I hope they can still change the grade, the heat treatment, the cementation, or surface coating for steel based components. Same for moulded or forged aluminium type parts were the proportions of alloy content can be modified.
The way the regulation read (to me) it seems that the requirement is that any new part has to fit in the old engine (were one to rebuild an old engine) and operate similarly. So, while you can't change bore/stroke ratio, you can make block, piston, valve, cam; machining adjustments--for reliability you understand.
Interesting to see how this develops in 2023 -- https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/fia-president-wants-to-start-process-for-new-teams-to-join-f1-grid/10416451/ FIA president wants to start process for new teams to join F1 grid The FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem has revealed he is looking to expand the Formula 1 grid by appealing for expressions of interest for potential new teams. By: Luke Smith Jan 2, 2023, 6:42 PM Image Unavailable, Please Login The F1 grid has stood at 10 teams since the collapse of the Manor squad at the end of the 2016 season, but the series has enjoyed a significant commercial boom in the meantime. It has led to a number of parties publicly expressing a desire to join the F1 grid, the most notable being Andretti Global, headed up by Michael Andretti. Until now, the FIA has not made any public indication that it would look to evaluate potential new teams through a tender process, leaving the grid set at 10 teams for the foreseeable future. But in a tweet sent from his official account on Monday, FIA president Ben Sulayem revealed he was talking to his team about starting the process to allow new teams to join the grid. Cookie Settings This content is blocked by security settings. Please allow social media cookies to access the content. Please click on button for showing it. Open settings “I have asked my FIA team to look at launching an Expressions of Interest process for prospective new teams for the FIA F1 World Championship,” read the tweet. The start of a formal process could pave the way for an interested party such as Andretti to join the F1 grid in the future, although there would still be a number of hurdles for any successful applicant to negotiate. Andretti’s efforts to get on the grid have so far hit a brick wall amid uncertainty from many of the existing teams that believe it would benefit the whole of F1 commercially. Only McLaren and Alpine have publicly stated their support for Andretti’s plans. Under the existing Concorde Agreement, signed in 2020, the teams have set out the split of the prize money awarded from F1’s revenue 10 ways, meaning the addition of an 11th team could reduce their slice of the pie. To combat this, a dilution fund was written into the Concorde Agreement that would require any new entrant to pay $200 million to join the grid, which would be split between the other teams. Andretti has said he is prepared to pay this fee to get his F1 operation up and running, but doubts have been raised by many that this is enough to make up for the possible lost revenue. “The dilution fund was set a few years ago, when the value of Formula 1 was different,” Haas F1 chief Gunther Steiner said in June. “I think one of the things will be, should we readjust it to current market rate, which is a lot more than that. But I think that's a very difficult process to do.” Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff said in May that any new team would have to prove it could be “accretive” to the overall value of F1. “If a team comes in, how can you demonstrate that you're bringing in more money than it's actually costing?” he said. “Because the 11th team means a 10% dilution for everybody else.”
$200 million entry fee that goes to the other teams? What kind of nonsense is that? I get that teams do not want to lose a portion of their yearly pay outs, but to suggest that a new team has to bring an increase revenue to justify that additional spread is crazy. Would F1 lose revenue if Williams quit and there was only 9 teams? Not a chance, and I don't think the remaining 9 teams would want to pay $200 million for them to leave. Also when is Mohammed Ben Sulayem going to get fired? His speeches during the F1 gala were beyond cringy. They were negative, thoughtless, and disrespectful to the point it only brought up hate. I'd have hoped the president would have higher standards.
I don´t get what´s the fuss about new entries. If someone pays the already outrageous fee he can race, even if the cars are built in a shed and is 20 seconds off the pace (that´s what the 107% rule is for anyways). Otherwise, any new entry approval is subject to whatever conflict of interests the other teams, Liberty or FIA have. You know how this goes: "OK, I support your entry but you´re going to be my satellite team, buy my engines, block my rivals and always vote the same than me".
$200M to get to the grid for a series you are only allowed to spend $135M to race. This is completely preposterous--however, it might have been tenable when you could spend $400M per year to race.
That's essentially it. F1 has dug itself into a weird hole. Once you paid your 200 million, you'll find the 135 million cost cap is an illusion, as the top teams are spending 300 million. Then you need all these facilities. Without your own engine, to really get the ball rolling you need to spend around a billion all in. And then you can race at the very back with Williams. Who have all these facilities. I just had a little look at the cost of Indycar to run a team there. Lets just say if I had to promote my billion dollar business some more I'd be walking right by F1's elitist fools and go straight to indycar, and take the same approach Red Bull did when they first became an F1 team, Talk about value for money.
Liberty thinks that a F1 team should be like a NBA franchise, and the rest are agreeing because it fits well for those who already are in. Running a team already is expensive enough to complicate things further with these "bureacracy" of "adding value to the championship".
“Teams” are investment vehicles first now. Nothing more lol. Hard to say it’s about competition at all. It’s looking very much like Premier League of Racing than an innovation and competition F1…,,
Well known that 8 of 10 team do not, want a new team at all. Expect further push-back and so far no positions have changed lol.
After testing, I'm going to revise my predictions: 1 - Red Bull Not quite sure whether they'll have the qualifying pace just yet, but in race pace they look mighty. They're supremely confident they may even be in a class of one... 2 - Ferrari Mega single lap pace, long runs I didn't find impressive with quite bad rear tyre wear just like post TD39 last year. 3 - Mercedes They've made some improvements but I don't believe they'll be challenging Ferrari let alone Red Bull. Will be upset by Alonso on occasion. 4 - Aston Martin Big step forwards, Their car is very extreme which will take time to understand but can cause the occasional upset to Mercedes and capitalize on mistakes from any of the teams up front. I believe Aston Martin has made such a jump that ''best of the rest'' is now the top 4 teams, rather than top 3. Or if RBR is as good as it seems, Ferrari/Merc/AM is the midfield with the rest after this backmarkers... (this is where it gets difficult) 5 - Alpine? I hate the way the behaved, very bouncy, significant problems with getting the tyres off even so that's priority number one...but the data seems to support that they do have a pretty good car. I'm not entirely convinced. 6 - Alfa Looks to have build on last years decent car. Still reliability issues here and there. 7 - Mclaren I've only put them 7th because I refuse to believe they'll have dropped behind AT and Haas. That's such a massive drop in performance you've got to wonder what the F they're doing in Woking?! 8/9 Alpha Tauri and Haas Nothing in it between these two IMO, each will have tracks that suits them better. 10 Williams I mean they don't even have an aero guy. Albon to work his miracles when he can. Extra minus points for having an awful livery.
RedBull - all the others are just slower. I dont see anyone taking them off the titles this year. I hope to be wrong. The car in testing - simply says sorted + planned upgrades etc. All others are .5 or more behind and thats before upgrades. If they win the first 6 its over lol. They can win a few odd more and keep the title unless they have multiple DNF's etc. If Perez can provide more P2's its really over.
Ferrari comes out and looks good, we struggle, RB runs away, we look better at the end and hope for next year.
#1: Red Bull Racing. The car looks the fastest, had great race pace in their long runs. No issues with reliability or tire wear. Ended 2022 with the best car, so they already had a great foundation to build on. #2: Ferrari. This might be a hopeful prediction, but we do know the car was very good in 2022 and they evolved from that design. The car did look to have the wrong balance with the small wing they brought and the updated wing broke before they got a proper test on it. Tire wear is a huge concern and the Ferrari PU cars had reliability issues, so that could destroy their chances and put them down to 3rd even. #3: Mercedes. Kings of the sand baggers, so for all we know they come out with the best car. Doesn't appear that way since the car still bounces, there hasn't been a lot of smiles inside their garage. With the same tires, they don't seem to have the same pace as Red Bull or even Ferrari. Despite a stoppage, I expect them to have phenomenal reliability as usual. #4: Alpine. This is very hard choice. They looked pretty bad in testing, but they have proven to be an efficient working team and they have a very solid driver line up that usually gets the results when presented. I suspect they worked on the reliability of their PU, but reports also suggest they have the least power which is a huge handicap that will hurt them all season. #5: Aston Martin. I truly hope they are 4th and very close to the top 3, but I doubt it. Even 5th might be a stretch. Since Stroll took over, the team buys ideas and can't translate that into actual performance. Their track record suggests that even if they have a good car, they will somehow throw that away. Alonso is a HUGE asset to the team, but only if they work around what he wants. If not, his attitude goes to crap which hurts his performance. If the team choose to develop around Daddy's son, then that is a huge mistake. #6: McLaren. They have looked awful in testing but they have a great driver in Lando and all the resources to get it figured out. I think Oscar will be a bit of a flop so I don't expect him to bring in all that many points compared to Norris. #7: Alfa Romeo. They just as easily could be 9th. The car looks good so far. Reliability is a big concern for them, and I expect even if they come out great, their development will again drop them down the grid just as it did in 2022. I do think their driver line up is very solid, so if the car is there they should be capable of points each week. #8: AlphaTauri. I wouldn't be surprised if they are up there battling for 4th or 5th in the championship. Red Bull has put a lot of pressure on them this season, already talks of selling, etc. Their result last year is unacceptable in their eyes. So 8th would be disastrous for them. I worry about their drivers. Yuki did great in 2022, but he's still near the bottom for driver talent. Nyck De Vries I expect to be the stand out rookie, but he's still a rookie and so I'd expect mistakes here and there as he learns. #9: Haas. A veteran line up but they don't really have the engineers to develop the car or come up with new ideas or solutions. #10: Williams. I really do hope they are able to fight for points on regular basis, but why would anyone think they could over the entire season? Their testing results look like they made big gains, which is very encouraging. However, they seem to have the worst collection of designers and engineers that despite retaining a great PU, can't for the life of them build a decent chassis. WDC: 1: Max Verstappen. Best driver in the best car, you have to predict he's the champ. 2: Charles Leclerc. Probably the only driver that comes close to Verstappen's outright pace, but still makes way too many mistakes. It really depends if Ferrari have a car and can't mess it up. 3: Lewis Hamilton. Even though he got beat by Russell last year, in the second half of the season he was definitely the better driver. 4: Sergio Perez. He'll have a car good enough to win races, so no reason why he shouldn't be top 4. 5: Carlos Sainz. If the car doesn't DNF, and he doesn't make his own silly mistakes, he is very capable of staying within a respectable reach to Charles. He can go on long streaks of scoring good points.
I’ll say it here too. Mercedes will be quickest by no later than mid season. Red Bull have a low development ceiling. Merc are just beginning to figure out this platform and only have a front end grip issue to sort through. Red Bull may be too far ahead by then. This is why we watch. I miss @fastian
Bold prediction with respect to Mercedes and yet we could see that. It is F1 and almost all is possible lol. I do miss Ian. A good man and human being certainly!!
I miss Ian a lot too...great guy. PS Ferraripilot I liked your statement for the Ian content, not the Merc will be at the front mid season
Hopefully we were sand bagging during the tests by running full fuel loads. So with hope in my heart I am going with the above. We will know on Sunday if there is a chance of this happening.
Based on testing performance, it’s all over. Hand the title to RB and a 3rd wdc to Ver. The rest of the field ought to save their money for 2023 and put it all into developing their 2024 cars. Still looking forward to seeing the first race..!
