Engine Tokens Officially Dropped?

Engine Tokens Officially Dropped?

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entropy

Original Poster:

5,403 posts

202 months

Thursday 4th February 2016
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leglessAlex

5,384 posts

140 months

Thursday 4th February 2016
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Reported on the BBC too.

Will it fix anything though? Won't it just give Mercedes more testing time to get even further ahead? Of course, there will be less improvements Mercedes can make as time goes on and the engine approaches the best it can get, but still.


The other thing this highlights is just how useless the decision makers of F1 seem to be. I try and see the other side of things as much as possible and I'm not sure I could do a better job of running the sport/making the rules myself but it has reached a point where I feel the whole situation can be called a total farce.

Surely it can't be THAT difficult to make some basic rules that will keep costs to a semi-reasonable level and allow for innovation as well as close racing? As I said, I don't have the ideas myself but I'd expect people who's job it is to be able to come up with something.

KaraK

13,177 posts

208 months

Thursday 4th February 2016
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Sensible in my opinion - the token system was good intentioned and had the the engine manufacturers been closer in performance than they were it might even have worked but as it was it not only left the formula massively skewed from a competition point of view without much potential to change but trying to understand the token system left large numbers of fans utterly confused as to what the hell was going on. Engine manufacturers were probably put off from coming into the sport after the Honda debacle and Renault seemingly flirted with the idea of leaving completely. Open development with fixed unit pricing (or at the least controlled unit pricing) is a no brainer to me - sure works teams have an advantage as they probably have more incentive to spend more than the revenue on development but is that necessarily a bad thing as it would IMO encourage more manufacturers to run a factory team to get the full benefits

Scuffers

20,887 posts

273 months

Friday 5th February 2016
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so, the whole point of these new powertrains was to nail down development and thus costs.

well done F1, yet again showing the kind of joined up thinking that will lead to the death of F1

CraigyMc

16,313 posts

235 months

Monday 8th February 2016
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Scuffers said:
so, the whole point of these new powertrains was to nail down development and thus costs.

well done F1, yet again showing the kind of joined up thinking that will lead to the death of F1
F1's death has been predicted without fail for each of the 30-or so years I've been watching.

I'm for the dropping of the token system - it was simply locking in an advantage Mercedes have, irrespective of what the other manufacturers threw at it. At least now there's a way for the engines to get to parity eventually, even if it costs them all a huge fortune.

Scuffers

20,887 posts

273 months

Monday 8th February 2016
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CraigyMc said:
F1's death has been predicted without fail for each of the 30-or so years I've been watching.

I'm for the dropping of the token system - it was simply locking in an advantage Mercedes have, irrespective of what the other manufacturers threw at it. At least now there's a way for the engines to get to parity eventually, even if it costs them all a huge fortune.
you really think this will make any difference? (apart from more engine failures at race weekends)

given another 5-8 years with the same regs, the others might just catch up and we reach a plato (like the V8's were at), but before that point, one will always dominate.


Adam Ansel

695 posts

105 months

Monday 8th February 2016
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Doesn't this let VW (or Toyotor whoever) join the circus without suffering a Hondaesque debacle?

CraigyMc

16,313 posts

235 months

Monday 8th February 2016
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Scuffers said:
CraigyMc said:
F1's death has been predicted without fail for each of the 30-or so years I've been watching.

I'm for the dropping of the token system - it was simply locking in an advantage Mercedes have, irrespective of what the other manufacturers threw at it. At least now there's a way for the engines to get to parity eventually, even if it costs them all a huge fortune.
you really think this will make any difference? (apart from more engine failures at race weekends)

given another 5-8 years with the same regs, the others might just catch up and we reach a plato (like the V8's were at), but before that point, one will always dominate.
Eventually, yes, I think they'll converge in performance. That's a difference from the token based limit-your-developements system F1's been using.
It's better than them being locked [by the tokens] where the engine makers are at present, with Merc so far ahead that the others really don't have a look-in, and with Honda so far down they have a speed delta of 20km/h at the end of the Kemmel at Spa, and with limits on what they are allowed to do to catch up.

The longer the manufacturers all allowed to spend as much as they like doing whatever is needed, the smaller the difference between them until they are eventually at parity by the law of diminishing returns. How fast they get there is really a function of time and money. They will plateau eventually, but before then there will be a leading manufacturer as you say -- but the lead they have will get smaller and smaller.

In the short term, losing the token limitations also allows Honda to throw the farm at development, in an attempt to catch up more quickly instead of being limited on introducing new stuff by the token rules. Last year, even if Honda turned their entire company into an F1 development organisation they'd still have been limited to 9 tokens worth of new engine pieces on the car in season. When those restrictions are gone, Honda could turn up at every race with a new design if they needed to (they'd start from the back all the time due to penalties for out of sequence engine changes, but at least engine development progress would be faster).

The engines are complex enough that development progress is naturally limited anyway - the damn things are so difficult to get right that the manufacturers are averse to risk with them - nobody is going to bring a new turbine every weekend.

So back to my opinion - token system gone means eventual parity. If it had stayed, everyone but Merc would have been screwed until a new formula came along.

Scuffers

20,887 posts

273 months

Monday 8th February 2016
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Adam Ansel said:
Doesn't this let VW (or Toyotor whoever) join the circus without suffering a Hondaesque debacle?
that's not what stops them

it's the thought of spending half a billion euro's in development costs for exactly what?

the token system is not what cause the Honda situation, they did that all on their own.


CraigyMc

16,313 posts

235 months

Monday 8th February 2016
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Adam Ansel said:
Doesn't this let VW (or Toyotor whoever) join the circus without suffering a Hondaesque debacle?
VW can't because of their corporate financial situation with diesel issues.

Toyota probably wouldn't because they put $1bn in last time and didn't even win a race (though they did try to staff an F1 team from Cologne which was probably a mistake).

I'd quite like to see Ford back personally. They are getting back into Le mans stuff so who knows eventually.

Scuffers

20,887 posts

273 months

Monday 8th February 2016
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CraigyMc said:
I'd quite like to see Ford back personally. They are getting back into Le mans stuff so who knows eventually.
ford were never in F1 (directly)

they just paid others (Cosworth etc).

You could argue that with Merc, although they brought Ilmor and spend the money expanding it.

Audi brought Cosworth (the bits that was useful), got they engine work they needed done, they sold them off again (Mahle).

Toyota don't even design their own engines, they usually pay Yamaha to do the work.

Renault use Mecachrome.

Ferrari actually do their own engine work in house.




mfmman

2,362 posts

182 months

Saturday 13th February 2016
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Scuffers said:
ford were never in F1 (directly)

they just paid others (Cosworth etc).

Do you not include Jaguar F1?

Scuffers

20,887 posts

273 months

Saturday 13th February 2016
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mfmman said:
Do you not include Jaguar F1?
no, they basically just 'sponsored' Stewart F1

they did not own the team, employ the staff, etc.

Merc Own the team (they brought it), ferrari own the team (they started it), Renault have just brought their old team back so they own it.

In the past, Toyota owned the team, as did BMW, etc etc.




mfmman

2,362 posts

182 months

Saturday 13th February 2016
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Scuffers said:
mfmman said:
Do you not include Jaguar F1?
no, they basically just 'sponsored' Stewart F1

they did not own the team, employ the staff, etc.

Merc Own the team (they brought it), ferrari own the team (they started it), Renault have just brought their old team back so they own it.

In the past, Toyota owned the team, as did BMW, etc etc.
There are any number of links stating that Ford bought Stewart Grand Prix having funded it for a few years before. That's how I remembered it at the time.

here's one http://www.crash.net/f1/news/33977/1/ford-to-buy-s...

And Ford selling it to Red Bull http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula... at a later date





Edited by mfmman on Saturday 13th February 13:02

BarbaricAvatar

1,416 posts

147 months

Sunday 14th February 2016
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Scuffers said:
mfmman said:
Do you not include Jaguar F1?
no, they basically just 'sponsored' Stewart F1

they did not own the team, employ the staff, etc.

Merc Own the team (they brought it), ferrari own the team (they started it), Renault have just brought their old team back so they own it.

In the past, Toyota owned the team, as did BMW, etc etc.
The Jaguar/Ford "Sponsorship" only applied to the first year - as is often the case with team buyouts. For Jaguar year two (R2) it was all-change and everything that was previously Stewart was stripped away. A similar story to when Jaguar became Red Bull; in the first year it was mainly sponsorship and the team + tech departments remained largely the same as before.

Red Bull is more than just a sponsor, as was Ford. It's just in Ford's case they were not successful and the changes they made were not improvements. The purely marketing exercise was that the team was named Jaguar.