The FIA has now issued the edicts for the 2003 season. This has been brought about in part by the demise of two F1 race teams in the last 12 months, and by the lack of excitement caused by the inability for the cars to actually race each other.

President of the FIA, Max Mosely

Last October, the Formula One teams rejected all the FIA’s cost-saving proposals. The teams themselves have had several meetings, but produced nothing. The FIA invited the teams to a meeting at Heathrow Airport January 15th and informed them that in order to reduce costs and improve the racing it will rigorously apply existing rules from the start of the coming season, in order to:

1. eliminate pit to car telemetry;

2. eliminate car to pit telemetry;

3. eliminate all radio communication between team and driver;

4. allow only two cars per team (i.e. no spare car);

5. place cars in parc ferm่ between final qualifying and the race (teams will be unable to work on them, except under strict supervision);

6. eliminate traction control, launch control and fully automatic gearboxes (possible derogation for all or part of 2003 to be followed by absolute enforcement in 2004, if necessary by means of standard electronic control units).

In addition, the FIA will also allow teams to use common components; and that it intends to introduce sporting rules for 2004 which will require the use of a standard braking system; require the use of a standard rear wing; require the use of long-life components; ensure that car manufacturers involved in Formula One supply engines to all competing teams; and that for 2005 it intends to bring in further sporting rules to require engine life to be extended from one to two races; a further extension to the life of major components; new penalties for engine or component changes outside permitted times; and that for 2006 it intends to bring in a further sporting rule to require engine life to be extended to six races; and that it will seek the agreement of the teams to introduce a new technical regulation to eliminate the use of expensive exotic materials in any part of the car, including the engine.

Next week I will go through these new items and what the new rules could do for the Grands Prix.

The Detroit MoShow has been and gone, and many of America’s manufacturers use the show as a toe in the water exercise with their concept cars to see if it would be worthwhile looking at turning a concept into production. The following article on the V16 Caddy is one of those sorts of vehicles. However, the Nissan company, which is quite frankly storming the world, used the show-to-show America’s big 3 that Nissan has taken up the challenge, and then some!

We think of Thailand as the land of the pick-up and I don’t mean of the female gender either! America is big on pick-ups too, and Nissan just dealt one in the eye to Ford Motor Company with its new Nissan Titan.

Nissan Titan

This big Titan pickup and a new, larger minivan look like making an even greater market share for Nissan. Last year Nissan’s U.S. sales rose by a tad over 5 % to 739,499 units. Carlos Ghosn, Nissan’s dynamic boss is now a legend in Japan and declared, “There are lots of big trucks out there but none like this one. We have done our homework, and we know what truck owners want.”

Last week I asked who was the father of the Stingray? That should have been easy, and for my money it was Zora Arkus-Duntov, the designer of the Ardun head for V8 Fords. However, Zora A-D moved to GM and was involved in the early Chevrolet Corvettes in camshafts and suspension design (1957 and 1958), but it was the Stingray released at the end of 1962 that had Zora all through it. The body was designed by Bill Mitchell, the successor to Harley Earl, the original Corvette designer (Note Earl did not design the “Stingray).

Incidentally, the first of these cars was called the “Sting Ray” but in 1969 it became the one word “Stingray”. In 1968 and for one year only, it was just called the Corvette. Now there’s some really useless trivia that could win you a beer or two in a bar!

So to this week, and let’s go across the pond to the UK and specifically Jaguar, even though it is now owned by FoMoCo. The XK 120, a classic, was the result of a cock-up by the bodywork company that had been assigned to build the Mk VII Jaguar sedans. They were unable to deliver on time for the 1948 London MoShow, and the boss of Jaguar, Sir William Lyons, said that if nothing else, the new chassis would go on display. To make an impact, he designed a spectacular 2 seater bodywork to go on the chassis. This was called the XK 120. Now I am coming to the question - how did they pick on that designation for the 2 seater Jaguar? A clue - there was one reason for the XK part and another for the 120 bit.

For the Automania FREE beer this week, be the first correct answer to email [email protected]