F1-Blog

Happy 30th birthday Williams F1.

Yup they have been in the sport for 30 years now, and therefore are celebrating. Over the next couple of months during testing they will run the car (FW29B) in 6 colour schemes to reflect their history.

The team will compete in their 500th GP this season (at Turkey this year), They will record their 50,000th racing lap sometime this year (around Spain if all goes well).

Frank Williams will take part in his 600th GP this year at Monaco, that’s 39 years in the sport, where he has only missed 23 races so far. But that is not the icing on the cake, no he will officially overtake Enzo Ferrari as the longest running F1 person this year.

We say good luck to the team, and lets hope their FW30 will be a cracker.

Here are a few more hi-res pictures from the Toyota launch event.

It’s interesting, the car is certainly a Toyota, however it’s quite different to the 2006/2007 car, and reminds me more of their more successful 2005 one, albeit in an updated for the hi-aero efficiency times.

I’m quite looking forward to the Toyota team this year (I am a fan, just look at the site’s title image after all), and I’m hoping with a rejuvenated driver line-up and a new car, that they can show significant progress this season.

Force India have finally announced their driver lineup for 2008.

The drivers are Giancarlo Fisichella and Adrian Sutil, with Tonio Liuzzi taking the third seat duties for the season.

The two main drivers were widely believed to be the ones in the cars, however the interesting announcement is Tonio in the third seat. It will certainly make sure that the main line drivers are kept in check, as if they are slow, he will be promoted.

Let’s hope the new team get up to speed quickly, and we wish them luck.

The TF108 has been launched today, and from the images and press information, seems to be a complete departure from their previous cars.

The car has a complete change to the layout of both the front end and rear of the car. The obvious changes are Aero based (like the McLaren nose copy), but this car has a stretched wheelbase, and new suspension layout.

Toyota seem to be the first team to show their car that have not directly improved their 2007 car, the TF108, is a complete departure on the aero and layout sides of things especially.

Pascal Vasselon says “The aerodynamic concept of this car has changed. The TF107 was an evolution of the TF106, but this time the new package is a departure from recent Toyotas. The primary aerodynamic design philosophy for the TF108 is geared towards optimising the entire package. In mechanical terms we felt we had a strong basis so we have focused on making a few refinements”

The other significant developments (like in the McLaren) are in the gearbox area, McLaren have moved to completely carbon box, and Toyota seem to have decided that this is one of their area’s to improve as well.

We will see if all the changes - in both car and driver lineup - have improved the motoring giants on track abilities, they join the test setup for Jerez on January the 13th.

A couple of shots from the first testing day for McLaren at Jerez.

You will notice that the Aero Bridge on the nose of the car is back, even if it was missing from the car at the launch event.

How much of the actual 2008 car is on show is anyone’s guess, you do however notice the slight increase in the cars wheelbase in these shots, the shots below have a nice closeup of the detailing around the rear wheels and exhausts.

Pedro and Heiki are the drivers on the track at Jerez at the moment. Today however should see Lewis behind the wheel.

BMW have added the voice of concern to the already vocal Renault and Ferrari worries about the M.E.S Electronics that all the teams have to run this year.

I can see there reason for concern in it’s most basic way, however the system is jointly developed with Microsoft, and McLaren Electronics are only supplying just that, the electronics that joins the system to the car, almost all the development of the ’software’ is done by, or overseen by Microsoft.

However the whole thing about the standard control unit is a farce anyhow, yes try cut costs, but this has only raised them as teams have not only had to re-develop components, interfaces, procedures and practices, but have essentially lost a sponsor as well (whoever was supplying the electronics before M.E.S)

To add insult to injury, how are the teams going to add the energy re-gain systems expected next year to their cars, if they have little control over the electronics, as most of the systems are going to require very clever, and advanced electronics solutions.

I know a lot of these issues will be worked out, perhaps Microsoft allow the teams to hook a certain number of exposed API’s (Application Programing Interfaces) in the controlled electronics unit, but even so, it will not be the same as a custom written, designed and built system.

Time will tell, I for one am certainly looking forward (in some ways at least) to the drivers not being able to rely on the TC systems to get them out of trouble, it will certainly benefit the more natural drivers. However I am sure there are bound to be a slew of ‘Electronics Issues’ used as excuses when cars stop working.

This is the video of the Fiorano test of the F2008.

Following the Ferrari shakedown picture’s, here are the McLaren launch pictures from today (Quick warning, some of the images are quite large 2+Mb when opened).

More pics after the jump. Read more

Here’s some pics from the F2008 Fiorano Shakedown.

There is a bunch more shots after the jump.

Read more

McLaren are the second team to launch their F1 challenger for 2008.

The car has been in design/wind tunnel since May last year, and like the Ferrari is more of a super tweaked version of the 2007 car.

The car will have to be good this season, as it’s been pawed over by the FIA and Ferrari, and most importantly has two very fast rookies at the wheel, if the car is flawed it will certainly show.

As with the Ferrari, we can see that the aero is the most significantly changed part of the car.

The sidepods, like the Ferrari have gone through the biggest visible changes, along with the high crash protection that all the cars will run.

We can expect to see significant development work before the race in Australia, as the car will not be finished just yet, and from the looks of it carries quite a few of the MP4-22’s parts over to this car.

Expect to see a significantly modified car over the next few weeks at the test’s.