2014 Formula 1 Thread
 

How many of you guys follow F1?? Thoughts on 2014 regulations, testing, drivers, cars ???

I follow.

Sub'd.

I suspect we'll be seeing a lot of engine/drivetrain failures this year. Less than FaeFae, more than Hustler.

Yeah, mostly from the Renault powered guys. Mercedes engines are doing very very well. Most Mercedes guys have done race simulations already and are working on adding performance. I was never a hater of the Turbo engines, Though i wish they didn't limit the fuel capacity.

Avid F1 fan. 2014 should prove interesting. The big question right now is whether Adrian Newey and company can recover from the bad start at testing. Will some other team have a chance this year? Will Herr Vettel be dethroned? Can Sire Lewis win in '14? Will Caterham or Marussia get into Q2?

Should be an interesting year - aside from the ugly-ass nose configurations.

I miss Mark Webber already.

those noses crack me up, the red bull is the most elegant looking chassis. But is a turd at the moment due to the extreme packaging. I have good faith in Jenson this year, mclaren look strong and the butterfly suspension is going to be the novel edge this year, like double diffusers and f-ducts.

The noses are awesome. I'm very excited to finally see Red Bull on their back foot, even if it's just for a race or two.

I feel like this year they took a cattle prod to the rule book and engine design. I love it.

Big surprise, renowned MT.net member who loves the phallus-shape:dealwithit:

It gives me great pleasure watching RB struggle with their basement-developed powertrain.

i agree, i chuckle every time i read they caught on fire, or had to end their testing program early.

I think a lot of the heavy hitters may be down in points early on due to failures with all of the new energy recovery system issues. The first several races will be a war of attrition.

I'm looking for Lotus and McLaren to be out front early, with RB catching up mid-season. Any thoughts on how Kimi will make out at Ferrari? Things have been suspiciously quiet from that front.

He'll do just fine there. They can afford to pay him. He certainly wasn't having any trouble getting used to the car, he had FTOD on the first day of testing.

Ferrari is the best of the rest, that is non Mercedes power. I think its going to be a battle between Mercedes and Mclaren. Ferrari might get lucky in the first few races but i wouldn't expect people to start catching up until they hit the euro races. Although a lot can change as they will be bringing a lot of Melbourne spec parts next test up to FP3.

Bummed to find out no New Jersey race this year. Surprised to see Sochi on the 2014 schedule.

NJ organizers dropped the ball on funding, pretty much they didn't pay Bernie. Sochi was planned for a while now. They are pretty far along on the venue, but contraction can't interfere with the Olympic games

Big F1 fan

Also a member of the "Anyone but Vettel" club

Re - Crack at Renault F1 engine being developed in a basement: An engineer that worked for Renault F1 engine team left Renault to go work for HPD (Honda Performance Development) in California. After a year he went back to Renault F1.

So if Renault F1 is the worst engine team in F1, and it's still 100x better than HPD...how bad is HPD? Hopefully there is a big difference (there is...) between Honda F1 and HPD

Mclaren/Honda will dominate next year. Honda has a extra year to develop their motor based on what others struggle with. They will be getting data from Maca about the merc engine. It will be built to suit the Mclaren. They are immune to the freezing of engine parts this year.

Not to mention that Mclaren have Ron Dennis back, Eric Bollier as Head of racing. They have Neweys right hand man coming to take over aero.

Jenson Button WDC 2014+2015 then he will retire.

From the little reading I did, it is still on for 2015?

Going to at least one F1 race is on my bucket list and NJ would be in driving distance, therefore not breaking the bank. I would love to go to Texas, but too costly.

We have gone to the Baltimore GP both years it ran here. Now it is postponed for a couple years due to scheduling conflicts. I know F1>everything but too close to not go to Balt. I guess we will be going to a NJMP event this year.

Texas > NJ. Just sayin'. LOL.

Big F1 fan here. I'm mixed on this year's regulations. This entire "green racing" thing is mind boggling.

"Hai gays, letz maek teh cars use les feul"

While totally ignoring the 20+ hospitality buses per team and the like.

I'm also part of the "anyone but Vettel" club. And I even use to be a big fan of his, but it's boring to watch the domination. I only ended up watching the first few races, then my favorites (Monaco, Spa, Canada, Monza) and skipped the rest.

I don't like that the regs have slowed the cars down almost to GP2 levels.

I like some of the new stuff:

1) the engines are cool
2) the fuel limit per race is not. limiting the fuel flow is probably fine though. I suspect you will see some significant differences in qual vs. race laptimes since races last more than an hour.
4) Don't really like how they are dropping the RPM limit. seems much more like a normal car now. especially since early speculation indicated they don't make much power up top and are probably early shifting a lot.
5) I don't like the double points.


I don't care about vettel, but I suspect Red Bull is going to be one of the front runners by mid-year. Ferrari will be interesting to watch, just because Fernando vs. Kimi. They may even get challenged by FI and the other mid-field merc. teams if the pace they have showed so far is close. With that said, Ferrari is a couple or days behind in the testing schedule vs. Merc.

If Renault doesn't get an extension on the engine spec. lock, I suspect a good number of those cars won't finish Australia.

1. Agreed. The TERS is a really cool idea. ScarbsF1 has a good video explaining the basics.
2. Agreed.
4. With the fuel flow limit, it wouldn't really matter anyway. They can still theoretically have a 15,000 rpm rev limit, but I don't think the fuel limit supports that amount of air flow through the engine at that engine speed.
5. It's beyond ridiculous.

They are not gp2 slow. Rosberg was only 1 sec off his pole time from last year. Give them done time to sort out the bugs and they will be faster than the v8s

Here is some comparisons between last years race laptimes and Rosberg's Race Sim from Bahrain. The graph is very helpful.
2014 Testing - Bahrain 19-22 Feb - Forum - F1technical.net

It looks good so far. Rosberg's laps look a little slower, at the very least there is larger difference from one lap to the next. a bit difficult to analyze really because I am sure traffic is worse during testing and Vettel generally maintains a gap (plus I don't remember the race).

Anyways, end of Rosberg's testing has him doing extremely slow laps compared to Vettel (2-3s slower) and his earlier laps too (~1s). Hard to really compare his previous laps as they have big gaps...anyway, I suspect that is fuel saving on Merc's part just to finish the sim.

Yep, sorry about that. I accidentally wrapped in Kobash's comments with something else. Caterham are another 5 or so seconds off of Rosberg's pace.

I wasn't a huge Vettel fan in the past, but now I kinda root for him just to say I got to watch the GOAT (I didn't follow F1 when Schumacher was winning). Sort of like why I sometimes root for Tiger Woods.

And who needs high RPM when you have boost.

DOUBLE POINTS!!!???

Whoever thought up that idea (let's hope it came directly from Bernie's warped mind) needs to be drawn, quartered, shot, and then shot again. That's the dumbest idea since grooved tires.

Yes Double Points is complete rubbish

they are actually supposed to vote on double points for the last 3 races...can't remember if they have already or not.

I know nothing about Formula 1, but I am curious, why all the hate for red bull racing?

Because no one likes it when one smug ass team dominates.

Yep, Vettel won every race after the break last year. He's a great driver, it's just getting boring.

...sorta like "the Schumacher Era".

Christian Horner tries to be humble and (a tiny bit) respectful of other teams and drivers, but Vettel is just an arrogant a$$ - easy NOT to like. If you saw what he did in Malaysia last year you would understand.

Even when McLaren dominated, there was always Senna vs Prost. One driver on one team dominating is just plain boring.

Webber was constantly dicked around by the team, Silverstone 2010? I'll actually be watching some endurance racing this year because of his switch.

See I don't see Vettel as arrogant, just honest. He doesn't use $0.02 platitudes or suck the media's dick in interviews. I prefer the honesty to making everyone try to like him.

That said if the RBR cars are a bit slower than everyone else this year to keep it interesting you won't see me complaining. Unfortunately based on Seb's performances in the past where he took a car that is a couple of hundredths faster in Q3 and ran the first lap of the race 2 seconds faster than everyone else, they'll have to be a lot worse. That shit still blows my mind.

No doubt Vettel is a good (great?) driver, and I respect him for that. I even respect his honesty about the car / other drivers / the team / F1 in general. Maybe it's just a "German thing" (and I'm not casting stones), but he just rubs me the wrong way.

Alonso is just a vocal (even criticizing the team!!), doesn't kiss a$$ with the press, whines and cries when he doesn't get his way...but I can tolerate that from him. I can even get over my anti-Ferrari-bias (yeah, I said it) when/if he and Vettel or Hamilton are battling on the track.

What's really pissing me off about the double points is that it's now aimed in Red Bull's favor. They'll suck at the beginning and a swear to christ if Vettel wins the championship at the last race because of the fucking double points I'm going to shoot him and then myself.

Lets stop the Vettel/RBR shitting and have a few laughs with Kimi:

1. Martin Brundle: “Kimi, you missed the presentation by Pele.”
Kimi : “Yeah.”
Martin: “Will you get over it?”
Kimi: “Yeah. I was having a shit.”

13. Interviewer: “The helmet has a special meaning for many drivers. How important is it to you?”
Kimi: “It protects my head.”

20. Interviewer: ”Do you have any special rituals when the helmet is concerned like many have?”
Kimi: “I wipe it so that I can see better.”

19. Interviewer: “The most exciting moment during the race weekend?”
Kimi: “I think so it’s the race start, always.”
Interviewer: “The most boring?”
Kimi: “Now.”

And they left out, "Leave me alone, I know what I'm doing"...

Seeing how teams keep FI engines together with the fuel restrictions will be fun. Lean burn characteristics are even more important now.

It's been explained to me (not sure it actually true) that at high RPM, its possible to a certain extent to 'out-run knock' where yeah you do get a explosion rather than an orderly flame front but in the time it takes to get the conditions in the cylinder ripe for that the piston is already moving downward, limiting the damage. With a short stroke engine and an RPM limit its probably going to be tough to do that. But hooray for direct injection to make it possible.

In for spectacular catastrophic engine failures. They probably wont be as cool as the 80s ones but still.

More race sim data from today's not quite finished testing.

Conspiracy Theory:
Also, I think Red Bull is going to come to Australia and post a top 5 time. They are basically saying they have no problems with the Renault engine, but have their own cooling issues. They are probably using it as n excuse to sandbag this year.

I think they have no reason to sandbag this year. They need data. Then can not prove the car with out it. Everyone looks genuinely frustrated at redbull.

But all in all I like Vettel a bit, everyone gets in a uproar about using team orders. Everyone is like if I was Masa I wouldn't move over. But when Vettel says screw this I'm faster than Mark , I'm passing! All you guys act like he's the bad guy

RBR posts a 1:35.x today. Still running very few laps though.

Merc is out due to a gearbox issue.

Also, Alonso is doing a race sim today, so we should have more data there.

Lotus and Caterham catch fire...interesting day for Renault engine'd teams!

This is why I don't think RBR are sandbagging. None of the Renault engine teams are doing well with it. Teams like Lotus and Caterham can't afford to miss track time like this.

Riccardo was 3rd fastest today.

Perhaps Newey figured out a compromise from the packaging/cooling standpoint.

The sandbagging thing was just more an idea to stir things up a bit. Today proves that RBR actually has a lot of pace as it sits today. The questions really lie in whether they can keep that pace up for the race.

I have no doubt in my mind that one of RBRs is going to be in the top 7 qualy spots for Melbourne. I can't make any claims for the race though.

I would laugh if the alternator issue is coming back to bite them with all the increased heat.

Yeah Redbull is going to have some pace, no doubt i think there chassis will be very good once they get the power train worked out. But Im not sure that they have the reliability to go into the first race with confidence. I think Merc and Mclaren were working on durability testing today both with gearbox issues.

Jenson said that tomorrow they will be working on Setup with the car. They have a very good understanding of the power train and drivability. But they need to work on balance and performance setup.

I can't wait for Q1

RBR has completed no laps today. Renault still on the low end. With Sauber completing 1 lap?

Laptimes are slower today due to conditions. Also...
Alonso:
"“I’d say that there are not huge differences in how you manage a race distance: without going into too much detail I can say that many things have stayed the same. Last year we had to manage tyres from the first lap and this year it’s the same, with the extra point that the car seems slower thanks to the increased weight and the reduction of the available aerodynamic downforce. You also have to manage fuel consumption and the batteries. There are therefore few big changes even if the time to complete the race distance will inevitably go up. The biggest differences this year will probably be seen between the race and qualifying because you will really be able to push hard on Saturdays.”

I can see the fia raising the fuel load available next year. Say 125kg and raising the min weight

Oh that'll make the teams happy...more weight.

Since we're speculating, how 'bout a return to fueling during pit stops?

No, the teams lobbied to get rid of it because of the heavy expensive equipment and how much danger it adds to a pit stop. Singapore and Massa, anyone?

I would love to see refueling, even if it was a limited fuel load, they could make 75kg tanks with 1 allowed refuel

Make them use dump tanks like NASCAR

If NASCAR can do it then Bernie can do it better!! :giggle:

Helmet Marko says RBR is TWO MONTHS behind schedule thanks to the problems during pre-season testing.

"The opening race comes at least two months too early for us," Marko told Servus TV. "This is a very serious matter. At the moment we do not know in what time frame it will be possible to catch up, or if it is possible at all."

Anyone have thoughts on Carl Haas trying to put together a F1 team in 2015?

I would love to see an american team, I think that most americans who watch would love to see an american team/driver. But i get the feeling that the Haas team is going to get a lot of resistance from the FIA and Bernie.

After the disgraceful USF1 team, i don't think that they are keen to allow another US team in. And i don't think that many US racing team realize the investment and commitment thats is F1. But i guess there is plenty of aerospace engineers in the US to take up the aero department.

^I think there has already been a statement that either the FIA or Haas has already put this off. He has an advantage in that he already has a wind tunnel, but I'm not sure he understands the top teams: Mercedes/McLaren/Ferrari/RBR are all around $400 million a year.......and that doesn't include all the necessary infrastructure.

Toyota spent BILLIONS in there failed attempt at F1.

It's yet another reason I'd like to see a real RRA, in reality, I'd like to see just a set spending cap.

Its my understanding that Gene Haas has already made his "bid" for an F1 grid slot. I think there is another team that is applying also.

Its definitely a good thing. I hope is more prepared than the USF1 team.

I disagree with that in general.
1) F1 is not really in any danger of losing its current position. One way to make that a reality though is upset the largest teams by implementing a spending cap.
2) Part of the challenege (and intrigue) in F1 is in the survival aspects of it.
3) I like the fact that back marker teams tend to get dropped. survival of the fittest type thing.
4) <speculative> spending caps are more likely to affect the employees of teams than the money being spent on stupid shit anyway.