FORUMula1.com - F1 Forum

[logan1080]

Ok so with a million regulations limiting this sport it seems the FIA is trying to limit the potential of these race cars. The latest to be brought up is the engine mapping bans so that a team cannot change tunes between qualifying and the actual race. Every team can give the engine an "extreme" tune for qualifying therefore by allowing it, no team would be at a disadvantage. Every team has equal opportunity to give engine an extreme tune so to me this is ridiculous. Now they are implenting turbo V6 engines with a 15,000 RPM cap. Well my first thought is that they are trying to be more enviromentaly friendly. There is one thing that doesn't make sense though, these new engines will be allowed to have the same fuel flows as the v8's which would make them not any more efficient and or enviro friendly. Why are the engines shrinking but not required to burn less fuel? What the heck FIA???? A lot of their reasoning is supposed to be making the sport more affordable so new teams can come in. Here is a quote, "The fuel flow limit will stay the same. The technologies are the same and as a consequence any increase in rpm will constrain the engineers to work harder on reducing friction and gaining on engine efficiency. The challenge will be even bigger than originally planned and will therefore enhance the technological lead of Formula One." This sounds like this will cost even more money to get the engines to work at their peak rather then continue to use the V8's which all teams have already. Now they have to spend more on R&D for v6's. Not saving any money, FIA makes no sense to me. The cars should be able to keep their v8's which have already been shrunk down from v12s to v10s to the v8. They should not have aerodynamic regulations. If teams can make these cars move better through the air then why not. The only thing the teams should have to have is an excellent crash safety system and excellent driver protection. If they want to make the cars the ultimate (which to me is what F1 is) then they must have the best possible downforce, engine tunes, allow refueling, etc etc etc to do so, not limit the cars so they cannot perform to the max.

[tpherson]

This is exactly my thought evrytime the FIA changes regulations, which seems to be a bi-annual event if not more often. How much do you hear right now about resources going to engine development, I would say very little. And why? Consistant regulations and a freeze on development regarding engines (althought I think a development freeze is nonsense). How much do we hear about resources being devoted to Aero development? It s constant discussion about upcoming Aero development for the teams, new items nearly every race. Now they change (clarify?) regulations mid year? Can you imagine the time and resources being spent as I type to redesign Aero packages to adjust for the change in the blown diffusers. And with no testing, that makes a lot of sense. I'm sure all the cars will be perfectly balanced with the change in downforce balance the first time they hit the track, sounds very safe to me.

They need to get a set of regulations and stick with it. Stop making it neccesary to redevelop parts of the car or the entire the car. Stop trying to make the sport politically correct. Let the racers do what they do best, race. Make a set of rules and get out of the way. And for crying out loud, quit changing (sorry, I mean CLARIFYING) the rules in mid-season because a team has developed an advantage. That's what six year olds do on the playground (or maybe even they know better). The other teams just need to get their crap together and catch up. This bit of nonsense has NASCAR written all over it.

[logan1080]

I agree. The FIA is trying to turn F1 into GP2. GP2 has all identical cars which is excellent because pure driver skill is what will win the race (and a good pit crew). F1 is not GP2, HELLO FIA!!! F1 is about who can develop the fastest car. It's about not just the drivers but the teams as well and how well they can make the car. That is what F1 is all about, the drivers AND team. Sure it is expensive but that is what it takes to make an F1 car an F1 car. I almost want to say they are trying to slow down red bull. I love how Vettel won with such a gap over the other teams in Valencia right after they made changes that some people thought may affect red bull. I wonder if we had a different top 3 drivers every race if they would be changing regulations like they are? It just goes to show that it is all about the teams having the best engineers and drivers combined. Next new regulation "your engineers can only have so much experience and can not have scored over 85% on there schooling exams". Good point with the mid-season changes, this should not be allowed. Bring in the rules next seasons so teams have time to adjust instead of running around like chickens with their heads cut off to adapt. Engine development should be allowed. That is how the sport will progress as well as technology. F1 has to be about constantly making the cars better, so that "may the best team win" can be said.