World Motor Sport Council has made their decisions:

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/72459

Ban on refuelling for 2010, someone in F1 does have some common sense it seems.

I really do think that the agreed changes will be for the better this time.
No tyre warmers and no refuelling should hopefully make for some interesting racing from 2010 onwards.

The 60% wind tunnel thing is going to hurt a few teams that invested in one. Although I suppose they can just put smaller models in them.

Some good things in there. But some really awful stuff too, mostly (but not limited to) about the standardising of components and the sharing of information.

Quote from tristancliffe :

and the sharing of information.

Something which only a year ago would have got teams in a lot of trouble.

Standard parts is horrid, it seems that they are going to run a 'public survey', hopefully the people with sense will protest against the standardisation when this survey comes about.

Well, it could have been a whole lot worse.

Not too much of a mention of standardised parts except radio and telemetry, so they're nothing to get worried about, although the chassis rules are a bit vague.

I've never been a fan of this engine lasting for "X" amount of races, but while it's here they may as well go the whole hog and say the engine has to last a full season.

Ban on refueling, tyre warmers and wind tunnel size, all V good
Possible reduction in race distance or duration (proposal to follow market research). V V bad. Proposal to follow market research eh ! Hmmm not happy about that one.

The other stuff is pretty much Meh

The hugest things at work were the ban on in-season testing and the future limits on facilities.

It's going to affect more than just the large amount of people being laid off as teams consolidate their separate race and test groups.

It'll affect the amount of development that occurs in the year.

There's a lot more to cars than what you see on the outside, and all of those parts will have been run on a test car at some point. If teams will only be able to test on a Friday then they're going to have to commit to potentially ruining their whole weekend if they make a change for the worse that cannot be undone quickly.

Teams will even be scared to test insignificant things, for fear of anything going wrong.

Test ban: at which point a crap car is supposed to turn into something half-decent?

Crap car in Melbourne, crap car in Interlagos.

Quote from deggis :

Test ban: at which point a crap car is supposed to turn into something half-decent?

Crap car in Melbourne, crap car in Interlagos.

They can still try new parts in the practice sessions during a GP weekend.

so they get 1 day of testing per race weekend then... meh

Im happy to have testing limited, just seems a little bit much though.

Race distance is perfect as it is imo. Not too pleased on the sharing of information bit, tactics are one thing i enjoy to see and info sharing will mess that up a fair whack.

looking at some of these changes it basically looks like teams are going to be forced to sack people wether they want to or not.

Engines and chassis stuff im fine with.

Medal survey?

http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews/2008/12/8775.html

Simple yes/no at the bottom of the page...

Ban on refueling in 2010? The races are going to have to be a heck of a lot shorter.:mad: Maybe they could run two sprint races or something. (Doesn't GP2 do that?)

Quote from ultrataco :

(Doesn't GP2 do that?)

One sprint race and one longer race, AFAIK. Not as long as a F1 race, though.

1. I can't see why banning refuelling during the race is making anything cheaper and make races more exciting. The older people of us might remember that it was allowed in '94 with exact the same reason.

2. First they let every team spend several millions on developing their own KERS just to introduce a standard one for all teams? Yeah, thats what I call saving money. Not speaking of the fact that this kind of technology would get improved quite a bit by motorsport.

3. Testing: A crap car stays crap. Also a big help for (potential) new drivers to get some more experience...

4. Tires: I didn't know that tire warmers are that expensive, same as cleaning the tires by hand...

F1 is becomming more and more like a tuned up GP2...

Quote from three_jump :

4. Tires: I didn't know that tire warmers are that expensive

http://www.f1technical.net/features/3189

The blankets cost approximately £2200 per set, and with the teams needing between 36 and 40 sets each, they are a costly - but vital - feature of the F1 pitlane. However, the blankets are at least durable: Ferrari still uses the blankets that Drury made for them in 1996. "We don't need to send an engineer to races," says Drury, "because we never have any problems with our blankets."

So hardly top of the iceberg in budgets..

I think there could be some other reason for the ban... harder compounds, if not less used tyres at least slightly slower speeds?

I can't think any other reason for banning tire warmers than having some "excitement" and passing after pit stops when drivers have to go on the track with cold tires.

Now I hope they can get rid of the two compound tire rule in the race, let's say make it optional? Also they should get rid off the heavy load qualifying session and really start sorting out drivers on based on best times and not fuel tactics. Would make qualifying much more interesting because you'd see absolute results, now you can only guess who is running heavy and who is not.

Standard components sounds a bit worrying. Cutting cost is also a bit hypocrite, when they have been back and forth changing the rules every second season. Time will tell if F1 stays as the pinnacle of motorsport I guess, doesn't look that good.

Quote from ultrataco :

Ban on refueling in 2010? The races are going to have to be a heck of a lot shorter.:mad: Maybe they could run two sprint races or something. (Doesn't GP2 do that?)

why do they need to be shorter? before brabham introduced refueling in the 80s F1 races lasted for close to the full 2hrs / 200 miles figure specified, in fact they were longer than some of todays races. it just means the cars will have to carry more fuel when designed and they've got 12 months notice to make sure the tank is big enough. if they cant get a big enough tank, they need to imrove their mpg or face being beaten by someone who can make it to the end. i'm not alover of economy formulas but it does open up a few more options in race tactics.

nice to see they've finally listened to what prost has been saying they should do for the last 10 years. the current regs mean drivers do 3 or 4 sprint races and have no consideration to preserving the car, with the cars beingn heavy at the start they will have to think a bit about saving brakes and tyres to find the optimum stratergy (before someone mentions it, modern F1 brakes do still suffer from heavy use, look at some of the problems teams have had in canada ) with a bit of luck this should see a return to the old days of some drivers going like a bat out of hell from the start and then suffering near the end of the race and others looking after the car when its heavy and being in better shape at the end. at times when refueling was banned you could have the chasing cars catching the leaders at up to 3 sec a lap and entering the last lap 2 secs behind.

if all of these measures save enough money then maybe we won't need / be forced to use a "spec" engine in the future

I'm not sure how bigger fuel tank could be added to the current car though. Maybe it would have been sensible to keep refuelling but limit them to using a DTM-style can rather than an aeroplane rig.

The Renault can nearly do a full distance with its current tank, and since refuelling is being banned in 2010 they will have time to increase the size. Also if they decrease the races by about 10 laps and reduce the rev limit, then they might not even need to increase the tank size on most of the cars.

Quote from ultrataco :

Ban on refueling in 2010? The races are going to have to be a heck of a lot shorter.:mad: Maybe they could run two sprint races or something. (Doesn't GP2 do that?)

Senna did a full Monaco GP on one tank (and one tyre set too). No pitstops for a whole Monaco GP is quite an achievement

Quote from TurboLag :

Senna did a full Monaco GP on one tank (and one tyre set too). No pitstops for a whole Monaco GP is quite an achievement

Mika Salo did that aswell. Not sure about the year, think it was 1997.

yup. 1997 in a tyrell, came 5th in the end! had a front wing element missing all race too.

I've read in a magazine that in 2009 season, after 40 years, they have allowed inrace adjustable front wing. A driver would be able to do 2 changes per lap in range of 6 degress, or no more then +/-6*, dunno.

It may be interesting due to new extra wide front wing, which makes car slower on straights, as some drivers says.

needs not only no refuelling but a limit on pitcrew members (im thinking in the cost-cutting perspective). Another way to cut costs would be to limit the amount of people that can enter a team's garage. So no team would have a 200 man crew while another would have 10. (numbers pulled from my arse, but you get the picture)

Does no refuelling include move out from mandatory use of softer and harder compound?

Even without refuelling IMO there will be more random pit-stoping for new tires, if flatspoted, damaged front wings which are so exhibited for damade now, and for semi slicks/rain tires if rain starts (full slicks! )