This week's Grapevine brings you information fresh from the paddock on: McLaren Target Williams Honda Working it Out

McLaren Target Williams

Following yet another inadequate performance, and the impressive turn of speed shown by Ferrari's new F2002, Ron Dennis has come to the conclusion that this season, realistically, now has to be about getting ahead of Williams rather than taking either Championship.

At Brazil, where Michael Schumacher's pace did not look much faster than the Williams - especially at the end of the race when Ralf Schumacher closed down on his brother relatively easily - the new car has been put down as a smaller step than originally anticipated. At the time, Schumacher was clearly struggling to find the limits, having regular spins in practice through the weekend; however, despite continuing the increased spin trend at Imola, both Ferrari drivers were clearly in their element.

McLaren are not hiding behind the tyre war excuse either - Sauber's pace was good over the weekend, but they were no closer to troubling Williams than usual. Even if Bridgestone's latest tyre favoured the F2002 over the other Bridgestone runners, McLaren are attempting to get on terms with the whole package, and with Williams outperforming them, improvements from Michelin are not enough to bring race wins.

So, the aim for the remainder of the season is to get on top of the gap to Williams, a feat which is going to require considerable effort in its own right. As things stand, McLaren believe their aerodynamics are ahead of Williams. Mechanical grip appears to be roughly on a par, though Williams might have a slight braking advantage; the one area where there is no comparison, however, is when it comes to the engines - BMW's V10 is generating enough power to more than compensate for the small aerodynamic advantages McLaren might have had to date.

Given that McLaren's pace is somewhere around half a second a lap off Williams (at San Marino, at least), attempting to make up that deficit through the engine is going to require somewhere around 50bhp (approximately a tenth per 10hp). Last year, Mercedes managed to find an extra 30bhp or so between the start and end of season, so clearly, finding so much would be a big task.

McLaren are, in fact, looking for Ilmor to find the same 30hp improvement again this year, whilst making up the rest of the deficit to Williams in other areas. Judging by the drive Renault are getting out of corners, the Woking squad are looking to improve their traction control - making more efficient use of the available power could be worth the equivalent of 10 or 15bhp in its own right. Added to that, the never ending quest for efficient aerodynamics is expected to yield another few tenths over the remainder of the season. When it is all added up, it shows that if Mercedes and McLaren's development efforts come together over the next six months, the team can expect to find another six to eight tenths.

Ironically, their own estimates are predicting Williams will improve by another third of a second in the same timescale, which means that any slips between now and the end of the season will ensure that passing Williams is not going happen this year.

Under the circumstances, it's little wonder that the team has also started working seriously on next year's car too.

Honda Working it Out

Honda's lack of pace this season is starting to become a problem with the board, who need to start to see results from their investment - especially with Toyota coming on the scene. A lot of fuss was made over coming into this season with a new engine, and in light of the rule change for 2004 (which will require a whole new design to ensure engines last the whole weekend), time is fast running out.

When Giancarlo Fisichella tested the new Honda engine before the San Marino Grand Prix, it was safe to say he was glad to see it was finally moving forward, but the news was, at best, mixed.

The engine did deliver more power, and as much to the point, improved driveability; however, the improvements were not what Jordan had hoped to see - rather, the changes only really brought the unit in to line with the expectations the team had held for the original incarnation of the RA002E. Roughly speaking, it puts the engine around four months behind its planned evolution.

In bringing out this revision, some of the underlying issues with the engine are being shown up. For starters, this engine is slightly heavier than the previous evolution - indicating work is taking place to beef up its structural integrity. Considering the engine is a stressed component of the chassis, if the loads on the unit are in excess of the designer's expectations, then it will flex, normally in a twisted shear. Inevitably, considering that even small movement increases both the stresses and wear on internal components, requiring peak performance is not conducive to a long and healthy life.

The "improved driveability" line is rather good, given the "accelerate by wire" nature of the modern Formula One engine. Whilst the smoothness of the power curve does have some relevance, the engine mapping and traction control system make the driver's job considerably easier, providing an artificial smoothness to the throttle. However, the mechanical grip of the car is definitely affected by the chassis rigidity, so even without smoothing the power curve, this structurally reinforced unit does, indeed, improve driveability.

Anyway, getting back on track, this season is presenting something of a challenge for Honda. Since diagnosing and solving the structural issue, research and development has been working on getting the program sorted out. A pure power evolution, originally intended for the start of the season, is now pencilled in to arrive for Canada in June. If all goes according to the revised plan, there will be further revisions in France and Belgium, along with a "special" for the season close in Japan - or Indy, if it is ready in time.

Sounds simple, put like that. However, this represents a new release approximately every six weeks, and that is pushing the boundaries. Whilst delivering "production" units to the teams for racing, the development team needs to get the new ideas into development models, prove their concepts on the dyno, then get them into a car for testing and feedback ahead of the event. The logistics become almost as critical as the developments themselves.

Now, there is an interesting rumour starting to do the rounds concerning how Honda are going to achieve this - and there's no surprise to discover it requires them to focus on a single team in order to maximise the speed of development. More surprisingly, it would require a degree of co-operation from the teams involved if it is to be in any way successful.

Since David Richards took the helm at BAR, Honda have bought in to the image he has painted of a successful, front running team. His sweeping changes have met with solid approval, as he seems to be taking decisive action, and driving the team towards fulfilling the image; and Honda are sure they have a solid part to play in that. Enough, it seems, that the rumours of Honda aligning themselves behind BAR alone are again gathering momentum. In this scenario, Honda play a cunning game - relying on Jordan to test their engines as they come through the development cycle, feeding back their engine mapping information to BAR, who are busy working on getting their chassis sorted out. By the end of the season, having been able to concentrate on chassis work, with Jordan and Honda sorting out the engine, BAR would head up the Irish outfit, and be the natural choice for pride of place in 2003.

Of course, Jordan might have something to say about that. This year, they have put together a car that, frankly, they believe to have as good a chassis as anyone - except Ferrari - in the pitlane. All they need now, is to get some evolutions on the engine, and raise the rev limits. Then they could show a thing or two.