McLaren MCL37 speculation thread

[Big Tea]

On a side note, I have always found it strange the Ferrari leak so much information about the upcoming cars, I used to be very sceptical of any rumours, given how secretive the world of F1 is, but I’ve come to learn that these leaks usually turn out to be true, to some extent

Not sure Italians are known as being very discreet

At least half the rumors for any team are always "enhanced" by journous, so if we look past the numbers and buzz words and focus on the main things - its usually close to the truth.

A good meal and copious wine does not help discression when you are enthusiastic about something, and most Italians seem partial to all three. (me too )

[AR3-GP]

Legal? Apparently, fair? That’s up to individuals to decide for themselves

What would be unfair about homologating highest power you reached and then looking for reliability step by step?

Vanja I know you're not naive . Normally these things are entrenched in political controversy, but since everyone is doing it, everyone just looks the other way.

[Vanja #66]

Vanja I know you're not naive . Normally these things are entrenched in political controversy, but since everyone is doing it, everyone just looks the other way.

The first thing that came to my mind when I read about development freeze was exactly this - drive the engine to the limit, homologate with highest power and torque and then work on reliability while using lower power settings. It was reported Mercedes had a bit more power available with 3rd PU due to reliability upgrades. I can't imagine a single team missing this.

[ME4ME]

I think they have increased the requirements for acceptence of reliability upgrades. The manufacturers have to pretty open not only to the FIA but also to their competiters with what they plan to do and why. So there is a risk of technology-transfer if the choose to upgrade. Rival manufacturers apparently also get a say in if an reliabilty upgrade is fair and necessary or not. It's been reported that they often avoid blocking each others upgrades and let the FIA decide, and expect the favor in return. Basically to avoid a political mess. So it shouldn't quite be like you make it sound that anything goes.

[Vanja #66]

Yeah, I also mentioned the approval of other teams for any update, it's not at all that anything goes - but there is wiggling room. And it's all fair, legal and in the spirit of regulation in my view.

All four manufacturers will bring reliability updates that will allow them to reach desired reliability in ever higher power modes. All those updates take time to get cleared and must be cleared by other three makers as well, not just the FIA.

[Big Tea]

I think they have increased the requirements for acceptence of reliability upgrades. The manufacturers have to pretty open not only to the FIA but also to their competiters with what they plan to do and why. So there is a risk of technology-transfer if the choose to upgrade. Rival manufacturers apparently also get a say in if an reliabilty upgrade is fair and necessary or not. It's been reported that they often avoid blocking each others upgrades and let the FIA decide, and expect the favor in return. Basically to avoid a political mess. So it shouldn't quite be like you make it sound that anything goes.

But if a team (say Merc) introduce something on their engine and another team (say Ferrari) find out about it, as the engines can be changed for reliability only, the other teams will not be able to gain anything from it as they can not change their engine except for reliability issues. There is nothing to lose by showing things off

This is of course assuming the affected part on the engine is not the same on both cars, which has to be unlikely

[AR3-GP]

I think they have increased the requirements for acceptence of reliability upgrades. The manufacturers have to pretty open not only to the FIA but also to their competiters with what they plan to do and why. So there is a risk of technology-transfer if the choose to upgrade. Rival manufacturers apparently also get a say in if an reliabilty upgrade is fair and necessary or not. It's been reported that they often avoid blocking each others upgrades and let the FIA decide, and expect the favor in return. Basically to avoid a political mess. So it shouldn't quite be like you make it sound that anything goes.

But if a team (say Merc) introduce something on their engine and another team (say Ferrari) find out about it, as the engines can be changed for reliability only, the other teams will not be able to gain anything from it as they can not change their engine except for reliability issues. There is nothing to lose by showing things off

Exactly! It's a "look the other way" affair.

and in a shameless attempt to discuss the MCL37, maybe the MCL37 adopts some characteristics of the W13 for which the engine was designed for.

[ME4ME]

But if a team (say Merc) introduce something on their engine and another team (say Ferrari) find out about it, as the engines can be changed for reliability only, the other teams will not be able to gain anything from it as they can not change their engine except for reliability issues. There is nothing to lose by showing things off

This is of course assuming the affected part on the engine is not the same on both cars, which has to be unlikely

It's a mechanism of showing your cards at which point a rival can call into question an upgrades' purpose. I disagree that information and display of the workings and technology of a rivals engine has no value; learnings and insights can go directly into the development of future power units such as the 2026 one. I even think its not unthinkable that learnings can go into the current units as well, not as a specific fix but more as an understanding of a problem area and a rivals approach at solving it.

[Vanja #66]

and in a shameless attempt to discuss the MCL37, maybe the MCL37 adopts some characteristics of the W13 for which the engine was designed for.

[continuum16]

Quite random but I would expect them to focus on maximizing the DRS effect with the new endplate-less rear wings. In 2020 and 2021 they were very good in this area, hence why they always performed well in places like Austria where every straight is a DRS zone. In 2022 RB had a similar advantage, while McLaren was one of the slowest on most tracks on the straights, with or without DRS open.

Otherwise I expect fairly different sidepods (probably Red Bull style, based on their developments) and a completely redesigned floor. McLaren had one of, if not the most complex floor edges on the grid, while the actual tunnels, inlet, and diffuser were significantly less complex than, say, Red Bull (as were most teams tbh).

Raising the floor edges might significantly compromise/ruin whatever complicated flow structures they were trying to achieve in 2022.

Oh, and all that with the old wind tunnel, so if it doesn’t work you know what the reasoning is going to be

[Blackout]

They'll adopt a water/air intercooler, losing the big sidepod mounted intercoolers. This should open up some opportunities to repackage the very long radiator set up from last year.

So this is an info, not just speculation?

That's the first obvious step IMO: To use the Merc water-air interccoler that was designed for that compressor, and is used by every other Mercedes team, instead of those air-air ones and their 20 miles-long pipes.

Their cockpit is very rearwards like RB, so MCL could take advantage of this in 2023 and copy the other RB tricks to extract more performance from that design choice.

They could push the now smaller cooling package backwards an put it in a more normal position, and move the lower side impact structures from the sidepods to inside the floor to get bigger sidepod front undercuts.

Their 2022 sidepods were very busy and did host most of the systems, while their splitter/bib area was empty because it was an ultra slim splitter.
In 2023 it could be the other way around if they follow RB.





I wonder if they'll keep the same monocoque design. They could do that to retain the low fuel tank and low CoG. I dont think they need to dig the sides of the tub for the repositionned cooling. Their packaging would be similar to Ferrari.

[Blackout]

13.02?

[haza]

Is that a side pod inlet ?

[the EDGE]

Is that a side pod inlet ?

I can see why you would say that, but I doubt it, that would be too much to reveal

I don’t believe the top and bottom parts of the structure are connected, despite what it looks like

Maybe the bottom part is some sort of stand

[scarbs]

Is that a side pod inlet ?

It's a seat, but upside down