F1 teams on notice tomorrow

The TWG may disregard the FIA¹s guidance at this stage if it so decides but, if the TWG fails to reach agreement on these or other measures by 6 September, the FIA will then offer the 10 technical directors three alternative packages of proposals. They must choose one within a further 45 days (before October 21). Otherwise the FIA will independently impose regulations that will come into force after three further months (after January 21, but to be implemented for the 2005 season). These will be based on the FIA recommendations, which will be presented to the TWG within the next fortnight.

FIA president Max Mosley said: "Of course, if they produce a satisfactory proposal within the next two months, it would be quicker. [But] I think the chance of them producing a proposal is remote because there are 10 teams, and all the technical directors of the teams constitute the Technical Working Group. Those 10 people have to agree by a majority of at least eight votes before anything can come in. It has to be an 80 percent majority.

"So, in order to help them perhaps, we're going to furnish them within two weeks with a precise set of regulations covering three topics engines, aerodynamics and tyres which they may choose to adopt. They will then know that, if they don't produce something themselves, these will be the measures that in all probability we will adopt.

"It may be that some of the teams will prefer simply to follow the regulations we publish on the grounds that they are certain, they know what they're doing, and they've got time to do everything. Others may prefer to campaign for other regulations but, if they do, they will have to get eight out the 10 teams to agree with them something not immediately easy to do.

"As to engines, in 2005 we will require engines to do two races two weekends between rebuilds in order to reduce the power slightly. We feel that is as far as we can go on the engines for 2005. In 2006, we will require them to drop the capacity of the engine from 3.0 litres to 2.4. It will be a V8, and it will be more restricted than the restrictions proposed by all seven engine manufacturers. These will be restrictions on dimensions and on materials which have already been proposed [and they will bring] power escalation under control. They will have an incidental side-effect of significantly reducing the costs of working on these engines.

"In addition, we will then have to confront the difficulty: what happens to those teams which do not have a 2.4 V8 for 2006 because they¹re not aligned to a manufacturer (or perhaps a manufacturer can't get an engine ready in time)? [In that event] we will allow them to continue to run a 3-litre V10 but with a rev-limiter. The rev limit will be set at a level which will ensure that the engine is less powerful (but not much less powerful) than the 2.4s which will have been built.

"It is [also] our intention to require the engines to use bio-fuels that is to say, fuels that are carbon-neutral.

"We also will bring in a standard ECU as soon as we can. We would like to do that at the beginning of the 2.4 engine. This may not be possible. The reason is that, although the electronics experts all agree that they could produce something which would give us the assurance that there was no cheating, no traction control, I think it's almost impossible to convince the public or even the press that nobody is doing something they shouldn't. We've always said that, unless we can be absolutely certain that we can demonstrate to the public beyond any doubt that there is no cheating, we don't go along with the system.

"As to aerodynamics, there is a significant package of measures already [in place] for 2005, the detail of which is still be worked on.

"The tyre regulation that we will suggest will drastically reduce the number of tyres available per weekend. What is being talked about at the moment is two sets of tyres, one for [the] Friday and Saturday, and another set for qualifying and the race, with the original set as a back-up. Two types of tyres would [be available in order to] take account of the possibility that a team couldn't work on a particular set."