Alternative engine configuration

[FW17]

Franz Tost, however - who heads the Red Bull junior outfit Toro Rosso - said: "I think it's a good idea."

Even Federico Gastaldi, deputy of the Lotus team that is on the verge of being bought out by the French carmaker Renault, is backing the idea.

"From my point of view, from our point of view, it will be good for the sport to have this new engine running.

"I think it's important to move into the direction of keeping the prices as low as possible so that all of us can be more competitive," he added.

The departing Manor chief Graeme Lowdon, meanwhile, commented: "I think we need to welcome anything that is designed to make the sport more sustainable and hopefully, as well, put back into the hands of the teams a little bit more about what they can control."

[FW17]

Why should Red Bull be blamed for failing to get an new engine manufacturer to enter the sport when the engine rules are locked down (and have a 5 year development lead) by Renault and Mercedes who demanded that there new rules be implemented or they would leave the sport?

Well, Williams...let me just say that Renault and Mercedes were keen for either 4 cylinder or V6 engines. Mercedes would've stayed with V8 as it fits the V8 AMG demographic. But it needed to have energy recuperation which was/is a massive issue of our time. Let me remind you 4 cylinders were even benched at Brixworth before Audi/VW turned their noses up at F1(again).
But if you are advocating the use of a V8 that's frozen for the last 6 years as progress, then I'll leave you to it.

Besides, Why should Red Bull not consider getting a different supplier like Cosworth, Ilmor or AER? Those avenues are available, and Red Bull are making money out of the sport. So what's the problem?
Time? It took Mercedes ages to get aerodynamically competent.
Money? They spend a good 100 million net less a year now than they did in 2009.

You are just bitter that Red Bull bitched about Renault and they should face the consequence for the same.

Bitter? why the personal rubbish?
I love the sport, I'm passionate about it. And in light of their 8 titles, when a team that hasn't built an engine bitches about an engine, it's staff, and it's competence, freely, I find that crass, uncouth and bitter.

F1 is an chassis formula and not an engine formula ie. You have to build a chassis yourself not an engine.

While we both mean the same Red Bull and I use the words like bitterly disappointed at Renault, I guess you and the English Media would have not faulted them if they were passionately disappointed.

[wuzak]

F1 is an chassis formula and not an engine formula ie. You have to build a chassis yourself not an engine.

While we both mean the same Red Bull and I use the words like bitterly disappointed at Renault, I guess you and the English Media would have not faulted them if they were passionately disappointed.

If that were true F1 would have had a spec engine a long time ago.

And note for a large portion of F1's history teams could use off the shelf chassis, they didn't have to build their own.

[hollus]

The proposal was $12 million for current specification power units and $8 million for year-old ones. Ferrari famously veto'd those measures, of course.

I fear we are discussing a political entity more than a piece of hardware. Of course the 4 manufacturers and Red Bull are playing politics on this... and so is the FIA, big time.

Ferrari's veto was on the 12M for current years engines. That's silly and cheap if you include the R&D costs in it. And a bit insulting, 4M for all the R&D?

FIA could suggest (actually, virtually impose, but not for next year, obviously, schmolitics again) the 8M$ for 1 year old engines... and stop at that. With the tokens reintroduced, that surely means an slightly uncompetitive engine.

So a simple rule saying that (from 2017, anything else is silly now) all PU manufacturers must be available to supply 4 other teams with the 8M$, 1 year old PU spec would solve the issue. I refuse to believe that just building and operating the PU costs more than 1M$ per unit, and a proven unit means that 5PU should cover the year. The WC would still go to a current spec engine, the old ones would actually be capable of race wins here and there, and the big manufacturers could have their cheese and eat it too: Make as good a job as Mercedes has done, and you get to win the championships yourself, to deny Red Bull of the current (threatening) PU spec, to have teams with serious ambitions (Williams, etc) pay your full price and help your R&D budget, and have the low teams and newbies flood the field with your year old spec, and produce results with it. Imagine the marketing: "one year ahead of the competition".
Such 8M$, 1 year old PU could be made available via lottery if too many teams want the same, that's the reason anchor points were standarized.
And imagine how good this would sound to potential entrants, being guaranteed a reasonable PU, maybe 1 sec/lap behind, for 8M$.
[/end wall of text]

[mrluke]

+1 good post

[Phil]

Ferrari's veto was on the 12M for current years engines. That's silly and cheap if you include the R&D costs in it. And a bit insulting, 4M for all the R&D?

Why? That R&D is not only benefiting them in F1 terms; their exterior markets are too. They are already using their outside markets as a means to pump more money into their factory-teams to do well and have a budget advantage - all the while using the sport as a means to promote their image in - again - their outside markets. Compare this to say, a team like Force-India, or Williams, or Sauber with little to no outside market that are solely in the sport to compete and survive.

Perhaps if you look at it purely in terms of F1; yes, force-dropping the price of these engines for the manufacturers will result in red-numbers when exclude anything outside F1. But we need to look broader than that; These engine/car manufacturers are in the sport for promotional reasons and what they invest into these engines can A.) be used in part for their road-car programs and future road car engines and B.) them doing well in F1 has a benefit in terms of better image, prestige, brand recognition and promotion that has an effect of them selling more road cars.

FIA could suggest (actually, virtually impose, but not for next year, obviously, schmolitics again) the 8M$ for 1 year old engines... and stop at that.

If you do that, you are virtually paving the way that only 1 year old engines are for sale while the competitive ones are ridiculously expensive (inflated if you like) to the point no one can realistically buy them. Classic 2 tier championship then. If you however cost the cap of the latest engines, it essentially becomes an "off the shelf" part with a fixed price tag, one anyone should be able to buy in a straight forward process. I pay - I receive.

[turbof1]

Ferrari's veto was on the 12M for current years engines. That's silly and cheap if you include the R&D costs in it. And a bit insulting, 4M for all the R&D?

Why? That R&D is not only benefiting them in F1 terms; their exterior markets are too. They are already using their outside markets as a means to pump more money into their factory-teams to do well and have a budget advantage - all the while using the sport as a means to promote their image in - again - their outside markets. Compare this to say, a team like Force-India, or Williams, or Sauber with little to no outside market that are solely in the sport to compete and survive.

Perhaps if you look at it purely in terms of F1; yes, force-dropping the price of these engines for the manufacturers will result in red-numbers when exclude anything outside F1. But we need to look broader than that; These engine/car manufacturers are in the sport for promotional reasons and what they invest into these engines can A.) be used in part for their road-car programs and future road car engines and B.) them doing well in F1 has a benefit in terms of better image, prestige, brand recognition and promotion that has an effect of them selling more road cars.

FIA could suggest (actually, virtually impose, but not for next year, obviously, schmolitics again) the 8M$ for 1 year old engines... and stop at that.

If you do that, you are virtually paving the way that only 1 year old engines are for sale while the competitive ones are ridiculously expensive (inflated if you like) to the point no one can realistically buy them. Classic 2 tier championship then. If you however cost the cap of the latest engines, it essentially becomes an "off the shelf" part with a fixed price tag, one anyone should be able to buy in a straight forward process. I pay - I receive.

I can't commend on the R&D budgets, only that we can safely assume they are huge, and I do mean huge. Back during the V8 freeze, manufacturers were still spending around 50 million on the engine department. It's not a stretch they are pumping a few hundred million yearly into it now.

If I remember correctly, Arrivabene already explained they are making losses on these PUs. Not that he's the most neutral person to ask this to.

We do not have a clue if the costs ultimately get recuperated through marketing benefits and R&D transfer. It's certainly possible,

I will repeat though: if the FIA and FOM are that concerned about the smaller teams going broke, then they should sponsor themselves, not wrecking havoc on current budgets. A cost cap was viable in 2011, not now when the investments have been made.

[motobaleno]

F1 is an chassis formula and not an engine formula ie. You have to build a chassis yourself not an engine.

Could you please indicate me where in the F1 rules or elsewhere you find that?

[djos]

F1 is an chassis formula and not an engine formula ie. You have to build a chassis yourself not an engine.

Could you please indicate me where in the F1 rules or elsewhere you find that?

It's been that way ever since they banned selling chassis to other teams, RBR got around it for a while using RedBull Technologies but the FiA closed the loopholes iirc.

Generally speaking it has been a Chassis Constructors series since the Concorde agreement in 1981 which has required all competitors to build their own cars.

[Phil]

I can't commend on the R&D budgets, only that we can safely assume they are huge, and I do mean huge. Back during the V8 freeze, manufacturers were still spending around 50 million on the engine department. It's not a stretch they are pumping a few hundred million yearly into it now.

If I remember correctly, Arrivabene already explained they are making losses on these PUs. Not that he's the most neutral person to ask this to.

We do not have a clue if the costs ultimately get recuperated through marketing benefits and R&D transfer. It's certainly possible,

I will repeat though: if the FIA and FOM are that concerned about the smaller teams going broke, then they should sponsor themselves, not wrecking havoc on current budgets. A cost cap was viable in 2011, not now when the investments have been made.

I agree that the budgets are huge. But they (and the benefits) will pave the way for years to come as road cars move more and more into this crucial field of energy harvesting and deployment to make more efficient cars. And these car manufacturers will be at the forefront with benefiting from that investment, where as the teams, todays mere costumer teams, will not; Because they ain't in the road car building business.

Ferrari might be a bit of unique one here, because they don't sell cars on the premise on efficiency and a greener planet. Their image is one of passion and rarity, exclusivity. But Fiat I'm sure can very well benefit from all this R&D, not only image wise. So black-on-white, yes, they are certainly losing money. I'd expect them to. But looking at the broader picture and that road cars are moving in that direction with or without F1, it's an undertaking they will take sooner or later and those investments will be made irregardless at some point.

But that's the problem with R&D; It's hard to account R&D to something singular when the benefit it yields can be spread over various divisions over perhaps multiple years.

[F1NAC]

Mecachrome joins AER and Ilmor with request

[Blackout]

Mecachrome joins AER and Ilmor with request

Will this exhaust-intake layout be legal in the low cost formula? It's not legal under the current rules.
http://fr.motorsport.com/f1/news/exclus ... -standard/

[dodds_turbo]

Mecachrome joins AER and Ilmor with request

Exclusive news to Motorsport.com (apparently).
http://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/exclu ... ender/?s=1

Engine could look like:


Looks like they are aiming big. Two teams and four engines:
http://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mecac ... -plan/?s=1

[wuzak]

Mecachrome joins AER and Ilmor with request

Will this exhaust-intake layout be legal in the low cost formula? It's not legal under the current rules.
http://fr.motorsport.com/f1/news/exclus ... -standard/

Yes, because it isn't restricted in exhaust layout.

That said, I think the likes of Red Bull would prefer twin turbo with the exhaust and wastegate down low where they can direct it somewhere useful.

[dren]

F1 is an chassis formula and not an engine formula ie. You have to build a chassis yourself not an engine.

Could you please indicate me where in the F1 rules or elsewhere you find that?

It's been that way ever since they banned selling chassis to other teams, RBR got around it for a while using RedBull Technologies but the FiA closed the loopholes iirc.

Generally speaking it has been a Chassis Constructors series since the Concorde agreement in 1981 which has required all competitors to build their own cars.

But the Formula part of Formula 1 refers to the regulations, which most definitely include the PUs.