Racecar Engineering January 2016

Tom Wolfe explored and extolled the character and make-up of test pilots and astronauts in The Right Stuff, where testicular fortitude and a cool approach to crisis and challenge was built into the breed. Motor racing had much of the same requisites; talent and courage, plus a competitive spirit to bring out the best in the protagonists. But during the course of the book the worm in the fruit began to appear. After the initial exploratory reaches of aviation, where flying skills were paramount, the progression into space flight led to the derring-do of pilots giving way to the work of engineers, relegating the pilots’ role to being simply ‘Spam in a can’ in the subsequent capsule launches – not giving input into what was happening and just going along for the…

SIDETRACK Silver Arrows they may be, but the Mercedes W06 cars look grey on screen Formula 1 has not been short of criticism lately, and perhaps I can gently stir the pot a bit more, but from a simple perspective. Regardless of all the politicking and endless discussions, there are ways to improve the show. Considering the vast sums sloshing about (for some), fundamental and relatively inexpensive opportunities to appeal to fans are being missed. Some months ago I touched upon the spectacular Formula 1 concept proposed by Ferrari, and how that would create greater interest – among younger potential fans in particular – because of its futuristic looks. This is especially relevant, as to casual followers F1 cars probably don’t seem to have changed very much in appearance for a long time. Maybe…

The Silver Arrows of Mercedes-Benz have been in grand prix racing in full works team in three distinct eras – and the cars became the dominant force on all three occasions. In the 1930s its cars clinched the European Championship, in the 1950s they raced to a pair of world championships, and now in the second decade of the 21st century it has once again become the dominant team. But a second consecutive world championship victory for the team is just a headline, it’s the detailed statistics that reveal the level of that dominance. In 2015 the Mercedes AMG F1 W06 Hybrid was almost in a different class to the rest of the Formula 1 field. Indeed, no car has ever scored more 1-2 finishes in a single season – and…

Mercedes AMG HPP could quite easily have been satisfied with what it had achieved by the end of the 2014 F1 season. In qualifying its product had been on pole position for every single race, and it had powered cars to 16 race victories and both world titles. But while the results were good, the staff at the factory in Brixworth were not entirely happy; and they wanted to build something better for 2015. ‘As a company we have two missions on our intranet homepage which we see every time we login to our computers,’ says Andy Cowell, managing director,- Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains. They are to win the Formula 1 world championship, and have zero category one failures at the circuit. We did not have a perfect 2014 season…

Force India’s delayed start to the 2015 Formula 1 season raised a number of eyebrows, and restarted stories that all was not well within the Silverstone-based team, especially with regards to its finances. The team looked to be in disarray, missing the first test in Jerez altogether and debuting a 2014-spec car at the second test, held in Barcelona. It introduced the first iteration of its 2015-spec VJM08 at the second Spanish test, and finally a ‘B-spec’ 2015 car at the British Grand Prix in July. Yet, despite this start, the team has stepped up to grab fifth place in the constructors’ championship – a record for the squad in its current guise – with 89 of its 120 points (as of the Brazilian Grand Prix) secured since the introduction of…

Peugeot returned to rallying in 2015 with its 2008 DKR that first featured in Racecar Engineering V24N12. It marked the brand’s return to top level international motorsport for the first time since the cancellation of its Le Mans programme in 2012, and also offered a better return on investment with rallies in all of its key markets, including South America and China. The team opted for a two-wheel-drive concept which allowed it to use bigger wheels, a lower weight car, and run with more suspension travel, but on tough terrain the vehicle would struggle for traction compared to its 4wd competitors. Yet for the 2016 version, the team considered the 2wd option to have yielded the desired results and it stayed with the concept. In fact, even though the car looks significantly…