Subscribe

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Autosport Plus

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Honda targets helped Red Bull's fuel partner fast-track F1 upgrades

Honda's ambitious 2019 Formula 1 power targets have allowed fuel supplier ExxonMobil to fast-track a series of upgrades that would normally only have been introduced during the season

The engine supplier is yet to score a podium since it returned to F1 in 2015 but has its sights set on victories with new partner Red Bull this season, and ExxonMobil said Honda had offered it extensive feedback over the winter break.

ExxonMobil developed and tested more than 36 engine oils and 40 fuel variations ahead of the start of the campaign, and global motorsports technology manager David Tsurusaki said the company has been pushed to the limit to introduce the best products it could.

"We have gone through upgrades during the winter, even though we never got to race them, because we got so much data and so much information back," Tsurusaki told Autosport.

"We had enough time to make these changes, so we said, 'Let's keep going'. We were in Japan in early December and we discussed what was the very last deadline to make a final change - as they were asking us.

"We said we had begun shipping for Barcelona testing, but we agreed we could airfreight something new if we made another change. So we did that.

"We are now already working on when can we get the next upgrades planned, when can we have [dyno] testing time availability and all of that."

ExxonMobil's progress with previous partner Renault was hampered by Red Bull's customer relationship with the manufacturer, which meant dyno testing availability was limited.

But as Red Bull is effectively Honda's works team, Tsurusaki said the pressure is now on ExxonMobil to keep up with the Japanese manufacturer.

"It is sometimes difficult when they say, 'We are ready to test, can you have something ready in three weeks?'" he said.

"But most of the time we can do it, we can get it done. I think our guys thrive on that.

"It is nice to be in a situation where you are jointly working to progress forward, and we are OK with them giving us a timeline and we can meet it or not.

"It is still a big jump from where we were before, so it is good."

Ferrari boosted by new chassis approach with Shell

Ferrari's fuel and oil partner Shell says it has been active from the concept stage of this year's car to help the team design the most compact chassis possible.

Any gains Ferrari can make as a result of a smaller fuel tank and better packaging at the rear can offer direct weight-saving and aerodynamic benefits.

Shell's F1 fuel development manager Benoit Poulet said: "With the fuel flow being the same, the framework and many of our trade-offs have been kept similar.

"But the integration with the chassis has increased in the last year, and we have been integrating more and more chassis aspects and trade-offs to get that extra performance for the car as a complete design."

Be part of the Autosport community

Join the conversation
Previous article The 10 key tests Ferrari must pass in 2019
Next article Tost 'never understood' Ricciardo's Red Bull to Renault F1 move

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Autosport Plus

Discover premium content
Subscribe