Williams has Mercedes as well….
Australian Grand Prix 2014, Melbourne - Race 1/19
- Thread starter Shimmy
- Start date
2 corners and 2 offs for Maldonado.
Seems that he's kept to his regular performance level.
And the engine's shut down and he's freewheeling down the pitlane entrance. That could have been dodgy.
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Smoke in the cockpit?
Reminds me of Raikkonen's KERS failure in the Ferrari in 2009 *iirc*
Seems that he's kept to his regular performance level.
And the engine's shut down and he's freewheeling down the pitlane entrance. That could have been dodgy.
[edit]
Smoke in the cockpit?
Reminds me of Raikkonen's KERS failure in the Ferrari in 2009 *iirc*
not the first to break, can't have it all.Nothing like a good hot flash eh?
Caporegime
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decided to sleep through FP1 and get up for fp2. Seems some interesting stuff happened, Hamilton's failure not so much a failure as a smaller issue. Anyone following testing would have picked up on a lot of software issues. For testing they would gradually turn up the software shutdown safety limits as they wanted to push the engine harder and eventually beyond what they hoped to run throughout the season. I can imagine both these things combine to the point where software could cause quite a few unexpected shutdowns throughtout the year.
This may have been an intended one that saved them from the engine blowing up 3 laps later, or could have been an accidental bug in the software, if an engine blows with 5 laps to go, okay, if an engine shuts down because of a safety setting that is wrong and ruins the end of a race... I'll be disappointed.
Lap times were pretty god damned tame, 1:27.2 fastest in FP1 last year, wasn't at all expecting them to max it out but they are 5 seconds off, they dropped to 1:25's in FP2 last year, and 1:27 in Q3 after rain in Q1. Though I presume different tracks will show changing difference in times vs last year, Bahrain fastest in testing was pretty close to Bahrain pole from the previous year, the pretty much 7 second gap is huge.
My guess would be times currently are completely miles off FP3/q1-3 times, but the real question is who will improve the most. Could be that say Merc move up to a 1:28, Mclaren stop at a 1:30 and Red Bull stay at a 1:32, or they all move up together and this is the same order. Not sure anything can be known in terms of times/speed yet, not even sure qualifying will be a true reflection, maybe a couple teams scared of breaking the car will be happy to just use qualifying as further testing. Stick on some harder tyres, fuel up and stay out the entire session at relatively low speeds just to get more laps done.
This may have been an intended one that saved them from the engine blowing up 3 laps later, or could have been an accidental bug in the software, if an engine blows with 5 laps to go, okay, if an engine shuts down because of a safety setting that is wrong and ruins the end of a race... I'll be disappointed.
Lap times were pretty god damned tame, 1:27.2 fastest in FP1 last year, wasn't at all expecting them to max it out but they are 5 seconds off, they dropped to 1:25's in FP2 last year, and 1:27 in Q3 after rain in Q1. Though I presume different tracks will show changing difference in times vs last year, Bahrain fastest in testing was pretty close to Bahrain pole from the previous year, the pretty much 7 second gap is huge.
My guess would be times currently are completely miles off FP3/q1-3 times, but the real question is who will improve the most. Could be that say Merc move up to a 1:28, Mclaren stop at a 1:30 and Red Bull stay at a 1:32, or they all move up together and this is the same order. Not sure anything can be known in terms of times/speed yet, not even sure qualifying will be a true reflection, maybe a couple teams scared of breaking the car will be happy to just use qualifying as further testing. Stick on some harder tyres, fuel up and stay out the entire session at relatively low speeds just to get more laps done.
I'm sitting opposite the pits/podium, and the engine sound is pretty disappointing to be honest. The V8 Sipercars were louder.
One thing you can notice is that the Renault engines sound shockingly terrible at pit limiter and slow speed pull away, but they sound fine at full chat.
There's a hell of a lot of turbo chatter, when they pull away, they sound like a mix of electric hedge trimmer and a big HGV turbo spool up. The engines sound pretty good, but they're just too quiet.
DC drove the RB7 round earlier at full speed, you could hear it all the way round the circuit. You lose the sound I the new cars after they're round the corner!
One thing you can notice is that the Renault engines sound shockingly terrible at pit limiter and slow speed pull away, but they sound fine at full chat.
There's a hell of a lot of turbo chatter, when they pull away, they sound like a mix of electric hedge trimmer and a big HGV turbo spool up. The engines sound pretty good, but they're just too quiet.
DC drove the RB7 round earlier at full speed, you could hear it all the way round the circuit. You lose the sound I the new cars after they're round the corner!
I thought the cameras had to be in pre-defined areas on the side of the nose this year?
Caporegime
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Quite a few broken engine parts needing replacing already but no penalties till you need to actually use something beyond your initial allocation.
OPps, Grosjean power steering not working and "false neutral", not a clue what that means, just that the steering wheel is saying neutral and not keeping track of which gear it's in?
Personally in terms of sound, the one race I went to gave me headaches, but I've always been prone to migraines
So I'm not a huge fan of huge loud engines and never will be. Outside of at the track knowing when to look for the car coming I don't really car much more than that.
Without knowing how and when they did their fastest laps in FP1, I presume they are all on the pace much quicker and the times will come down. 7 seconds down on last years times I can only presume there is a huge amount of lap time to come in.
OPps, Grosjean power steering not working and "false neutral", not a clue what that means, just that the steering wheel is saying neutral and not keeping track of which gear it's in?
Personally in terms of sound, the one race I went to gave me headaches, but I've always been prone to migraines
So I'm not a huge fan of huge loud engines and never will be. Outside of at the track knowing when to look for the car coming I don't really car much more than that. Without knowing how and when they did their fastest laps in FP1, I presume they are all on the pace much quicker and the times will come down. 7 seconds down on last years times I can only presume there is a huge amount of lap time to come in.
Caporegime
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vettel and Alonso doing some pretty big power slides, losing a lot of control under braking. How much is that the car and how much is that them just finding the limits, because practice is when they need to take those risks and find those limits. Vettle has had the least chance in testing to just throw that car into corners.
Times have to be able to come down loads based on Vettel/Alonso's times and several really bad corners.
Times have to be able to come down loads based on Vettel/Alonso's times and several really bad corners.
I thought this as well. I'm not impressed so far with any car, they sound crap and are very skittish.
Caporegime
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Some of these shots down a longer straight where the car looks fairly normal at a distance but the closer it comes, the more reflections you can see and the dong seems to appear out of nowhere 
Times coming down and I didn't realise they were missing maybe a second to the supersoft tyre they used last year so not too bad.
They haven't shown an awful lot of either Merc's fast laps while they've shown loads of Alonso and Vettel's laps. The Merc does seem to be almost cruising around while Alonso/Vettel do seem rather all over the place, sliding into many corners. The main area they seem to have problems is braking into corners then losing a little control and ending up in a bit of a power slide. Because of that it does feel like Merc have something left over while Alonso/Vettel are leaving it pretty much all out there on the track.
Wow, that Lotus is ALL over the place, looking terrible and still 5 seconds down though he may be doing race fuel as they are desperate for laps but still slow and not good, and with the other car not running, only just gone faster than Chiltern with that lap.
Times coming down and I didn't realise they were missing maybe a second to the supersoft tyre they used last year so not too bad.
They haven't shown an awful lot of either Merc's fast laps while they've shown loads of Alonso and Vettel's laps. The Merc does seem to be almost cruising around while Alonso/Vettel do seem rather all over the place, sliding into many corners. The main area they seem to have problems is braking into corners then losing a little control and ending up in a bit of a power slide. Because of that it does feel like Merc have something left over while Alonso/Vettel are leaving it pretty much all out there on the track.
Wow, that Lotus is ALL over the place, looking terrible and still 5 seconds down though he may be doing race fuel as they are desperate for laps but still slow and not good, and with the other car not running, only just gone faster than Chiltern with that lap.
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Buttons first radio message of the year: "can we talk about balance?".
Really interested in RBRs interpretation of the camera rules. I expect a number of other teams with the higher noses (I.e. everyone other than Ferrari and Mercedes) to copy the idea.
Really interested in RBRs interpretation of the camera rules. I expect a number of other teams with the higher noses (I.e. everyone other than Ferrari and Mercedes) to copy the idea.
Caporegime
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Don't they have the camera out off the nose so they can do this whole 180 turn on the camera? Surely RBR's nose prevents them doing that completely? Or is it like before and they only nominate a few teams to have those cameras per race, in which case would RBR require a sticking out camera nose for those races only potentially?
Presuming(with no certainty at all) that they are all doing the highest fuel simulation on softs then it would seem potentially Merc capable of sub 1:34, Williams closer to a 1:35, Mclaren seem to be around the 1:35 mark, Red Bull I think closer to 1:35's.
They were doing different amount of laps though so if Merc's numbers were aiming at 5 laps less. Wouldn't be surprised to see each driver trying both, so one aiming at 12-15 laps faster, one towards 20 laps slower, and see what tyre deg is like on different paces, then chose the best one for the race.
Presuming(with no certainty at all) that they are all doing the highest fuel simulation on softs then it would seem potentially Merc capable of sub 1:34, Williams closer to a 1:35, Mclaren seem to be around the 1:35 mark, Red Bull I think closer to 1:35's.
They were doing different amount of laps though so if Merc's numbers were aiming at 5 laps less. Wouldn't be surprised to see each driver trying both, so one aiming at 12-15 laps faster, one towards 20 laps slower, and see what tyre deg is like on different paces, then chose the best one for the race.