Engine Development

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Ruslan
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Engine Development

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Post by Ruslan »

I wasn't paying close attention to the engine development freeze rules until it became a factor what we are seeing:

1. Red Bull showed up with more power than Mercedes.
2. Mercedes has suddenly got their mojo back the last two races.
3. Helmut Marko complains.
4. Ferrari has suddenly announced they are making engine upgrades.

https://www.grandprix.com/news/ferrari- ... eason.html

The article on Ferrari is particularly interesting because:

1. "The regulations allowed us to homologate a new engine at the beginning of the season, but we only changed some parts." said Binotto.
2. Binotto claims they had slashed the laptime deficit from 1.5 seconds to around 0.7.
3. I gather this means with the engine upgrades, it will be even less (how many tenths does the engine upgrade provide?).

Anyhow, the impression I get (reinforced by a conversation I had last night) is that 1) Red Bull made all their engine changes at the start of the season giving them an advantage; 2) Mercedes held off making all their allowed changes, but made them two races ago, returning the advantage back to Mercedes; and now 3) Ferrari is making their changes now, which should close some of the gap to the leaders (and pull it ahead of McLaren?).
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