sato+honda=kaboom

[Guest]

as with the brake caliper bleeders these are torqued with 7Nm and one tends to apply too much force tighteningjust to make sure it is closed securely.
Did you spot the very common routine of race mechanics nut checking?
they all use a ratchet wich is entirely wrong.You have to crack the troque and open the nut bolt to see if it was torqued correctlyand then retorque it again to the correct spec.turning the nut /bolt in its torqueing direction you will always overtorque the nut/bolt and put unnecessary strain on the bolts.Loose bolts should always alarm you :wrong engineering or human faults are everywhere...Ferrari seems to have theitr act together in that area ,and that´s what makes the real difference.marcush.

[-shr3d-]

hey marcus(h)...
yes dnf strikes again for sato.......geoff willis said that they had very little warning on the telemetry before it let go, but surely there must be something that sato is doing that button isnt...... looking forward to this puzzle being solved......

[Guest]

how can poor taku destroy the thing in five minutes?Is he doing something odd in the formation lap or on his way onto the grid(???) Idoubt that.shedding off wheels and plastic is what is driver induced nowadays.You can´t miss shifts,the box just wo´t shift down before it makes senseso all I could think off would be him flooring it and letting the traction controldoing the workputtadditional strain on it.But rest assured this was checked again and again... marcush.
so you have to look at the differences between the two cars/crews or what about his use of the clutchat the start???maybe the honda does nottake too well to a clutchheld too long openputting strain or harmonicsonto the thrust bearings...

[EvilPhil]

i believe its the breaking techique..

[j4kwan]

If BAR was smart, put in Davidson ... at least for the new few races...

Hey, I like sato...but BAR need the points to beat Renault, and having one car burn up every race doesn't help - Waiting until the last couple races to sub-in, would be too little, too late.

Have Sato as the 3rd Friday Driver for the next 2 races. Put Davidson in, test his capabilities, test the engine reliablitity - see if it is Sato's driving style that keeps burning out engines, and score some points with the second car.

[Guest]

it is BARand Hondas rsponsibility to supply equipment that withstands the demands of a raceweekend.I cannot see anything wrong in satos actions and to put him aside will not solve any problems but create new ones.they fired Villeneuve and retained the horrible reliability with their lead car under the responsibility of Jock Clear...how many dnfs has this crew compared to Buttons crew?

[j4kwan]

You can't say its up to the team to provide Sato equipment that withstands a race weekend - or even to win races. Otherwise, anyone can drive the car! Might as well bring back Alex Yoong. It's a team sport where driver and team engineer/developers have to work harmoniously.

Its a team game - the car can obviously finish races as you see with Button. The driver has to ease up if it means to finish a race. Drivers always ease up - M. Schumacher does it all the time. The engineers provide Sato the car, but Sato's got to provide the chequered flag.

Most importantly for BAR, is that they have score points and beat Renault for second place. That's huge cashola and travelling dough for next season. If Sato (one person) can't be part of the solution (as oppose to all the engineers) then put Davidson in the seat.

With Villeneuve - I totally believe BAR screwed him. He was black balled so Sato can take his place - HONDA!

[-shr3d-]

well it seems that BAR still have no answers yet on the engine issue, but like i posted earlier, there must be something in the telemetry to indicate a progression of events that is causing it...
whether it is worth swapping drivers or not is debatable but the driver is surely one variable of the equation...
be interesting to go back through all the sessions from the weekends where his engine has let go and check lap counts and lap times...

[Guest]

As said before: you can only see the results of what was happening in the data logs,and you have to know what you are looking for..it can be damn difficult to trace something like a wrongly installed component or a cap put on to late or whatever..As we do not know what component actually fails it is speculative and will remain as such.
Coming back to the Driver issue :Taku is one fine driver and he deserves his place at BAR.He is well capable of driving the car as well as Jenson and so it is up to BAR to tell him what he has to do differently to make the
thing last.this is a technical issue not a case of driver being to dumb to drive.I would swap crew and car for the next weekend ,engineer included.As both crews can get the job done you could see if the car fails still and if Taku is the cause he will take the problems with him.

[Spencifer_Murphy]

I read in this month's F1Racing magazine that BAR have found out the reason why Sato's engine was detonating. They say it is due to..........wait for it......here it comes, the BIG revalation..........It overheats.

I think at next year's Bernie awards BAR should get the award for "Stating the bleening obvious".

But upon furthur reading it becomes a bit more substantial...

Apparently BAR say that if you look at the majority of Sato's engine blow-ups this year the vast majority take place after a pitstop. (I can't remember well enough to confirm this) But they say that they think that the engine temperatures surge during the stop while the car isn't moving (Fair enough) and when Taku gets back on track it detonates as a result (So why doesn't it happen to Jense?!)

Well they say they still don't know about that. I rekon it could be that Sato is a very aggressive driver and Jenson is much smoother, suggesting that after the pitstop Sato's aggressive style could be causing just a little bit more stress on the engine imidiately after a stop...I don't really know for certain, but if this is the case you can't really blame Taku. BAR are pushing the limits on the cooling of thier car too much with Taku because his particular driving style may nessesitate more cooling. And you can't ask Taku to drive less aggressively after a stop because you make up your time in a pitsto during your out and in laps. Easing off on the outlap isnt an option.

[j4kwan]

they're going to have to have Sato chill out after pit stops or else he really will be chilling out - in the motorhome. So far it points towards him blowing up after pits. I'd rather have Sato lose track position after pits(say 5th to 6th) and score points than DNF and get a big fat zero on the score chart.
He's not helping in the constructors!

Honda obviously has to solve this problem - that's for sure. However, easing off is good short term solution to suit the current Honda engine.

go Bourdais! go!

[Guest]

isn´t bourdais that lunatic that muscled off Martin Short off the track being laps behind?
back to sato:BAR does not really look too good in solving that issue..overheating...well blaming the result for being the cause is not quite intelligent.very amusing stuff....

[-shr3d-]

hey all..... yeah straight after pitstops is always a dangerous time for F1 cars whether it be engines with regards to overheating or drivetrains....
Will have to go back and check but im sure at least 2 of his blowups have occured before any pitstops so not sure what is up there... and it seems that a lot of the time they say they get little notice on the telemetry that there is a problem before it lets go..
lucky for BAR that Jarno got caught napping on the last lap....

[Guest]

is it possible that in a world wherebrake ducts get an inch bigger than allowed abunch of specialiists is unable to find the cause for a reoccuring failure?We are made to believe you could simulate and calculate about everything,wich might be true if you just knew the whole picture.As we don´t know how much we know of the whole affair and don´t know how much more the guys in the frontline KNOW (not believe to know).

[Rogue230]

It appears to happen shortly after pitting.

Heat-soak?

If so I'd think it would hit Button too.