F1 Testing 2015: Week 2 Barcelona (19th - 22nd)

this_is_gav said:
The times will be removed for cutting the chicane or using the old layout. It's the same every year. I wish they'd just ditch the bloody thing and use the old track, as MotoGP does. I understand why it was introduced, but it's hardly helped generate more overtaking, even with DRS coming into play.
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The chicane wasnt introduced to aid overtaking.
 
this_is_gav said:
I always thought overtaking was the reason, given that safety would be more of an issue in MotoGP than in F1, but apparently not. I guess the bikes are deemed to go around there slow enough to not require any change.
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It was too slow the cars down for when they approach turn 1 as there isn't that much runoff and no room to increase it. If you have a brake failure your going to end up in a bank full of spectators at quite a rapid pace.

Its got nothing to do with the final corner, which seems even more of a shame as the final turrn used to be epic :(. Its been ruined through no fault of its own.
 
Mr Jack said:
She's been doing race simulation runs though, hasn't she? So she'll be a lot more fuel-heavy than the others.
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Pace doesn't seem too bad, though it would be nice for well her to get a representative pace lap as if they are the only team to do full fuel she'll look comparatively awful.

Looking at barca laptimes from the race

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2014/05/11/2014-spanish-grand-prix-lap-times-fastest-laps/

Effectively Mercedes(team) times were 1:31-32 in the first stint, about a second faster in the second stint and finishing up with 1:29-30's for the final stint.

Most other teams were more like 1:33-34/1:32-33/1:30-31 in the three stints. Vettel was faster in the final stint with 1:28-30's but he burned through tires and was one of the only ones on a 4th set in a final short stint on low fuel.

So depending on where Wolff is in those runs, 1:30's that she is pushing is about on par with the final stint as compared to last year in a race. Warmer temps and being more aggressive on the engines in the season than early in a test week I would say that pace doesn't seem bad at all. Only 4 cars posted a below 1:30 time in the race.
 
DiCe! said:
Just one issue after another it seems, I know its testing and so on but how would you not spot these issues on a dyno?
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Nismo said:
Sounds like bad QC on a particular part (rushed?), could happen any-time even with something ultra-reliable.
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One of the fundamental problems of development when you start from way behind the curve is you have to prioritise where you spend time and money. Remember Renault ran a similarly faulty part in Jerez, some part of the water pump iirc. Renault effectively said they had so much work to do they deemed that one part simple enough to basically make a basic design without putting a huge amount of effort into research or testing on it, just presuming something so simple would be hard to screw up. Then.... it screwed up. While it was an easy part to fix and an easy part to make right in the first place, had they put more time into that before they'd have put less time into something else.

Hindsight in those situations is easy but when you've got probably thousands of parts ahead of time it's hard to know where to invest that time and money. The simplest parts are maybe the easiest to under estimate how much work is needed, with them thinking "we've made a million of these before so that should work, don't waste time on it" but it ending up costing them in the end.

You just can't easily condense 4 well used high quality years of development into two years, there will be sacrifices, such as simple bits having less time spent on them and then ending up failing as a result. If Merc had spent 4 years with bad engineers producing a meh engine then a brilliant team MAY be able to match/beat it in less time, but unfortunately for Honda(and Renault/Ferrari) Mercedes hit it out of the park, they spent longer and produced a brilliant engine as a result. Honda are rushing and these things should pretty much be expected.

The big question is, if a conservative simple chassis/car design like a Caterham or Marussia banging in laps at Jerez without running into electrical problems like Mclaren did(supposedly not mostly engine problems) have done enough laps to find this problem and it would have been fixed way before this test?
 
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Skeeter said:
It was too slow the cars down for when they approach turn 1 as there isn't that much runoff and no room to increase it. If you have a brake failure your going to end up in a bank full of spectators at quite a rapid pace.

Its got nothing to do with the final corner, which seems even more of a shame as the final turrn used to be epic :(. Its been ruined through no fault of its own.
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If that was the reason, why isn't DRS disabled along the start/finish straight?
 
LOL, Wolff and Nasr appear to have collided, causing a red.

Edit: Significant damage to the Sauber:
B-NhSqFIMAApD_L.jpg
 
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Haven't seen cause yet, it's possible the Sauber just lost it but was going up the inside of Wolff so she had to dive off the track to avoid him and got stuck in the gravel. Largely as the rear wing of Nasr is gone but the front wing on the Williams appears completely fine.
 
Does anyone know if FI are running the new Merc engine or the old one? You'd presume they'd want to stick a new one in to get running on it but if they really have money problems they both may not have paid for new ones yet and may not want to kill a new engine, at least not while going around in the old car.

Either way could be interesting to see where the FI ends up with last years driver, this years tires and either engine. Old engine gives us a car going around at least years pace for comparison, old car with new engine could give us an idea of how much the engine alone improves the car.
 
There's no obvious damage to the Williams at all. The rear wing is clearly there, all the wheels appear to be at least roughly where they should be and the front wing (not entirely clear on the shot above) is clearly in one piece on the closer image Autosport have posted (where they've collected the Sauber and it's parked on a truck next to the Williams).

Clearly the Sauber has either heavily contacted the barrier on our left (outside of turn 5) or he's been upside down.



drunkenmaster said:
Does anyone know if FI are running the new Merc engine or the old one? You'd presume they'd want to stick a new one in to get running on it but if they really have money problems they both may not have paid for new ones yet and may not want to kill a new engine, at least not while going around in the old car.

Either way could be interesting to see where the FI ends up with last years driver, this years tires and either engine. Old engine gives us a car going around at least years pace for comparison, old car with new engine could give us an idea of how much the engine alone improves the car.
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Almost certainly the old engine. Even if the mounts are the same, there will be different cooling needs, bodywork, etc.

They just using this to compare the tyres from last year to this to get some data on them.
 
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