No, the shield was for the event of the turbo disintegrating. Edit: Others beat me to it. And I'm seconding garagtinkerer's question: Does anybody know the outcome of this disagreement?
Why is this a separate thread instead of in the F14T thread?
The disagreement was concluded by suggesting Ferrari also incorporate the shield in their car, which as per Ferrari they didn't need. No other details as far as i'm aware has come out. Whether Ferrari engine is built to withstand such failures, or not, they're running with it as of now, iirc. Ferrari, i think wasn't very pleased with the decision, but agreed to it nevertheless. It at the time seemed that Renault/ Mercedes went the traditional route of lightest possible engine/ PU, and a shield to compensate for failures. Ferrari on the other hand were quietly confident that their engine/ PU could withstand such failure events, which made me think that they hadn't gone for the lightest, as is the norm, but went more effective, and efficient overall. I wonder, if they were even allowed to reduce weight from engine/ PU, but i doubt it since the homologation and development ban may mean that Ferrari couldn't. It would suck for a manufacturer in my opinion, as one, their PU is heavy as it is, and then on top of it, they were asked to implement the shield into the car as well. Bonkers!.
Details regarding the entire episode, are limited to just the fact, that Ferrari were asked by FIA to incorporate the protective shield.
No chance. 20hp isn't going to erase a 1 sec/lap disadvantage that redbull have at the moment.
I don't know what and why it is... but somehow people think that the gap between Mercedes and RBR is small... which it is not as far as i could tell. In my humble opinion, MGP-W05 is one of the most dominant cars ever to have raced since McLaren's and Williams built the monsters. Brilliant, brilliant car...