Yeah they wanted to keep the "jewel of an engine - Ron Dennis" to themselves. They should have given them free to Manor in 2015 and kept them a float.
McLaren Honda
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Yeah they wanted to keep the "jewel of an engine - Ron Dennis" to themselves. They should have given them free to Manor in 2015 and kept them a float.
Yes, and yes. Ron Dennis blocked Honda supplying any other teams as he wanted exclusivity, but it actually works against an engine supplier as the more data they get, the more they can develop. With testing so limited, having more than one team running your engine is essential, and the money earned from selling engines can be put back into the engine development.
Deleted member 651465
D
Deleted member 651465
They had a good idea how Merc built their engine last year.
They knew where they went wrong (small turbo IIRC).
Even a monkey could work out that they simply needed to copy and paste and tweak the design to suit them. I honestly fear for their future.
They knew where they went wrong (small turbo IIRC).
Even a monkey could work out that they simply needed to copy and paste and tweak the design to suit them. I honestly fear for their future.
I am a long time McLaren fan and I too am concerned for there future. The big question is what happens to Honda? Do they walk away from F1? Do the FIA and Liberty Media stand back and let that happen? Is it in Mercedes, Renault and Ferrari's interest that a huge global brand like Honda leave F1.
Soldato
Given the fundamental problems they're suffering from (such as the oil tank issue and the failure they can't diagnose) I'm not sure a second team would help at the moment. They have to get the basics right first.
2016 wasn't too bad in this regard (compared to 2015 and thus far in 2017) so they might have benefited last season from having data from multiple teams, but as things stands and the shear number of issues they've had (was it 5 engines they used in 4 days on 1 car?) I think they'd struggle to supply any more teams.
They already did once before because the board didn't want to look like losers. Ironically, Brawn then won with all the work put in by Honda and a Mercedes engine, making Honda look even more clueless. This must be even worse, because all the blame is landing on Honda because their engines aren't fast or reliable, we're not even able to see if there are problems with the Maclaren chassis. How long are the Honda board going to stick it out before they lose too much face?
They fixed the oil tank issue, going by Ted's video last week. I think its a bit much to write them off completely just yet.
Caporegime
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The biggest issue is after March 2014 it was clear the split turbo and more importantly, a HUGE turbo was the way to go.... then almost a year later they brought that tiny turbo'd compact engine to the 2015 season. They are the only team who had a chance to see what the other guys were doing and decided hey, engine matters a lot, we shouldn't compromise the engine for a little aero gain and we definitely don't want a smaller turbo than Renault and Ferrari, we want something like Merc..... then they brought the smallest turbo of anyone a year later. It's genuinely pathetic.
Soldato
With a plaster so McLaren could start aero work and the car could only complete a handful of laps at a time. The fact remains that a fairly fundamental flaw existed in the first place, not that it was fixed. No other team has suffered issues like these as far as we know (after the initial issues in 2014 (2015 for Honda)). The Ferrari unit last year was renowned for unreliability early on, but that was in a completely different league compared to any season Honda have had.
Don't get me wrong, I really hope Honda come good, but literally nothing has changed in 3 years. Every single pre-season the same excuses are brought out, then come the season things have improved, but they're still miles off everyone else.
Caporegime
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There is no good having a global brand involved making a fool of themselves. Honda are damaging their own name, damaging Mclaren(though largely their own fault to, them putting large design limitations in place on Honda) and ultimately having two cars constantly dropping out of races and such a big team fail so consistently which also means they weren't really providing much in race entertainment is not good for F1 by any means.
I'd be happy if they'd already given it up as chasing something that won't happen now. Let Mclaren, particularly without Dennis involved, make a better choice and take a Renault engine or something. Ultimately the way the other three engines stand Renault is the only engine for which they aren't the best team using their own engine and are quite heavily invested in making every Renault using team look as good as possible.
Soldato
My other concern than the damage to Honda (and Renault) is that the problems suffered are going to deter other manufacturers from entering the sport. Should Mercedes leave, which they might well do at some point as they can only lose from here, and should Honda leave, as they won't suffer this embarrassment indefinitely, then you're left with Ferrari and Renault, the latter of which is notorious for coming and going from the sport every few years.
Who is seriously going to enter given what's happened since 2014? The cost is massive and the risk is huge. As businesses go, they're hardly selling points. Ford won't, GA won't, Toyota and BMW missed the boat, VW group has far bigger issues at the moment, Cosworth and indeed most companies don't have anywhere near the resources for this tech. Who's left?
The oil tank wasn't fixed, it needs a complete redesign, Mclaren just went slower in testing last week. It sounds like they will have the full race engine this week.
Andi.
Soldato
IIRC the toothless guy is a Spanish comedian telling a story about a job he had when he was younger where he ended up losing a lot of Paella dishes in the sea.
I totally agree with your points in relation to McLaren moving on to another well represented and established engine manufacturer. What I don't understand is why Honda decided to return to F1 under a very restrictive testing environment with only one team. Yes I know Ron had big say in what happened but did no one at Honda look at this mighty challenge and think this is impossible with only one team returning data. Both companies reputations have taken a serious hammering of late.
Soldato
The heads are starting to roll http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/39183145
Sounds like he left rather than being given the chop. Honda have never wanted help.
Andi.
Andi.
Well at least McLaren are putting the foot down and sort this mess out.
Caporegime
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They definitely didn't want to be outwardly poaching top guys from other teams after they entered because it only signifies they are failures and whoever it is from another team is coming in to fix it. But the guy was there from 2013.
The rumour being he left because he wasn't being listened to, however would he have stayed there since 2013 being ignored, not too likely. People who are being ignored now but weren't a couple of years ago makes me think he was more involved with the bad concept and now he's being marginalised as he was part of that team that failed.
As for Mclaren putting their foot down... there isn't much indication of that, a guy choosing to leave because the team doesn't listen to him doesn't really give any insight into what Mclaren are saying. Also Mclaren/Dennis are hugely responsible for the mess themselves, insisting on size zero(which they're moving away from for that flared air exit/under cut) which required a smaller engine and insisting it had to be 2015 to enter. Honda made a bad engine but I don't think Ferrari or Merc would have come close to the engines they have both in speed or reliability, if their development program had been cut in half and then trying to both develop new engine while constantly trying to fix the other stuff that isn't working yet. Honda were utterly moronic to agree to such a deal, but Mclaren both obviously approached Honda and gave them undeniably stupid design goals to try and achieve. Even if they'd relaxed the sizing demands it's unlikely they'd have made something genuinely good in 18 months, but considering how many failures over the past two years have been compress/mgu-h related and considering how much easier those would have been to improve and get more performance from in a larger package... I think the majority of the blame goes to Mclaren.