They may not have the best car, but they have been flawless in every other department, pit stops, strategy and reliability. The last time Alonso DNF'd because of reliability was Malaysia 2010, 40 Races ago...crazy stat! If they can get their car to 3rd/4th fastest then Alonso has a fighting chance.
Ferrari and Shell have been playing with Redex Ferrari boosted by more powerful Shell fuel for Barcelona
It pretty much is but i thinks just certain additives to raise the octane are banned and the composition of different elements have to match pump fuel. They do have labs working on the fuel but the regulatory restrictions are so tight the HP gains are usually in the low single figures.
I know they brought it in to ban the chemical mixtures that were in use at one point (I think BASF were making 'fuel' at one point for F1 teams) but didn;t realise there was still some room for development with it, other than the normal eveolution of pump fuels you can buy on the forecourt these days. Good job Ferrari have an unlimited budget, I can't afford to put V-Power into my car
To my (limited) knowledge, the fuel mixture can only contain compounds found in 'fuel pump' petrol, but the manufacturers can vary the composition of the fuel. This allows quite a lot of scope in fuel development, seeing as some compounds may be present on the ppm scale in 'regular' petrol, but at say 1% can significantly increase power. The chemistry is a bit suspect in places, but this F1 Technical article sheds some light. Edit: Oh, and here are the technical regulations governing fuel.
I posted the video in the Monaco thread but the information from Fry's interview is relevant here. Fry on Spain updates: "All the bits added performance, some just a little bit less than we were expecting so all in all I think everyone is reasonably happy with the update we made" (1:28-1:36) Fry on Monaco: "We got a few more small updates that adds a little bit more downforce to the car" (5:55-5:59) Fry on future updates: "We've got a different rear wing and front wing package for Canada, which is obviously slightly different in downforce level, and then we're still working on the exhaust system, there'll be versions that that we'll test" (7:07-7:20) DDRS for Canada maybe.
Front bulkhead on Thursday: please log in to view this image Front bulkhead on Saturday: please log in to view this image Getting ready to incorporate a DDRS?
With regard to fuel, i had a friend that used to Import his fuel from the states to race with as the octance % was higher, yet still below 100%. As with everything in motor-racing it the rules tend to be read as what isn't actually written as banned rather than what is.
Hamilton sure Ferrari will give Alonso a car to stay in the championship fight Hamilton also hinted that Alonso will only become harder to beat once he and Ferrari get on top of the F2012 as the season goes on. Finally... please log in to view this image
Autosprint say Ferrari will test their original exhaust in Canada. http://www.auto.it/autosprint/formula_1/2012/06/04-11125/Ferrari: in Canada con scarichi "nuovi"
My understanding of that is a bit hit or miss but its saying they're looking to gain in traction from this upgrade? The side effect being that they may loose race pace if the exhaust goes to town on the rear tyres like last time. Canada is usually cool so that should help but its quite a slippy track which means added rear slip.
Going off Monaco images it looks pretty similar to me. New in what way? It may be slightly more curved at the front but I'm not sure.
