AndyL, a fair point. I think when James Allison (?) claimed that works teams are going to have a significant advantage, he indeed meant "packaging advantage", not horsepowers or other differences in engines itself. The difference with V8 engines is that everyone got so used to V8's that even despite "reliability upgrades" everyone knew them like the back of their hands. V6 is going to be new, and teams with more in-depth knowledge (i.e factory teams) could have more of an advantage than in previous years.

But I do think that if a so-called private team can come up with an excellent chassis, they will be competitive too and not notably handicapped. Like Lotus was in 2012-13. And I am sceptical about claims that gaps could be big. I think they may be small(ish) as well, depending on the phase of the season. I think ultimately the difference in "gaps" isn't so dependant on whether we have a rule change or not, but more on the quality of the teams itself. By the end of 2013 we had had quite a stable set of rules, yet Red Bull was dominating by a bigger margin than ever before.

The main issue is, which "non-factory" team can actually come up with a top-notch package, because the three main teams we are talking about seem to be more complete teams in general and it's not just about engines - great engineering/design teams, very good drivers, experienced and proven leadership, big budgets so that they can develop efficiently. Competition is close anyway and this is where the "completeness" of a team is important - that you can eek out just a little bit more to rise above most of others and be a genuine frontrunner. McLaren is in a bit of a transition phase and regardless of whether they are "handicapped" by engines, transition phases always have at least some kind of influence - it is a state of re-building.