Australian F1 Gran Prix pics
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Junior Member
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 104
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From: Jalalabad, Afghanistan
Australian F1 Gran Prix pics
It's been a month since this race, but I figure better late than never 
I've been in Iraq since early November 2005, and this trip to Oz was the first time I'd had a chance to take a vacation, so I figured I'd schedule it around the Grand Prix. The race was great, and like usual I was able to get into the Honda garage after the race and help the team do their post race pack out.
One thing that was great about sitting at turn 9 was that because it was a slower corner you could really tell a difference in the way various drivers attack a corner differently. Anthony Davidson would just demolish the corner! It was very easy to see why he posts such great times. Just before apex hes's back on throttle. Kimi was noticeably different in execution from other drivers as well. Schumacher, like usual looks like he'll early apex and hits it just right. The Merc V8 had a noticeably different sound than other engines over the weekend. Not weaker, just different.
So here's the pics and descriptions...
Friday and Saturday practice and quali
Sunday: Race Day
BMW 1series Pro/Celebrity support race
V8 Super cars race. If only Nascar was this cool. If you look close on some of the pics you can see flames at the exhaust exit from the body work by the left rear wheel while they were braking and at part throttle conditions
Some drifting to help kill the time till the real fun begins...
Drivers parade. Jenson Button in the first pic, Felipe Massa in the 2nd pic
Jenson in P1, lap 1
early lap yellow flag train. Safety car in background leading the pack
This is right after Christian Klien's shunt at turn 9 while braking. In this first pic you can see some white chunks on the track the Super Aguri is about to pass through. Those are chuncks of styrofoam that used to be a corner distance marker. Klien slid right along the wall in front of us.
the marshalls went a picked up the main chunks of Kliens front wing and one of the tires that had come off
Fisi chasing Button in the closing laps
Last lap of the race. We all know what happens about a minute later... Buttons engine goes KABLEWY!! on the last corner and fails to cross the finish line. Ironicly, he came to a halt on the main strait directly in front of the Honda garage, ha ha.
Walking the track after the race.
Hooray for Ferrari shunts! We all cheered...
Pics from the pit/main straight after the race:
the WilliamsF1 boys working over Nico Rosberg's car. Nico came out and signed autographs for a while and hung out in the garage with his mechs. He seems like a pretty good guy.
Michael Schumachers race engineer (i don't remember his name). He was talking to these guys for a good 20 minutes, and obviously knew them. He seemed really nice, but I didn't want to interlope in thier conversation, seeing how I was wearing a HondaF1 team shirt
Yuji Ide signing autographs.
Ahhhh, yes the Honda garage...
Okay, really funny story to these pictures... After the race ended and the podium events had taken place, a replay of the race was shown on the screens and PA system around the track. With about 4 laps left on the replay Jenson Button came to the edge of the garage and watched the replay. Eventually the rest of the team (except for the Japanese guys who are there for engine support) gathered around to where you can't even see Jeson in the crowd anymore. Then, on the last lap of the replay, last corner....
they watched the engine blow and had a great laugh at it! It was hilarious to watch, and it let you know that these guys knew they'd done everything to bring home a win and when it didn't happen, they could laugh about it and move on. On the other hand, while I was helping out in the garage post-race, you could tell the Japanese guys weren't very pleased with what their engine had done. They were less than cheery and you could tell they just wanted to get the hell out of there.
It was that lady's last race with the team so they gave her a big, happy send off. You can see the back of Jenson Button close to the front of the group as they posed for a picture.
I didn't get many pics in the garage till we were damn near packed up and about to walk out the door. Here you can see the cars all ready for shipping.
It can be hard to tell in photo's with bright sun, but the cars are now using good ol' Championship White as their base color. Just like on street cars with CW the off white creamy color is very obvious in lower light conditions like outside the garage, when I was cleaning the engine covers. I was too busy to think to get a picture. Maybe next time. It's great to have CW back on the car again
Chassis -01 is still racing! Not sure who its driver was over the weekend.
You can see the Red Bull Racing guys in the back ground with blue equipment and matching blue car covers. You'll also notice the brake ducts are taped over for shipping. Right above the cockpit is a zipper so that the steering wheel can be easily accessed to manuver the cars. In the background you can see 2 skinny wood pieces leaning up against the chainlink fence. Those are skid plates from the bottom of the cars. They are HEAVY (much more than expected when you look them anyway) which makes sense considering they are attatched to the bottom of the car.
Because its a fly away race there is a HUGE amout of packing to do. We were there till ~1130pm. All along the pit area and the main straight as well as behind the garage were air and sea shipping containers to pack all the shizzie into.
another shot with the Red Bull garage in the background
Look at that camber on the front! Brake ducts taped over
the above cars from the side, where you can see the WilliamsF1 cars in the background.
WilliamsF1 cars, taken through the fence.
Race ticket and FIA paddock pass.
Just the paddock pass
I was pulled aside by the chief mechanic a few times and given a few souveniers....
this picture is from last year at Monza. I'm showing it here to show where exactly the exhaust shrouds from the following pics come from:
These are exhust shorouds that unbolt from the main engine cover. The header leaving one side of the engine V sits immediately under these. At first I was given the shroud on the bottom of this pic. It was one from the pair on of shrouds on Barichello's car from Saturdays practice and qualifying. I asked what was going to happen to the shrouds on Buttons car from the race (because they'd been through the engine fire) and was told they'd be binned (thats British english for "trashed") beacause they were a used part, so I was welcome to pull them off of the engine cover I'd been working on. DONE! ha ha. So the upper 2 shrouds in the pic survived Button's engine fire at the end of the race. There was actually VERY minimal damage to the engine cover of Button's car. The inside of the covers are coated with a very effective reflective surface that resists heat. What was dirty as hell was the undertray from under Jenson's car.
These next 2 pics show the underside of the shroud used on Barichello's car Saturday. It actually showed more damage on the underside than the 2 that survived the fire on button's car! On these the matrix used to hold the carbon fiber stiff was backed completely off around the outer layer, and mostly off of the area where the hole is. The layer with the hole was starting to peel and separate from the other plies. It becomes pretty obvious why these shrouds are replaced everyday the car is used. There is also discoloration in the matrix through the rest of the center of the piece. The shroud looks to be about 4-5 plies of carbon fiber thick
These are the 2 shrouds that survived Button's final corner engine fire. The one from the left side of the car is obviously missing some of carbon fiber. There was some discoloration of the matrix and fibers on the outside and inside of the shroud. There are also some blisters starting to form on the shouds' underside that I was able to capture at the right angle of light.
they area where the gloss is missing from these pics is where the matirix had been cooked away
AlpineStars HondaF1 Racing Team shoes. They're pretty bad *** and very Euro
Titanium bracket from the skid plate of Barichello's car. Shown on a card for size reference. In the second picture you can see the serial number for the part. As an FYI, if you didn't know, most F1 teams will design, then build a part, then test it individually, THEN and only then will the part recieve a stamped serial #
teH end
Modified by pythonScott at 12:45 AM 5/10/2006
I've been in Iraq since early November 2005, and this trip to Oz was the first time I'd had a chance to take a vacation, so I figured I'd schedule it around the Grand Prix. The race was great, and like usual I was able to get into the Honda garage after the race and help the team do their post race pack out.
One thing that was great about sitting at turn 9 was that because it was a slower corner you could really tell a difference in the way various drivers attack a corner differently. Anthony Davidson would just demolish the corner! It was very easy to see why he posts such great times. Just before apex hes's back on throttle. Kimi was noticeably different in execution from other drivers as well. Schumacher, like usual looks like he'll early apex and hits it just right. The Merc V8 had a noticeably different sound than other engines over the weekend. Not weaker, just different.
So here's the pics and descriptions...
Friday and Saturday practice and quali
Sunday: Race Day
BMW 1series Pro/Celebrity support race
V8 Super cars race. If only Nascar was this cool. If you look close on some of the pics you can see flames at the exhaust exit from the body work by the left rear wheel while they were braking and at part throttle conditions
Some drifting to help kill the time till the real fun begins...
Drivers parade. Jenson Button in the first pic, Felipe Massa in the 2nd pic
Jenson in P1, lap 1
early lap yellow flag train. Safety car in background leading the pack
This is right after Christian Klien's shunt at turn 9 while braking. In this first pic you can see some white chunks on the track the Super Aguri is about to pass through. Those are chuncks of styrofoam that used to be a corner distance marker. Klien slid right along the wall in front of us.
the marshalls went a picked up the main chunks of Kliens front wing and one of the tires that had come off
Fisi chasing Button in the closing laps
Last lap of the race. We all know what happens about a minute later... Buttons engine goes KABLEWY!! on the last corner and fails to cross the finish line. Ironicly, he came to a halt on the main strait directly in front of the Honda garage, ha ha.
Walking the track after the race.
Hooray for Ferrari shunts! We all cheered...
Pics from the pit/main straight after the race:
the WilliamsF1 boys working over Nico Rosberg's car. Nico came out and signed autographs for a while and hung out in the garage with his mechs. He seems like a pretty good guy.
Michael Schumachers race engineer (i don't remember his name). He was talking to these guys for a good 20 minutes, and obviously knew them. He seemed really nice, but I didn't want to interlope in thier conversation, seeing how I was wearing a HondaF1 team shirt
Yuji Ide signing autographs.
Ahhhh, yes the Honda garage...
Okay, really funny story to these pictures... After the race ended and the podium events had taken place, a replay of the race was shown on the screens and PA system around the track. With about 4 laps left on the replay Jenson Button came to the edge of the garage and watched the replay. Eventually the rest of the team (except for the Japanese guys who are there for engine support) gathered around to where you can't even see Jeson in the crowd anymore. Then, on the last lap of the replay, last corner....
they watched the engine blow and had a great laugh at it! It was hilarious to watch, and it let you know that these guys knew they'd done everything to bring home a win and when it didn't happen, they could laugh about it and move on. On the other hand, while I was helping out in the garage post-race, you could tell the Japanese guys weren't very pleased with what their engine had done. They were less than cheery and you could tell they just wanted to get the hell out of there.
It was that lady's last race with the team so they gave her a big, happy send off. You can see the back of Jenson Button close to the front of the group as they posed for a picture.
I didn't get many pics in the garage till we were damn near packed up and about to walk out the door. Here you can see the cars all ready for shipping.
It can be hard to tell in photo's with bright sun, but the cars are now using good ol' Championship White as their base color. Just like on street cars with CW the off white creamy color is very obvious in lower light conditions like outside the garage, when I was cleaning the engine covers. I was too busy to think to get a picture. Maybe next time. It's great to have CW back on the car again
Chassis -01 is still racing! Not sure who its driver was over the weekend.
You can see the Red Bull Racing guys in the back ground with blue equipment and matching blue car covers. You'll also notice the brake ducts are taped over for shipping. Right above the cockpit is a zipper so that the steering wheel can be easily accessed to manuver the cars. In the background you can see 2 skinny wood pieces leaning up against the chainlink fence. Those are skid plates from the bottom of the cars. They are HEAVY (much more than expected when you look them anyway) which makes sense considering they are attatched to the bottom of the car.
Because its a fly away race there is a HUGE amout of packing to do. We were there till ~1130pm. All along the pit area and the main straight as well as behind the garage were air and sea shipping containers to pack all the shizzie into.
another shot with the Red Bull garage in the background
Look at that camber on the front! Brake ducts taped over
the above cars from the side, where you can see the WilliamsF1 cars in the background.
WilliamsF1 cars, taken through the fence.
Race ticket and FIA paddock pass.
Just the paddock pass
I was pulled aside by the chief mechanic a few times and given a few souveniers....
this picture is from last year at Monza. I'm showing it here to show where exactly the exhaust shrouds from the following pics come from:
These are exhust shorouds that unbolt from the main engine cover. The header leaving one side of the engine V sits immediately under these. At first I was given the shroud on the bottom of this pic. It was one from the pair on of shrouds on Barichello's car from Saturdays practice and qualifying. I asked what was going to happen to the shrouds on Buttons car from the race (because they'd been through the engine fire) and was told they'd be binned (thats British english for "trashed") beacause they were a used part, so I was welcome to pull them off of the engine cover I'd been working on. DONE! ha ha. So the upper 2 shrouds in the pic survived Button's engine fire at the end of the race. There was actually VERY minimal damage to the engine cover of Button's car. The inside of the covers are coated with a very effective reflective surface that resists heat. What was dirty as hell was the undertray from under Jenson's car.
These next 2 pics show the underside of the shroud used on Barichello's car Saturday. It actually showed more damage on the underside than the 2 that survived the fire on button's car! On these the matrix used to hold the carbon fiber stiff was backed completely off around the outer layer, and mostly off of the area where the hole is. The layer with the hole was starting to peel and separate from the other plies. It becomes pretty obvious why these shrouds are replaced everyday the car is used. There is also discoloration in the matrix through the rest of the center of the piece. The shroud looks to be about 4-5 plies of carbon fiber thick
These are the 2 shrouds that survived Button's final corner engine fire. The one from the left side of the car is obviously missing some of carbon fiber. There was some discoloration of the matrix and fibers on the outside and inside of the shroud. There are also some blisters starting to form on the shouds' underside that I was able to capture at the right angle of light.
they area where the gloss is missing from these pics is where the matirix had been cooked away
AlpineStars HondaF1 Racing Team shoes. They're pretty bad *** and very Euro
Titanium bracket from the skid plate of Barichello's car. Shown on a card for size reference. In the second picture you can see the serial number for the part. As an FYI, if you didn't know, most F1 teams will design, then build a part, then test it individually, THEN and only then will the part recieve a stamped serial #
teH end
Modified by pythonScott at 12:45 AM 5/10/2006
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 11,967
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From: Charlotte
Re: Australian F1 Gran Prix pics (Honda318dx)
<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Honda318dx »</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Awesome photos man!</TD></TR></TABLE>
Once again... super pix!
Once again... super pix!
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Thread Starter
Junior Member
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 104
Likes: 0
From: Jalalabad, Afghanistan
Re: Australian F1 Gran Prix pics (Outrun)
thanks for the compliments guys! Its great to be able to attend and see what I get to see, so I like sharing what I can.
<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Outrun »</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I probably asked you before but it was so long ago that I forgot. Anyways, how'd you get to be an "insider"?</TD></TR></TABLE>
I know the chief mechanic, so when I'm able to attend a race I'm normally able to get into the garage after the race and help out.
<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Outrun »</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I probably asked you before but it was so long ago that I forgot. Anyways, how'd you get to be an "insider"?</TD></TR></TABLE>
I know the chief mechanic, so when I'm able to attend a race I'm normally able to get into the garage after the race and help out.
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