McLaren MCL39

[SiLo]

Those cooling holes upstream, or dented in holes as they are being called here, is just a cooling outlet area trick.
The car needs X units of cooling outlet area.
When you have these holes upstream the outlet requirements at the last hole by the exhaust pipe is smaller.
This smaller hole allows the car to have a slimmer engine cover and more aero efficiency.
This is seen with Ferrari and any other car with these mid body outlets. Beam wing efficiency is at a premium with this regulation.
That pictue with the rear of mcl38 and 39 illustrates perfectly how much smaller an outlet there is at the muffler with the rest of the cooling outlets located upstream.

I believe they are located in high flow streams to help pull the air from inside the engine cover. I know a lot of the higher ones are part of streams on the older cars that sort of flowed upwards along the engine cover towards the rear.

[De Wet]

Planet F1:

I’ve highlighted this with a series of red dashes on the leading edge of the steering arm in the image above, which although the pictures are taken at slightly different angles it’s clear to see just how different the arrangement is, especially as the steering arm now sits ahead of the lower wishbone on the upright.

There’s clearly going to be an impact on how all of these changes manifest in terms of mechanical performance, especially in terms of ride height but, as is almost always the case in these situations, much of what’s been done here is about improving aerodynamic performance.

[KimiRai]

https://bsky.app/profile/carpentiersf1. ... ptf5elps24

(mod edit request: no politics)

[CjC]

Red Bulls Wache on Mclarens extreme front suspension. He says the anti-drive is very high.

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mcla ... uspension/

[Hoffman900]

Red Bulls Wache on Mclarens extreme front suspension. He says the anti-drive is very high.

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mcla ... uspension/

I mean, too high and it’s undrivable or at least not predictable (which in turn causes a driver to not be as smooth and consistent, and will eat tires). Lotus tried 100% anti dive with the Lotus 23. It doesn’t work. It can also cause jacking issues.

Near half the front suspension travel is in the tires alone. You can’t do anything about that. If you have 3-5mm of travel in the suspension itself. Going from 0 to 100% anti dive will just cover that much.

Furthermore, the more anti dive, the more load into the arms and pivot points, ehich requires beefier parts (weight), which Wache is alluding to.

The locations of the arms are still 99% about aero.

[thisisatest]

Red Bulls Wache on Mclarens extreme front suspension. He says the anti-drive is very high.

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mcla ... uspension/

I don't think the anti dive is as high as people think. The lower control arms are positioned with a downward slope towards the rear, just like the upper ones but to a lesser degree. This alone would be pro-dive, in this case partly countering the anti-dive effect of the upper wishbone's angle.

[Hoffman900]

Red Bulls Wache on Mclarens extreme front suspension. He says the anti-drive is very high.

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mcla ... uspension/

I don't think the anti dive is as high as people think. The lower control arms are positioned with a downward slope towards the rear, just like the upper ones but to a lesser degree. This alone would be pro-dive, in this case partly countering the anti-dive effect of the upper wishbone's angle.

You also need to know the CoG of the car and good luck getting that.

Here is an attempt at figuring it out with the current generation of cars:


Here is an attempt to understand how the suspension arms can influence the floor:


It’s not about absolute figured with unvalidated cfd, but just pay attention to the trends.

[Vanja #66]

Low-speed analysis

So far, I didn't see McLaren having a clear obvious static rake angle like SF25 does, but with excellent traction it goes without saying they can't avoid softer suspension in the 1st phase of non-linear spring compression and therefore likely a slightly higher rear end in low-speed sections



Medium-speed analysis

Both front and rear end of the floor get a boost, but I believe the rear end gets more, as diffuser kick also represents the floor throat on McLaren. Additionally, their side and rear boat keel kicks start yielding bigger gains at these speeds and ride-height ranges



High-speed analysis

Finally, at extreme low ride heights, the diffuser kick becomes the definitive downforce peak point - hence the amazing high-speed performance and rear-end stability on McLaren cars for almost two years now

As for boat keel kicks, I believe McLaren lets them stall locally to shed some downforce, but prevents stall propagation as the lateral flow from the side of the boat section starts taking the place of the flow from the bottom. McLaren often sparks quite heavily on straights and high-speed corners at low fuel, so it's difficult to imagine the lowest section of the floor and those kicks aren't stalled when the ride height oscillates with small amplitudes.

[venkyhere]

NIce illustration, Vanja
seems like MCL39 has absolutely huge tunnels. It's much bigger than the ones in your SF25 diagram.

[Vanja #66]

NIce illustration, Vanja
seems like MCL39 has absolutely huge tunnels. It's much bigger than the ones in your SF25 diagram.

Indeed they are

[mwillems]

Red Bulls Wache on Mclarens extreme front suspension. He says the anti-drive is very high.

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mcla ... uspension/

I don't think the anti dive is as high as people think. The lower control arms are positioned with a downward slope towards the rear, just like the upper ones but to a lesser degree. This alone would be pro-dive, in this case partly countering the anti-dive effect of the upper wishbone's angle.

You can argue about who are the best designers, but if Wache stands up and says it is higher than before then in my view that trumps some of the forums opinions and we should take note. Better to try and understand why previous opinions in here are deemed wrong by him. Something is seemingly missing from the forums understanding.

But look at the telemetry, it is night and day between this year's front end and last year.

[Hoffman900]

Red Bulls Wache on Mclarens extreme front suspension. He says the anti-drive is very high.

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mcla ... uspension/

I don't think the anti dive is as high as people think. The lower control arms are positioned with a downward slope towards the rear, just like the upper ones but to a lesser degree. This alone would be pro-dive, in this case partly countering the anti-dive effect of the upper wishbone's angle.

You can argue about who are the best designers, but if Wache stands up and says it is higher than before then in my view that trumps some of the forums opinions and we should take note. Better to try and understand why previous opinions in here are deemed wrong by him. Something is seemingly missing from the forums understanding.

But look at the telemetry, it is night and day between this year's front end and last year.

But what is higher? Is it higher in relation to anyone on the grid in this generation? Higher than all time? Higher than all other racing cars?

If I put “higher” in any work engineering document without quantifying it, everyone would be like “this means nothing”.

You’re also comparing two entirely different conditions between this and last. The proof is in the pudding over multiple racing weekends in all racing conditions.

If F1 raced in 15* and lower temps all year, Merc is probably a 2x champion in this rule set. Those conditions are just not reality over a season.

[mwillems]

I don't think the anti dive is as high as people think. The lower control arms are positioned with a downward slope towards the rear, just like the upper ones but to a lesser degree. This alone would be pro-dive, in this case partly countering the anti-dive effect of the upper wishbone's angle.

You can argue about who are the best designers, but if Wache stands up and says it is higher than before then in my view that trumps some of the forums opinions and we should take note. Better to try and understand why previous opinions in here are deemed wrong by him. Something is seemingly missing from the forums understanding.

But look at the telemetry, it is night and day between this year's front end and last year.

But what is higher? Is it higher in relation to anyone on the grid in this generation? Higher than all time? Higher than all other racing cars?

You’re also comparing two entirely different conditions between this and last. The proof is in the pudding over multiple racing weekends in all racing conditions.

If F1 raced in 15* and lower temps all year, Merc is probably a 2x champion in this rule set.

Clearly higher than before and not the reduction suggested in here, otherwise he wouldnt just be observing that now if it were the same or less anti dive than last year. Though the layout is indeed for Aero, the idea anti dive is reduced or even equal to last year seems thoroughly debunked now.

[the EDGE]

Well I’m still far from convinced that it’s a high anti-dive geometry. For 2 reasons…

1, Every part of that suspension, including the track and pull rod, has been specifically place in its location to work the airflow. That is clear to see. Are you telling me that it’s just a coincidence that it also produces high anti-dive geometry? Or maybe McLaren are just having to learn to live with that amount of Anti-Dive for the sake of having perfect control of that airflow?

2, F1 cars can’t possibly dive enough to warrant that much anti-dive geometry. Can they? It’s like twice what last year was

Also, wouldn’t Wache have to know more about the MCL39 that he possibly could know, to ascertain if it’s anti-dive or not? The level of anti-dive is based on more than the positioning of 1 leg of a wishbone

[mwillems]

Well I’m still far from convinced that it’s anti-dive geometry. For 2 reasons…

1, Every part of that suspension, including the track and pull rod, has been specifically place in its location to work the airflow. That is clear to see. Are you telling me that it’s just a coincidence that it also produces perfect anti-dive geometry? Or maybe McLaren are just having to learn to live with that amount of Anti-Dive for the sake of having perfect control of that airflow?

2, F1 cars can’t possibly dive enough to warrant that much anti-dive geometry. Can they? It’s like twice what last year was

Also, wouldn’t Wache have to know more about the MCL39 that he possibly could know, to ascertain if it’s anti-dive or not? The level of anti-dive is based on more than the positioning of 1 leg of a wishbone

I'm not disagreeing that that structure has been designed for the purposes of airflow very strongly in mind, this was fairly clear from the start. This has been the case for several years. But they'd always done it in a way that the suspension can still do it's job, they can't sacrifice this. I noted the conversations earlier in this thread that seemed to ridicule people who suggested this was also increasing anti dive, whilst stating confidently that actually it was reducing it to allow the driver to feel the road more. This condescension now extends to Red Bulls technical director who is probably a little more knowledgeable than they.

Regarding Wache's knowledge of anti dive, I couldn't speak for. But I'd wager he's a better idea than those not working in the paddock, and probably better than many that are in the paddock. So if he makes the point of saying he's noted that the anti dive of this solution is very high this year, I'm not inclined to think he'd be saying it for any other reason than he thinks it true and that he's more than qualified for such an assessment.

As for the behaviour of the anti dive, is it possible that there is more at play than just the obvious geometry but also the dampers and perhaps other trickery that might allow the anti dive to be strong at the right time and softer at others. Or perhaps the car just works well with strong anti dive. I don't know, other people are better qualified to have another stab at it than me.

I saw some say that too much anti dive causes bounce and used this a strong reason in favour of their argument. But I haven't seen any evidence of this or that the previous geometry was close to this behaviour, or how much scope was left before this behaviour manifested.