The team ran the same engine throughout the four days and, though the team did suffer a few problems in that time, none of them were to do with the engine.
“We had twice an electronics problem, nothing big mechanical,” team principal Gunther Steiner told motorsport.com. “[Ferrari] have done a fantastic job, in my opinion.
“To come out here with a new engine, a complete new engine, and be this reliable, it is amazing. If you look at the other ones around, and they are no dummies, they have quite a few issues.
“So, from last year to this year, Ferrari stepped up a lot and it is very good.”
Honda suffered a number of problems at the start of the test, whilst the Renault engine caused problems for Toro Rosso.
The engine reliability bodes well for Haas’ aim to fight in the midfield. Steiner believes it’s too early to make any precise predictions, but the team is confident it can reach the midfield aim.
“In general, we are pretty confident we are in the mid-pack,” he said. “I don’t know yet.
“I just hope we are more to the middle of the midpack than last year.”
It isn’t all good for the American team, though. Haas are still dealing with the braking problems that they had faced in the second part of their debut season in Formula One.
The team are still testing brakes supplied by Carbone Industrie to find out if they are consistent.
“We haven’t tested them enough to know if they are consistent or not,” Steiner said. “We did a test last year, but we haven’t come to a conclusion.
“We need to test them for this year, because we were late with the sign off and we have to produce new brakes because the discs are thicker and we haven’t got them yet.
“We will test them. We just don’t know exactly when or which race we will have them on.”
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Do you think Haas will be up there in the midfied? What do you think of what we’ve seen of the Ferrari engine so far? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
