Honda - another disaster ?

[Sa Calobra]

McHonda have gone backwards and if we knew where they are now back in 2015 Honda would have quit at the start and McLaren would have gone a different route.

It's painful to watch them every race. It's embarrassing.

[glazbagun]

If Alonso walks who could they get to fill his seat? Maybe Massa would fancy driving a bit more, but not at the back for 20 laps before retiring.

No WDC would touch that car and the best of the rest probably wouldn't unless it's for a 10x salary boost.

[cuprabob]

glazbagun said:

If Alonso walks who could they get to fill his seat? Maybe Massa would fancy driving a bit more, but not at the back for 20 laps before retiring.

No WDC would touch that car and the best of the rest probably wouldn't unless it's for a 10x salary boost.

Jolyon Palmer has the right experience to drive the McLaren

[lee_fr200]

To not lose anymore sponsorship they would need someone up and coming or an ex wdc

And apart from Jenson button (who does have a contract to race next year) I don't see anyone rly wanting at drive! Maybe kimi if Ferrari oust him

[pits]

cuprabob said:

glazbagun said:

If Alonso walks who could they get to fill his seat? Maybe Massa would fancy driving a bit more, but not at the back for 20 laps before retiring.

No WDC would touch that car and the best of the rest probably wouldn't unless it's for a 10x salary boost.

Jolyon Palmer has the right experience to drive the McLaren

In that he can park a car up on the side of the track after hitting something, or the car dying, I like him as a person, but he is quite st.

lee_fr200 said:

To not lose anymore sponsorship they would need someone up and coming or an ex wdc

And apart from Jenson button (who does have a contract to race next year) I don't see anyone rly wanting at drive! Maybe kimi if Ferrari oust him

They have Alonso, and they're still losing sponsors, the only thing that will bring sponsors back is winning.

[Gary C]

cuprabob said:

Jolyon Palmer has the right experience to drive the McLaren

Hee hee, that's funny

[cuprabob]

Gary C said:

cuprabob said:

Jolyon Palmer has the right experience to drive the McLaren

Hee hee, that's funny

I'm glad someone got the joke...

[Shelsleyf2]

I was mystified why Honda would announce a spec 3 engine then decide not to run it on reliability grounds. Ilmor apparently are currently running Honda engines on their dyno in an effort to improve reliability, they are revising bearing specs,coating specs, tolerances , materials etc etc. The initial spec 3 Honda was failing a bit too often. Ilmor with their motorsport / F1 knowledge are re engineering where possible and spec 4 will see Ilmor input at design stage .Honda have bowed and realised they need help. I have no knowledge on the Honda design teams experience but it seems it has been treated more like and engineering exercise for their bright young engineers.

[rev-erend]

Perhaps the Honda F1 engine team were sourced from their MotoGP team .. which seems to have gone backwards this year.

[Gary C]

Shelsleyf2 said:

I was mystified why Honda would announce a spec 3 engine then decide not to run it on reliability grounds. Ilmor apparently are currently running Honda engines on their dyno in an effort to improve reliability, they are revising bearing specs,coating specs, tolerances , materials etc etc. The initial spec 3 Honda was failing a bit too often. Ilmor with their motorsport / F1 knowledge are re engineering where possible and spec 4 will see Ilmor input at design stage .Honda have bowed and realised they need help. I have no knowledge on the Honda design teams experience but it seems it has been treated more like and engineering exercise for their bright young engineers.

Ooh, that's good news.

I'm sure ilmor will really help Honda to get their act together. I would love to see mclaren Honda back at the top, but I though Honda would pull out rather than suffer the shame of having to ask for help.

Just hope they really allow the ilmor engineers to fully integrate. For taking to a friend who was a Honda engineer, they are a bit strange about external (Ie none Japanese) input on some projects.

[lee_fr200]

I think they probably had no choice and mclaren might be forcing outside help

[aeropilot]

thegreenhell said:

They just used to be the loudest, fastest racing cars on the planet,

Never been close to that accolade.....

Top Fuel drag racing has, and will always be the loudest and fastest - period.

[thegreenhell]

The Sauber-Honda deal is now officially dead.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/sauber-honda-en...

[MartG]

thegreenhell said:

The Sauber-Honda deal is now officially dead.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/sauber-honda-en...

I wonder - was Kaltenborn sacked because of the Honda deal, or did she know she was getting the boot and made the deal as pre-emptive revenge ?

[cuprabob]

For sure the two decisions are connected but my gut feeling is that her sacking was a consequence of the Honda deal.

[rubystone]

cuprabob said:

For sure the two decisions are connected but my gut feeling is that her sacking was a consequence of the Honda deal.

Of that, there is no doubt.

[cuprabob]

Although I very much doubt she could have done the deal without the board's consent but possibly they just gave her enough rope to hang herself.

[rubystone]

cuprabob said:

For sure the two decisions are connected but my gut feeling is that her sacking was a consequence of the Honda deal.

Of that, there is no doubt.

[ajprice]

MacLaren seem to have a light at the end of the tunnel, both cars scoring points, Alonso getting the fastest lap in Hungary. The team have 11 points going into the summer break with Renault on 26 and Sauber on 5. They'll be looking at the teams ahead of them now, so how far ahead of them should they look at as a target?


Sauber could still do something this year now they have Vasseur in charge, but I don't think they're going to get close to McLaren.

Edited by ajprice on Monday 31st July 08:42

[DanielSan]

An educated guess says they won't be quite as competitive at Spa or Monza unless Honda can come up with 50bhp or so