Mercedes AMG have today completed their shakedown of the W03, the team's new 2012 car. After the team decided to run at last week's Jerez test with the older car, Mercedes will present its new car to the public next Tuesday at the start of testing at Barcelona.
A place to discuss the characteristics of the cars in Formula One, both current as well as historical. Laptimes, driver worshipping and team chatter do not belong here.
Mr.S wrote:Cover the rear wing??? I dont think that there is nothing much to hide????
Three possible (even if different) explainations:
- they have indeed something to hide there today
- they do not have anything to hide there today, but they will have in the future: mechs are practising procedures
- they they do not have anything to hide there today, but they have something to hide elsewhere today, so they are just diverting attention (it has been doe in the past)
pocketmoon wrote:Do we know for sure if Merc are running with the EBD ? Perhaps it's the exhaust position they want to hide rather then wings/diffuser ?
Without the better pictures it's hard to guess. But yesterday I noticed heat isolation on upper rear wishbone. SO if they were blowing at it could be somewhere inside this bodywork. But the view is blocked BW.
Last edited by Forza on 08 Feb 2012, 18:51, edited 1 time in total.
Referring to the pic forza posted has the floor seen Thru the diffuser at this angle always had those openings? Theres a small rectangle and a tiny triangle, it may be a trick of the lighting, alot of errors like that are made on here..
Autosport confirmed that Mercedes ran their 2011 spec car with EBD & all. The only possible work they can possibly do is on the Front WING F-duct.
I dont know about RRH in here & all the mercury talk. If they dont want to give it or something why debut in here especially when Charlie Whiting is having a stern eye for every car
"'Everyone's windtunnel is beautifully calibrated,' said Allison. 'They are exquisitely calibrated with very expensive instruments. I think that the word that people maybe should use is correlated. What aero guys are continually searching for is correlation between the tests they do in the windtunnel, on track and in CFD. I'm sure if you went to the teams up at the front end of the grid, one of the reasons is that they are at the front end is that the vast majority of the experiments they do in their testing domain translate into the physical domain. What aero teams strive for in addition to coming up with good aerodynamic ideas is a testing environment where they know the fruits of their labour in the tunnel will translate to laptime on the track.'
"So, that's the idea. The trouble is that this correlation takes a little work to get right. At the level that F1 teams are operating, very tiny discrepancies in correlation can make a big difference and it's only possible to know if a car is going to work properly when you run it in the real world. Teams have a multitude of factors to take into account. In the windtunnel, there's a danger you can come up with a car that works perfectly on the flat but has big airflow separation problems once bumps and yaw are taken into account. Teams try to factor this in, but you can only really be sure how the world works in the real world. With CFD, for example, the further downstream you go in the car, the more calculations the simulation relies upon and the greater margin for error. In the windtunnel, you can only simulate the car in so many transient states so you need to get it onto a real track to see how it works. Ideally, the correlation is good and your car is a goer. If not, as Ferrari found this year, very small differences can put you on the back foot."
I hope Merc have some trick up there sleeve otherwise this could be a disaster. These 5 days of running are like 7-8 race Weekends. Huge changes in set-up & can lead to huge possible gain especially over long run with varying fuel loads.
Keeping my Fingers Crossed. Waiting for 21st & hoping Mercedes deliver a Fantastic Car
Michael Schumacher completed 132 laps in the W02 on Wednesday
After setting the fastest time of the second day in Jerez, Michael Schumacher says it is important that the W03 is reliable when it is launched ahead of the second test.
Schumacher was using the 2011 Mercedes to analyse the new Pirelli tyres on Wednesday, and on a short soft-tyre run set the quickest time of 1:18.575. While the time is not comparable to the 2012 cars so far, Schumacher was asked if he was concerned that the team would only have eight days to test the W03, and he said he just hoped for the most track time possible.
"The main point is the reliability factor," Schumacher told reporters at Jerez. "I think if the car has a certain performance, you're going to dial that out reasonably quick unless you have unexpected circumstances which we occasionally had in the past. We hope not to have this, we hope to learn our lesson and our program is done in a way that we believe in.
"[The later launch] is maybe an important factor because we work longer on our car, but as I've said before I don't think we can realistically achieve a championship car from where we started last year. We have to build our way there; I'm confident we can do that in future but let's take it step by step."
Reflecting on Wednesday's running Schumacher said that the team had been able to make the most of the 132 laps completed.
"We had a very productive day, did lots of mileage - good mileage, not just cruising around - we made some very good work with the new tyres that we have to face for this year. And that was the main focus for us; understand those tyres, use the old car as much as we know what is different between those cars for this year and last year's car, and trying to understand and work a program that we've done perfectly well today."
Mr.S wrote:Ideally, the correlation is good and your car is a goer. If not, as Ferrari found this year, very small differences can put you on the back foot." [/b]
