66 replies to this topic

[MrSlow]

His nickname is earned from his aggresive managment style. He has worked at McLaren, Jordan and Renault and many thinks he is the best of all F1 engineers. He made a great car for Jordan at 1999, but failed 2000. Then he went to Benetton/Renault and his cars made decent results. The 1999 Jordan and the Benetton/Renault cars gave him a reputation of being the real thing and Toyota offered him plenty of gold and there he went.

Renault seem to have been faired pretty well without him, so maybe he should not have all credit for the good results that they had when he was there. So what about that 1999 Jordan - was it a lucky chance, was there other people involved that has been forgotten when credit has been distributed or was that car a good indication of Mikes talent?

Altough Toyota was sometimes quite good last year I do not think they are anywhere where they expected themselves to be. Who's fault is it? When I read interviews with Mike Gascoyne I think he comes across as a very arrogant and bull...doggy. Not at all sympathic. Usually that is forgiven if the person in question actually delivers, but this years car seems so far to only bring tears at the Toyota HQ.

Toyotas first year was quite good, then they fired everybody. They continued to sack people, reorganize and recruit with a frenzy that made their F1 car look like a turtle in comparison. Until Mike entered the building. So for a few seasons now there has been a cartain stability at Toyota F1. But the result is still not there.

Did they sack the wrong people? Is Mike overrated?

[Speed_A]

His best quality is a huge talent for self-promotion. Otherwise, I consider him average in the F1 world's terms.

[xype]

Originally posted by MrSlow
Renault seem to have been faired pretty well without him, so maybe he should not have all credit for the good results that they had when he was there.

Uhm, they have had better results since he was gone. So, yes, I think he's overrated. But then, I think he's at the right place - with the team that is about to get their maiden win for the 4th year in a row...

[peroa]

Originally posted by Speed_A
His best quality is a huge talent for self-promotion. Otherwise, I consider him average in the F1 world's terms.

[Pumpkin]

Originally posted by Speed_A
His best quality is a huge talent for self-promotion. Otherwise, I consider him average in the F1 world's terms.

How does he self promote himself?

[GregorV]

Is everyone forgetting where Toyota was running before Gascoyne? Last year they almost finished 3rd in the championship which is a really good improvement over their first couple of seasons. It may not be down to Gascoyne, but revivals of all the teams happened when he was in charge, be it Jordan, Renault or Toyota. Being a technical lead for a team is as much about people management as it is about technical know-how, and it seems that Gascoyne is good at both, even though the actual solutions to the car are done by junior engineers. Once a certain structure is established then the team may continue doing well, which is what happened at Renault.

Gascoyne therefore may or may not be a brilliant engineer, but he obviously knows how to motivate people in his department to do their best.

[Ghostrider]

At Jordan and Renault, he had or brought some of the best engineers in with him, like Mark Smith and Bob Bell. He hasn't really been able to poach that many top-class designers with him to Toyota and he still hasn't proven that he can lead a technical team to build a WCC-car.

I guess this year and next will show if he is as good as he is touted to be, Toyota needs to deliver victories this year and go for the title next year for him to keep up the status as one of the best.

[Speed_A]

Originally posted by Pumpkin


How does he self promote himself?

Very well ;)
But he is still good enough to build good cars.

[Clatter]

I don't doubt his talent, but he does seem to always move on without actually finishing the job. By that I mean actually being part of a team that goes onto win something.

[HBoss]

It takes time to build champion winning teams in F1 (look at Schumacher and his crew's trajetory at Ferrari or Renaults trajetory since 2002), so I think that it's premature to judge Gascoyne and Toyota.


Still, 2005 was Toyota's best season by all accounts so far and who knows if they'll have an even stronger 2006? Winter testing gives clues but is not all revealing and all telling.

[xype]

Actually last season I heared that while he was at Sauber he was generally regarded as a talk-much accomplish-little kind of guy and noone was really sad when he left.

I don't really like Toyota's approach and the longer it takes for them to win the happier I am.

[Buttoneer]

Originally posted by GregorV
Being a technical lead for a team is as much about people management as it is about technical know-how, and it seems that Gascoyne is good at both, even though the actual solutions to the car are done by junior engineers. Once a certain structure is established then the team may continue doing well, which is what happened at Renault.

Gascoyne therefore may or may not be a brilliant engineer, but he obviously knows how to motivate people in his department to do their best.

I don't think anyone outside of the teams can possibly guage how well or how badly he has done and so right now, today, we can't judge his skills. We can only see how much his employers pay for his services and take a lead from that.

The difficulty is that Toyota is a team that paid top dollar for the wrong Schumacher and so it is difficult to tell whether they knew what they were doing when they hired Gascoyne or simply made a similar mistake.

[Scudetto]

Originally posted by GregorV
Is everyone forgetting where Toyota was running before Gascoyne?

Yeah, I remember...to the shredder to rid themselves of all those Ferrari drawings and software code.

[Kaiser]

How can you doubt MG? He has produced everywhere he has been. Renault should give him a WC ring, or something, Toyota has been on pole, and led races since he took over, and they look poised to take their maiden win. Jordan took it to the big boys in 99 with a mugen motor, mugen man, I know they make a bitchen cold air deal for a civic, but mugen for christ sake. 00 was a bit off, but don't forget that Mac was very strong in 00, and a 2 time WDC was on the grid for all the GP's that year.

I wonder if RD will try to poach MG.

[330R]

Originally posted by Kaiser
Toyota has been on pole, and led races since he took over, and they look poised to take their maiden win.

Pole. Yeah, with a handful of laps' worth of fuel. Glory runs, both of 'em.

Once Toyota have tested with their updated aero on the same circuit along with other teams - or much better yet, after the first race - we'll see how the new package is working for them. I don't think they're poised for their maiden win just yet, though.

Jordan took it to the big boys in 99 with a mugen motor, mugen man, I know they make a bitchen cold air deal for a civic, but mugen for christ sake.

That Mugen, yeah. Where did they get off making a good engine?

[Kaiser]

Originally posted by 330R
That Mugen, yeah. Where did they get off making a good engine?

Yes, they made a good motor, reliable, with decent power. Jordan had to pay some money for them, IIRC, and they weren't as good as the MB or the Ferrari. The 2000 Jordan suffered by having the POS Honda motor. They'd been better off with Mugen again.

[330R]

Originally posted by Kaiser


Yes, they made a good motor, reliable, with decent power. Jordan had to pay some money for them, IIRC, and they weren't as good as the MB or the Ferrari. The 2000 Jordan suffered by having the POS Honda motor. They'd been better off with Mugen again.

Nope. In 2000 Jordan still had Mugen-Honda engines. In 2001 they made the switch to Honda.

Jordan likely would have had to pay for a MB or Ferrari customer engine, as well. I don't really get your point there.

Jordan finished 5th in the Constructor's Championship in 2001. That POS Honda engine sure let them down.

[kodandaram]

Well I guess its time he delivered a winning car eh ?

He obviously has some attitude and a bit of arrogance too but he seems to be a genius in getting the balance between the management and engineering of his technical team .

One thing I feel is that he certainly doesn't know **** about drivers and shoots his mouth off too many times ..

[Naushad78]

People seem to overemphasis the influence that one man has on the final design and performance of a car. Either it's Newey, or Byrne or Gascoyne or someone else.

Will someone tell me who should take the credit for last years championship winning Renault?? Or this years Renault which yet again seems to be the car to beat? Or the sudden improvement in the new BMW car over last years Sauber. Or BARs fantastic 2004 season despite Willis coming on board in 2002. What happened to them in 05? And now that Newey's gone to RedBull with Promodue, will those two come up with a WCC winning car next year? And what about Gascoyne? He was part of the team that was responsible for the Renault last season or was it the season before that(to a small extent) and what has he done at Toyota yet????

[Mohican]

Originally posted by xype

But then, I think he's at the right place - with the team that is about to get their maiden win for the 4th year in a row...

Are we talking about Gascoyne and Toyota - or about Button and Honda ?

[Orin]

Is this inspired by Toyota's 'poor' winter season? Best to see where they are once the definitive aero package has been tested. I thought the team had a good 2005 and definitely made year-on-year progress. I don't know how he rates overall, but he's certainly no mug as a designer.

[xype]

Originally posted by Mohican
Are we talking about Gascoyne and Toyota - or about Button and Honda ?

Heh, I just joked with a friend of mine yesterday that it looks like the Toyota team being the new "We have a strong feeling that we can fight for the win this weekend!" Honda team.

[polaris]

a talkahanic!

[Fortymark]

Marmorini is more important to Toyota than Mike Gascoyne.

[Mobil1NSXR]

I remember reading an anlaysis on Mike a year or two ago, and it says that he always moves on to the next team just as it is becoming very competitive, as if hes a bit afraid that he wont be able to deliver that last bit that wins the championship. That's why he has more bark than bite.


In terms of results, yes, no team he has been with has won the championship with him at the helm. In that sense he is overrated.

[baddog]

Or he could be accused of being the ultimate non self publicist as his "fix it" style gets these teams in a winning shape then he leaves for a new challenge leaving others to claim the glory.

Shaun

[Ghostrider]

Originally posted by baddog
Or he could be accused of being the ultimate non self publicist as his "fix it" style gets these teams in a winning shape then he leaves for a new challenge leaving others to claim the glory.
Shaun

Jordan didn't really hit the glory after he left did they?

[SeanValen]

Originally posted by Ghostrider


Jordan didn't really hit the glory after he left did they?

Jordan had their best year with Mike in 1999. Obviously helped with Schuey not in the ferrari throughout the season, but Jordan were pretty good that year.

[baddog]

Originally posted by Ghostrider


Jordan didn't really hit the glory after he left did they?

No indeed it was his car that achieved the teams high point.

Shaun

[rbdwin]

Originally posted by SeanValen


Jordan had their best year with Mike in 1999. Obviously helped with Schuey not in the ferrari throughout the season, but Jordan were pretty good that year.

Yes, but in 1999, Jordan managed to be the best of the rest when the rest were a pretty bad lot. If McLaren and/or Schumacher stumbled all Jordan had to beat to make the podium were Eddie Irvine, Stewart-Ford, Williams-Supertec, Benetton-Playlife, Prost-Peugeot....I wouldn't want to hang my reputation on beating that lot. On the other hand, Jordan did beat them which says something for Gascoyne's ability. Just not that much.

[Mobil1NSXR]

dont forget the BAR supertec, minardi fondmetal, arrows supertec

[kodandaram]

btw - is he called the bulldog or the rottweiler ?

[Lontano]

Originally posted by Mobil1NSXR
dont forget the BAR supertec, minardi fondmetal, arrows supertec

in 1999 Arrows made their own (awful) engines

[Mohican]

Originally posted by rbdwin


Yes, but in 1999, Jordan managed to be the best of the rest when the rest were a pretty bad lot. If McLaren and/or Schumacher stumbled all Jordan had to beat to make the podium were Eddie Irvine, Stewart-Ford, Williams-Supertec, Benetton-Playlife, Prost-Peugeot....I wouldn't want to hang my reputation on beating that lot. On the other hand, Jordan did beat them which says something for Gascoyne's ability. Just not that much.

The way I remember it, Heinz-Harald beat them - for which he got fired soon after.
Where was Damon that year ?

No, it was the driver rather than the car. The '99 Jordan-Mugen was good, but not exceptional. Although - together with the '97 Jordan-Peugeot, and the original '91 Jordan-Ford, the best Jordan car.

[MrSlow]

Originally posted by rbdwin
Jordan did beat them which says something for Gascoyne's ability. Just not that much.

Hehe, I guess that sums it up

[HSJ]

Originally posted by GregorV
It may not be down to Gascoyne, but revivals of all the teams happened when he was in charge, be it Jordan, Renault or Toyota. Being a technical lead for a team is as much about people management as it is about technical know-how, and it seems that Gascoyne is good at both, even though the actual solutions to the car are done by junior engineers. Once a certain structure is established then the team may continue doing well, which is what happened at Renault.

That's why I'd still like to see Gazza at McLaren, like I've said a few times in the past. Coz McL's current management seems to suck. They have all that is required to succeed, but don't, IMO because the resources (people, money, etc.) are not used properly, and it is squarely down to the top-level management. I suspect Gazza would do better.

[wati]

Originally posted by SeanValen


Jordan had their best year with Mike in 1999. Obviously helped with Schuey not in the ferrari throughout the season, but Jordan were pretty good that year.

Yeah, but everybody forgets that it was Gary who penned that car ...

[Melbourne Park]

Toyota Racing have been putting into place much of Toyota's own production systems into an F1 team.

Upper management has gone along with that process, but a very senior Japanese guru showed how to put such work practices into place. If Toyota does poorly because of such systems, I would more put the blaim onto Toyota than onto MG.

It all started when the head of Toyota watched a GP and didn't like the pit crew, and he went down and spoke to the team. Shortly after, someone from HQ turned up to "help out". Since then people have become enthused and expert, and they have rolled the Toyota production systems and philosophies out into various departments. In what is a job shop operation its quite a different process than what other teams are doing.

It seems to me that MG has always been a fan of incremental change, a model which is pretty obvious. The analysis of how effective changes are might be a big contribution he made. In other words, MG has a principle of focusing on changing the things that most need to be changed. I guess the process to decide what most needs to be changed is his contribution.

I see MG's philosophy one of a conservative base with incremental change. I can only presume he is a top leader.

Onto that process of incremental change is the Toyota way of doing things, which appears to me at least to have improved the rate, timeliness, cost and effectiveness of change. Add these elements together: a conservative base, improving the change process, a better exchange of where and what the change direction is among the whole organisation, I think the model has interesting potential.

If it works, I won't be giving MG genius status though. I think all organisations require leadership, and if Toyota do become winners, MG will be due great credit. But I'll give just as much to other key leaders, and most to Toyota.

[bigbrickz]

Originally posted by Melbourne Park
It all started when the head of Toyota watched a GP and didn't like the pit crew, and he went down and spoke to the team. Shortly after, someone from HQ turned up to "help out". Since then people have become enthused and expert, and they have rolled the Toyota production systems and philosophies out into various departments. In what is a job shop operation its quite a different process than what other teams are doing.

Fascinating, thanks Melbourne Park. I'd heard of it the other way round; Honda sending their production engineers to F1 to learn from the "F1 way"; so this is a bit of a surprise. Do you have any more info about the application of Kaizen to the Toyota F1 team?

[Melbourne Park]

Originally posted by bigbrickz
Fascinating, thanks Melbourne Park. I'd heard of it the other way round; Honda sending their production engineers to F1 to learn from the "F1 way"; so this is a bit of a surprise. Do you have any more info about the application of Kaizen to the Toyota F1 team?

here's a bit:

As with engines, the first step was to observe and understand the processes involved in the department.

“For the first three months we just watched and observed, and tried to get the trust of the people. It was much harder in composites, because there are 12 different nationalities in this one department alone! They needed to believe it was not about reducing the head count, it was about improving the process itself, and using the capacity for something else, even improving their own work environment.

We tried to do a similar thing to engine production, find out what the process was for the monocoque. It’s a very, very complex part, and it took a long time. The problem is that we only produce about eight or nine per year in a six month period, so you don’t have the opportunity like you do with cylinder heads, where every day you can check. All we could do was analyse the TF 03 monocoques, and then improve things for the TF 04 the following year. So there was a time factor.”

"The whole exercise was about time and quality. Again, there was a clear target to be met."

“When we started, it took weeks to make the first monocoque for a new car. We looked at the process, at the theoretical lead time, and agreed that the target for the first one should be minus 20%. And from the third one onwards, because then you have stabilised things and you have solved the problems with the first prototype, it should be minus 25%.”

It was an extremely complex and involved process. The project group, made up from members of the composites department and Schmidt, identified 42 individual steps in the production of the prototype, a figure that fell to 28 for subsequent chassis.

“The majority of work is manual, which takes a long time, so it was a tough target to say minus 20%. A lot of the people had the same reaction as in engine production. They said, “OK, but at the moment we are already working all day. So where do you want to shorten something?”

The key was to make more efficient use of everyone’s time: “We implemented performance analysis sheets, because we had no idea how long people needed for the process steps. It was difficult, because every operator felt controlled. We had data where we could see one guy needed nine hours for a job, and maybe another took six. We had to understand why this was so.

It was just a black box, so we had to go into details of every process. This was the thing that we had to push to team leaders and to managers – we needed the data. We had no understanding of the laminating process, it’s such a long term thing, and this was the only opportunity we had.”

Maintaining quality is essential in any area of a race team, but especially so in composites, and it was acknowledged within the company that there was too much wastage. Attacking this muda was a priority, and key to that was introducing the TPS principle of stopping production as soon as a problem was spotted.

“We implemented the same jidoka system that we used in engines, and we introduced scrap reports. Whenever we had a problem, we all got together to discuss it. We needed to make sure that we were doing something, and that somebody followed up.

“We also instigated problem sheets, so that whenever the operator had a problem he filled out the sheet and said, “Because of this or that, I lost two hours,” so again we had data we could analyse. This was important because we knew we only had half a year.

With the feedback from the operators and the problem sheets, we set a priority list, and decided that these are the main problems we need to concentrate on first – all the others were addressed later. We made sure we really had responsible people tackling the problems. For example design might say, “I know I need to change the drawing,” or “I need to keep an eye on it next time.””

It is very important to ensure that someone is always responsible for ensuring that problems are addressed and the solutions are in turn reviewed. This is an example of the implementation of PDCA, or Plan-Do-Check-Action.

The ‘toolbox’ project was implemented, the name given to a set procedure initiated for every new TPS activity within Toyota Motorsport, with one project leader responsible to solve a specific problem, such as final machining of the monocoque, the lamination steps, or the assembly stages.

“We analysed all the data we had, and split it up into different areas. These were problems related to production, to design, and so on. We put all the responsible people together in a workshop, looked at the problems, and asked what can we do to solve them and avoid them for next year?”

As with the engine department, it became evident that the positioning of equipment within the factory did not always contribute to efficiency. As the Cologne organisation grew into a Formula 1 team, there was little time to plan the optimal arrangement. This was particularly evident in composites, where operators were sometimes obliged to leave the clean room in the middle of tasks.

“Every time they went in and out they had to change their clothes. That’s very time consuming, so we did what we did in engine production. We counted the footsteps needed, and reduced it by 50%. We made sure everybody had the just the number of tools that he needed right by his work bench, so he didn’t need to go in and out, and didn’t need to go to the other end of the clean room. We had a special area for suspension parts, a special area for the monocoque, and we put up signs so that when you were looking for a part you knew it would be close to this work bench.”

All this ‘housekeeping’ was common sense, but it also reflected a key element of TPS known as the 5S’s, derived from the Japanese terms seiri, seiton, seiso, seiketsu and shitsuke. The collected 5S concepts can in essence be translated as tidiness, orderliness, cleanliness, hygiene and sustaining discipline, ideas that should be second nature to anyone working in a Formula 1 environment. However, the busy team in the composite department had rarely found time to focus on the basic issues of keeping the place tidy and organised, and that had to be addressed.

The results of the TPS project, reflected in production of the TF 04, were impressive.

[HBoss]

And think what would happen when a team who employs that is rejected to GP2 while an organization with no more than 30 people promoted to F1...

[BRG]

Originally posted by Melbourne Park
a key element of TPS known as the 5S’s, derived from the Japanese terms seiri, seiton, seiso, seiketsu and shitsuke.

I think they have overlooked the sixth S which is B-S.

All this is fine for a volume car manufacturer, but if applied a competition team, it will drag them down. It will drain away flexibility, stifle innovation and generally make them mediocre. Toyota will produce extremely well-made and reliable cars that retain their second-hand value well. But they will be dull and slow performers. A bit like we saw last year.

It is just this mismatch between the imperatives of volume car production versus those of a competition team that lead Subaru, Ford and others to outsource their rally teams.

[Melbourne Park]

Originally posted by BRG
I think they have overlooked the sixth S which is B-S.

All this is fine for a volume car manufacturer, but if applied a competition team, it will drag them down. It will drain away flexibility, stifle innovation and generally make them mediocre. Toyota will produce extremely well-made and reliable cars that retain their second-hand value well. But they will be dull and slow performers. A bit like we saw last year.

It is just this mismatch between the imperatives of volume car production versus those of a competition team that lead Subaru, Ford and others to outsource their rally teams.

Yeh, its sure differerent. But on a serious note, when have Toyota listened to others? They were laughed at by Mercedes Benz and BMW when they introduced a tarted up range of cars in the States, called Lexus. Now, they are #1 in the states. Funny thing is, they will no doubt apply lessons from the F1 program back into their manufacturing operations.

But a key to whether this might work is that they have some believers in Koln who are learning quite a lot, who are very experienced racing teams pros.

Take the motor example. They've cut down engine production to now less than two weeks, and they make them to order (just compare that performance with what is going on a Ilmor to get a handle on efficiencies - haug has said Ilmor is at the moment where they expected to be in mid December). All the Toyota engine bits arrive just in time, and have similarly recent parralled tech. improvements. And with the very short production times, the costs are much lower. And their systems do produce quality.

Ask McLaren, quality is as necessary in a racing car as a road car. But the racing car has much closer tolerances. Toyota found out that machining the cylinder heads varied by a factor of three, due to individual techniques. Those guys weren't amateurs either. Analysis and systems resulted in uniform techniques, lower costs, and more exact tolerances. Only recently have the Toyota F1 engines got green stamps, a quality assurance methodology. And because the various parts are produced just in time, there's no scrapped parts. Efficiency adds up.

F1 is becoming a race against time, not just a race on the track. Still, people will laugh at it. Its the way of the world I guess.

[BRG]

I have owned a couple of Toyotas and have no doubts about the quality of their road-cars. As they were both rear-wheel drive Corolla Coupe GTs, they were also quite a hoot to drive (something that Toyota are not always guilty of!). As a road car maker, they put all but the very best in the shade in terms of reliability and quality, especially at the cheaper end of the spectrum. So I do not question the worth of those values in their rightful place.

And I suppose that if it is just applied to the repeat production of F1 cars and engines, rather than to the design and development stage, it might provide more efficiency. But these things have a way of spreading to areas where they are unwelcome. If in its wake comes board-room meddling in the race-team (such as we saw applied so successfully at Jaguar) then things are on a steep slope to oblivion.

The strengths of a racing team are innovation, rapid reaction and change, a bit of lateral thinking, flexibility and ‘can-do’ attitudes. This Kaizen(?) philosophy seem to be more about consistency and efficiency but not change. Big corporations are like supertankers, taking forever to change course. Which is why IMO they do nto make the ideal environment to base a racing team

[Melbourne Park]

Originally posted by BRG
... This Kaizen(?) philosophy seem to be more about consistency and efficiency but not change. Big corporations are like supertankers, taking forever to change course. Which is why IMO they do nto make the ideal environment to base a racing team

Your method of judging Toyota is by remembering your old Corrollas. This is typical of your posts. Actually the process is the inverse of what you say, it's about creating innovation, creating links, sharing information, and its operator lead. It foster's ... heck you need to read a book, a better way to base an analysis compared to whimsical rememberances about your old cars.

[bigbrickz]

Originally posted by Melbourne Park
here's a bit:

Thanks

Originally posted by BRG
The strengths of a racing team are innovation, rapid reaction and change, a bit of lateral thinking, flexibility and ‘can-do’ attitudes. This Kaizen(?) philosophy seem to be more about consistency and efficiency but not change. Big corporations are like supertankers, taking forever to change course. Which is why IMO they do nto make the ideal environment to base a racing team

Kaizen is often translated as "continuous improvement", so more constant change than no change. Most of the examples I've read have been - like MP's article - about lots of small changes, but I don't see why big changes would be incompatible with Kaizen.

Modern F1 strikes me as more about making lots of small improvements to the cars rather than grandiose disruptive ideas. The last of such ideas I can remember: the wide angle Renault engine, the MP-18 and the walrus nose Williams, all proved inferiour to much more conservative cars.

[Mobil1NSXR]

Originally posted by Lontano


in 1999 Arrows made their own (awful) engines

Really? What were they called?

[Melbourne Park]

Originally posted by Mobil1NSXR
Really? What were they called?

They were called Arrows engines. After the Yamahas, in '98 I think Walkinshaw bought control of Brian Hart, and hence they were Arrows engines. Later they used the Supertec engines.

[V10 Fireworks]

Originally posted by BRG
It is just this mismatch between the imperatives of volume car production versus those of a competition team that lead Subaru, Ford and others to outsource their rally teams.

Cheating ain't great but this same TTE wasn't super hopeless in that field or in LM, were they? :

[BRG]

Originally posted by V10 Fireworks
Cheating ain't great but this same TTE wasn't super hopeless in that field or in LM, were they? :

No they weren't. But TTE was an independent outsourced company too at that time. It was only when they went F1 that it was absorbed by the Toyota corporation. And look what happened to the results...