© Renault F1
WHEN DOES IT ALL START?
When a new car rolls out in late February for its shakedown and the subsequent winter tests, the team’s engineers are already looking ahead to its successor.
“Generally, [the process starts] during the pre-season of the preceding year. So we started talking about the 2018 car at the beginning of 2017 and for some things we begin talking about a bit earlier than that, because if it has a knock on effect to what we want to do with the power unit we have to begin even earlier.
“On the power unit for example there are quite a few things that can affect the back of the chassis design. And if we want the power unit designers to have enough time, because their lead times are even bigger, you might talk about that in October of 2016 for 2018.
“Then, the switch in resource comes normally in June. As the 17 is coming down, the 18 is coming up. We allocate more people to it in June.”
| 2016 | S E A S O N n – 2 |
|---|---|
| October | First thoughts and ideas on some aspects of the 2018 chassis and integration of power unit |
| November | |
| December | |
| 2017 | S E A S O N n – 1 |
| January | |
| February | Early development thinking on the 2018 chassis |
| March | |
| April | |
| May | |
| June | Crossover point in funding allocation, as more resources are channelled towards the 2018 project |
| July | |
| August | Production of the gearbox starts |
| September | Production of the monocoque starts |
| October | Production of the suspensions and of the wings starts |
| November | |
| December | Production of bodywork |
| 2018 | S E A S O N n |
| January | Crash tests |
| February | Shakedown and first tests |
