More testing required before 2014 engines are introduced: Stefano Domenicali

Oliver Turvey of Great Britain and McLaren on track during Formula One Testing at the Mugello Circuit on May 3, 2012 in Mugello, Italy

Speaking at Ferrari‘s annual Wrooom event, team principal Stefano Domenicali again stepped up Ferrari’s want for more extensive testing. For the last few years, we have seen president Luca di Montezemelo time and again campaigning for more track testing than is currently available. Unlimited testing in the early part of the last decade played a huge role in the Prancing Horse’s metronomic success with Michael Schumacher.

Nowadays, with increasing reliance on aerodynamics, it becomes even more important to test the new upgrades before running them in race trim. One prime example of what burning rubber on the track can do as compared to wind tunnel testing was Ferrari’s turnaround in form from the Spanish Grand Prix onwards last year, which was held just after the in-season Mugello test.

The in-season test has been done away with this year to reduce costs and thus there are only 3 tests for the teams to fine-tune their 2013 challengers before the season begins.

It might not be a big crisis this year as the regulations remain almost similar to last year, with a few changes in crash testing which have already been completed by quite a few teams.

The priority is next year when there would be a huge change in the technical regulations, the most crucial of them being the sport switching to 1.6l turbocharged V6 engines from the current 2.4l V8 ones. The V8 engines were first introduced in 2006 and very soon the engine freeze rule came into effect, which meant the teams couldn’t make any major changes to the engines and gain performance benefit.

That is all set to change with the new ‘power units’ (as they will be called). In place of KERS, we shall have ERS which will give extra 160hp to drivers for 33 seconds instead of the current 80 extra hp for 8 seconds per lap.

Currently, the new engines are all being run on the dyno – Mercedes revealed an image of their new engine a few days ago – but when they are fitted and the 2014 cars take to the track during the pre-season tests, the teams will have a much bigger workload on their hands. Along with the constant aerodynamic battles, it will be interesting to see which team gets the most out of their engines quickest. With the new engines being turbocharged, drivers will face much greater oversteer at corner exits and it will take some time to adjust the anti-roll bar and spring stiffness settings to make it to the liking of each and every driver. Not only that, much complex matters such as how to map the engine in an optimum way so as to obtain maximum benefit from the coke-bottle region, will be a severe headache for the world’s best engineers associated with the teams.

When we consider all this, we can understand why Domenicali is correct in demanding more track testing time from the FIA and there is no doubt that every other team principal down the pitlane will readily agree with him.