That is my thought too. It has not been that long ago that Max was saying to Williams that its business model was obsolete. I wonder if it is an attempt to get manufacturers to withdraw from team ownership and go back to a role of a major sponsor. Most interesting from the statement is that there will be an engine available from an independent engine supplier for independent teams (Prodrive?).

Do I detect that someone is hankering for a return to the Cosworth days perhaps?

I think his Croatian missus' genes, thankfully, dominated proceedings at conception.

That and the milkmans genes maybe ;)

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/71236

BBC Interview with Max

What usually happens is this:

Max or Bernie make a wild proposal, ie single engines,

Teams say oh my god it cant happen

Max or Bernie say ok, here have a standard block and gearbox instead

Teams say, oh ok then

Like always, proposing some extreme measure is a negotiating ploy by the FIA and/or FOM to have teams or manufacturers accept some less-far-reaching concept. I see teams accepting standard gearboxes, front and rear wings et al, but not engines.

Edit: What Hacklerf said.

If Max really wanted cost cutting and relevance to road car technology then he'd mandate that the engine had to be based on an engine which comes from a manufacturer's production road car. As simple as that. Not gonna happen though.

Production Engines are too heavy and not stiff enough.
At Present the 2.4Litre V8's used in F1 weigh 95KG and are a fully stressed component of the car.

But if the engines were based on production engines with a certain amount of modification then it could work. I'm not worried about the weight - the teams will find a way to reduce the weight.

So now we ought to "Bailout" the teams that are struggling are we? Dont they get those Toyota engines for free already?
What way a standard engine is gonna help them?

.........heck it seems everyone is joining the bailout party! F1 needs a bailout from Mosley and his idiots .

"survival plan"? What, is F1 in trouble? Really?

:\

Okay as a comparison the BMW S65, 4 Litre, V8 used in the M3 weighs 200KG.

The S65 is a VERY good engine.

A heavier car is not a bad thing. I have no qualms about putting a heavy engine in the cars. That would give F1 a direct link to road car technology if Max wanted it.

Surely the easiest way to cut spending is to severely restrict the advertising space and thereby the income ? That would make a new Cosworth type situation feasible again .

No sponsors, big numbers - I'm liking the sound of this.

I would much perfare standardised engine rather then chassis, suspension, etc.

It would be much more impressive to see someone overtaking another because of better exit speed due to better setup instead of because he has 50 more hp when full trottle on a straight.

Saying that how are they gonna develope green technology with a standard engine? there needs to be competetion and rules that reward more efficient engines, like no refueling.

This is a fair, if unpleasant , assessment of the present state of F1. When teams have gone to the wall in the past, there has been a collective expression of sorrow, but another team has always stepped up to the plate to replace them. STR, Williams and FIF1 must be teams with a high level of uncertainty about there future. If two of the present ten teams folded then, as Max said, F1 would become unsustainable.

Max and Bernie have become figures of ridicule, deservedly so some would claim. But this initiative really could save F1 for the future.

Williams going bust would be a bombshell. Something like losing Brabham or Lotus.

I think unfortunately F1 needs a big team to go bust to get the wake-up call to properly reform. Super Aguri going bust won't have concerned any of the other teams - Williams going bust would get their attention.

Relax Williams aint gonna go bust!
Im seeing Sir Jackie Stewart in an RBS-Williams ad every friggin 2 hrs.......and every half hour on race weekends

Or Having 14-car grids...

This is what you get if you standardize parts: there are no real arguments left against a spec series. Formula 1, including many fans, were in favour of spec tyres and spec electronics. If you accept standard components, what argument is left against a spec engine and a spec chassis? I can't see any. This slippery slope was one of the main reasons why I opposed the control tyre and spec ECU.

There is nothing we can change. Formula 1 is dead and proposals like these underline it. Face the facts, Formula 1 is about to become a spec series with artificial rules 'spicing up' the racing.

It has not been all that long ago that Cosworth was the de facto standard engine in F1. It is not necessarily such a bad thing. There will still be plenty of other areas where innovation can take place.

It is a bad thing if ur an engine manufacturer.
There were not too many of them around back in the days of Cosworth.

Sir Frank sold his jet and Head his helicopter by their own admission a few years ago to support their team financially, not many others would have done that.

Like what? Tyres? No, we have spec tyres. Electronics? No, we have a spec ECU. Aerodynamics? Yes, but for how long? The 2009 regulations will restrict the aerodynamics even further. Gearbox? Hmm, it is likely that the gearbox will be standardized too.

Any F1 that 10 teams can afford to compete in is better than no F1 at all. So, putting the cries of tradition, motorsport culture and FIA slagging matches to one side, somethings gotta change.

What gets me though is why we are hearing that somethings gotta change in late 2008 in time for 2010.

This could and should have been debated, studied, designed and implemented as a phase in plan since about 2001!!!

What the hell do the FIA do all day? Oh...

Go ahead. Spiralling costs have been the downfall for sports car racing more times than can be counted,

I must admit I enjoy watching IRL - good officiating, good racing, well organised.

Now as for F1, what is compelling about this formula??

We all know that change is the biggest cost impact - like KERS for instance, and yet BE proposes a std engine.
WTF is going on? KERS becomes just a short dalliance and huge cost impact.

Looking forward to Bathurst this w/e and Indy at Gold Coast shortly.

Just as well I haven't booked the tickets for Albert Park.

And I thought F1 was the pinnacle for Motorsport!!

I don't see the teams agreeing to the engine spec rule.

I do like the fact that certain parts - gearbox, brakes (should be steel) ducts - should be standard.

I just want to see entertaining races.

In my country it is usually a postman

Car paint schemes and livery Who can better Honda and Renault in a race to the bottom .

..wich is a non-argument. It wil never happen. If 3 teams leave tomorrow 6 will be ready to jump in. If they allow 3 teams slots back in tomorrow well have 26 cars on the grid. Jordan sold to midlands who in turn sold to spyker. The minute spyker wanted to sell that fat indian came round.

Mosley is using george bush talk. Trying to scare fans while F1 is very healthy and doing fantastic. As long as force india, the backmarker team, is capable or snubbing 10 million pound cosworths and builds 10 million pound new motorhomes, nothing is wrong. Teams that do bad should take some lessons from ferrari, who, with their 400 million dollar budget, do seem to be able to make a profit.

Putting different brand names in the same engine is hilarious! or stupid... Very Maxesque, like reversing the grid, etc. etc.

Formula Clone here we go................................................

So teams will now spend millions of Pounds/Dollars/Euros developing an exhaust system that gives 1BHP more than another's, and several million Pounds/Dollars/Euros improving the gearbox so that it changes gear one microsecond faster than it did last week; the nett result will be no reduction in costs at all, they will merely have been shifted to another part of the operation.

If they really want to reduce costs, they must go back to ferrous brakes, engines that are connected to the throttle pedal by a length of Bowden cable, an ignition system not in any way connected to any other electrical system, foot operated clutches and manual gearchange with no electrical/electronic element to them.

In the early days of "electric" gearboxes there may have been cost savings owing to a reduction in the consumption of dog-clutches, but compared with the cost of developing the modern seamless shift gearboxes, dog clutches are cheap!

Of course, we could buy up all the old CART chassis and engines and use them for Formula One.............................................

First they give us slick tires and everybodys rejoicing,but bernie thought" fans cant be happy,so lets pull this shit" Im down with this when bernie gives half of his fortune to charity...greedy bastard

And already the plan is backfiring. Several manufacturers have stated they would leave F1 if a standard, single engine would be forced.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/71236

Good They should start their own series if these 2 seniles dont come to their senses.

Screw cost cuts!
Bernie needs to take a paycut! and give back more to the teams.

As I said earlier, I wonder if the ultimate intention is to get manufacturers leave F1 as owners. F1 would survive without them, but the playing field would be very different. Teams owned by manufacturers would have to do some severe down-sizing if they were cast off by their patrons.

It would transform F1 overnight. I am sure that F1 would survive such an upheaval, but there has to concern over how attractive the new F1 would be to major sponsors.

No, that means the plan is working. That's what they want.

But the couple of golden years once in a decade are worth it.

Bernie's plan is rarely what it appears to be on the surface. They talk about cost-cutting, but the Williams CE says it isn't that costs are too high, it's that revenue is too low.

Why is revenue too low? Because TV doesn't pay enough because audiences are too small, viewers are put off by dull races. OK, they're trying to do something about that next season, although I wouldn't like to bet on it being any better.

What's another way to increase TV revenue? Have more races. Why was the Canadian GP cancelled? Because there was a limit of 18 races and Abu Dhabi is obviously more important than North America, isn't it? No, it isn't.

So what have this plan and the cancellation of the Canadian GP got in common? They're both designed to persuade the manufacturers to agree to more than 18 races.

What F1 should be following closely is 2009 Formula-Nippon, it implements a 'spec'-engine yet, allows each manufacturer to cost effectively make their own engines, and also allows those engines to be compatible with GT racing and other international race venues . The engine in question is 3.4L V-8 making over 600hp@10,700rpm with a "push-to-pass" boost button. Power is limited to 600hp, but obviously more can be produced. Moreover, Honda's F-N engine seems only to be a variant of their IRL engine and the Acura LMP2 cars run in the America-LeMans series.

The engines will be mandated for the 2009 season of Forumla-Nippon, atop that, the exact same engine will be used in the Super GT cars (a popular GT motorsports series in Japan), where the power will be restricted down to 500hp. To further reduce costs these engines are also designed to meet FIA specifications for LMP2.

Currently, Honda, Toyota, and Nissan have already built these engines (Nissan even runs the engine in their current GT-R GT500 cars). For the FIA, instead of having one-manufacturer building all engines, it may be better to standardize existing engine platforms between multiple series to promote more manufacturers into F1 and allow the teams to still keep their brand identity. It also may have the added benefit bringing more manufacturers, like Porsche, in F1 (and Ferrari and other F1 teams into LMP2 and other FIA series around the world).

So where are they? There were two empty slots even before Super Aguri bit the dust, how come they weren't filled if there are teams "ready to jump in"?

Hacklerf nailed it - this is the usual first totally unpaletable suggestion aimed at forcing through a much less drastic measure.

Williams did say that the costs are too high to bring new sponsors into the sport during this economic meltdown.
They mentioned, as I recall from reading an article yesterday, that businesses would be 10 times more interested in sponsoring a team if the operating costs of running a team was 50M instead of 200M, specially for a mid-field team which is not going to be a front-runner.

If F1 doesn't get to a spec formula soon (and a spec budget for the teams), yes, we'll have 14-car grids...

You dont get it do you, as in the past, threaten draconian rules and only then do the manufacturers take it seriously and come up with viable rules of their own