Honda might be running on unstable ground....

Depends how long they're planning to "save" them for. Are they not getting paid then while they're looking for a buyer?

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Everyone knows that million-to-one chances happen 9 times out of 10; indeed, it's a common requirement in fairy tales. If the human didn't have to overcome huge odds, what would be the point? Terry Pratchett - The Science Of Discworld

GPGSL S5 Race driver for IED.

My understanding is that Honda were still funding the team I for think for three months up until the new owner was secured.

If a new owner is not secured, then Honda will shut the team down.

And this tax payers bailout, it's almost as cringe-worthy as the web based scam type things, thinking they have a chance to buy the team.

Any possibility of Fry buying the team or something like that?

If that's the case, personally I think it's better then to close doors definitely.

It's rumoured that Fry's management buy out is the favoured option....

oh dear this could be very bad news for the team indeed.

Why? It would require the least change wouldn't it?

And is Fry really that bad? He gets alot abuse but he's certainly done alot more in his life and been alot more successful than any of us can even begin to dream.

With him running the business and Ross running the team I think there could be good things.

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

And is Fry really that bad? He gets alot abuse but he's certainly done alot more in his life and been alot more successful than any of us can even begin to dream.

That isn't how it works champ. Using this logic you can say George W Bush doesn't deserve any abuse for f**king up the world. Afterall, he has achieved a lot more in his life time than any of us will.

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haha
true.

But Fry isnt as dumb as Bush. It is very difficult to blame Fry for the performance of the team also.

imo it goes alot higher up than Fry. I do generally think that Nick Fry had little decision making power within HondaF1. It was probably Honda who assigned that Nakamoto guy as tech director which forced Geoff out which then started the ball rolling for disaster.

Earthdreams was Fry's brainchild and it could be argued that Fry/Honda implemented at the worse possible time (beginings of the recession).

Earthdreams recieved alot of respect and recognition, but at the same has to be considered as one of the reasons HondaF1 are no more today. I do not think we can say Fry is the cause for that though. However he was unable to find a large sponsor for Honda... At least not to the requirements or standards that BAT did. Finding many little sponsors was not the issue. It was the big logo and the big spot Fry could not fill. But then were Honda arragont to think they did not need one? I believe any other team it would have been the case...

2008 was a step forward. Fry was going to concentrate more of the business sdie while Ross focused on the engineering... Other than a slow car whith little development this year has proved nothing to say Fry is useless or not good at his job.

What specifically is wrong with Nick Fry, what specifically do people think he has done wrong?

Dave Richards had well has alot of confidence in him, and he certainly made an impression at Prodrive.

2005 when Fry was first in charge the team were caught cheating and banned for two races, the only thing to taint their season and him tbh. But whether or not other teams were cheating is not known and as far as BAR were concerned it was interpretation of rules and regs again (ie they claimed to be legal during the race). other than that the season was pretty good. Not as good as 2004 but then its impossible to blame Fry for that.

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

But Fry isnt as dumb as Bush. It is very difficult to blame Fry for the performance of the team also.

Granted on the first part, but not on the second. He is in charge, has a massive budget, 2 respectable drivers, and has archived nothing. He is responsible for the teams performance.

Earthdreams was Fry's brainchild and it could be argued that Fry/Honda implemented at the worse possible time (beginings of the recession).

Well you could argue that not only was it the wrong time, but it was the wrong sport. To make Honda look green and start appealing to the eco crowd was nothing more than insulting their intelligence. At the end of the day, the car that was advertising being eco was running around at the back of the grid, burning up fuel, pumping out green houses gases and generally doing nothing good for the environment, and as has become apparent now, didn't even help Honda.

Earthdream was patronising and hypocritical. If that truely was Frys idea (and I don't belive it was, as they brought in Simon Fullers PR guys to pull it off), then the man is a moron. So far he has done nothing to suggest he is anything better than a poor manager. Taken a team which Prodrive started to make look decent, with one of the largest budgets in motorsport, took them to the back of the grid, and now so bad that Honda have pulled the plug. So it isn't a case of what he has done wrong, but more, what has he done right?

If Fry buys the team like has been suggested (how would he do that? Does he have money to fund this? Because he sure as hell doesn't have sponsorship to do it) then it won't last long.

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Well you could argue that not only was it the wrong time, but it was the wrong sport. To make Honda look green and start appealing to the eco crowd was nothing more than insulting their intelligence. At the end of the day, the car that was advertising being eco was running around at the back of the grid, burning up fuel, pumping out green houses gases and generally doing nothing good for the environment, and as has become apparent now, didn't even help Honda.

Agreed to a point.

It seems kind of ironic that an F1 team is trying to advertise it. However F1's contribution to emmissions is minimal tbf. But Honda did incorporate alot of things during the earthdreams project, I cant name any of the top of my head. But I can however name the big one, and a very big one...

The premises at Brackley, formally HondaF1's site is fully ISO 14001 certified.. It took 2 years but Nick Fry got the factory ISO 14001 certified, and remains the only F1 factory to do so. That is quite a big thing and I shows Honda and Nick were fully committed to the getting a message across. Earthdreams was to help Honda get the message across and we dont need to mention Honda's efforts for a greener vehical do we. Without a sponsor they used possibly the best advertising tool available.

You use manager, and its proberly the correct word, but I do wonder how much influence he had on the team. I highly doubt Nick Fry had much choice in the matter of Nakamoto - that must have surley been 100% Honda.

At least half the problem has been a bad car... Nick Fry got Brawn in to fix this and I guess we were about to see if it was a good move or not... Thing is what started with the removal of Willis has just passed on and Honda have had a difficult time to try and recover. I fully blame Honda. Nick should take the blame for the posistion he is in, but Honda imo are the ones fully responsible. He managed to sign Rubens, and keep Jenson and hire a few more people to boost his technical team. On the whole resutls have been poor, but imo its very hard to blame that purley on Fry.

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2009 05:31PM by chet.

chet Wrote:
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> It seems kind of ironic that an F1 team is trying
> to advertise it. However F1's contribution to
> emmissions is minimal tbf.

minimal? Define minimal in the current natural state of the world.

approx 7 hours in three days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday) contributing to emmisions is minimal for you?

even when I had to drive to work and go back to home at night i could contribute less than them...

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chet Wrote:
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>However F1's contribution to
> emmissions is minimal tbf.

i wouldn't go that far,ok it pails into insigificance against china and the USA's yearly CO2 output, but it isn't just cars going round the track thats f1's environmental issue.

i know Max goes on about being carbon neutral and all that, but when you're ferrying tonnes of cargo half way across the world in rather large jets its a bit difficult to play the green angle.

but point taken that Honda as a company have taken up the 'green' challenge more than some of their competitors and F1 provided them with a platform to promote it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2009 05:39PM by marwood82.

Minimal in terms of the overal effect imo..

think how many internal flights there are in India and China... then add America. F1 is a tiny amount, a very small percentage compared to these on a global scale.

approx 7 hours in three days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday) contributing to emmisions is minimal for you?

Or even consider the number of cars on the any road at any one time. 24hours in 7days, 365 days a year...

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

to be honest its the symbolism more than anything else.

Cars world wide are a very visible contributer to greenhouse gasses. (yes there are much bigger culprits)

Formula 1 is seen as the pinicle of this problem. cars being flown around the world to drive around getting 4 mpg.

I think in principal, trying to go down the green route makes sense, with different kind of green technolgy employed to make cars go faster, improve milage, reduce imissions etc with their use focused on then bringing those devices to bear on normal road cars. F1 would become a focus for how to improve the situation.

The problem is that many technolgies simply don't transfer to the road. KERS is a prime example, the stopping power of an F1 car is huge compared to any normal road car so there is a vaugely usable bit of energy to be stored when a driver hits the brakes, even so its only conisdered to be worth a few tenths a lap.

Its got uses on trains(virgin use it on some of theirs) but on a normal road car it would make next to no difference.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2009 06:18PM by marwood82.

I also think that KERS wont be useful in road cars. a normal road driver isnt required to hit the brakes as hard as a F1 driver.

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Well you could argue that not only was it the wrong time, but it was the wrong sport. To make Honda look green and start appealing to the eco crowd was nothing more than insulting their intelligence. At the end of the day, the car that was advertising being eco was running around at the back of the grid, burning up fuel, pumping out green houses gases and generally doing nothing good for the environment, and as has become apparent now, didn't even help Honda.

From one perspective, it's a good idea. Formula 1 is, in general, atrocious for the earth and the environment. There isn't a whole lot good about it at all, actually. So to take the eco message to F1 fans was a bold move and one that needed to be done (and still needs to be done) because F1 fans are generally car lovers in general, and there is zero eco street-cred among car lovers. With a successful team, I think people would have over-looked the fact that it was hypocrisy for an F1 team to advertise green issues. The problem, as you rightly point out, is that the message was being advertised by Honda, who were running around at the back of the grid in a puck-ugly car, doing nothing good for the environment, either in real terms or in awareness-raising terms. If it were McLaren or Ferrari, perhaps there would be far greater efforts now to make F1 eco-neutral(ish). Indeed, I think for someone like McLaren, it would be an excellent move, as it would associate Mercedes with "green" cars, and Mercedes have been making strides in this area, only to be overlooked by cars like the Prius. Instead what happened was Honda damaged the idea of eco-awareness in motorsport.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2009 06:45PM by The Lopper.

I also think that KERS wont be useful in road cars. a normal road driver isnt required to hit the brakes as hard as a F1 driver.

But a normal driver use brakes more often, you go for one place to other, you brake in almost any traffic light. F1 dont stop in traffic lights and, if you are in an autobahn with a lot of traffic, you will run like this: gas, brake, horn, gas, brake, horn, horn, horn, horn, gas, gas, gas, BRAKE FROM 120km/h TO 0, you crash, but the KERS battery is fully loaded





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2009 06:47PM by Frantic.

the problem is that in a normal road car you're only braking from 30-40mph (often even less if you're trying to drive through bristol in the morning!).

KERS is coverting and then storing kinetic energy which changes by a factor of v^2
ok, road cars have more mass than F1 cars but its the velocity that makes the key difference.

also most car journeys are actually rather short(sometimes to the point of being totally uncessary). so you wont be using the brakes as much as you'd think.

I know there are 2 types of brake energy recovery one is better than the other but i cant recall which most of the hybrid cars use, but i always thought (i could be wrong,so please correct me if so)they gain most of their efficieny by being able to run their internal combustion engines at optimum performance (as its only being used to charge a battery rather than propel the car)

which means for a lot of hybrids, their mpg is often no better than one of the top line diesels.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2009 07:25PM by marwood82.

Date: January 30, 2009 05:01PM
Posted by: chet (IP Logged)

Minimal in terms of the overal effect imo..

I agree, F1 has very little effect in the grand-scheme of things. But it is an effect. Thats like saying "My car is only one car, it only has a little effect". Well yes, but if everyone has that attitude then it grows into something bigger.

I have addressed the topic of KERS before and there is much larger issues at hand than the energy a road cars brakes can generate for it. The very fact that the hybrid technology in F1 cars is completely useless for road development is the main issue. The closest racing hybrid system you'll get that is possible to be developed into road use is the Peugeot 908s hybrid system. KERS is a PR scheme. Nothing more.

Indeed, I think for someone like McLaren, it would be an excellent move, as it would associate Mercedes with "green" cars, and Mercedes have been making strides in this area, only to be overlooked by cars like the Prius. Instead what happened was Honda damaged the idea of eco-awareness in motorsport.

And yet ironically, Honda is pushing forward with Hydrogen Fuel-Cell technology, which IS the way forward. They just need people to embrace it. If Honda had applied that message to the F1 team, then race fans would sit up and listen.

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^^

Exactly, that's the kind of thing that'd have made the Honda-Earthdreams partnership work brilliantly, had they been successful. It's just such a pity that instead you have millions of Clarkson-type fans who can still laugh at the "eco-crowd" as a bunch of nancy-boys who are associated with crap (and now defunct) F1 teams.