(T)Racing Point

[Fundoreen]

RP have been getting an easy ride.
The ressurection as RP without paying the fee that HAAS had to pay to join for one.
Even the move by stroll on Ricchiardo at the end of the last race totally ignored and unpunished.
F1 is in a panic and eager to get the latest billionare spending freely.
The autosport article makes a very sensible and clear argument at what the situation is.
People just ignore anything too complex and go with the emotional angle.

[Mr Pointy]

robbieduncan said:

When will the FIA make a decision? Before the race this weekend would seem to be necessary

It's going to take several weeks.

[robbieduncan]

Mr Pointy said:

It's going to take several weeks.

That's really not good for either Racing Point or the fans. I assume if found guilty RP could be excluded from the results. So in a few weeks the results of previous races could change. FIA need to speed this up

[TheDeuce]

Ferrari getting in on the action now: https://www.racefans.net/2020/08/03/ferrari-wade-i...

I still can't see how these complaints can ever be successful though.. Even if Mercedes invited RP in to the factory and showed them exactly how everything worked, RP would still have redesigned the parts as closely as possible (but not identical) in order to not get caught out by the regs. All the photos I have seen comparing the two show an uncanny similarity, but also a lot of difference in the details.

These complaints can only be successful if the FIA draw a new line in the sand and state that "anything obviously copied, over and above being the result of a teams own R&D is not acceptable" - only they can't say that as doing so would be to classify every team as breaking the same rules on some level, at some point. Hence, not only do I find it hard to see how the complaints can stand up, I also doubt there is any appetite whatsoever at the FIA to declare RP's car illegal. You either allow fairly blatant copying or you do not, and it's been blatant in F1 forever. If they stopped that, certain teams would basically be screwed and have to leave the sport, they wouldn't be able to be competitive without 'copying' whatever they think they can based on the F1 paps photo intelligence..

I'm firmly on the side of RP here, it's been said that everyone copies, they just did a more thorough job of it - I think that's accurate.

[TheDeuce]

Heartworm said:

Renata argument isn’t honey that they copied though, but that they received the Mercedes design/drawings for the brake ducts.

From what I can tell copy has forever been a part of F1 and if they have successfully done this very well all good on them, but if they have actually got a hold of Mercedes design drawings as Renault allege that’sa different game.

I'd be amazed if it was the case that anything had been directly shared like that. However, even if in some weird other universe it were the case that Mercedes had handed them design details - they would still have considered the chance of being questioned and would still have ensured the final cars were different in the detail and that there was no evidence left to find.

I doubt Renault have any expectation of being successful - it's entirely possible they're simply testing the water by protesting the RP car ahead of opting to do something similar themselves at some point.

I'm expecting the FIA to find that the parts in question are similar yet unique in the detail, also to confirm that they have found no evidence of collusion between Merc & RP. I'm also half expecting Ferrari to do the FIA a favour by publicly stating they're satisfied with the FIA investigation immediately following it's findings and that they have no further concerns...

[anonymous-user]

It was legal to buy and use the brake ducts from another team last year. They were not a listed part. It was entirely legitimate to have drawings from another team for those parts.

The rules changed for this year, brake ducts are a listed part, so you cant buy and use another teams.

All RP have to do is create their own drawings for those brake ducts, even if that makes them identical and they have met the rules.

This is why Renault went after the brake ducts specifically, because they know RP would have had those Mercedes drawings and parts. They are hoping to have caught them on a technically, pretty underhand IMHO.

It's one for the lawyers and the FIA so I'm not prejudging what comes out of that process, I've often been gobsmacked by the results.

[anonymous-user]

996Targa said:

"He also talks about reverse engineering software from photographs and that there is legal precedent on IP in F1 from a case in the 1970s".

In the 1970's case, Shadow vs Arrows I think, the two cars were the product of the same designer within a very short period of time.

pretty much the entire team left Shadow, Tony Southgate designed the car for Shadow then left with the driver Jackie Oliver to start Arrows using the same design.

It was motorsport journalist Alan Henry who dropped them in it because he walked into the Shadow pits and on first seeing the car he said it's a bloody Arrows. He was forced to testify in court that he said that.

It was completely blatant, but at the time not far removed from the norm anyway.

For example Tony designed the Shadow DN8 for 1976 then left the team and went to Lotus, where he worked on the Lotus 77 where he came up with narrowing the car by moving the oil cooler to the nose.

Shadow kept the DN8 for 77 with mods to the bodywork but it wasn't competitive, mid 77 Tony left Lotus and went back to Shadow where he modified the car to do the same as he did with the Lotus 77, moving the oil coolers from the sides to a single one in the nose.

Alan Jones won his first F1 race in the modified version.

Edited by anonymous-user on Tuesday 4th August 04:24

[kambites]

jsf said:

All RP have to do is create their own drawings for those brake ducts, even if that makes them identical and they have met the rules.

I don't think that's true is it? I was under the impression that the rules state (or at least imply) that when a part goes from non-listed to listed, any team which was buying in the non-listed part needs to design their own new component from scratch for season in which it is listed.

[TheDeuce]

kambites said:

jsf said:

All RP have to do is create their own drawings for those brake ducts, even if that makes them identical and they have met the rules.

I don't think that's true is it? I was under the impression that the rules state (or at least imply) that when a part goes from non-listed to listed, any team which was buying in the non-listed part needs to design their own new component from scratch for season in which it is listed.

Looking at this year's brake duct on the RP it does look as of it's essentially a 're-design' of what they were buying from Mercedes previously. But it's visibly different in the detail. So it's not a clone.

At best the design was influenced entirely by what they learned from the Mercedes part but what's wrong with that? Designers and engineers don't tend to 'un-learn' what they have already learned works best. Which teams haven't ever observed and all but replicated parts from other cars?

[MB140]

Ha Ferrari complaining as well. I think they would do well to keep quite.

I mean if the FIA do find RP and Merc were involved they might just solve it like they have the Ferrari engine issue. pay us some cash and we will keep it a confidential closed document. Now RP please go and alter your brake ducts to make it less obvious.

F1 is becoming a laughing stock.

[kambites]

TheDeuce said:

Looking at this year's brake duct on the RP it does look as of it's essentially a 're-design' of what they were buying from Mercedes previously. But it's visibly different in the detail. So it's not a clone.

I think that's the question isn't it. Is it "similar" inside where we can't see or is it "identical".

Is this the first time a part has gone from "unlisted" to "listed" without a change in the technical regs governing it?

[TheDeuce]

kambites said:

TheDeuce said:

Looking at this year's brake duct on the RP it does look as of it's essentially a 're-design' of what they were buying from Mercedes previously. But it's visibly different in the detail. So it's not a clone.

I think that's the question isn't it. Is it "similar" inside where we can't see or is it "identical".

What do we expect though? That they were sensible enough to redraw the outside loosely enough to not be 'identical' but then didn't bother to change the internals at all? If so that level of stupidity would deserve a penalty I guess! Seems very unlikely though.

Apart from anything else, RP's design team are not simple human photocopiers... The Mercedes part they had to recreate wouldn't itself have been 'perfect' - after running the original last season wouldn't they want to make a few hopefully positive changes of their own? In other words they would have to be lazy in addition to stupid if it really was found to be identical inside.

[kambites]

TheDeuce said:

Seems very unlikely though.

Can't disagree with that.

[TheDeuce]

MB140 said:

Ha Ferrari complaining as well. I think they would do well to keep quite.

I mean if the FIA do find RP and Merc were involved they might just solve it like they have the Ferrari engine issue. pay us some cash and we will keep it a confidential closed document. Now RP please go and alter your brake ducts to make it less obvious.

F1 is becoming a laughing stock.

Depends why they're getting involved now. It could be because they agree with Renault... It could in fact be the opposite. They could potentially do F1 and the FIA a pretty big favour by getting involved, depends how they play it.

[WickerBill]

MB140 said:

Ha Ferrari complaining as well. I think they would do well to keep quite.

To be fair i think Ferrari would be better off copying the HAAS than complaining about the Tracing Point ;-p

[anonymous-user]

kambites said:

jsf said:

All RP have to do is create their own drawings for those brake ducts, even if that makes them identical and they have met the rules.

I don't think that's true is it? I was under the impression that the rules state (or at least imply) that when a part goes from non-listed to listed, any team which was buying in the non-listed part needs to design their own new component from scratch for season in which it is listed.

They have to design the part. Produce a drawing and you have designed it. It's not illegal to copy what you can see, in the case of the brake ducts they could see every aspect of the part because they legitimately owned them.

[kambites]

jsf said:

They have to design the part. Produce a drawing and you have designed it. It's not illegal to copy what you can see, in the case of the brake ducts they could see every aspect of the part because they legitimately owned them.

I could be wrong but I thought the rules same something like the team must not use any IP owned by a competitor on any listed part, which is not the same thing at all. Even if RP have the rights to see the Mercedes IP from last year, it's still Mercedes' IP.

[Nampahc Niloc]

kambites said:

jsf said:

They have to design the part. Produce a drawing and you have designed it. It's not illegal to copy what you can see, in the case of the brake ducts they could see every aspect of the part because they legitimately owned them.

I could be wrong but I thought the rules same something like the team must not use any IP owned by a competitor on any listed part, which is not the same thing at all. Even if RP have the rights to see the Mercedes IP from last year, it's still Mercedes' IP.

But then you get into the very hazy area of how different does something have to be?

[kambites]

Nampahc Niloc said:

But then you get into the very hazy area of how different does something have to be?

Yup, it might be that even the FIA don't really know what the rules are.

[TheDeuce]

Nampahc Niloc said:

kambites said:

jsf said:

They have to design the part. Produce a drawing and you have designed it. It's not illegal to copy what you can see, in the case of the brake ducts they could see every aspect of the part because they legitimately owned them.

I could be wrong but I thought the rules same something like the team must not use any IP owned by a competitor on any listed part, which is not the same thing at all. Even if RP have the rights to see the Mercedes IP from last year, it's still Mercedes' IP.

But then you get into the very hazy area of how different does something have to be?

Exactly - and that was my original point many posts above.. The only way Renault can be successful that I can see is for the FIA to draw a clear line in the sand regards how different something should be - and for obvious reasons doing so would be a monumental problem for F1 as there would be endless complaints that parts 'XYZ' on pretty much any/all cars crossed that line.

This isn't so much a tricky thing for RP right now as it is a tricky thing for the FIA to deal with and put to bed without making a rod for their (and F1's) own back for the future. How many of the current teams wouldn't have been able to afford entering the sport if they couldn't essentially copy what was proven to work? At least copy it well enough to have a hope of being somewhat competitive and hit the ground running.