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Author Topic: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes  (Read 6085 times)

Offline Irisado

Re: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes
« Reply #30 on: October 23, 2014, 12:13:50 PM »
Actually, customer cars have worked quite well. As noted Rob Walker ran a number of cars for drivers such as Stirling Moss, Seppi Siffert and Graham Hill with remarkable success. March sold cars to Ken Tyrrell for Stewart and they were usually faster than the works team. Others, like Innes Ireland and Hector Rebaque ran Lotus chassis for private teams with varying results. Ferrari was even going to supply Walker with a car for Moss until the later was injured.

I wasn't thinking of the 1960s and 1970s ;).  I was thinking of more recent attempts at customer cars or customer chassis.  These have all failed.

I also don't see customer cars as being a positive step for Formula 1 at all.  All this does is reduce diversity, and turns the small teams into nothing more than satellite operations without any identity (this is effectively what Toro Rosso is, for even though they have to design their own car these days, they were the Red Bull customer chassis team, and still operate very much in that mode).
Soņando con una playa donde brilla el sol, un arco iris ilumina el cielo, y el mar espejea iridescentemente

Offline Jericoke

Re: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes
« Reply #31 on: October 23, 2014, 04:36:53 PM »
Actually, customer cars have worked quite well. As noted Rob Walker ran a number of cars for drivers such as Stirling Moss, Seppi Siffert and Graham Hill with remarkable success. March sold cars to Ken Tyrrell for Stewart and they were usually faster than the works team. Others, like Innes Ireland and Hector Rebaque ran Lotus chassis for private teams with varying results. Ferrari was even going to supply Walker with a car for Moss until the later was injured.

I wasn't thinking of the 1960s and 1970s ;).  I was thinking of more recent attempts at customer cars or customer chassis.  These have all failed.

I also don't see customer cars as being a positive step for Formula 1 at all.  All this does is reduce diversity, and turns the small teams into nothing more than satellite operations without any identity (this is effectively what Toro Rosso is, for even though they have to design their own car these days, they were the Red Bull customer chassis team, and still operate very much in that mode).

If the small teams did produce competitive cars, I'd agree with you, and there's no way we'd have this discussion.

STR tanked once they were forbidden from running RBR chassis  (Remember when STR beat RBR?).  Caterham and Marussia continue to struggle as their entire budget is eaten up producing a car that meets the 107% rule.  Who is benefiting from sending substandard cars to the every race weekend?

Who was the last 'small' team to design a winning chassis?  A championship chassis?

Adjust the rules for new entries.  Allow a start up team to run, say, 3 years with a customer chassis.  They can build a reputation and earn sponsorship to fund the development of their 'real' car, all while learning the ins and outs of running an F1 team.

Yes, there will be plenty of teams that run for three years and then fold up shop, but they won't all be like that. 

When McLaren and Ferrari were becoming the teams they are now, yes, they built their own chassis, but they ALSO sold their chassis as customer cars.  That's part of how they became big successful race teams.

Offline Irisado

Re: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes
« Reply #32 on: October 23, 2014, 09:52:46 PM »
They can't produce what you deem to be a competitive car because of the importance of aerodynamics and the high costs of racing.  Pay them more and change the rules to make aero less critical.  Problem solved :).

Your choice of words always makes me scratch my head.  Why substandard?  Substandard means defective.  The cars are not defective.  They'd have to be fitted with fake or broken components for that to be true.  Even Caterham's suspension repair on Kobayashi's car in Russia wouldn't be classed as a defect, because repairs were attempted.

The small teams are the lifeblood, not the manufacturers.  Your vision of a Formula 1 dominated by big bucks manufacturers selling hand me down customer cars to independents would just kill the whole sport for me Jeri.  Diverse teams is an integral part of the Formula 1 experience in my opinion.  Customer chassis should be for lower formulae.

Also, the whole discussion about competitive seems rather moot to me.  Lap times from the back to the front of the grid are much closer than they ever were in previous eras, so I don't really understand where all this 'they're uncompetitive' mindset comes from.  Anyone not having watched the sport would think they were 10-20 seconds off the pace or something from reading your post :P.

As for the 107% rule, it shouldn't be present.  It's simply not needed at all.
« Last Edit: October 23, 2014, 09:54:22 PM by Irisado »
Soņando con una playa donde brilla el sol, un arco iris ilumina el cielo, y el mar espejea iridescentemente

Offline cosworth151

Re: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes
« Reply #33 on: October 24, 2014, 01:11:13 AM »
I agree with Irisado about the big manufacturers. We've seen that they will come and go whenever it suits them. The non-manufacturer teams (I don't say "small" because I I would include McLaren & Williams) exist to race. They can be depended on.
“You can search the world over for the finer things, but you won't find a match for the American road and the creatures that live on it.”
― Bob Dylan

Offline Scott

Re: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes
« Reply #34 on: October 24, 2014, 08:49:17 AM »
Substandard just means below standard, not defective.  It CAN mean defective, if 'standard' means 'by design' but not necessarily.  Non competitive cars from previous eras had more of a chance because of the often large number of DNF's of the fragile front runners.  Today's backmarkers don't have a chance.
« Last Edit: October 24, 2014, 08:51:57 AM by Scott »
The Honey Badger doesn't give a...

Offline Jericoke

Re: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes
« Reply #35 on: October 24, 2014, 03:31:35 PM »
They can't produce what you deem to be a competitive car because of the importance of aerodynamics and the high costs of racing.  Pay them more and change the rules to make aero less critical.  Problem solved :).

Pay them more?  Even if FOM was out of the picture and teams earned 100% of F1 revenue:  winning teams will always get more than losing teams.  Ferrari will always spend more than Caterham.

If aero is regulated to the point that it doesn't matter... that's the same as saying chassis design is unimportant.  If chassis design is unimportant, then what's the problem with using customer chassis? 

As for the first issue, F1 could completely reform.  In North America the 'big four' professional sports leagues (Football, baseball, basketball and hockey) operate as partners off the field, and competitors on the field.  The big teams realize that the small teams have to be healthy to provide competition.  F1 teams could find a way to share money equally.  Of course, that would require a new Concorde, and there is one person standing in the way of that.

As for the second issue, I love that each team designs their own car.  I agree there needs to be a way to give everyone a chance.  I think that making safety aspects of the car standard issue will save R&D money that can then be focused on aero, weight savings and balance.

Offline Irisado

Re: Russian GP Heroes and Zeroes
« Reply #36 on: October 24, 2014, 05:41:24 PM »
Non competitive cars from previous eras had more of a chance because of the often large number of DNF's of the fragile front runners.  Today's backmarkers don't have a chance.

Well, they have a chance.  Bianchi scored points at Monaco after all, and Ericsson almost scored at the same race.  They just have far less of a chance than they used to.

That's not the fault of the small teams though, that's the fault of excessive reliability caused by the rules.

Pay them more?  Even if FOM was out of the picture and teams earned 100% of F1 revenue:  winning teams will always get more than losing teams.  Ferrari will always spend more than Caterham.

Correct, but smaller teams would be able to compete more effectively with the midfield with more money to obtain the resources needed to give them a better chance of investing in the necessary staff and facilities.

Quote
If aero is regulated to the point that it doesn't matter... that's the same as saying chassis design is unimportant.  If chassis design is unimportant, then what's the problem with using customer chassis?

I'm talking about aero dependency.  Red Bull dominated for the previous four years because of their superb chassis (the aero being a huge part of that) combined with a drivable engine (it wasn't the most powerful).  Red Bull had the money, staff, and facilities to develop that level of aerodynamic proficiency.  The smaller teams don't have any of that, because they cannot afford it. 

Quote
As for the first issue, F1 could completely reform.  In North America the 'big four' professional sports leagues (Football, baseball, basketball and hockey) operate as partners off the field, and competitors on the field.  The big teams realize that the small teams have to be healthy to provide competition.  F1 teams could find a way to share money equally.  Of course, that would require a new Concorde, and there is one person standing in the way of that.

Let us hope that when said individual is no longer an obstacle, that this become a reality :).
Soņando con una playa donde brilla el sol, un arco iris ilumina el cielo, y el mar espejea iridescentemente

 


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