WHAT’S NEW
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SEASON
30
PREVIEW
Although the regulations are largely stable heading into the 2015 season, there are always some
F1’S ENGINE UNFREEZE
The engine freeze was one of the most-talked-about
subjects during the winter. Then, thanks to lobbying
primarily from Ferrari, which was key in isolating the
loophole in the regulations that allowed a different
interpretation of the freeze, things became a little freer.
But it’s best to think of what has happened as a partial
thaw, rather than the start of an all-out engine war.
Under the original interpretation of the rules, each
manufacturer set down the design of their engine before
the start of the season, with no changes permitted
until the winter. This year, changes are allowed
during the season, but there is one very
important proviso: the regulations governing
how much of the engine can be changed
remain in place.
The engine is divided
into a total of 42 different
components, with each
awarded a token value of
between one and three.
For 2015, a total of 32
tokens can be spent, which
represents a change of
48.5 per cent of the
power-unit package. Each
year, the amount that can
be changed is reduced.
The difference now is that while the
restrictions on how many tokens you can
use remain, the window during which you can
30 AUTOSPORT.COM MARCH 5 2015
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‘spend’ them now extends through the preceding
winter and the full season. All the power-unit
manufacturers have made changes over the winter, but
will still be able to introduce new engine specifications
during the year. This includes newcomer Honda, which
was initially not allowed to make in-season changes on
the grounds that it had freedom to change as much as
it wanted until the start of the year.
All four engine manufacturers are reserving some
tokens to carry into the season, with Ferrari believed to
have kept the most in reserve. As Renault Sport F1’s
Rob White explains, it means that the planned
developments can be less rushed.
“We had a development programme that
was heading towards the first race and we
were expecting not to do performance
development into the season,” he
explains. “The impact of the first racing
spec is perhaps that stuff which
doesn’t make it to the first race
could be introduced later
in the season.”
The positive thing about this
change is that the competitive order of
the engine packages at the first race may not
hold for the whole season. So while it is not a
pure development war, we will see more ebb
and flow among the engines, particularly
in the first half of the season.