Raikkonen: “Trickier” to get most from new engines

2014 F1 season

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Kimi Raikkonen played down the impact of the engine change but admitted it will be “much trickier” to get the most out of the new formula.

“I think the biggest challenge is getting all the new stuff working as we want and working together,” said Raikkonen after driving the Ferrari F14 T for the first time.

“It is much trickier than what we are used to, but from the driving side I don’t think it’s an awful lot different.”

Raikkonen only completed 31 laps but that was more than any other team managed and some did not run at all. He said it is “pretty normal with such a big change” to see teams struggling with reliability.

“It is just the first day with all new stuff so it takes time to get things up to speed. One day to go, a lot of work to do, we know that.

“But we expected these first test days to learn things, so I really don’t feel like it is such a big difference to this year or any previous one.”

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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19 comments on “Raikkonen: “Trickier” to get most from new engines”

  1. I guess they don’t even have turbo lag because of ERS.

    1. ers dosnt negate turbo lag. ers can be used to avoid lag, but it all depends how teams with to best utilize the ers. all teams have the same amount of time to use it per lap, out of slow corners or off boost will be best used, but i see only starts being a problem unless they use some kinda antilag system, which would be cool.

      1. You can use it as an anti-lag device like the WRC teams do for their turbos, but without ignition downstream, instead employing battery-power. Pretty smart IMO.

      2. I think the rules don’t define a time you can use ERS energy, but rather a set amount of energy per lap – 4000kJ. Used at full power of 120kW, thats 33,3 seconds per lap, but since the ECU will now control the power, instead of the driver, they could use it longer at lower powers.

        Also, since the energy use limitation of 4000kJ/lap seems to refer only to the energy fed back to the KERS unit (MGU-K), I think the energy used to keep the turbo spinning via the MGU-H unit does not count towards the limit they can use every lap, so I think everyone will be keeping the turbo at the necessary speed at all times.

        1. Does the rate of recharge allow use of 4,000kJ every lap?

          1. Luth (@soulofaetherym)
            28th January 2014, 21:36

            No, rate of recharge is around half of that per lap, which is interesting, because you will not have the full 4000kJ always :)

          2. The rate of recharge from the MGU-K (braking energy) is limited at 2,000kJ per lap, so from the braking energy, you can only recharge half the energy you can use in a lap. But the MGU-H unit (attached to the turbo) has no recharge limit, so you can extract the other half (or even more, if you can) of the energy from the exhaust gases, so yes, you should be able to use the full 4000kJ per lap, unless the team finds that the extra 120 kW are less useful than extracting less energy from the MGU-H.

            The interesting part is, that under the rules, you could even extract all the energy from the exhaust gases, and only use the MGU-K part for acceleration, not energy harvesting. While it is doubtful anyone would do this, it still means that there will be an alternate solution to the team radio messages about reducing KERS-harvesting to improve handling under braking. If you can get more than 2000 kJ of energy from the MGU-H, you could possibly improve the cars handling without losing out on KERS power the next lap.

        2. So this would mean that you could have ERS strategy similar to fuel strategy where you could run a leaner ERS Mix (I guess thats what you would call it) and make it last maybe 60 seconds a lap but with less power or use a richer ERS Mix and make it last 30 seconds a lap but with more power. Thats so much strategy especially for a qualifying laps. Maybe this could give an advantage to midfield teams trying to make it into Q3 by ERS Strategy over a lap.

  2. The Ferrari really starts to grow on me, initially i thought it looked weird. Actually, i still think it does. But it has something about it, it’s kind of refreshing seeing some new designs in F1.

    1. It’s the same for me, slowly getting used to the new looks of the cars

    2. I can’t look at that front end without thinking of this guy.

        1. Classic, bahahahaaaaaaaa

  3. Is it just me or is the Ferrari on different tyres? They look devastatingly cool o.O
    Also love the sound so far, eventhough it seems they aren’t going anything like flat out..
    Nevertheless, fancy myself a deep manly growl, none of that screeching **** reving at 20.000+ :D

    1. The ferrari might be on Pirelli’s “Cold” Hard compund tire made specifically for today’s testing in the cold weather.

    2. those are the Pirelli special tyres for colder weather running the brought for Jerez only @mrboerns

  4. Shouldn’t the headline be, Raikkonen: “Much trickier” [for team, not driver] to get most out of new engines

    Hate these clickbait headlines.

    1. @joepa The headline is accurate. It does not say Raikkonen is referring to driving the car.

      And calling it ‘clickbait’ is hysterical. It’s not as if it says “Raikkonen in steamy three-way tryst with Finnish beach volleyball team”.

      1. That would be “5 way Tryst” as Kimi would have both teams under his wing .

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