Mercedes W14

[Andi76]

So you are standing by this conclusion?
Remember don't change your tune if it's not the case!

I am awaiting the second race before I judge the car.
I do think that a possible upgrade is a smaller radiator inlet. The current design the opening runs to the ground. They could make the open start higher if they find they can still cool the car.
The other Idea is maybe a ridge on top of sidepod similar to the Ferrari. To manipulate any eddies from the front wheels.
But i suspect the car to be second fastest over a race distance. I am not seeing any alarms right now.
At most fixing the balance and suspension tuning.

https://www.gpfans.com/en/f1-news/10205 ... y-meeting/

At Mercedes, at least, there are crisis meetings. I can confirm this report and have already reported this this morning. There are problems on the front axle and there are problems as soon as they get below a certain ground clearance.

I might be wrong here, but this is why teams test....

Sorry, but crisis meetings are not why teams test and what is the order of the day in testing. The balance changes constantly and nobody knows why, the rear end breaks out uncontrollably, aero load is not consistent and changes extremely with vehicle height, to the point that the car becomes uncontrollable as soon as it gets below a certain ground clearance. At the front axle there is a sudden loss of downforce when cornering. The car should behave largely according to the simulations and calculations. But this is not the case at all with the W14. The problems are so far-reaching that a crisis meeting has been called to discuss how to proceed and what to do. And unplanned crisis meetings are not part of the test program and why one tests. Likewise, you don't test to clear up unexplained reactions of the car. I don't even want to talk about the other rumors, because on the one hand these are actually rumors so far for which I haven't received any direct confirmation, and on the other hand it is a very sensitive topic to which a few people here react sensitively. At least in the past. But in fact, many of these statements are reminiscent of what was said about cars that had a fundamental aerodynamic problem.

So you are standing by this conclusion?
Remember don't change your tune if it's not the case!

Do you stand by the boundary layer on the ground?

And yet you're still wrong. Watch Kyle's video to see the debunk (for the nth time) regarding wider sidepods being structurally improved over zeropod

Well...Kyle says he doesn't believe in it. Definitely he has not proven anything. In any case, there are the following facts :

- Aerodynamicists from other teams say this side box concept is too complex to make it work.

- Mercedes has again problems to make the car work

- the car again behaves differently than in the simulations

- suddenly dropping uneven downforce, logically has an aerodynamic origin, as well as cars that showed this in the past usually had a fundamental aerodynamic problem

If you put one and one together and put this in relation to what the aerodynamicists of other teams have said about the complexity of this concept, then there is at least a lot to suggest that Vanja is not wrong here.

And quite honestly front wheel wake management is extremely important for the aerodynamics of a car. Without bargeboards, however, this is extremely difficult and the sidepods are a component of what Kyle also clearly stated. So now you can believe that the sidepods are not the reason at Mercedes. Certainly nobody says or knows that. But in any case it would explain the problems Mercedes has been struggling with since they introduced this concept. And in my eyes it would be a great coincidence that everything fits together so well.

[chrisc90]

Teds development corner (quick note taking transcript of how the car has changed over last season/winter. A lot of short note taking) Im sure the interview will crop up on Youtube in time.

Paint:
* Predominantly the branding to work with
* Hard to say how much weight saved 2-3kg paint normally
* Bodywork not too sensitive to paint finish, but wings, leading edges maybe a bit more

A lot of effort put into problems last season and over winter to try and fix the issues, bit sceptical whether they are 'Back' but they seem confident they will be competitive

Higher nose on front wing - a lot into the realms of aero dynamics and CFD etc

Push rod suspension - Stayed the same, track rod moved down, top wishbone down to the bottom, carefully balanced with the geometry and kinematics.

Rear suspension developed in conjunction with the floor and airflow around and to the diffuser.

Slot gap separators - rules changed from the primary purpose - aero as secondary purpose. 2 planes 10mm apart which you have to fill however you feel. Not game changers - but wait and see if they appear on the Merc front wing.

Mirror stays to control front tyre wake and the other little fins - all part of the little details on wake management.

FW endplates meant to be closed down but theres a loophole that allows them to run it.

Cockpit hasnt moved at all

Halo integration into the cooling tunnels (gulleys) and drivers head all about managing the losses from the open cockpit. Pretty light bodywork of the cooling tunnels and wont affect CoG.

Reckons Ferrari chassis duct is to just manage the losses off the side of the chassis to manage airflow.

Sidepod concept not the issue - Upgrade package will look different, wont look like someone elses, will be a evolution of ours. no other teams concept not in the teams plans. (George reckons race 6 - Imola for the package)

Floor throat - most of the performance is from the floor and managing how the air travels under the car / interaction with the ground.

Floor raise 15mm, worse edge of bouncing last year, a lot of development into that and ensuring the metrics were working over the winter, seems of so far.

Straight line speed - not running the wing when they come racing next week. Cars efficiency developed a lot over the winter - testing is there to understand, not improving downforce levels.

Reckons the car is operating on the weight limit and might even have a little ballast in there.

[pursue_one's]

Interesting

[mkay]

Not an aerodynamicist but it feels to me like the sidepods are missing an undercut to channel air more effectively to the diffuser.

Perhaps that’s part of Merc’s new sidepod package?

[VacuousFlamboyant]

It's clear as water the rectangular intake and overall shape isn't finalized. Even before they put flow-vis on its base you could see it was disconnected. One of the reasons Redbull exceeds at generating floor downforce is because they downwash the air up from the halo all the way to top of the diffuser and the slot gap between the wheel, energizing the diffuser.

Extending the back of the sidepods is an indication Mercedes wants to direct a flow to this area similarly, manage tyre skirt at the expense of a wider profile. Sidepod development is likely to follow baby steps, correlating a particular design that matches this idea.

It doesn't mean smaller sidepods are flawed. If that was the case teams like Redbull and Ferrari wouldn't have slimmed their designs. There are always drawbacks, so we need to consider a middle ground were performance can be found - for all teams.

Don't read too much into pre-season testing. Mercedes were capping their top speed, Ferrari were running on high load and Redbull were doing a bit of both. Though Mercedes and Ferrari were experimenting more with their setups, naturally.

[NoDivergence]

Sorry, but crisis meetings are not why teams test and what is the order of the day in testing. The balance changes constantly and nobody knows why, the rear end breaks out uncontrollably, aero load is not consistent and changes extremely with vehicle height, to the point that the car becomes uncontrollable as soon as it gets below a certain ground clearance. At the front axle there is a sudden loss of downforce when cornering. The car should behave largely according to the simulations and calculations. But this is not the case at all with the W14. The problems are so far-reaching that a crisis meeting has been called to discuss how to proceed and what to do. And unplanned crisis meetings are not part of the test program and why one tests. Likewise, you don't test to clear up unexplained reactions of the car. I don't even want to talk about the other rumors, because on the one hand these are actually rumors so far for which I haven't received any direct confirmation, and on the other hand it is a very sensitive topic to which a few people here react sensitively. At least in the past. But in fact, many of these statements are reminiscent of what was said about cars that had a fundamental aerodynamic problem.



Well...Kyle says he doesn't believe in it. Definitely he has not proved anything. In any case, there are the following facts :

- Aerodynamicists from other teams say this side box concept is too complex to make it work.

- Mercedes has again problems to make the car work

- the car again behaves differently than in the simulations

- suddenly dropping uneven downforce, logically has an aerodynamic origin, as well as cars that showed this in the past usually had a fundamental aerodynamic problem

If you put one and one together and put this in relation to what the aerodynamicists of other teams have said about the complexity of this concept, then there is at least a lot to suggest that Vanja is not wrong here.

And quite honestly front wheel wake management is extremely important for the aerodynamics of a car. Without bargeboards, however, this is extremely difficult and the sidepods are a component of what Kyle also clearly stated. So now you can believe that the sidepods are not the reason at Mercedes. Certainly nobody says or knows that. But in any case it would explain the problems Mercedes has been struggling with since they introduced this concept. And in my eyes it would be a great coincidence that everything fits together so well.

One more thing, if you think a team would have a crisis meeting such as that in front of the worlds media then you have no clue how a successful team operates. Whatever that meeting was it was not a crisis debrief played out in front of the cameras. (If you want an example of how this is poor management check out Phil Brown keeping Hull City on the pitch and berating them at half time when they were being beaten by Man City.). Management 101 is keep it in house and berate your team behind closed doors if that’s what’s required, not out front of the team hospitality. Whatever that was it was most certainly not a crisis meeting or b*llocking.

I'm not commenting on this now. I just want to tell you - I talk and write to people in Formula 1 personally almost every day...so I get a lot of my information first hand, like this. And so I can also tell you - don't overestimate what a team in Formula 1 can keep secret. The F1 world is small, incestuous and everyone knows everyone....But as already said - I am herewith out of this topic again, because in the end always the same comes out anyway if one addresses this topic.

Yeah, so first hand that you're wrong about the sidepod width has any significance structurally to the whole porpoising effect. Rewatch Kyle's video again. He goes in depth with pictures of EVERY team on the grid's car which did and did not have stays, how many stays, etc. Regardless of width of sidepod. And there is no seeming correlation with the amount of porpoising experienced. Which leads to my conclusion which mirrors Kyle's that the porpoising correlates predominantly with the floor entrance geometry, throat proximity to ground, and very very little to do with the edge floor vortices. Which are a performance consideration, but not a flutter mode. This is classically understanding of ground effect. It's not new.

Those of us with significant engineering experience know that almost NOTHING complex ever truly follows simulation. I can count on one hand the number of times I was positively surprised the behavior matched prediction. And that's mostly after decades of experimental correlation to our development tools, none of which exists for true innovations like what we see in F1.

That's literally why evolutions of successful car concepts continue to succeed. Because they're based on known performance behavior that is just optimized.

None of our simulations on this site can remotely come close to the real deal because the flow structures, the strength and position of vortices interacting with each other and wheel wake are some of the most complex analyses out there. And then to consider these in yaw, roll, and differing, dynamic conditions. This is why teams and engineers are generally fearful of making large changes. There ALWAYS is an expectation of it not following simulation.

The front wing concept of this car is different to last years (significantly more center loaded). The front suspension is different. The floor entrance is different and raised. All these things influence the concept of the sidepods.

This is how development works. You choose a concept and optimize. You don't know if you're on the right branch or not unless it becomes significantly more expensive with little gains and you're still not up there, or if someone can make a significant jump by starting with another branch (like Ferrari in 2017).

There are 4-5 sidepod concepts, yet only 1 seems to really be working for the Redbull type, 1 for the Ferrari type, and 1 for the Merc type (which is ahead it seems of most non-Redbull cars with Redbull type sidepod).

[NoDivergence]

Not an aerodynamicist but it feels to me like the sidepods are missing an undercut to channel air more effectively to the diffuser.

Perhaps that’s part of Merc’s new sidepod package?

Interestingly with these regulations, a lot of teams have undercuts that don't lead to the diffuser since they have a bluff sidepod that ends in front of the rear wheel. It's used like an outwashing channel. It looks simple geometrically, but that bluff surface does help increase pressure above the floor entrance. Also, because fundamentally the sidepod is significantly narrower than anyone else's sidepod, you could almost think of it as if the entire sidepod is "undercut".

A lot of the recent increases in undercut this season is to manage rear wheel tire squirt rather than direct flow to rear suspension/diffuser interaction

[ringo]

https://www.gpfans.com/en/f1-news/10205 ... y-meeting/

At Mercedes, at least, there are crisis meetings. I can confirm this report and have already reported this this morning. There are problems on the front axle and there are problems as soon as they get below a certain ground clearance.

I might be wrong here, but this is why teams test....

Sorry, but crisis meetings are not why teams test and what is the order of the day in testing. The balance changes constantly and nobody knows why, the rear end breaks out uncontrollably, aero load is not consistent and changes extremely with vehicle height, to the point that the car becomes uncontrollable as soon as it gets below a certain ground clearance. At the front axle there is a sudden loss of downforce when cornering. The car should behave largely according to the simulations and calculations. But this is not the case at all with the W14. The problems are so far-reaching that a crisis meeting has been called to discuss how to proceed and what to do. And unplanned crisis meetings are not part of the test program and why one tests. Likewise, you don't test to clear up unexplained reactions of the car. I don't even want to talk about the other rumors, because on the one hand these are actually rumors so far for which I haven't received any direct confirmation, and on the other hand it is a very sensitive topic to which a few people here react sensitively. At least in the past. But in fact, many of these statements are reminiscent of what was said about cars that had a fundamental aerodynamic problem.

Do you stand by the boundary layer on the ground?

And yet you're still wrong. Watch Kyle's video to see the debunk (for the nth time) regarding wider sidepods being structurally improved over zeropod

Well...Kyle says he doesn't believe in it. Definitely he has not proved anything. In any case, there are the following facts :

- Aerodynamicists from other teams say this side box concept is too complex to make it work.

- Mercedes has again problems to make the car work

- the car again behaves differently than in the simulations

- suddenly dropping uneven downforce, logically has an aerodynamic origin, as well as cars that showed this in the past usually had a fundamental aerodynamic problem

If you put one and one together and put this in relation to what the aerodynamicists of other teams have said about the complexity of this concept, then there is at least a lot to suggest that Vanja is not wrong here.

And quite honestly front wheel wake management is extremely important for the aerodynamics of a car. Without bargeboards, however, this is extremely difficult and the sidepods are a component of what Kyle also clearly stated. So now you can believe that the sidepods are not the reason at Mercedes. Certainly nobody says or knows that. But in any case it would explain the problems Mercedes has been struggling with since they introduced this concept. And in my eyes it would be a great coincidence that everything fits together so well.

I do not know why my posts are being deleted. They are all in the guidelines of the forum.
I am no seeing these replies to my post above. The moderation is very inconsistent. But it's all good; I just have to work with this inconsistency.
As for the other aero guy in the youtube video. I don't think every one on an F1 team understands everything all teams are doing; that's why some teams get it wrong and some have different ways of acheiving the same goal. Even moreso an individual who may be only responsible for a single part or process.
The Merc aero guys probably watched the video and shook their heads at what came out of his mouth.
He made two contradictory statements in that video. I wont bother to mention it because my post will just get deleted again anyway, if it weakens an agenda.
But let's be objective. There is no indication to suggest any crisis.
I don't see how a basic sidepod is complex.
The only dificulty with mercedes sidepods is the packaging underneath the skin.
Mercedes are doing something else, to have their cake and eat it, that is not evident and no one realizes.
The front wheel wake was managed by the turning vanes and barge boards on previous cars, and even then it was not 100% managed.
The cars today also do not completely manage the wake from the front wheels. Most of the wake will never interract with the flow coming off the body.
If we look on the RB19 with the deeper undercut this year.. it's obvious that things are not as simple as putting a big bluff body to deflect the whole wake outward.
Even ferrari have reduced the size of the sidepods, rounded them and added more undercut.
My suspicion is mercedes have a suspension trick that gives them more speed on the straights and it's being tuned. The rear maybe should go down at high speed relative to the front, but is probably missbehaving at other parts of the circuit.

[ringo]

Interesting

Great post!! Killed half the rumours with this video. From the horse's mouth. Mike Elliot.
But some will say he is lying to save his job.

It's clear mercedes is fully aware of wake management. They did not need anyone to tell them this.
As has been said, the underfloor and front floor design and how it's coupled to the rear suspension are big performance differentiators.
Other key factors will be the diffuser efficiency of course and what each team does to impact that, like tyre squirt, floor sealing etc.

[Femi]

Interesting

Great post!! Killed half the rumours with this video. From the horse's mouth. Mike Elliot.
But some will say he is lying to save his job.

It's clear mercedes is fully aware of wake management. They did not need anyone to tell them this.
As has been said, the underfloor and front floor design and how it's coupled to the rear suspension are big performance differentiators.
Other key factors will be the diffuser efficiency of course and what each team does to impact that, like tyre squirt, floor sealing etc.

I doubt he was being untruthful especially if the motive was job preservation as that will come back to bite. What he revealed were facts known within the team. His job if threatened at all would be by results not words.
I agree with the suggestion to end rumours propagation.

[zibby43]

Interesting

Great post!! Killed half the rumours with this video. From the horse's mouth. Mike Elliot.
But some will say he is lying to save his job.

It's clear mercedes is fully aware of wake management. They did not need anyone to tell them this.
As has been said, the underfloor and front floor design and how it's coupled to the rear suspension are big performance differentiators.
Other key factors will be the diffuser efficiency of course and what each team does to impact that, like tyre squirt, floor sealing etc.

I doubt he was being untruthful especially if the motive was job preservation as that will come back to bite. What he revealed were facts known within the team. His job if threatened at all would be by results not words.
I agree with the suggestion to end rumours propagation.

When the technical director almost scoffs at the notion that the side pod bodywork had/has any impact on their performance last/this year, that tells me everything I need to know.

He then goes on to point out what we already know anyway, which is that the underfloor is overwhelmingly the decisive performance differentiator in this ruleset.

[ringo]

Anothe rumour killed was the cockpit moved 20cm.
Elliot said it was in the exact same place as w13.
The poster with the photos did say this but he was out maneuvered with gab and thus deemed incorrect by the majority. But it's all what the forum is for discussion. The debates as trivial as they can be sometimes does perculate up to the media who then asks the teams.

[Henri]

This is good.. need more straight line speed for the race

[organic]

They were hitting 322 km/h with the barn door. Drag is obviously not an issue

[Andi76]

Well thats a great prediction, something that has being reported by the media, being reported by the actual team, reported by Toto.

If you want to take the liberty of reminding us...
I'll take the liberty of laughing at you.

I don't know if you are a Mercedes fan, or some other teams fan that comes here to spread doom and gloom.
but you seem to have taken every little rumour you have heard that isn't good, mashed everything together, added your own spice and come up with some end of the world stuff.

We have add tub shaking, suspension breaking.
The lose of front down force, was something that occured yesterday and they worked on last night, it could have being something broken or someone set something wrong, but no you think it is some type of unknown disaster.
I mean you have such great contacts that you resorted to posting from the Judge

Now if you had bothered to compare the time, you would have noticed that I wrote all this 4 hours before the judges' article even appeared.

But it doesn't matter anyway, because I'm off the topic again, because as far as that goes, it's more like kindergarten here - as soon as the topic comes up that zerpods are the reason for certain disadvantages, personal attacks and other things follow.

And I don't remember anyone at Mercedes saying that they are gradually turning away from the Zeropods...why would they do that when it has no impact on performance and is a concept that promises superior downforce (which in itself is a contradiction in terms)?

I concur that here must be an impact on performance, or else teams wont spend so much time shaping them. I think that in itself is undeniable.
I think the issue is if the sidepods are the source of aerodynamic problems. This is the contention most have especially with the lack of real evidence.
It seems that, based on Elliot's words, the zeropods will evolve over the season.

If they are changed I will hazard a guess of a blend of MP4-26, Ferrari 641. Just a wild guess based on their philosophy. I am thinking low slung side pods with vertical openings near the body, but bluff body lumps outboard to sheild from the wake while providing a low gully towards the diffuser.

That sounds like a possible solution. Of course, you'll never know for sure if the side boxes are to blame. Even the teams, despite their resources and expertise, have a hard time determining the exact trigger. But I think that if the very team that is the only one to have such sidepods obviously has aerodynamic problems on both models, then that at least strongly suggests it. Add to that what other teams have said about the complexity and control of the vortex and the indicators of more difficult management of both the top and lower front wheel wake and its detrimental effect on underbody performance, and I think it's fair to say that there is some evidence to suggest that.

But strong indicators or not - it is a topic on which some people here react sensitively and do not want to hear. And for this reason and also because it remains of course finally a theory, which can be just as well wrong, as so much other also what we do here and about what we talk, I withdraw from this topic again. The final proof will come. If Mercedes actually deviates from the concept, it should be proven.

Yeah, so first hand that you're wrong about the sidepod width has any significance structurally to the whole porpoising effect. Rewatch Kyle's video again. He goes in depth with pictures of EVERY team on the grid's car which did and did not have stays, how many stays, etc. Regardless of width of sidepod. And there is no seeming correlation with the amount of porpoising experienced. Which leads to my conclusion which mirrors Kyle's that the porpoising correlates predominantly with the floor entrance geometry, throat proximity to ground, and very very little to do with the edge floor vortices. Which are a performance consideration, but not a flutter mode. This is classically understanding of ground effect. It's not new.

Why the constant need to twist our words? Haven't you guys had enough of that? No one was saying W13 zeropods were the predominant cause of bouncing, it was clear as day W13 initial floor was way too aggressive compared to RB and Ferrari and they had to dial it down with Barcelona upgrade. It was an improvement, but when they tried to lower the car back to intended ride height problems started re-occurring, coupled with flapping floor in the rear. Don't tell me the diffuser throat section movement doesn't affect floor performance

Those of us with significant engineering experience know that almost NOTHING complex ever truly follows simulation. I can count on one hand the number of times I was positively surprised the behavior matched prediction. And that's mostly after decades of experimental correlation to our development tools, none of which exists for true innovations like what we see in F1.

That's literally why evolutions of successful car concepts continue to succeed. Because they're based on known performance behavior that is just optimized.

None of our simulations on this site can remotely come close to the real deal because the flow structures, the strength and position of vortices interacting with each other and wheel wake are some of the most complex analyses out there. And then to consider these in yaw, roll, and differing, dynamic conditions. This is why teams and engineers are generally fearful of making large changes. There ALWAYS is an expectation of it not following simulation.

Simulations are better than ever today, users are also better than ever with input and proper settings. It's only going to get better still. I did a race car CFD with two software and correlation in WT, 1% error on downforce and 2% error on drag. And that was 7 years ago. On the other hand, the geometry of these cars is simpler than any since 2009 and even then the Y250 vortex and double diffusers were a headache for any meaningful prediction that very same year. Aerodynamics are not sorcery and witchcraft, they can be understood to great extent even when you are not in an F1 team. That's what we are trying to do here.

By the way your CFD lacks enough detail to draw any conclusions.
We should be seeing a storm of vortices in those areas that you focus on to draw your conclusions. Instead you show a few strands of stream lines.
It's a welcome effort to visualize. But I can bet if you change the boundaries, change the wind speed, or even increase the mesh and ran over the simulation, the results will not be the same.
You can easily paint any picture you wish with your simulation, once you are not sharing the preparation and the numbers.
So your opinion and your results are as good any one elses opinions on the forum once they have enough experience.

Any engineer knows what CFD stands for ;colors for directors

Unless you get a lot of time and resources, CFD will say not much.
.

I don't think that Vanja claims that his simulations are completely accurate and fully meaningful. On the contrary, he always emphasizes that they are not. They are there to provide general insight into the goals and effectiveness of the changes. And in this regard here they are quite meaningful and well suited for this and say quite something .That he takes the trouble to do this is immensely enriching. His CFD simulations are even used by former F1 aerodynamicists. Instead of criticizing his simulations, we should accept and honor them, and not say that they are no better than a mere opinion of anyone halfway experienced in this forum. Otherwise we will soon have to do without it, because I don't think anyone will continue to invest so much effort if there are people who don't appreciate it. So I ask you - if you don't appreciate it and think you are so good that you can see with the naked eye what is visible on these CFD simulations - I am not and many others are not. So don't destroy it for us who don't have this gift and appreciate these CFD simulations very much and that makes this forum stand out even more from all the others.