Alonso will replace Palmer once his injuries from his ill-fated Indy venture have healed. Bottas gets another year at Mercedes as Werdheim slips another disc at the RoC. Perez replaces Kimi at Ferrari, who couldn't care less and goes out to get drunk. Massa retires again.......then comes back as Williams realise there really is no one else out there who wants to drive for them at the moment who is worth it as the only other candidates is the displaced Palmer or Maldonado. McLaren give up and let all the staff have a year off when some one peels off the Honda stickers to reveal Motori Moderni cam covers and confirm Honda were ill advised to out source their engine development over the winter break to Italian 'specialists' in F1 who aren't Ferrari.
Read somewhere that Honda are in advanced talks with Merc for PU technical support!!!! Plus Illmor and lots of ex Ferrari, Merc, and Renault PU engineers. Honda are saying that they have changed and are getting outside expertise!!! Doesn't look good for 2017 but hopeful for 2018. Fingers crossed for a fast turn around.
Will kind of take the shine off it, if they do become successful. But at the same time I want to see them fighting at the top, no way around it than for Mercedes to intervene.
They had outside expertise already, they refused to listen to what he had to say which is why he quit. That said, this has gone beyond embarrassing and is really giving Honda a bad name. However, they were 4th quickest in Bahrain testing, posting a faster time than their qualifying time, though I have no idea of fuel loads or tyres, but Stoffel also managed to do 81 laps (so he ran the whole of the GP, just 3 days late.) No one, including Honda, can be really sure of what they have, who knows, out of the 6 parts that make up the PU they could have the best of 4 of them, but like a computer, if you have the best of almost everything but 1 thing is ****, the whole computer will be limited to the **** part. The engine vibration is killing them, and is no easy fix, and who knows what affect fixing it will mean for the rest of the PU. But if they can't run the combustion engine how as it was designed to run, then it isn't going to be running near it's theoretical optimum, and that must surely have a negative effect on the rest of the PU parts.
Hmmm, the top seems to be pretty close to driver's eye-level. Would it interfere with their vision? Would it have to be taller than in these pics? Also, I'd have thought it would have to be much more upright, to minimise the potential for optical aberrations. With this design, the driver is looking through a lot of plastic, at a very shallow angle. I hope I'm wrong - a taller more upright screen would look nasty.
Would the solution would be to have a lower screen but possibly some vertical strakes to deflect objects over the drivers head, without impeding their full view in front of them? All solutions are unsightly to an extant and go against the open cockpit principles of single seater racing cars. What will they do with junior formula though? Is this device going to be cascaded down, as their have been deaths from objects hitting drivers? Would be very difficult to do as those cars have shorted front bulkhead and noses than F1 cars so would look even worse. You'd end up with something looking like the Caparo T1. May as well just call it junior WEC............... please log in to view this image
My rendering skills are not brilliant. But how about this 'Guard' concept? High enough to deflect side impacts. But both tall side windows could behave as a "ramp" if you will. To raise any debris or large objects up and away from the drivers head... Furthermore the drivers vision of the track ahead is not impeded, however there may be issues entering or exiting the cockpit. Or using the side mirrors.
So Eddie Jordan confident enough about McLaren Mercedes for 2018, that Channel 4 so a segment about it. Also suggests that Alonso to Renault is likely.
The worst kept secret ever. I'm assuming there either free or Honda are paying them so IF McLaren remain that's a hell of a financial commitment from Honda? Edit......If FA leaves or has already left for Renault (2018) that leaves them 30+ mil to cover it I suppose.
Rumours swirling that Vettel has a contract waiting to be signed at Mercedes. I would love to see a true comparison of Vettel and Hamilton.