2018 McLaren F1 Team - Renault

[diffuser]

So we’ve got a combination of Pat Fry and Andrea Stella who lead the design of the 2019 car. This will be a fascinating process. Zak Brown says this is a reduction from 3 people to now just 2 being ultimately held accountable.

I think we're in a pretty good place now," Brown said, confirming the Fry appointment on Tuesday. "We still need to kind of populate, i.e. James' start, but Andrea Stella is leading all performance, setting the targets, and it's for Pat as engineering director to execute, so it will ultimately be led by Andrea with Pat, the development of next year's car.

"And then of course there's lots of people that feed into that. Pete Prodromou from an aero, Mark Ingham and Neil Oatley from design, Simon Roberts the COO ultimately responsible for bringing everything together and Gil on the sporting side but at the end of the day it's Andrea and Pat who are going to drive next year's car."]

Just flicking through Pat Fry’s last McLaren stint, he led design on the 2005, 2007 and 2009 cars. Whilst not always nailing it out of the box, all cars unlocked significant performance so it will be intriguing to see what direction they go in with James Key set to give his input on the 2020 car.

I think the new aero regs for next year represent a good opportunity for Fry to set McLaren on a better path- we hope.

Wasn't the 2005 car designed by Adrian Newey?

I think he's very good but no god. He had a great aero guy in those McLaren years and didn't at Ferrari. We'll soon find out if Pete was part of the problem, I don't think he was, or is part of the solution.

[diffuser]

Just checked and mcl definitly brought the new rear suspension only to the last race, so they really wanted to test it for next year i quess. In brazil it was not on the car

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DtFpsBGXoAEOWit.jpg:large

I wonder why they added the arch there ??

[M840TR]

Just checked and mcl definitly brought the new rear suspension only to the last race, so they really wanted to test it for next year i quess. In brazil it was not on the car

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DtFpsBGXoAEOWit.jpg:large

I wonder why they added the arch there ??

Seems to me the purpose is to get more air towards the tiny winglets towards the inside of the wheel.

[trinidefender]

Just checked and mcl definitly brought the new rear suspension only to the last race, so they really wanted to test it for next year i quess. In brazil it was not on the car

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DtFpsBGXoAEOWit.jpg:large

I wonder why they added the arch there ??

Seems to me the purpose is to get more air towards the tiny winglets towards the inside of the wheel.

Looking at it, I think there may be some confusion. I don't think they changed their suspension, what I think that kink there is, is the joint between the suspension wishbone and the wheel upright. The wheel upright just extends very far inboard.

That also correlates with how it would look at different ride heights, I.e squatting at speed etc.

[diffuser]

My Guess is they made a change AFTER the rear suspension broke in the Russia race.

Russia


Susuka


Mexico



EOS TESTING

[M840TR]

My Guess is they made a change AFTER the rear suspension broke in the Russia race.

Russia
https://imgr2.auto-motor-und-sport.de/M ... 192681.jpg

Susuka
https://imgr2.auto-motor-und-sport.de/F ... 193059.jpg

Mexico
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DoKnUeAXoAUUHsm.jpg:large


EOS TESTING
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DoK-aAXXoAEmnb8.jpg

The slight curve was present in the preseason image posted above. The new upright is quite different if you compare.

[M840TR]

McLaren CEO Zak Brown says that although the team did not make visible progress with the pace of its car through the year, its understanding of what went wrong progressed rapidly.

"Specifically and technically we now know what we have done wrong," he said. "A lot of the development that has been reported – like we stopped developing the car in Barcelona – was totally inaccurate.

"We had tonnes of bits going on the car up until the US Grand Prix. Some of those were to address the current car and some of those were to validate what we understood were the issues with this car so we didn't replicate those issues going forward."

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mcla ... r/4308849/

[charliesmithhd]

McLaren CEO Zak Brown says that although the team did not make visible progress with the pace of its car through the year, its understanding of what went wrong progressed rapidly.

"Specifically and technically we now know what we have done wrong," he said. "A lot of the development that has been reported – like we stopped developing the car in Barcelona – was totally inaccurate.

"We had tonnes of bits going on the car up until the US Grand Prix. Some of those were to address the current car and some of those were to validate what we understood were the issues with this car so we didn't replicate those issues going forward."

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mcla ... r/4308849/

They brought big things such as suspension, removal of nose elements and simplified rear wing endplates since since Barcelona.

[M840TR]

McLaren CEO Zak Brown says that although the team did not make visible progress with the pace of its car through the year, its understanding of what went wrong progressed rapidly.

"Specifically and technically we now know what we have done wrong," he said. "A lot of the development that has been reported – like we stopped developing the car in Barcelona – was totally inaccurate.

"We had tonnes of bits going on the car up until the US Grand Prix. Some of those were to address the current car and some of those were to validate what we understood were the issues with this car so we didn't replicate those issues going forward."

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mcla ... r/4308849/

They brought big things such as suspension, removal of nose elements and simplified rear wing endplates since since Barcelona.

Also a new diffuser, front wing and turning vanes etc

[dren]

I hope they figured out what not to do next year because the new bits to improve the car didn't seem to help much relative to the competition.

[RonDennis]

I hope they figured out what not to do next year because the new bits to improve the car didn't seem to help much relative to the competition.

Well, they said that if they were aware of the problems in April they would have introduced a b-spec car. So I guess most parts they used were aimed at 2019.

[KingHamilton01]

Makes you wonder why they introduced such a complex New nose/canopy if they weren't sure about the fundamental flaw they had on the car, if that isn't carried over to 2019 a bit of wasted concept?

[Jackles-UK]

Makes you wonder why they introduced such a complex New nose/canopy if they weren't sure about the fundamental flaw they had on the car, if that isn't carried over to 2019 a bit of wasted concept?

I believe that they had intended to introduce the nose at the start of the year but late issues with the packaging of the Renault PU and then fixing reliability issues occurred during testing meant it got delayed. Adding yet another variable into the complex problems they were having can’t have helped things though!

[godlameroso]

Terrible midwing design didn't help either. This was probably the main aero flaw.

[PlatinumZealot]

McLaren CEO Zak Brown says that although the team did not make visible progress with the pace of its car through the year, its understanding of what went wrong progressed rapidly.

"Specifically and technically we now know what we have done wrong," he said. "A lot of the development that has been reported – like we stopped developing the car in Barcelona – was totally inaccurate.

"We had tonnes of bits going on the car up until the US Grand Prix. Some of those were to address the current car and some of those were to validate what we understood were the issues with this car so we didn't replicate those issues going forward."

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mcla ... r/4308849/

I have been crying out for Peter Prod to be fired since last year... It is no secret he royally screwed the pooch this year too. A fundamental error that only a new chassis can fix?! Unacceptable!