In the ever-increasingly competitive world of F1 racing, many teams have begun scouting for drivers earlier and earlier in their careers. In the past, smaller teams would scout the talent, and then the bigger teams would poach them with their vast resources. But in the wake of the immense success of McLaren's rookie sensation Lewis Hamilton, nobody can afford to rest on their proverbial laurels. Now, following existing programs at rival teams Renault, Honda, Toyota and McLaren, Ferrari is launching a young driver development program of its own.
The initial news came in last week from team principal Stefano Domenicali, and has now been substantiated by a new joint announcement from Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo in conjunction with Gino Macaluso, head of Italian racing federation ACI-CSAI. The Scuderia will offer test drives to Mirko Bortollotti, Edoardo Piscopo and Salvatore Cicatelli – the top three finishers in this year's Italian Formula 3 championship. If Ferrari decides to contract any of the drivers for a future race seat, they would be the first Italian driver for the Scuderia since the colorful Ivan Capelli (who, incidentally, won the Italian F3 title in 1983) raced the crimson cars way back in 1992. Now excuse us while we go sign up for next year's Italian F3 season.
The FIA and the teams participating in F1 have agreed to shorten the ban on engine development to five years. The FIA, which forms the rules for Formula One, had previously instituted a freeze on the development of every team's engine program for a staggering ten years in an effort to reduce the rapidly escalating costs involved with running an F1 team.
At a meeting called by the FIA in Paris, the principals of each team agreed that a ten year ban was too long, but begun discussions on how costs could be curbed in the sport. Rather than continue imposing half-measures aimed at reducing costs, most of the teams agreed that the FIA should actually reduce costs by instituting an overall budget cap, as many had suggested... Autoblog included. Although Ferrari remains opposed to a budget cap, its former technical chief and now head honcho at Honda, Ross Brawn, has been a vocal proponent of the idea.
With the freeze now cut down to half, the FIA announced it would begin working on a new engine formula for the series. F1 has gone in the past couple of decades from turbo eights to V12s and then to V10s before arriving at the 2.4-liter V8s currently used. Insiders expect the next formula to be unveiled within two years' time and to be both more environmentally-friendly and more cost effective.
The World Motor Sport Council of the FIA, the international racing authority that governs Formula One, among other series, has rolled out a series of restrictions on the development of F1 cars starting with the coming 2008 season.
The restrictions include a complete freeze on engine development for the next ten years. In a speech delivered last week in Monaco at the Motor Sport Business Forum, FIA President Max Mosley (pictured at right) justified the decision by pointing out that the engines developed by F1's six engine suppliers – Ferrari, Mercedes, BMW, Honda, Toyota and Renault – are already evenly matched and incredibly advanced: "There is no need to develop an F1 engine any further." (Heck, let's go back to foot-powered Flinstones-mobiles then.)
The far-reaching restrictions also covered the use of wind-tunnels for the first time in the formula. The new regulations state that each team can only use one wind-tunnel, can only operate it for 15 runs per 8-hour day, no more than five days per week. Further limitations were set on how the wind-tunnel may be used, and to prevent teams from simply switching their personnel over to even more expensive Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulators, the FIA intends to put a cap on that, too.
Ross Brawn, former technical director at Ferrari and new team principal at Honda, recently pointed out that restrictions like these don't achieve their intended goal of reducing costs, they just force teams to find newer, more expensive ways to gain a performance edge. We'd have to agree with Brawn: you can't contain a competitive spirit, and F1's chock-full of 'em.
Daimler CEO Dr. Dieter Zetsche offered a choice quote to his nation's leading weekly news mag, Der Spiegel, when he mentioned that the automaker would be open to developing an engine with the company's cross-town rival, BMW. Apparently, Daimler is in talks with several companies about joint projects, but as of now, nothing is set in stone.
The idea of a co-developed engine between the two German heavyweights is an interesting idea, especially if both manufactures begin to focus their efforts on some form of innovative propulsion. More turbos? New fuels? Pixie-dust power? Who knows?
Manufacturers testing development mules for upcoming models go to great lengths to camouflage their prototypes in order to hide from the public what they're working on. That never stops the motoring press, in print and in cyberspace, from speculating on what that the camouflage is disguising, usually with considerable accuracy. A certain set of spy shots, however, have been enigmatic, resulting in a number of different theories.
The spy shots in question show a two-door sports car being developed by Ferrari. We've speculated that the shots in question show an "entry level" Ferrari model, possibly to be labeled as a new Dino, despite Maranello's repeated denials with which, by now, we're all familiar. Our friends over at Motor Authority say it's a new model from sister-company Maserati, to be positioned below the new GranTurismo. The folks at Carscoop, meanwhile, insist that the prototype is more simply a convertible version of the aforementioned GT.
GM, delivering on promises to make Detroit all it can be, is getting into the development game. The General has given Hines Real Estate, out of Houston, a 6-acre riverfront plot next to the Renaissance Center where Hines plans to build 600 luxury condominiums. The condos, to be built in three phases, will go for anywhere from $300K to a $1M, and GM will get a cut of the profits. Hines oversaw the RenCen makeover, and built Detroit's Comerica tower.
According to the head of GM's Economic Development and Enterprise Services, "there's still a lot of pent-up demand for people to live in the city of Detroit." This, even though Detroit's riverfront -- and perhaps the entire city itself -- has long been overdue for some grooming. Fifty thousand residents have left Detroit since 2000, yet the downtown area has seen a slight rise, and the claim for the riverfront is that "there is no better real estate in the region." Groundbreaking on the potentially decade-long project is scheduled for the spring of '08. People might be able to move in by the spring of '09.
Mercedes-Benz has a long history of making cars safer, and the brand continues to spearhead a push to increase everyone's chances of survival. Mercedes currently has the Pre-Safe system that acts like an adrenal gland for the car, tightening up the muscles before an impact. Future plans for safety systems aim to make the cars even more attentive to things such as road signs, pedestrians, and impending doom. The second generation of PreSafe is undergoing tests, and there's a lot more accident prevention muscle coming our way. The safest car is one that does not get into an crash in the first place, and there are cameras, radar sensors, monitoring systems and warning beacons heading our way to keep us out of trouble
Continued after the jump with Mercedes' press release.
Lutz unveiles the Cadillac Sixteen concept at NAIAS 2003 in Detroit
It's official. It's been confirmed: Cadillac is preparing a new V12 flagship. That's straight from the mouth of our favorite man in the business, Bob Lutz. On a recent trip across the pond, GM's venerated product guru confirmed in an interview to the British car magazine AutoWeek that they are indeed working on a twelve-cylinder engine, slated to power a new range-topping, import-beating "Cadillac of Cadillacs," a super-luxury-sedan to rival the likes of the Mercedes S-Class and Lexus LS in the grandest of American style.
The new powerplant is being fabricated from two of GM's 3.6-liter 60-degree V6 engines mounted on a common crankshaft. Far from relying solely on cylinder count, sources speculate the engine will also benefit from such features as direct injection and cylinder deactivation, resulting in a 7.2-liter V12 with somewhere in the neighborhood of 600 horsepower and 540 lb-ft of torque.
And just where is GM testing such a behemoth of an engine? In Australia, of course! As has become de rigeur for American automakers of late, GM is relying on its Australian subsidiary to run the development work on the new flagship engine. Holden is reported to have already begun testing mules, based on a Commodore with a stretched-out engine bay, at its Lang Lang test center near Melbourne. Although the Zeta-based Commodore, (a.k.a. the upcoming Pontiac G8) is being used strictly as a test bed for the time being, it could end up providing the underpinnings for the Cadillac megasedan when the time comes.
Lutz has been pushing for a top-tier Cadillac for years now, and the impetus for its development has apparently come from the feedback received by the Cadillac Sixteen showcar debuted back in 2003. Although the showcase V16 engine was ruled out, apparently the V12 has gotten the green light for development. Shoot for the stars and land on the moon, eh Bob?
It'd be far too easy to dismiss as negligible the minority stake in Aston Martin retained by Ford after the sale, but even in the new era, Aston models will continue to benefit from its ties to the Ford Motor Corporation.
In addition to the safety systems expertise garnered from Aston's former PAG sister-company Volvo, on which we reported earlier, Ford resources will continue to have input into currently-produced and upcoming Aston Martin products. in a number of ways. First, Ford still owns the engine plant where Aston Martin's V8s and V12s are built, in Cologne, Germany. Second, even though Aston is no longer a wholly-owned Ford subsidiary, the British sportscar-maker will continue to benefit from FoMoCo's buying power in securing bulk rates on raw materials, especially aluminum. And third, Ford engineers are tipped to play an even larger role in developing future Astons, input which will come in handy especially as AM rushes to get the Rapide to market ahead of Porsche, which has been working on the Panamera for some time now.
When the sale was announced, Ford's statement read that they wished Aston Martin well in its new stage. As it turns out, they won't be leaving that up to chance.
One common complaint about General Motors in the past has been the amount of time it took the company to develop vehicles and get them to market. A recent study, however, shows that GM is certainly turning that around. The company is expected to tie Toyota Motor Corp. in "showroom age," which represents how new its showroom lineup is. The showroom age of each will be around 2.8 years by 2010. Chrysler is currently faring even better with 2.4 years to market.
In addition to the newness of model lineups, the Merrill Lynch study also looks at new vehicles being put out by automakers over the coming years, calculates the percentage of each automaker's fleet that will be replaced with new vehicles, and uses it as an indicator of future sales and financial health. GM will reportedly make huge strides in this area, replacing 75 percent of its lineup, coming in just behind Toyota, which leads the industry with a figure of 83 percent.
The study shows that Ford is lagging behind, placing itself in a precarious position with a showroom age of 3.5 years despite Way Forward architect Mark Fields' claim that the company's showroom age would be more like 1.8 years by 2008.
The study might not be perfect, however, because Merrill Lynch has to rely on sources other than the automakers for its data and predictions. OEMs do not reveal their product plans to analysts, or bloggers for that matter.
2010 Nissan Cube breaks cover in Japan
Officially Official: 2010 Ford Mustang!
2010 Ford Mustang revealed early on Ford's own website!
2009 Nissan 370Z rolls out early in So. Cal
VIDEO: 2009 Nissan 370Z revealed early in So. Cal.
In the Autoblog Garage: 2009 HUMMER H3T Alpha
In the Autoblog Garage: 2009 Mercedes Benz C63 AMG
In the Autoblog Garage: 2009 Hyundai Genesis
