Steering Wheels 2013

[FW17]

Schumacher's cars had a lot more buttons on the wheel as he was constantly changing various parameters through the race

on the other hand LH

“It was drowning in buttons; all the ones I never use, I eliminated them,” he said. “Next I moved the most important ones to the top so they were more visible. At Mercedes there are 26 of them. I’ve already got rid of six."

Mcrc wheel


Mclaren wheel

[Mika1]

Hamilton 2013 steering wheel tweeted by Mercedes

[allstaruk08]

does anyone know what the +10 and +1 buttons are for on both the McLaren and Merc wheel?

[astracrazy]

does anyone know what the +10 and +1 buttons are for on both the McLaren and Merc wheel?

all the cars/wheels have it

The green ‘+10’ button is used by the driver when he’s scrolling through in-car data, it just skips ahead 10 pages at a time.
The green ‘+1’ button lets the driver flip through the dashboard data pages one at a time.

for example an engineer might say please go to item 26. instead of pressing/switching something 26 times they can press +10 twice and +1 6 times.

you hear drivers 'resetting kers' in a race. it means they prob just go to an item which could be 12 for example. they won't remember all the items, there engineers will tell them and most will hardly be used by the driver

[allstaruk08]

ah cool thanks for that man

[Owen.C93]

Also make it easier if you need to select an "8". While racing with vibration it can be hard to accurately do 8 clicks, so 1 "10" and 2 "-1" is simpler.

[tbeeornottbee]

Could Rosberg and Hamilton use different steering wheels throughout the year, as in has it ever been done before and would it be technically workable? Just considering that Rosberg has been there for 3 years one could take it he knows the steering wheel well... Also if you look at this http://youtu.be/g-KYASQKdSU?t=1m5s he seems to be quite good at multitasking as is

Wonder if they'll keep the magic paddle too?

[aral]

Could Rosberg and Hamilton use different steering wheels throughout the year, as in has it ever been done before and would it be technically workable? Just considering that Rosberg has been there for 3 years one could take it he knows the steering wheel well... Also if you look at this http://youtu.be/g-KYASQKdSU?t=1m5s he seems to be quite good at multitasking as is

Wonder if they'll keep the magic paddle too?

No reason why controls on the wheel cannot be repositioned. As long as the connecting points are the same. And yes, it has happened before. I forgot who it was, but I have come across two differing wheels on the same car. Just to suit a particular driver.

[Poleman]

I remember Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard using different steering wheels at McLaren...However,that was way back and with considerably less buttons on the wheel but i cant see a reason it cant be done.

[raymondu999]

Could Rosberg and Hamilton use different steering wheels throughout the year, as in has it ever been done before and would it be technically workable? Just considering that Rosberg has been there for 3 years one could take it he knows the steering wheel well... Also if you look at this http://youtu.be/g-KYASQKdSU?t=1m5s he seems to be quite good at multitasking as is

Wonder if they'll keep the magic paddle too?

No reason why controls on the wheel cannot be repositioned. As long as the connecting points are the same. And yes, it has happened before. I forgot who it was, but I have come across two differing wheels on the same car. Just to suit a particular driver.

RBR does this. In 2010 Webber used a 4-paddle wheel, Vettel used a 6-paddle wheel.

[PlatinumZealot]

Could Rosberg and Hamilton use different steering wheels throughout the year, as in has it ever been done before and would it be technically workable? Just considering that Rosberg has been there for 3 years one could take it he knows the steering wheel well... Also if you look at this http://youtu.be/g-KYASQKdSU?t=1m5s he seems to be quite good at multitasking as is

Wonder if they'll keep the magic paddle too?

No reason why controls on the wheel cannot be repositioned. As long as the connecting points are the same. And yes, it has happened before. I forgot who it was, but I have come across two differing wheels on the same car. Just to suit a particular driver.

Hamilton had "chopped" off the bottom of his steering wheel in 2009?? Bringing a totally new form factor to steering wheels. Right now his Mercedes wheel is a regular looking wheel with the spans at the bottom, but I think they are going to chop them off for Melbourne.

[stefan_]

It's not that easy to "chop-off" a 50k E steering wheel because you have to rethink and redo the whole layout of the buttons and the internals. The buttons positioning remain the same for both drivers but they can be remaped in any way (Nico's fuel mix dial can be Hamilton's MID selector).

Here is a video of 2011 Mercedes steering wheel explained

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTUxPBzo2co&playnext=1[/youtube]

[feynman]

Hamilton 2013 steering wheel tweeted by Mercedes

Was pleasantly surprised he got as much changed in time for the first test as he did. It looks a reasonable first attempt at McLaren-ising the wheel.

Compared to Nico, +10 and +1 moved to match his McLaren. Diff Entry and KERS Harvest rotors swapped over and coloured. (Harv should really be green not gold, but maybe he prefers it that way). Diff Mid dial moved and colored white as McL (he didn't used to have a hi-speed diff dial). Fuel mix recoloured yellow, the 'Yellow G8' post-quali radio call. The Throttle-pedal Torque map button is slightly confusing, it has been recoloured to be the blue dial which was McLaren engine braking adjustment, and relabelled TRQ EB.
A couple of push buttons blanked-out, and Bitepoint and Display functions moved onto the multi-purpose dial, which is now purple as it is on McLaren. The Display dial as was is now a reasonable copy of the McLaren Tyre selector dial. OT fuel map now yellow and moved to somewhere closer to where he is used to, although I think he'd have preferred it a little higher up.

As for running two wheels in the same team, Michael and Nico already ran slightly different arrangements of the controls and specific functions in 2012. Michael had the orange layout, and Nico had the green layout. And not just preseason in PR videos, race photos MS in Belgium, and NR in Hungary.

[raymondu999]

With regards to Hamilton giving feedback on steering wheels,

Here's the 2009 steering wheel (before feedback):


Here's the 2010 steering wheel (after feedback):


The key changes are basically that they moved the dash display onto the wheel (which happened in-season in 2009) and they basically just cut off the bottom part of the handles - so that they just "hang down" instead of connecting back to the "body" of the steering wheel. This happened in the 2009/2010 winter. The last spec of 2009 McLaren steering wheel was basically the 2010 wheel (in terms of shape) but the handles connected back to the wheel's body.

Feynman - thanks for the pic. Is there a comparative shot against a first-gen (pre-Lewis) Mercedes steering wheel? I don't remember the thumbwheels being there either.

[feynman]

His first two McLaren steering wheels used to look like this:


It took two and a bit years for the dials to be moved-up to where he could see them, and for the display to be brought on-board. And another year before the bottom got chopped off, the wheel made narrower and thinner.
So a month of Mercedes searching the parts bin for some new dials is a fair start I suppose.

Raymodu, don't know if you meant to say McLaren or Mercedes; but all the Mercedes wheels have had the thumb rotors.