Technical director more than happy with Mercedes power but also stresses work the team have done after 2014 disappointment
Monday 16 March 2015 14:20, UK
Lotus technical director Nick Chester is anticipating a far stronger start to the season at the Australian GP than they managed in Melbourne 12 months ago.
On that occasion, there was little surprise when Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado retired in Albert Park, with both drivers ill-prepared after a fraught pre-season testing period.
The unveiling of the team’s distinctive E22 was delayed and the car was unreliable. Yet Lotus’s season continued to flat-line as Grosjean and Maldonado also grappled with handling that proved wildly unpredictable.
Its successor appears a big improvement and attentions have inevitably focused on Lotus’s switch from Renault to Mercedes power. Speaking in Barcelona, however, Chester was keen to point out that a new engine supplier does not represent the full story.
“The power unit’s a good step forward for us and on the chassis side; the chassis’s a good step forward,” he said. “We’ve got a more consistent car, the drivers can get more out of it more easily, it’s much easier to drive on the limit and much more predictable. So we’ve got good steps in both areas.”
Asked about the Mercedes hybrid, Chester added: “It’s obviously a very performing power unit as you can see from last year. The installation’s nice so that gives us some benefits and it’s extremely reliable: we’ve only run one power unit all through testing.”
Besides a lack of power and reliability last season, Lotus had problems with their car’s brake-by-wire system and also its aerodynamics, which would stall unexpectedly.
Chester said they are now on top of the former problem. “We struggled a lot with [brake-by-wire] at the start of the year and it got easier through the year. We developed the system, we developed its response and as the response got better it got better for the drivers.
“The response of the power unit does play a part, and the response of the power unit is very good.”
Regarding aerodynamic sensitivity, he added: “It was inconsistent and we knew the area we had to work in – and that’s been getting better.
“I’m sure it can get better still as we focus on that sensitivity, but we’re making the car less sensitive for the drivers so it’s easier to extract the full performance.”
Chester also confirmed that Lotus, who finished eighth in last year’s constructors’ championship, are looking to overhaul Williams this season.
“That’s the target, although they are a bit ahead of us at the moment,” he said. “We got some more developments coming at race two and race three that’ll hopefully help close that gap. But obviously they’ve had another year with the power unit.”
