Motors The Bit-Tech F1 2015 Thread - Season Complete

Or, after last year's dancing pig they've decided to make sure that both of their drivers understand the chassis and can set it up to their liking. Which means running the car light, trying every type of tyre and telling the drivers to go as fast as they can rather than testing something specific.

They can't afford to have another intractable car and they don't have Fernando really likes understeer Alonso to fall back on anymore.

I'm more intrigued by the relative Quiet of Williams, they haven't done very many miles and they haven't been especially fast. I really hope that the relative advantage of the Merc engine beign reduced doesn't dump Williams back into the mid field.

Also, Mclaren are on a shocker, although they did eleven times as many laps as Red Bull last year.

 

My understanding of things:

Merc are cruising. As Nico Rosberg said - they're driving as much distance as they can, trying to break the car. Find the least reliable parts. Ben Anderson observed on Tuesday that while Massa was going gentle through the chicane, the Mercs were not.

The same Ben Anderson also observed that the RBR seems good on turn-in, the power delivery seems a handful, Sauber looking less stable on turn-in, and Ferrari looking very stable all the way through, IIRC.

I genuinely think Merc will have some competition this year. Ferrari seems solid in their car, and if the power is there, we'll have a race.

RBR (though clearly hampered by the Renault engine's "stupid part") is not quite where they'd like to be. They had ERS issues (reminiscent of KERS and ERS issues of the past). Barcelona should allow Renault to fix their engine. Long runs should be standard there, with some quick ones in between.

McLaren say they are not worried and know how fast they really are. Barcelona should show long runs, unless they want to be in trouble (i.e. sandbagging like mad, putting massive - arguably stupid - faith in Honda). I foresee a difficult year for them.

 

It has been pretty widely stated online (thou I never know how much faith to put in testing reports), that McLaren are running no where near full power yet.

 

this is true - it is widely stated.
Rumours around the paddock (specifically from Ferrari) are also that the Merc teams were sandbagging and haven't shown anything at all yet.
Which is to be expected.

 

Have Merc and Ferrari revealed how many tokens they have used, suspect Ferrari have used a good amount of them

 

Everyone's quiet on that front so far, it would seem.

 

The tokens system is largely irrevelevant, the rules are so badly worded that one 'token' can mean essentially anything. For example changing the layout of the engine and all of the modifications it requires to the components to make that happen can be taken as 'one' token. This is helping Ferrari and Renault no end.

A lot of the changes the teams are making are being justified as required for reliability (which the rules allow) and by extension don't use any tokens at all. I expect that by Melbourne all four engine builders will have a lot of tokens left over to use in season.

 

That's pretty much how I see it as well.
The FIA will want SOME tokens to be spent by every team, so there may be negotiations in that regard.

Effectively, I think they're going to reword the rules in that area somewhat and the tokens are going to end up being used as a "well this year sucks, let's make sure we nail next year" kind of joker.

 

Force India blocking the vote on Manor GP/Marussia running last years car. All other teams voted yes, seems rather harsh of them considering they said Caterham could.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/31158612

 

Just remember, the last time the teams unanimously voted to allow a team a late entry they turned up with the Brawn Grand Prix 001.

Not that Marussia could manage such a thing. I expect this has more to do with money being owed somewhere along the line and FI are trying to turn the screw.

 

Hardly surprising TBH. What's more surprising is that Sauber didn't join them, but then that Banco do Brasil sponsorship must've really helped their cash situation.

FI stands to gain a lot if Marussia's winnings from last year are unclaimed and then spread over the remaining teams on the grid.

 

I thought if they money was "lost" as it were by no team taking it then it would vanish back into bernies fund.

 

Nope:

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...e-their-34m-share-of-prizemoney-10027499.html

 

I thought Marussia had allready developed a car for this year?

 

They had a scale model.

 

Just booked my flights to go see the Singapore gp!

 

Ferrari have released a concept design for what it thinks F1 cars should look like in the future:



Interesting concept, but I think its more like a future LMP1 car than an F1 car

 

Depends how drastic the rule changes go. Theres been rumours for years that they want to go bigger tyres and more bhp in the engines. The rear wing aside its not far away from the way the car would naturally have to go to get those things in.

Dout Ferrari have any intensions to run in LMP either.

 

Thats what I thought, no wonder Audi are interested in F1.

 

Looking at that Concept:
The changes from current to that are mostly cosmetic, I'd say... Fender structures were discussed and aren't popular amongst purists.
The thin survival cell, open wheels, front and rear wing are still there.