More F1 splits

andicole0

andicole0

andicole0

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It now looks like Red Bull & Renault could split at the end of 2018. So if TR do well with Honda could we see RB Honda?
In the end though it does appear that teams without their own engine are all a bit disillusioned.
Andi.
 
The whole engine situation is real mess.

We've got changes coming in 2021 and other potential suppliers with Aston/Cosworth and talks of VAG group maybe getting involved somehow. I think some teams are going to be setting themselves up for swapping supply closer to that time.

RB haven't been happy with Renault for a long time and it's letting down their season. Max is a million miles away from Ric on points this season due to unreliability. That's a huge hit for the team who should be all over Ferrari at this stage.

There could be opportunities down the line for cheap engines and/or sponsorship deals for those willing to take a risk. With the state of the Honda situation, nobody is going to come in now without really having done their homework and have something reliable and competitive to bring to the table as they face the same ridicule and embarrassment. But being unproven and little way of really testing them without signing big contracts, the risk means they'll be cheap which for teams like Red Bull is a big advantage.

We shall see. I'd like to see disparity between the engines become smaller with a more exciting development race in place. Unreliability can be interesting, but only when they're fighting at the front and pushing to the limit. I don't want to see any more weak power units being nursed around at the back only to fail anyway.
 
andicole0 said:
It now looks like Red Bull & Renault could split at the end of 2018. So if TR do well with Honda could we see RB Honda?
In the end though it does appear that teams without their own engine are all a bit disillusioned.
Andi.
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95% of everything right now is people jumping to conclusions. Even Alonso sticking with Mclaren because of a switch to Renault seems to be jumping to conclusions. I mean ultimately Alonso has stuck to his story of "I don't care about second places, I came here for a chance to win again".... so how does Renault at Mclaren add up to likely to win soon? If Mclaren got a Mercedes I could see him staying thinking he could win, but getting the third best engine instead of the 4th is according to him, pointless. So while a lot of people are saying Mclaren switched to Renault to appease Alonso that is just a crappy narrative people are jumping to. To me Mclaren have left Honda because Honda are a complete joke, if Alonso stays is a separate matter and for me if Alonso stays it proves he was at Mclaren for the money and all this stuff about not wanting second places and believing Mclaren was his best chance of a title is an excuse for him grabbing money. I said so back at the time, he wanted out of Ferrari, screwed himself out of any options when all the competitive teams moved behind his back and he was left with moving to a different sport or taking the 30-40mil a year from Mclaren. Now, I wouldn't turn down that money, but I also wouldn't dress it up as I don't care about second places, etc.

If he's true to his word, he's off, if he stays he was always there for the money. Anyway, the whole RBR are looking at Honda for 2019 is also a random narrative that gives the press something to say.

Mclaren just left Honda because they are an embarrassment and don't believe they can be remotely competitive next year either, but RBR from the outside massively outscoring a similar budget team who have their own reliability problems are considering a move to an insanely less reliable team with far worse problems and far worse performance.... nonsense.

If Honda suddenly came good in 2018 that might make people move to them in 2019, but Mclaren might go back, RBR could switch engines, so could Williams or anyone else. Right now the situation for RBR is the same situation as 3 years ago or 10 years ago, they'll take the best engine available to them at any given moment in time if and when they can move. There is zero indication, like literally not one little sign anywhere, that Honda will be better than Renault at any time so there is no chance RBR are considering switching engines, none at all. If Honda turn around their engine, of course they'd consider changing but so what. If Renault had an engine as good and as reliable as Ferrari, if Honda had a better engine than Renault they'd still consider switching.

The only things we know are, RBR has repeatedly commented on TR being a financial burden with little reward now, there have been rumours of them trying to find a buyer for TR for a few years and have been gaining strength in the past 18 months. The only thing the latest deal points to is that Honda were willing to give up more sponsorship money than Renault and having Honda in the TR reduces the financial burden while also lining up TR for being the most likely team Honda might consider buying if they wanted to run a full team which seems fairly likely. Anything else is seemingly people jumping to conclusions.
 
drunkenmaster said:
95% of everything right now is people jumping to conclusions. Even Alonso sticking with Mclaren because of a switch to Renault seems to be jumping to conclusions. SNIP
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Exactly, but the reality would be boring so let's have fun while the sun shines.
Nothing wrong with a bit of speculation.
Andi.

PS Seems Renault want to split from RB.
 
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drunkenmaster said:
95% of everything right now is people jumping to conclusions. Even Alonso sticking with Mclaren because of a switch to Renault seems to be jumping to conclusions. I mean ultimately Alonso has stuck to his story of "I don't care about second places, I came here for a chance to win again".... so how does Renault at Mclaren add up to likely to win soon? If Mclaren got a Mercedes I could see him staying thinking he could win, but getting the third best engine instead of the 4th is according to him, pointless. So while a lot of people are saying Mclaren switched to Renault to appease Alonso that is just a crappy narrative people are jumping to. To me Mclaren have left Honda because Honda are a complete joke, if Alonso stays is a separate matter and for me if Alonso stays it proves he was at Mclaren for the money and all this stuff about not wanting second places and believing Mclaren was his best chance of a title is an excuse for him grabbing money. I said so back at the time, he wanted out of Ferrari, screwed himself out of any options when all the competitive teams moved behind his back and he was left with moving to a different sport or taking the 30-40mil a year from Mclaren. Now, I wouldn't turn down that money, but I also wouldn't dress it up as I don't care about second places, etc.

If he's true to his word, he's off, if he stays he was always there for the money. Anyway, the whole RBR are looking at Honda for 2019 is also a random narrative that gives the press something to say.

Mclaren just left Honda because they are an embarrassment and don't believe they can be remotely competitive next year either, but RBR from the outside massively outscoring a similar budget team who have their own reliability problems are considering a move to an insanely less reliable team with far worse problems and far worse performance.... nonsense.

If Honda suddenly came good in 2018 that might make people move to them in 2019, but Mclaren might go back, RBR could switch engines, so could Williams or anyone else. Right now the situation for RBR is the same situation as 3 years ago or 10 years ago, they'll take the best engine available to them at any given moment in time if and when they can move. There is zero indication, like literally not one little sign anywhere, that Honda will be better than Renault at any time so there is no chance RBR are considering switching engines, none at all. If Honda turn around their engine, of course they'd consider changing but so what. If Renault had an engine as good and as reliable as Ferrari, if Honda had a better engine than Renault they'd still consider switching.

The only things we know are, RBR has repeatedly commented on TR being a financial burden with little reward now, there have been rumours of them trying to find a buyer for TR for a few years and have been gaining strength in the past 18 months. The only thing the latest deal points to is that Honda were willing to give up more sponsorship money than Renault and having Honda in the TR reduces the financial burden while also lining up TR for being the most likely team Honda might consider buying if they wanted to run a full team which seems fairly likely. Anything else is seemingly people jumping to conclusions.
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Well there is a much better "chance" of winning with a Renault than a Honda. In fact Renault engines have already won a race this season, Honda hasn't even been close. The Renault engine is getting better slowly, almost all analysts, believe it will pretty much be on par with the Ferrari et al next years. After-all there is the law of diminishing returns.
 
englishpremier said:
Well there is a much better "chance" of winning with a Renault than a Honda. In fact Renault engines have already won a race this season, Honda hasn't even been close. The Renault engine is getting better slowly, almost all analysts, believe it will pretty much be on par with the Ferrari et al next years. After-all there is the law of diminishing returns.
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Not sure what your point is, Alonso's response to Ferrari winning races was, winning races doesn't matter, winning championships does. I've seen zero analysts anywhere suggests Renault is expected to be at Ferrari level on the engine next year and there is no reason to believe so. The 'law of diminishing returns' requires both a theoretical maximum and for someone to be drastically closer to it than another team, we have no idea where the limit is and people have been saying since 2014 that the teams would catch up to Mercedes, and since 2015 that Mclaren would catch quickly because of the law of diminishing returns. People use it incorrectly all over the place, Mercedes have shown zero diminishing returns in their per year performance gains. Each individual engine design has a limit on theoretical performance, meaning the diminishing returns available on the Renault concept could be far lower than that on the Ferrari or Merc concept meaning Renault will hit that law before the others.

The only race Renault have won, was when both Ferrari and Mercedes had severe penalties, without those penalties the Renault powered RBR was absolutely nowhere near winning.


Anyway the latest news is that Honda are buying a large stake into Toro Rosso which is what I suspected, rather than the assumption that Honda to TR meant RBR works team in 2019. It does now look like RBR might be forced to go Honda, but not via choice and not via some grand master plan to use TR as a way to get Honda to choose them(RBR) for a works team in 2019 or 2020 or something, it's because they seemingly told Renault they don't know what engine they want in 2019 onwards so Renault have used that as an excuse to tell them to do one.

I'm still not convinced some accord won't be reached because unless a genuine miracle happens next year Honda still won't be competitive or reliable enough for anyone to want to switch to them for performance reasons by 2019. I think RBR will stick with Renault but the deal will end up more favourable, like maybe Renault give them 40mil now for sponsorship but in 2019 it will be 15mil instead, so it might cost RBR a lot more money to get that engine. If they do get a Honda, it will be extremely bad for F1 to send a competitive team way down the grid.
 
Horner was interviewed briefly after FP1 and Brundle pushed him on whether RB would take Honda engines or maybe a Porsche partnership. He shot down both and pretty much dropped that Aston Martin will be their engine provider. This seems a bit out of the blue and don't AM have close ties with Merc on engines?
 
Glaucus said:
wasn't AM been rumoured over the last few years, i swear i remember hearing rumblings. Or fake memory.
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They've definitely come more to the forefront after Infiniti disappeared. But I was always under the impression that AM hasn't been a true engine manufacturer. They've got a fairly new plant in Germany but I can't help but think they're hoping to use AM's Merc ties as a way in to getting a Merc F1 engine, or at least some parts from it..
 
Just seen the interview with Christian standing there with AM logo and name on his shirt.
I also think Adrian Newey had been working with AM on other projects.
Porsche may have to buy Sauber Lol.
Andi.
 
None of the Redbull AM rumours should come as a surprised at all. AM have had sponsorship on the car all year, Adrian Newey has been designing the AM 001 hypercar, and AM to buy RB have been doing the rounds almost as long as VW to buy RB have!
 
Syla5 said:
None of the Redbull AM rumours should come as a surprised at all. AM have had sponsorship on the car all year, Adrian Newey has been designing the AM 001 hypercar, and AM to buy RB have been doing the rounds almost as long as VW to buy RB have!
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My surprise was his confidence in AM's ability to produce an engine for 2018. I mean, where is it going to come from?
 
andicole0 said:
Their other racing interests such as Le Mans.
Andi.
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Their Le Mans engine is a naturally aspirated V8. A very very long way away from a small capacity 1.6 twin turbo with MGU-H and MGU-K. Unless they've kept their engine development so secret no one knows at all then it will likely be a rebadged Mercedes.
 
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