Inevitably Renault was again in the spotlight at Bahrain this week, although the problems experienced by its four cars were by no means all down to the power unit supplier. After the test the company issued this Q&A with Rob White, Renault F1’s deputy managing director (technical).
Q: What were the key steps taken between Jerez and Bahrain?
“We made a number of specification changes to the Energy Store (battery), involving modified hardware, requiring some gymnastics in engineering, procurement, assembly and logistics. We also introduced two levels of PU control system software updates; the first being effectively what would have been a decent starting point for Jerez. It eliminated some bugs that allowed us to make mapping and calibration corrections, which subsequently allowed us to operate the cars in a more robust way to gather mileage. The second layer of software changes had more functionality to allow a greater authority to the control systems, giving better performance and driveability, and a larger degree of Power Unit systems integration. All the cars started on the first route and all 4 cars migrated to the second solution as we gathered mileage.”
Q: How has the test in Bahrain gone this week?
“We have had some set-backs, but we have definitely made progress and have taken several steps forward. The changes have improved the PU behaviour in the car and we are have accumulated valuable mileage. There have been stoppages, on our side and on the chassis side as well, but we have ironed out some important faults and allowed the teams to gain crucial experience of the car as a whole. We have seen that minor incidents can cause downtime that is difficult or impossible to recover. In particular, we lost more time than anticipated on the final day. While we are not at the level of operation and performance we would want to be, we have a more solid basis to work from, and we are moving in the right direction.”
Q: Would you say you are back on schedule?
“We have made some good headway, in terms of PU performance and operation in the car, we are now in a situation we could have accepted mid-Jerez. We have solved some problems and revealed some others. We are not back on schedule but we are moving in the right direction – the running we have done is very valuable. The challenge is to improve the rate of progress, because the gap to where we wanted to be at this stage remains substantial. We are some weeks behind where we wanted to be, and we acknowledge it will take time to unlock the full performance of the PU. We are working hard to get there and we are determined to succeed. We remain confident in the PU and its sub systems, we are just not at the level of operation and performance we want to be. The immaturity of the PU combined with the time lost to incidents, means the chassis work to prepare for the season is also behind schedule. From this point on we must pursue and accelerate an upward curve.”
Q: What is the plan in the short break between tests?
“We run again in Bahrain at the end of next week. The homologation deadline is looming, the race engines for Melbourne are in the early stages of build. There is a huge amount of work in progress. The Viry team is working night and day to solve our problems. The collaboration with our teams is closer than ever. The rate of development is extremely rapid away from the track and that we can create and validate effective solutions very quickly shows the resolve and tenacity of all our team members. We now have a list of issues from this test we will address. There are of course priority calls to sort out the most important ones from the background noise, but we will come back stronger at the next test and continue to learn about the Power Unit and prepare for Melbourne.”
Adam Cooper F1 
So six days behind schedule at this stage. Merc was said to be ahead of schedule, but what about Ferrari? A day late?
“We are some weeks behind where we wanted to be, and we acknowledge it will take time to unlock the full performance of the PU.”
Yeah, second Jerez day was some weeks ago.
“we are now in a situation we could have accepted mid-Jerez”
I think we’re on the same page, yes? 🙂
Tenacious R.
Melbourne is likely to resemble 2002, only this time all Renault-powered cars will be out of the race on the formation lap; by lap 15 it will be over with Mercedes and Ferrari factory/customer cars suffering some kind unexpected failure which didn’t surface during winter testing.
Spectators, too, will be having a shocker with silent cars. Some people have negative feelings towards IndyCar, but I don’t. I think not only did F1 shoot itself in the foot – it also set itself on fire.
“…six days behind schedule at this stage” is much more specific than what Renault Sport F1 has said in this Q&A statement… I think it was worded very carefully.
I agree, but we want to get down to specifics now don’t we? Mid-Jerez to me means completion of two days worth of on-track testing.
With the first Bahrain test now behind, the teams have had eight days at a track in total. According to logic this means they have done 2/8 (25%) of their planned tasks at this moment. Six days behind before the final test.
I think the way I read this Q&A makes sense. The six days are clearly visible between the lines.
This has been a good learning excercize on how to understand these statements from Rob White. In this prior statement here of February 22nd, Rob had said, “We are some weeks behind where we wanted to be, and we acknowledge it will take time to unlock the full performance of the PU.”
In the light of the Bahrain 2 tests, and the new statement from Rob today, we can now more clearly understand the timeline Rob was attempting to convery in this prior statement here.