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« Reply #660 on: January 25, 2012, 05:58:55 PM » |
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Mid-body wings to become a thing, you reckon? Or is this gonna be the token different, ugly car (think the Williams Walrus) that's slow as hell and gets abandoned quickly?
It seems to be an idea a lot of teams are looking into as the rules regarding aero surfaces in that area is relatively relaxed so prime for exploitation for teams looking to make up for the loss of downforce from banned blown diffusers. More worryingly from an aesthetics viewpoint is the Ferrari is rumoured to have a bump on it's nose as well and a few teams seem to be going this route. If they are all as ugly as this leaked pick of the Caterham then this years cars could be the ugliest ever. What the hell is going on here!  |
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TheKhakinator
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« Reply #661 on: January 25, 2012, 10:21:09 PM » |
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Ack :/
That's no way to build a sport! XD
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« Reply #662 on: January 27, 2012, 05:57:12 PM » |
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Ack :/
That's no way to build a sport! XD
The more I look at it the uglier it gets.  The new regs are almost forcing teams to put that step in the nose though. On a brighter note it's now just 50 days to the opening race in Australia  |
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TheKhakinator
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« Reply #663 on: January 27, 2012, 10:37:39 PM » |
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Ack :/
That's no way to build a sport! XD
The more I look at it the uglier it gets. The new regs are almost forcing teams to put that step in the nose though. On a brighter note it's now just 50 days to the opening race in Australia It's truly hideous. A pity too as last year's cars were quite pretty after the F-duct was B&. |
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« Reply #664 on: January 29, 2012, 11:47:07 AM » |
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Ack :/
That's no way to build a sport! XD
The more I look at it the uglier it gets. The new regs are almost forcing teams to put that step in the nose though. On a brighter note it's now just 50 days to the opening race in Australia It's truly hideous. A pity too as last year's cars were quite pretty after the F-duct was B&. If this stepped nose is the route other teams take then I'd like to see a modifying of the rules again next year....although I doubt they'd change the rules purely aesthetic reasons. Well McLaren launch in a couple of days and they've come up with some of the more extreme designs in recent years (F-duct, cut away sidepods) so it will be interesting to see their interpretation of the new nose rules. |
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« Reply #665 on: February 01, 2012, 05:26:56 PM » |
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McLaren launch today and from what we've seen so far it isn't quite as radical as rumours suggested. It is gorgeous though IMO and none of the awful Caterham style stepped nose to be seen. Ferrari on Friday.  |
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« Reply #666 on: February 02, 2012, 08:40:39 PM » |
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Agh. Spa, which most people would have in their top few race venues, is to share it's slot on the calender with France from 2014, meaning we only go to Spa on alternative years. |
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« Reply #667 on: February 04, 2012, 04:23:52 PM » |
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TheKhakinator
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« Reply #668 on: February 05, 2012, 05:41:01 AM » |
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Those McLaren sidepods look amazing. The Ferrari and Force India - ack! What's the stepped nose doing? What regulation forced that?
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« Reply #669 on: February 05, 2012, 05:15:34 PM » |
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Those McLaren sidepods look amazing. The Ferrari and Force India - ack! What's the stepped nose doing? What regulation forced that?
There's a new regulation that limits the height of the nose to try and prevent it riding up over another car in a collision. However once you get the the area around the front wheels the car body is allowed to be higher. What teams want is to have as much air channelled around the sidepods and onto the floor which is where a large portion of the downforce is generated these days. To achieve that they have made the body as high as is allowed meaning they have no choice but to have that step in the nose. The extra drag from the step in the nose compensated for by much better downforce, the Red Bulls proving in recent years that downforce is much more important than top end speed. The new Lotus Renault has the broken nose too (the nicest so far IMO) so only McLaren haven't gone that route which to me suggests they might have made a big mistake.  |
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« Reply #670 on: February 06, 2012, 01:14:32 PM » |
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Yeah, I'm worried too. Only way I wouldn't be worried with a radical McLaren design was if it was a Newey car... and it's not.  Hope Lotus Renault (Lotus Black Label? Sounds nice...) do well this year. Big fan of them since the re-colour, ditching of Alonso (never liked him) and the cheats that set up the crash all those years ago. |
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« Reply #671 on: February 06, 2012, 06:12:19 PM » |
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Hope Lotus Renault (Lotus Black Label? Sounds nice...) do well this year. Big fan of them since the re-colour, ditching of Alonso (never liked him) and the cheats that set up the crash all those years ago.
I have a soft spot for Lotus too since they went back to the classic black and gold livery. I just hope Kubica can return for them some time too as he's one of my favourite drivers. Yeah, I'm worried too. Only way I wouldn't be worried with a radical McLaren design was if it was a Newey car... and it's not. Well the Newey designed Red Bull was unveiled today along with Torro Roso and Sauber and they all have a stepped nose. That means McLaren are the only team without one. I'd love them to be proved right, but it's looking increasingly like they have missed a trick. The Red Bull broken nose looks intriguing though. All the others look like a simple step and nothing more, whereas the Red Bull step looks like it might have another purpose. Whatever it's a very unusual and not particularly aerodynamic shape. Some kind of vent?  |
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« Reply #672 on: February 07, 2012, 02:05:52 PM » |
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Aha. I had questioned the design of the exhaust on the new McLaren when it was launched and now we know why it looked out of place. It wasn't the real thing.
Testing has started today at Jerez so we see the proper exhaust and I wouldn't be surprised if the other teams object to it. There are new regs about the positioning and shape of the exhaust exit (effectively to ban blown diffusers) and to get around this McLaren are using part of the bodywork to channel the exhaust gasses to the rear wheels.
While technically the McLaren meets the new regs regarding exhaust exit shape and position (you can just see it in the pic), they are clearly using the bodywork as an extension of the exhaust.
Expect this to get messy.
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« Reply #673 on: February 08, 2012, 09:02:35 PM » |
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The Red Bull broken nose looks intriguing though. All the others look like a simple step and nothing more, whereas the Red Bull step looks like it might have another purpose. Whatever it's a very unusual and not particularly aerodynamic shape. Some kind of vent?
Newey has confirmed there is a vent in the Red Bulls broken nose which he claims is used for driver cooling. Yeah right. This is the man that wouldn't compromise his aerodynamic design last year to allow for cooling of the KERS unit so there's no way he's done that just for driver cooling. |
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« Reply #674 on: February 12, 2012, 03:38:00 PM » |
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And surprisingly the exhaust on the McLaren has been declared legal so expect everyone else to copy the idea of directing exhaust gasses through channels in the bodywork.
Second testing in 2 weeks time.
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