Caterham principal aims for ‘fresh impetus’

Caterham team principal Tony Fernandes has spoken about the decision to axe Jarno Trulli in favour of Vitaly Petrov for the 2012 season. Go here for Red Bull v Cowboys! You heard right! Trulli was under contract for the team, but his future in Formula 1 now looks uncertain after being replaced by the Russian. Speaking about the [...]

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Formula1Fancast/~3/vIpThGa9LMY/caterham-principal-aims-for-fresh-impetus

Walt Brown Warwick Brown Adolf Brudes Martin Brundle Gianmaria Bruni

Mercedes formally unveils the new W03

Mercedes has officially unveiled its new W03, some five days after it was shaken down at a filming day at Silverstone. The car is the first to be produced by the stellar new technical team of Bob Bell, Aldo Costa … Continue reading

Source: http://adamcooperf1.com/2012/02/21/mercedes-formally-unveils-the-new-w03/

Jaime Alguersuari Philippe Alliot Cliff Allison Fernando Alonso Giovanna Amati

Barrichello back in Williams frame

Formula 1 always goes a little quiet over Christmas, but one team that has been making waves - both publicly and behind the scenes - are Williams.

The team that dominated F1 for much of the 1980s and 1990s are one of only two outfits still with an obvious vacancy in their driver line-up - the other being back-of-the-grid HRT.

And it seems that Rubens Barrichello, the veteran who has driven for the team for the last two seasons, is back in with a chance of staying with them for 2012.

Rubens Barrichello

Rubens Barrichello had been tipped to vacate his Williams seat. Photo: Getty

Venezuelan Pastor Maldonado is staying on in one of the cars after an up-and-down rookie season in 2011 - his position in the team is secure thanks to a multi-million sponsorship deal with his country's national oil company.

But the second seat is still up for grabs, and while Williams are not the attractive proposition they were in their glory days, they are the only decent choice for a whole host of drivers wishing to continue their F1 careers.

These include Barrichello, German Adrian Sutil, Brazilian Bruno Senna, Toro Rosso rejects Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi and Italian Vitantonio Liuzzi.

Sutil, who had an impressive second half of the season for Force India, has been the favourite for some time, but the situation appears to have shifted recently.

My sources tell me that Barrichello, who appeared to be out of the running as his 19th season in F1 drew to a close in November, has come back into the frame and now has a reasonable chance of a Williams drive in 2012.

Barrichello has been arguing for some time that, with the huge ructions going on at Williams through 2011 and over the winter, it would make sense to have a known reference in the drivers.

"With all the changes for next year on the engine side and engineers," he said at the season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix, "it would be clever from the team to keep the drivers and keep on going. I'm not pushing them, I'm just trying to show them that is the way to do it."

You can see his point. The team are changing engine suppliers, replacing Cosworth with Renault, and have undergone a wholesale restructure of the design department, with a new technical director, head of aerodynamics and head of engineering.

New tech boss Mike Coughlan is admired as being very clever, but his last role as a technical director was with the now-defunct Arrows team, who collapsed in 2002. As chief designer of McLaren after that, he was involved in the spy-gate scandal that engulfed the team in 2007 and for which he was sacked.

The technical changes at Williams were made even more seismic when it emerged on New Year's Eve that not only was co-founder Patrick Head stepping down as director of engineering, he was also resigning his position on the F1 team's board, thereby cutting all his ties with the sport.

It had long been known that Head, one of the most respected engineers in the history of the sport, would no longer have an active role in the day-to-day F1 operation, but it was a surprise to hear he was not going to be on the board of directors.

Head has insisted that his decision to end his day-to-day F1 role was based on feeling his relevance in F1 was diminishing.

In Brazil, he said: "I certainly didn't have an ambition to stop my involvement in Formula One with a season like this last one we've had behind us.

"But when I have a look at what specifically I can do to assist Mike Coughlan and (chief operations officer) Mark Gillan and (head of aerodynamics) Jason Somerville, I came to the conclusion that it isn't really enough to justify me carrying on doing the same thing."

He will still be involved at Williams through their subsidiary company Williams Hybrid Power and remains close to team boss Sir Frank Williams, who will doubtless be turning to him for advice on a regular basis.

All the same, many will consider it unwise that a team in such flux, and with such a grave need to improve, will not have on their board the guidance and wisdom of a man who not only co-founded the company but who was directly responsible for seven drivers' championships and nine constructors' titles.

Why will he not be there? Williams and Head were both unavailable for comment on Monday. I'm told, though, that his difficult relationship with chief executive officer Adam Parr was a part of Head's decision to step down.

Ironically, Head's departure may ease Barrichello's path to a return.

Head is forthright character and I'm told he had grown tired of the Brazilian's complaints about the team's difficulties.

With the 65-year-old no longer involved, that on the face of it is one less barrier to Barrichello being in the car again.

It seems, though, that all the driver hopefuls will have to wait. Williams are in the process of sponsorship negotiations with the Gulf state of Qatar, and they take primacy over a final decision on drivers.

With more than a month until the start of pre-season testing on 7 February, there is plenty of time to sort out drivers. After all, it's not as if Williams are struggling for choice.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/01/barrichello_back_in_williams_f.html

Kenny Acheson Andrea de Adamich Philippe Adams Walt Ader Kurt Adolff

Maldonado leads the way

Pastor Maldonado led the way on the third day of Barcelona testing, which seemed a rather incongruous result given the lap times from Williams up to now. However, it did underline that one cannot really read anything into the lap times until we get to Melbourne. Maldonado completed 106 laps of the track and set [...]

Source: http://joesaward.wordpress.com/2012/02/23/maldonado-leads-the-way/

Adri·n Campos John Cannon Eitel Cantoni Bill Cantrell Ivan Capelli

Five ways to improve F1


Emerson Fittipaldi in his heyday © Sutton Images
In an interview in the Times, former world champion Emerson Fittipaldi’s outlined his five-point plan to enhance Formula One. Cut costs “They spend a fortune in wind-tunnel testing alone. Reduce costs and the slowest teams would catch up and make it more even.” Limit downforce “They need to reduce enormously the downforce in the cars, the only way to bring back overtaking. We need more mechanical grip so that you have longer braking areas, can set up the car coming out of a corner, get in the slipstream and then overtake.” Close the pitlane “When the safety car goes out they should close the pitlane. Now it’s just a lottery.” Lift ban on team orders “It is a very stupid rule. It’s why they are called teams, it’s why they have two cars. If a driver is leading in the championship, everything has to go in his favour. What is wrong with that? It’s so easy for teams to camouflage their orders anyway. All they need to do is tell one guy on the radio he has a problem with his brakes. They can bend the rules very easily. In the old days they would even swap cars, so why do we have this ban now?” Retain traditional grands prix “These places are the soul of racing. The Americas are under-represented. We have Canada back, but there is no USA, no Argentina, no Mexico. We need to stay in the heartlands.”

Source: http://blogs.espnf1.com/paperroundf1/archives/2010/11/five_ways_to_improve_f1.php

Keith Andrews Elio de Angelis Marco Apicella M·rio de Ara˙jo Cabral Frank Armi

1/8 Monogram 1985 Corvette - WIP

Hello all!

I had originally posted this in the Builder's Corner section because I hadn't actually started work on this beast. Now that the work has started, it's time for a WIP!

Old post: http://cs.scaleautomag.com/SCACS/forums/t/107479.aspx

The Story: My Dad and I originally built this kit in (I believe) 1990. We never really did finish it, and to be honest the build quality was terrible. This was my Dad's first and only model, and I was 6 years old, so I think we have an excuse! I knew Dad had it in one of his sheds and it had been there for over 20 years. Since my re-entry into the hobby about a year and a half ago I have been bugging him to get it out for me. My constant nagging, and I think seeing some of my finished work, finally cracked him and we went and dug it out!

The unfortunate part of the story is that the box had become a nice cozy home for a mouse or two, all long vacated. The instructions were of course used for bedding material and the interior tub was a make-shift litter box. Some careful sifting found all of the pieces (hopefully!) and the model and parts were put in a garbage bag and sealed up.

Over the past two days I have been busy bathing the two foot monster in warm water and a mild all purpose cleaner. Three rounds in soapy water and one through fresh water should have gotten all the nasty stuff. I of course wore a mask and rubber gloves while doing this since mouse droppings can carry A LOT of diseases. All told the cleaning was about six hours.

If you read any of the other post, you will know I was trying to figure out how to take the behemoth apart. I'm very glad to say that after washing it, many of the pieces came apart very easily, with very little persuasion. The interior tub and front suspension are giving me some issues, but nothing I can't overcome.

The next step is stripping paint, and then on to the build!

The Plan: This model is going to be built as a gift for my old man, with Christmas 2012 being the goal. He's always wanted a Corvette, so this is going to be my contribution to his wanton lust for all Vettes. The build is going to be as close as I can get to how the 1:1 rolled off the factory line. I'm doing research to get as close to the real thing as possible. I am however limiting myself in scope. I want, scratch that, need to finish this by Christmas. It would be so easy in this scale to build an EXACT replica, but I simply don't have the time or skills for that.

Don't expect this build to move along at any speedy kind of rate, but any time I accomplish something I will post it here.

Now for some photos! Before the bath:

Source: http://cs.scaleautomag.com/SCACS/forums/thread/1003115.aspx

Roberto Bonomi Juan Manuel Bordeu Slim Borgudd Luki Botha JeanChristophe Boullion

Hulkenberg sets the pace in Barcelona

Nico Hulkenberg set the fastest time on the second day of the Barcelona test with a best of 1m22.608s, after a mammoth 112 laps of the track in his Force India. “We started the day with some aero work – trying some constant speed runs and collecting more data,” he said. “Then, the rest of [...]

Source: http://joesaward.wordpress.com/2012/02/22/hulkenberg-sets-the-pace-in-barcelona/

Edgar Barth Giorgio Bassi Erwin Bauer Zsolt Baumgartner Elie Bayol