... shades of John Barnard, and Ferrari's once proud GTO, have a look-see if and when you find time: https://www.avl.com/ For the 1st time since pre-war F1, Ferrari no longer wholly directs or guides the plight of its own engine development program. Technically, it is no longer a Ferrari engine. A cool 40 million, Euro, down the tubes, from here on out Ferrari's F1 power-plant merely a re-badged AVL, Enzo turns in his grave as once proud Ferrari now pays, through its nose, for its engine technology -- asj.
Why so much drama? Everybody in F1 subcontracts work. Ferrari has been using Mahle pistons for decades. And AVL has been doing work for Red Bull for some time too.
i don't particularly care, as long as Ferrari wins. I follow driver first then team, and so in 2015 I will be rooting for Alonso but still hoping for ferrari to win.
I don't believe this statement to be correct! In 1955 and 1956 Ferrari raced Lancia D50's, which despite numerous modifications by Ferrari (and a rename to Ferrari D50), still ran Lancia V8 engines that Ferrari had had no input into the design or development whatsoever! - It was never a Ferrari engine from the beginning!
There may be precedent but it's still not good news. When was this subcontracted? Under the new boss? The old boss? The older boss?
Avl is just helping building the simulation platform for now. Maybe doing a little work on the pistons and that's it. If anything Ferrari might learn something The only problem might come if Ferrari's secrets are then given to Red Bull by the same company, but don't see much to worry given the bad shape of the current powerplant
AVL is NOT building the Ferrari F1 engines. AVL is subcontracted to build certain pieces just as Brembo are subcontracted to supply Ferrari road cars with brakes and Mahle supplies the pistons for the road cars and the F1 cars etc. Or do you believe that because Alcoa suuplies the bodies for the road cars that they are building Ferraris? This is just silly.
+1 "Silly" is putting it very politely. There's a reason many have used the ignore button here. [Remember, this is the same guy who basically accused Tony S & organized motorsport of murder a while back ] Cheers, Ian
We deal a lot with AVL - they have the world market cornered for engine test beds and measurement tools and are one of the best, if not the best, contractor for powertrain engineering. For engine/powertrain simulation, the best tools out there are either the GT Power suite or AVL's Cruise/Boost/Fire. And apparently that's what Ferrari uses now. I remember talking to AVL's head of F1 operations some years ago. He said that they supply test beds and do engineering work for all F1 teams. I doubt that they distribute the secrets among their customers!
Sure but there are voices they'll become Red Bull's exclusive partners to produce own brand's engines. Impressive acquaintances by the way.
Frohes neues Jahr to you, too, Dave! Even then they couldn't risk giving away any secrets. I have rarely seen an engine test facility, including the one I happen to be somewhat in charge of, that doesn't at least use components from AVL. In the contrary, most are turnkey installations. If it came to light that they use information from customer #1 for customer #2's projects, they could close their doors rather today than tomorrow!
And don't forget that Riccardo have probably contributed to most engines somewhere along the way. Back about 16 years ago, I was in Modena visiting a potential partner for a friend's company. He was ex-Ferrari and knew a machine shop not far from the Modena train station. The building had no name on it. It was owned by a 75 year old fellow that did machine work for everyone in motor sports. In fact, he owned the development company which produced and sold to BMW the first BMW F1 engines. Its only my opinion, but I think the bulk of today's HP gains are in the fuel and the electronics, and not the hardware. I also heard from a friend in Emilia Romagna, that Ferrari's new wind tunnel has a rolling road, and they can now simulate the circuits on it. I guess that is what AVL helped Ferrari to develop. And much of that info came from Ferrari and not AVL.
