F1 Testing 2016: Week 1 Barcelona (22nd - 25th)

I'm not surprised that Arai has gone. I appreciate that this isn't the final race engine and these are early days of testing, but the McLaren is already 10 mph slower than Mercedes-powered cars on the straight. At least it appears to be more reliable so far this season...
 
The way Ted described the Honda testing strategy is rather worrying.

They are running a bunch of development parts here. And then they will run a new bunch of development parts at the 2nd test. And then they will just "see what works" and throw the best bits together for Melbourne.

So not only do they not really seem to have any clue as to what bits work and what bits don't, but they could also turn up to Melbourne with an engine (which will be used for 1/5 of the season, hopefully) that is in a mix and match specification of parts thats never been tested.

It all sounds very similar to how they went through the entire 2015 campaign, throwing parts at the engine praying that something worked.

:/
 
Pretty much, I'm not sure who Ted heard that from, would have been nice if he said someone at Mclaren told him that or it's just a rumour in the paddock. Because that rumour has been around as speculation for the past few weeks and frankly the way Ted/Sky are now it wouldn't surprise me if he just used that and took it as fact.

Aside from the fact that engine homologation needs to both be done by 28th Feb AND have the plans for that engine by 14th Feb which obviously has already happened, it as you say suggests the biggest problem for Honda remains... dyno testing.

They should at this stage have several engines running 24/7 and KNOW which set of parts IS better. That they don't is worrying and to me simply reinforces the idea that their testing in the lab simply isn't anywhere near good enough.

One engine maker brought an engine to Australia that wasn't used in testing last year, Renault... they changed it between testing and the first race with the piston update and wow did that not go well for them. Taking a rushed 'new' engine spec that you haven't tested screams disaster.
 
Playing devils advocate and presuming the worst, if McLaren wanted to ditch Honda, do we think anyone would want to supply them engines, given the RBR/STR saga?
 
Kris_90 said:
I think Merc and Ferrari would sell them one year old engines now the precedent has been set with STR.
Click to expand...

McLaren is a direct road car vival to Ferrari and Mercedes. I can't see any way ether of them would want to stick engines in the back of a McLaren. The McLaren/Mercedes partnership went its separate ways on both road and track a while back and I can't see either side wanting to rekindle it, and there's not a hope in hell that Ferrari would even entertain discussing the potential to supply their long term F1 rivals.

Which leaves Renault, who seem reluctant to supply anyone. Have McLaren ever used Renault power before?
 
It would mean starting an F1 engine division from scratch. They aren't geared up for it as they have partnered with Honda and let them handle that. You'd be looking at a few years and lots of money for them to make their own engine.
 
Day 2 mega album:
http://imgur.com/a/5FGyE

Liking the RB12 livery more and more, looking very tight.
f1-bar11.jpg
 
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