whole season. But other then that: it doesn't get worse atleast!

[pob]

I don't see these rule changes being rubber stamped so easily. Why would Red Bull agree to this?

[djos]

I'm more taking on the position of looking or discussing possible solutions, that yes, will probably come at the cost of those that did well.

Not necessarily. I'll state right here and now I'm nowhere in favour of putting specific disadvantages at one party that has earned its advantage. I'm of opinion the solution has to be found in opening up development rules. Look at Honda: didn't get it right, and now they are almost literally bound by their hands and feet and cannot make significant changes during the year to correct the issues. That's what nobody wants.

If you allow some chances, some wild cards, to correct the mistakes to all the manufacturers, including Mercedes, then you will find that the manufacturers being behind will close the gap by a good chunk already. Even with Mercedes getting the same chances, they will make inroads due Mercedes being much higher up the curve.

Let the law of diminishing returns do the work, instead of locking everybody on their position of the curve. Open up the development rules in some way to allow a one or two time joker for enormous changes.

imo the number 1 cause of our current situation was the first year engine freeze. This should never have happened, and combined with a limit of 5 PU's power driver, it has compounded the advantages and disadvantages from the start of 2014. Even Ferrari who have made purges this year still aren't at the level of Mercedes.

The other things the FiA screwed up are fuel regulations, they are broadly speaking supposed to be using 98 octane pump fuel and we know from Mercedes this is very far from the case.

The FiA also need to make sure the regulations don't allow the PU OEM's to withhold engine software versions and modes from customer teams.

I'm all for this being an engine formula but the FiA needs to make sure the engines provided to customer teams aren't crippled.

[dans79]

I'm all for this being an engine formula but the FiA needs to make sure the engines provided to customer teams aren't crippled.

Customer teams will always be at a disadvantage, because the engine was designed to be in harmony with the factory teams chassis and aero philosophies, that alone could be worth a few tenths. Look At McLaren last year, they where at a disadvantage because of the fuel & oil they ran.

[djos]

So you mean to say had the Renault Block been replaced by Merc RB would not have won 4 Championships?

Do you mean to imply that it's guaranteed Red Bull would have won four World Championships with Mercedes engines? That certainly didn't prove decisive for the Mercedes-backed teams Red Bull defeated.

Either way, logic doesn't permit such deductions.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but as I recall Mercedes had hot blowing which was considered superior to Renault's cold blowing however Mercedes and McLaren simply didn't master the aero implementation prior to it being banned.

[dans79]

So you mean to say had the Renault Block been replaced by Merc RB would not have won 4 Championships?

Do you mean to imply that it's guaranteed Red Bull would have won four World Championships with Mercedes engines? That certainly didn't prove decisive for the Mercedes-backed teams Red Bull defeated.

Either way, logic doesn't permit such deductions.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but as I recall Mercedes had hot blowing which was considered superior to Renault's cold blowing however Mercedes and McLaren simply didn't master the aero implementation prior to it being banned.

Hot blowing is theoretically more efficient, as it puts more energy into the exhaust, stream, However it requires more fuel to be carried, and when coupled with the fact that the Merc was less fuel efficient than the Renault, the advantage was mitigated.