Mercedes GP MGP W01

[Raptor22]

PS: F1 eng,


If someone is flat out wrong , then simply say so. Some of the f1 people appear to be present on the forum so I don't see that you are merely observing, that would make you a lurker without posting.

I think theres a lot to be learned from people such as yourself but the excuses of "i'm too close to it" just doesn't wash.

this is a case of participate or not.

since you have chosen to participate, i for one would appreciate participation in a way that does not reveal someone IP but still guides our understanding of what is going on mechanically aerodynamically etc.

thanks

[marcush.]

PS: F1 eng,


If someone is flat out wrong , then simply say so. Some of the f1 people appear to be present on the forum so I don't see that you are merely observing, that would make you a lurker without posting.

I think theres a lot to be learned from people such as yourself but the excuses of "i'm too close to it" just doesn't wash.

this is a case of participate or not.

since you have chosen to participate, i for one would appreciate participation in a way that does not reveal someone IP but still guides our understanding of what is going on mechanically aerodynamically etc.

thanks

Mates ,
I am of the opinion that these guys do know math but still have not really a handle of what is going on ...
Be it F1_eng is in F1 or not...i really don´t know and it really doesn´t matter .
if he is and he´s looking here it must have a reason .... there is some milk on the table ,I have no better reason for a F1 engineer to look up this space.to fathom everything is gold wich is posted here seems completely out of perspective
and totally unrealistic as some are schhoolboys ,some are just enthusiasts without any technical background ,have not studied (as me)or come out of a completely different background .Still we are nailed for things we post from guys who should know it all and to be honest ,those I know are very open to discuss these items as well it maybe sensitive grounds but what the heck could you do with the confirmed information that moving ballast to the rear is not on for a lot of teams
this year .
Quite interesting ..so if these choose to post that they are not willing to post ,so be it.It does not change my life and it should not change yours.If he fears to be the next gooney ..or he just doesn´t know more than us ..i still look forward to round 2 and what new details we can spot on the cars.. [-o<

[JohnsonEvilTwin]

I have to say Im looking forward to Australia.

Not entirley positive reasons either. Australia will either confirm or renounce our fears that this year is going to be a boring procession.
It could be that Red Bull are also outed as being the leading team-BY SOME MARGIN.
Im no Ferrari fan but I hope they challenge to put on a show.

MGP 001 dosnt have anything major in terms of development coming for Oz. Haug has stated "wait for europe". So we wait

[marcush.]

i´d think the stiff setup is not really an issue in Australia?

coming back to the cars weaknesses I doubt they have a chassis stiffness issue.to me these things are a thing of the past fem and fibre layup are well understood things they had the same engine adapted to last years car so this will be a good step forward in installation integrity.The gearboxhousing is not adapted it is purposemade for the merc lump this year.... so if at all the whole thing should be more homogenius in terms of stiffness distribution.

[JohnsonEvilTwin]

Marcush Reference stiffness: in the tests at Jerez The MGP001 was the only car lifting its unloaded front tyre. I noticed it from pics on F1 fanatic. The photographer was taking pics of all the teams going through that corner, and while you could see that all cars had an unloaded wheel, all still remained in contact with tarmac bar the MGP001.

I dont know what speeds they were all traveling at, but its odd that the Merc is the only one.

[marcush.]

the lift is not a sign of a soft tub.it is a sign of a lot of one roll coming from the rear .the front is rockhard anyways as we have seen.

so their setup is stiff front soft rear to promote traction ,nothing new in F1 cars ..
at least with this setup they do not have to worry much about their anti Ackerman percentage..

[ringo]

To blame the nose is a silly mistake IMO.

For all we know that nose is better than the rest of them and by some considerable margin.

It could be suspension, driver location or loads of things causing the issues.

+1

I agree with you here. I remember last year some people were going on about how the low brawn nose was so draggy that there was no way they could win on low downforce tracks. Then both cars cream the field at Monza.

I'm afraid it's very hard to infer aero performance from aesthetics alone.

I don't fully believe the nose is the problem either, but being in our position it's hard to criticize something that is not visual. We don't have any inside information, so we have to go with what we pick up in the car's movement on TV a few hi res shots we get of certain parts and media reports.
Their problem could be much bigger than the nose; i think it's the inherent design of the car that needs a rethink, but i don't know exactly where. The balance issues could be related to the tub design, which could influence positioning of other components, which could influence packaging, ballast then suspension. You never can tell.
The good thing is that the car is good enough to be a top runner. However it's not known how much they can do to challenge the leaders.

Aesthetics is also the part interacting with the air, it is not hard to compare aero performance from it. That's all the CFD and wind tunnel sees anyway. Other problems like suspension have an influence on ride height, transients, vibration on flow etc. But aesthetics is the bulk of the aero in my opinion. What's hard is not imitating another team's aero, but understanding why it is like it is.
Ferrari took what they could from redbull aesthetics and are now winning races.

About the nose, it could be the best or the worst, the passing of time will reveal who takes on the concept or if the W01 scraps it. I think it could be a good idea, but not fully grasped, kind of like some Mclaren updates last season that never worked well, but with more developement time were reintroduced this year.

[marcush.]

ok we do surely not have the whole picture but we see what we see .the car is setup ultra stiff at the front for no obvious reason for example.
It must dawn on the boffins that this is really really bad in terms of getting rid of the understeer but just why did they choose to run it that way?
would the car be scraping the ground with softer springing? why them and not Ferrari and Redbull ? Was the stiff hampering them only with near empty tanks?
it looks to me they have worked around the problem with the setup ,and they just know it is not as it should be.reminds me a bit of Williams when Ralf and Montoya
everytime resorted to ultrastiff front setups ,the cars bouncing like mad and the odd tenths were missing to be really at the sharp end of the grip.It worked on some circuits but it was a struggle on others...
lets assume they have analysed what is going on and have a solution to the root course the flaw in design.Why should they wait for the european season to put the solution on the car?
In effect this hints at a bottleneck they have to get over ... so a lot of delicate parts to redesign and also manufacture.. it can´t be a set of flaps a strake or a new bargeboard it takes time.. as designing and manufacturing 5or 6 sets of new wishbones ,pushrods rockers tierods the whole shebang at the front plus new longer nosecone to accomodate the front wing a few inches forward...
could be ..

[djones]

Before you laugh take into account I'm just an idiot....

If they have blance problems (ie understeer) why dont they just run more front wing?

[marcush.]

Before you laugh take into account I'm just an idiot....

If they have blance problems (ie understeer) why dont they just run more front wing?

doyou have more wing available? the whole endplate design thing is to reduce losses at the wingtips where losses are extreme especially with the turning wheel behind..
and the adding of a second plane is not really helping that much.
the middle section of the front wing is already lost for producing downforce..
and maximum flap height is written in the rulebook..so you are left with endplate fiddling ,wich seems to be quite detailed already ,the second deck of wing ,also
extensively exploited with slotgaps etc.. so where to gain more downforce ...?

[horse]

Aesthetics is also the part interacting with the air, it is not hard to compare aero performance from it. That's all the CFD and wind tunnel sees anyway.

Come on ringo, you can't infer just by looking at it how this nose interacts with the rest of the car, can you? And it's going to govern a chunk of the overall cars aero efficiency. Wind tunnel, CFD yes, but you can't tell just by looking at it, not entirely.

Not that I'm trying to condemn speculation, of course, especially as Loic seems to believe a "lower" sort of nose gives them some sort of advantage. It will be interesting, again, to see how the car performs over the different circuits to see if it is still as sensitive to conditions as last years car and, indeed, whether it hits a sweet spot at Monza again.

Talking of wheels off the ground, Rosberg had the inside rear off the ground loads in Bahrain practice. Not sure about the race. Didn't notice the same for Schumacher, though, so perhaps it's just preference?

djones, marcush, I believe putting too much front wing on can also impair the aero performance of the rear of the car.

[marcush.]

unloading inside rear tyres ? have not seen this..but how on earth could they have understeer then?..I´m more and more convinced they have found something of a balance with the car bot not the peak..
quite a word if you had to quick drivers and a bunch of testing already done.

[F1_eng]

[...] I have yet to see any decent technical basis to an argument. I posted 2 2D single element CFD result images on a McLaren thread of which there was not one reference to it. People wish to simply talk about things and give their views based on absolutely nothing, rather than try and interpret results.

Do you think because a couple of you say the nose looks "draggy", it actually is? Why does it look draggy? What do you think the effects are down-stream? If it were as simple as that, we wouldn't need wind-tunnels or CFD.

I don't think anyone has mentioned pitch/yaw sensitivity or the balance shift with speed and attitude. These are more important than the raw downforce level.
The phrase "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing" springs to mind.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

F1 ENG

You sir a full of it. So you know how to use computer programme, so what?
With a bit of time, Im sure so would 95% of us!
Your elitist rant is indicative to why no one bothered to reply on the Mclaren thread. And to assume you know more than most people on this site is arrogant in the extreme.

You are not part of any F1 team and you certainly now very little in how to communicate. So please, spare me the facade and post on crash.net or some other comic site for clowns.

[F1_eng]

How can something be "elitist" rant, then suggest I'm not part of an F1 team?
You are right, the industry is elitist, and so it should be.

I don't need to prove to you or anyone thank you, so unless you know I don't work for a team, I'd appreciate if you didn't mention it again.