INDYCAR: New McLaren ECU, Sato, Pagenaud Log Testing Miles At Sebring

IndyCar

INDYCAR: New McLaren ECU, Sato, Pagenaud Log Testing Miles At Sebring

Two months of engine testing concluded after teams tried the new McLaren ECU, and Honda gave Takuma Sato and Simon Pagenaud runs in its DW12.

Marshall Pruett | Posted December 17, 2011

Takuma Sato is tended to by the Ganassi/HPD test team at Sebring on Thursday. (Photo: HPD)

After three days of heavy activity last week on the Sebring short course, IZOD IndyCar Series engine manufacturers wound down two-months of intensive testing by pressing the new McLaren ECU and its associated electronics into service.

“We now have the McLaren (TAG-400i) ECU up and running on the cars,” said Will Phillips, INDYCAR’s VP of technology. “We appreciate the patience the manufacturers have shown in getting it into the development stream, and they’ve been incredibly helpful.”

Of the two engine manufacturers present, Honda Performance Development led the most ambitious plan, cycling Sam Schmidt Motorsports’ Simon Pagenaud, Target Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott Dixon, and Takuma Sato--who was participating through an evaluation requested by Rahal Letterman Lanigan--through HPD’s Dallara DW12.

Chevrolet, which did not comment on its test, was present with Tony Kanaan and Ryan Hunter-Reay.

Using Pagenaud on Day 1, HPD technical director Roger Griffiths told SPEED.com that the new engine controller delivered no surprises.

“Things actually went pretty well,” he said. “Given how little we knew about the McLaren system in general, and for the short amount of time we had our hands on it, we had a remarkably successful test. We took our time getting going on the first day with Simon. We had to figure out not only how it worked in a live environment, but how to calibrate everything with a new engine. Once we wrapped out heads around how McLaren does things, it all went well.”

Roger Griffiths, left, shares a laugh with Ganassi Racing's Charlie Kimball before the race at Las Vegas. (LAT)

Although Pagenaud had a few laps in HPD’s DW12 on a wet day at Barber Motorsports Park, Sebring represented the Frenchman’s first proper day in the car, but ECU testing was his focus.

“Simon was a bit of a test driver in that sense,” Griffiths explained. “He got the first go at it, which was very much in the early stage of development. But we didn’t have any problems; it didn’t stop on track or anything like that. We progressed from there and made as many advancements as we could in three days. All of the functionalities exists that will [be there] when we go racing. When Scott got in the car on the second day, he continued that development and by the third day, when Takuma drove, we were reasonably happy with how the engine and ECU were performing together. The third day was when we were able to do a lot of running.”

Despite being tasked with the more mundane testing duties at Sebring, Pagenaud said he enjoyed the experience.

“I always enjoy myself when I’m in an Indy car,” he said. “It was a lot of system checks and mapping work. It’s very important stuff to do. I feel honored to be asked by Honda to help with this kind of work because it’s a proof that they really believe in my abilities.

“It sets up quite a bit expectation!” he said with a laugh.

Outright speed wasn’t the goal for Pagenaud’s day in the car, but the former Champ Car ace says he took away some positive and familiar impressions of the DW12 in road course trim.

“It’s agile, as an open-wheel car would be. We didn’t get to do much setup work on my time in the car, so we had a bit of understeer. The braking is strong with the carbon brakes. The engine, even though it’s a turbo, everyone is asking me about the lag, but there’s not much lag going on. That’s a good sign as well. At this moment, the engine is a lot of fun, but the entire car is an ongoing process. It’s still early; you don’t get perfect handling or whatever when you are early in the testing.

“For what I did feel, in the high-speed stuff, I can feel that it has more downforce, which is nice. It feels more like the [Panoz DP01] did in the high-speed corners. In the low-speed stuff, it still needs work, but we have plenty of time.”

As the closest thing they have for factory test driver, Pagenaud and the staff at HPD got down to business immediately, while Sato, according to Griffiths, arrived as a bit of an unknown quantity.

“The first thing that’s really easy with Simon is that we all know each other,” he said. “It’s all very familiar. It was an interesting thing with Takuma coming in. Other than knowing him through KV Racing, we don’t know Takuma Sato. Everybody thinks that because he’s a former Honda Formula One driver that we at HPD know him, but my first real in-depth conversation with him took place the night before his test on Thursday.

Simon Pagenaud has tested and raced at Sebring extensively, and nearly won this year's 12-hour ALMS event after fighting the diesel giants in his naturally-aspirated HPD ARX-01e chassis. (Marshall Pruett)

“We’ve never had that intimate relationship with him. He doesn’t know me; he didn’t know us or the Rahal people… I was really, really impressed with his feedback. I think he’s gotten a bit of a bad rap. His technical feedback and detail orientation was first class.”

Sato told SPEED.com he was happy to get back to business after being out of the cockpit since Las Vegas.

“It was a great day and a great opportunity to drive the new car,” he said. “For me, the Sebring track is so memorable because it’s the first track where I drove and Indy car two years ago with KV. Although that was only 20 minutes of driving, I really liked the track. Going back there now, it’s nice to have my first outing with the new car and to help with the development of the Honda engine.”

Like Pagenaud, Sato found the DW12 to be a refreshing change from its predecessor, the IR07, but also noted the need for its development to continue.

“There’s still a lot of work to be done in testing, but my initial thoughts were pretty positive,” he said. “There are some areas we need to improve a lot, but generally, I was impressed. We worked on setup and the car reacted with the outcome we expected. I was pleased with that. The engine is very different--being turbocharged--from what we had last year.”

Receiving feedback from Pagenaud and Sato—drivers with very different backgrounds in motor racing—was quite revealing, as Griffiths explains.

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