Surely max Chilton is guaranteed that red bull seat. He was just bluffing of a second season in the marussia to speed red bull up.
Buemi is very highly rated in Red Bull... I think a lot of people don't consider Buemi because we all thought he was a bit overrated frankly.
Would be egg on face for a few of us (including me) if he did get the second seat and took it to Vettel, but I can't see that happening (+1 egg).
In some ways that makes him more likely to get the seat, he won't be likely to upset the apple cart...
Hopefully Red Bull will sign Raikkonen. If Vettel doesn't have a problem with it, neither should Marko or Horner. I don't think anyone on Red Bull's programme deserve the opportunity: Vergne rarely delivers in qualifying Ricciardo rarely delivers in the race. Da Costa has no experience. Buemi was replaced for a reason If they decide against Raikkonen but don't have enough faith in Vergne or Ricciardo, someone like Hulkenburg or Sutil would be a good choice. Who else? ... A lot of people on BBC's sportsday page are suggesting Di Resta. One in particular was hilarious - Steve Collins: Di Resta would be too competitive for Vettel and he wouldn't like it. Hulkenberg my guess. Someone who is happy to do with second. ..... LOL!
On driver line-ups, Horner says it's between Raikkonen, Vergne and Ricciardo. On engines, Red Bull wanted their own custom engine but the FIA has blocked that.
The FIA World Motor Sport Council (WMSC) has approved a raft of changes to the sporting and technical regulations for 2014, including a penalty points system for drivers, four two-day in season tests after European races and tyres designated for the first 30 minutes of Friday morning practice to encourage running. Most the changes have been agreed by the teams and therefore the WMSC decision is merely a rubber stamp, but a number will have a considerable effect on race weekends and the way teams work away from the track. The FIA released a statement on Friday outlining the changes. Changes made to the 2014 sporting regulations -Further to a request from Mercedes, it will be permitted to supply engines to a maximum of four Formula One teams in 2014. -A penalty point system for drivers will be introduced. If a driver accumulates more than 12 points he will be banned from the next race. Points will stay on the driver's licence for 12 months. The amount of points a driver may be given for infringements will vary from one to three depending upon the severity of the offence. -The procedure for a driver to be given the chance to give back any advantage he may have gained by leaving the track has been adopted. -A significant reduction in the amount of wind tunnel testing and CFD work has been imposed to help reduce costs and potentially allow two teams to share one wind tunnel. -Four two-day track tests will be allowed in season in place of the current eight one-day promotional days and the three-day young driver test. These will take place at tracks in Europe on the Tuesday and Wednesday after a race in order to ensure minimal additional resources are necessary. -Track testing will now also be permitted in January 2014 in order to allow earlier testing of the new power units. -For safety reasons all team personnel working on a car in a race pit stop will be required to wear head protection. -Each driver will be provided with one extra set of tyres for use only during the first 30 minutes of the first practice session on Friday, to encourage teams to take to the track at that time without having to worry about using valuable tyre wear. -A number of new regulations have been confirmed to govern the new, far more complex power units. It is agreed that only five power units may be used by each driver for the whole season. Any use of an additional complete power unit will result in that driver having to start the race from the pit lane. Any changes of individual elements above the permitted five, such as turbocharger, MGU or Energy Store, will result in a 10 grid place penalty. -No manufacturer will be allowed to homologate more than one power unit during the homologation period from 2014-2020. Changes to the homologated unit will continue to be permitted for installation, reliability or cost saving reasons. -Drivers must now use a gearbox for six consecutive events, an increase from the current five. -No car may use more than 100kg of fuel for the race, from the time the lights go out at the start of the race to the chequered flag. This will be monitored by the use of an FIA approved fuel flow meter. -The pit lane speed limit, which is currently set at 60km/h for the free practice sessions and 100km/h for the qualifying practice and race (60km/h for the whole event in Melbourne, Monaco and Singapore), has been amended so it is set at 80km/h for the whole event (except the three races mentioned which would stay at 60km/h for the whole event). This is for safety reasons, as most accidents happen during the race when the speed limit is higher; drivers also have very little chance to practice stopping from 100km/h until the race. Changes made to the 2014 technical regulations -Measures have been put in place to ensure that the cars do not incorporate a step in the chassis behind the nose. These changes will also ensure that a genuine low nose, introduced for safety reasons, is always used. -The minimum weight limit has been raised by 5kg, as the power unit is now likely to weigh more than originally expected. The weight distribution has also been changed accordingly. -Electronic control of the rear brake circuit is permitted in order to ensure consistent braking whilst energy is being recovered. -In order to ensure that side impact structures are more useful in an oblique impact and more consistent, they will become standard items made to a strictly laid out manufacturing process and fitted to the cars identically. The impact tests currently carried out will be replaced by static load push-off tests and squeeze tests. This will also help reduce costs as no team will need to develop their own structures. -In order to ensure that the cockpit rims either side of the driver's head are stronger, the amount of deflection during the static load tests has been reduced from 20mm to 5mm.
So in other words, Mercedes are supplying 4 teams next year. A step. The fact that apparently had the system been in place no-one would have been banned in the last season and a half, however, is disquieting. Huh? I thought this existed already. It's called "giving the place back". Makes sense with more on-track testing coming back. I thought Marussia shared Mclaren's wind tunnel already though and this runs the risk of allowing teams to put less well-tested parts out on track IMO, so I hope this has been well thought out. Given that promotional days and the young driver test were used as in-season tests, not surprising. Shame that we will be losing the young drivers' test though given that (as has been pointed out in Spare Parts) some of the drivers coming through look good and this is their best chance. Makes sense. Sensible. I.e. stop making the start of each practice session so boring. Interesting. Better hope the new power units are reliable! Interesting that the turbo is considered part of the engine, too. Same as ever. Better hope the gearboxes are reliable! Yay. Fuel saving mode. This is... kind of a weird one. I've never noticed an issue with a car using too much fuel. Can we stop messing around with the pit lane speed limit and just stick with one which we know is safe? The drivers have such trouble coming down from 100 km/h it's clear that it needs to be lowered. I hope this works. Good, unless it produces something even worse. Sensible Good, this has been an issue ever since they introduced KERS, Increase safety, reduce costs - excellent! Once again, safety is paramount. All in all good intentions can be seen.
A mate I saw from the trip to Spa last year who I met up with on Friday at Silverstone said that Eddie Jordan was talking about the subject about Vettel going to Ferrari and that it will be "sooner rather than later" and that he was being restricted from saying that on TV. And he also mentioned that Hulk was the prime target to replace Webber when he leaves.
maybe it won't be an immediate 'give the place back' call, but sent to stewards to look at then they decide and the place is given back maybe a few laps on
http://www1.skysports.com/formula-1...ing-Mark-Webber-at-Red-Bull-have-been-slashed Sky once again abusing their position as a news broadcaster to influence betting on Skybet.
You mean instead of giving them a drive-through? I suppose it could work, but it sounds very situational.
There's a lot of speculation here, but here's an early look at the 2014 engine pecking order: So as we know the FIA wanted the new power units to have the same power as current ones, but with greater efficiency (so in other words, V6 engine (590hp) + ERS (160hp) = V8 power (750hp)). Back in February, Renault did a press release for their 2014 engine where they revealed this: "Power output of the Internal Combustion Engine: > 600 horsepower". Renault had another press release recently but didn't give any updates about it's power, however last week Alain Prost did an interview where he mentioned that "the combustion engine generates around 600 bhp and the electric motors around 160 bhp" - which suggests that while Renault may exceed 600hp as promised in Feb, they probably won't exceed it by much. Ferrari haven't said nearly as much about their 2014 engine. The few bits of information they revealed in 2012 and early 2013 gave us nothing important. Today however, Luca Marmorini said "Next year, with an engine having somewhere between 600 and 650 horsepower and an additional 160 horsepower coming from the ERS". I doubt Marmorini would use the 650 figure unless his engine could perform close to (or even at) that level. Then there's Mercedes. When they revealed their engine in January, their Performance Powertrains managing director Andy Cowell gave an insight into what to expect from Mercedes in 2014: Cowell also told Sporting Life that he expected the units to reach the stage of being able to deliver the same performance in terms of lap time as this year. "We will be about there in terms of lap time compared to 2013," he said. "It's a stretchy target, it's very ambitious, but then this is Formula One.". Assuming a 90 second lap, 750hp over 90 seconds is roughly 690hp over 57 seconds added with 850hp for the remaining 33 seconds (ERS). Maybe it's too ambitious, but that's the only thing I can find about the Mercedes. So overall then: 1. Mercedes - 690hp (850hp with ERS) 2. Ferrari - 650hp (810hp with ERS) 3. Renault - 600hp (760hp with ERS) Just a final note, AMuS gave this bit of information a few days ago: I don't know who they're talking about when they use the 900hp figure but from what I've said above, Mercedes are closest to it.
By the way, does anyone know how much extra laptime Mercedes would gain if they did have a 40hp advantage? Today they have about 15-20hp over Ferrari and Renault and it doesn't seem to make much of a difference.
Aerodynamics & Drag In modern day F1, aerodynamics (and its efficiency in terms of drag) play a far bigger part in resulting lap time, than power. Equally, one might make a case for how available power is transmitted, rather than how much of it there is. Power Probably the most intuitive comparison is MotoGP v Moto2 bikes. The aerodynamics and grip levels of both are very similar (since a rider makes a very significant part of the total drag and the tyres are the same); but even with over 50% more engine capacity for the premier class â and a corresponding difference in power output â the lap times are very close. Thus, with other considerations all but eliminated from the equation, it should be seen that the massive difference in the power of these bikes gives very little pay-back to the stronger over a lap. Grip When the same logic is applied to F1, the differences become even smaller due to the fact that at most circuits it is how a car performs in corners that makes the biggest difference, because here an F1 car has a huge advantage over a bike, due to massive downforce and far, far more grip from much greater contact with the surface. And of course, we are never going to be talking of 50% differences in power between F1 cars anyway. Weight Assuming no differences in a vehicle's scrutineered (racing) weight, where power can be more significant is in straight line acceleration (not 'curved' acceleration because this is more tyre-limited, hence no differences in corners). But even with straight line acceleration, the rate of increase drops off rapidly as air resistance rises exponentially. This means that a small increase in top speed requires a disproportionately large increase in power to overcome an even larger increase in air-resistance. Transmission We should bear in mind that more power needs beefier components to transmit it, with a corresponding increase in weight. At some point, the extra power is more than offset by this extra weight. Thus there is an optimum, beyond which the extra power becomes counter-productive. This becomes even more important when cars are required to meet a minimum weight because the extra ballast for bringing the car up to this minimum allows it to be better placed, with a corresponding improvement in vehicle handling characteristics. Result At a guess, I'd hazard that 40bhp more power in an F1 car is worth a tiny difference in lap time, depending upon the circuit â probably in the order of 0.05 secs over a 1:20.000 lap. Far more important are power delivery and aerodynamics, as mentioned. - - -o0o- - - *Nonetheless, at some circuits the extra power can help offset chassis deficiencies â which tend to become less important in a straight line. Gradients will also be easier with more power, due to the fact that a greater part of the total resistance (which is always comprised of drag+surface friction) is coming from the track than normal. So hills out of straights â such as Spa's famous 'Eau Rouge' â would be the best places to notice any differences.
I think there was a lot of talk by Renault saying they were going in the direction of reliability and fuel consumption rather than power. Renault might not have the grunt, but it will hardly break down or run out of fuel while the other 2 will be like ticking time bombs. Plus I don't think RBR will allow themselves to be screwed over considering they helped them design this engine.
I imagine there will also be a lot of manouvering by the engine companies to try and get a break from the FIA to ensure their engine is 'equalised' to the others. Until the engines can be tested side by side by the FIA on dyno's all the press released have to be taken with a pinch of salt. Bearing in mind, over 25 years ago 1.5l turbo engines were getting close to 1400bhp in quali trim, and some 1100bhp in race trim, I can't reeally see that Renault can 'only' get 600bhp out of their new engine. It seems to me its the usual old crap about a certain team who will doubtless be whingeing already about engine disparity........ even though as a package, as Silver has said, they are going down a different route to pure power. Didn't stop RBR moaning their back teeth off when their previous Renaults had better fuel and torque figures than the others.
Kers currently gives a boost of 80bhp for seven seconds of a lap, but it's deployed by the driver in the seven seconds where it's most beneficial. So I'd guess it's worth a few tenths. Like Cosi says, power is relatively small differentiator between cars, and even comparing just the engines, power isn't the single most important factor. A more fuel efficient engine allows a team to fuel their car lighter for the start of the race. Cooling is also very important because if you can run smaller air intakes and therefore run with less drag, like Cosi said, drag squares with speed so if you're having to run with gaping air intakes to cool a high power engine you're going to end up losing time on the straights. Packaging is also critical, Red Bull reportedly ran a more lightweight Kers system so they could package the rear of the car tighter, proving that power isn't everything. Then how the power is delivered is also a big factor, the engines are far more complicated next season, presumably boost from the turbo will vary significantly from engine to engine, judging by the 100bhp difference between quali and the race in that AMUS quote, full boost will be worth around that value, but it will vary from different engines in terms of how much power they gain from it and how long they can use it during the race. Also, reliability is obviously huge. Next year the engines are supplied as power units including the ERS, turbos, electronics and exhaust. They only get five of these units per season, and if one component fails and they have to use a sixth they incur a ten place grid penalty. Personally that seems incredibly wasteful to me, I thought these rules were introduced to cut costs and prevent waste, binning a perfectly good turbo engine off because a battery fails seems to fly in the face of that to me, but they always do stuff like this.
I think remeber Renault saying that they hadnt run their engine at full revs when they showed it to the press to stop competitiors making a comparison. Not sure if this would fall in line with their slightly conservative power figure?
I think this is a very fair point, ASC. I would be very surprised at any competitor wanting to claim a high output.
