Mercedes GP MGP W01

[luca]

Q. What areas have you looked to improve over last year's car?

RB: Well there were a few challenges. One is obviously the fuel capacity. We believe the Bridgestone tyres need a different weight distribution than they had last year, they have a different characteristic so we had to design the car around that. I think the predominant thing is for all the teams to find more aerodynamic performance. This is not the definitive car, the definitive car comes out for Bahrain. It's an interim car for us as I am sure it is for all the major teams. Mainly aerodynamic performance.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/81208

Looks like this is an interim car guys.

Thanks for posting this interview. It confirms a lot.

they have altered the rear suspension geometry which is too accomodate a larger diffusor later on in the test program.

The W01 has modified bits of last years car on it so that they can gauge the performance of the floor and front splitter relative to last years car.
They're just performing on track verification of CFD data - they are heading in the CFD direction more now with cost and resourse restrictions coming.

the exhausts also will change once the new Diffusor is fitted. theyhave them in the current configuration to minimise the influence on the under car flow. Hence the FIA are not concerned with the exhaust for now but the car won't be raced with those pipes. Merc are sandbagging all their major areo kit till later tests.

remember this test session most teams will only be going through reliability checks, vehicle operations procedures, mechanics drills (since this is the first time most of the race team has seen the new car and such testing. they are not focusing on performance testing for now, merely establishing whether certan major components are working better than the last when mated to known performance components.

Don;t read anything into this test session.

Well, do read into that Schumacher is an absolutely brilliant driver.
First day back and already he is dishing out a can of whooopass.

Yeah, I agree with you.

[horse]

This is an interesting issue, this interim car business. How interim can the car be? I assume the chassis is `as is' and the teams are stuck with what they have designed, in general. So, it's mostly the aerodynamics that are interim, would I be correct in saying?

Does this not add quite an element of risk, though? If you don't test your A-spec aero stuff, it may give you a bit of a fright at the first race should it not work. I know this is just early doors, but I can't see any team holding out all of their major parts for the first race, it just seems way too risky for engineering companies.

[f1rules]

i think the chassis will stay the same, but i agree the diffuser is an interim solution. Maybe that is a little risky. But still they be able to get the mechanical sorted. Looking at the rear suspension, it looks like they moved the wishbone arrangement forward a lot, making lots of place for a future diffuser. Their rear suspension actually look pretty agressive, so i exspect a huge ddd in the future

[Raptor22]

Not really any risk attached unless they have got their wind tunnel or CFD calibrations wrong, hence the test with known components first.

Ferrari has doen thismany times in the past. Test the car with older wings and then bang first race of the season they have new wing no ones seen before. Of course this was in the Golden age. Now they're back in the spaghetti age who knows what will happen!

the components that are hard to change is the floor and the chassis tub.
Everything else can be modified in a relatively short time, around 4 weeks from design to on the car.

In this case the non series bits are the '09 bits that determine the flow under the car. This year this is the single most important performance enhancing area for any F1 car. Everyone is focussed on developing these areas.

Ferrari and McLaren may have shown thier hand too early but that most likely because they literally had to start from scratch with their new cars; the old ones being so poor aerodynamically that no correlation is valuable to develpment of the new car. Don;t read too much into their current lap times.

All the teams that had poor cars last year are probably showing what is closer to what we will see in Bahrain than what Mercedes is showing.
I would not be too surprised to see a less radically changed RB6 than what many people are expecting. that car has served as a benchmark for the others and I think Newey will continue developing its concept.

[horse]

Not really any risk attached unless they have got their wind tunnel or CFD calibrations wrong, hence the test with known components first.

I'm not sure this is strictly true. Brawn had a whole series of upgrades last year that didn't work too well, in particular. CFD, wind tunnels, are great facilities, but you won't really know what happens until you are in full scale operating dynamically as one package (including the driver). I just think if you have parts and testing time available then get on with it. Much as it's a fun validation exercise, the key is to make sure the car works, not so much the limited simulations.

I totally agree with everything else you said, by the way.

[Raptor22]

granted, there is always risk.

LAst year their hit and miss development was underscored by a few issues they had.

1) the BGP001 was designed for a heavier, thirstier Honda engine which played som havoc with thier mass distribution at some circuits

2) their aero updates started coming in late because again the planned updates were for a different engine and cooling layout which resulted in some unknown's. Essentially they had a bastard car that worked out better than they expected.
the development stages for a car are planned months in advance of the debut of those changes. Certainly some changes are more on the fly as they see or expereince new ideas and try to bring that to fruition.

the mErcedes deal was in the pipeline for quite some time before it was announced so they knew they were going to keep Merc power for 2010 hence they started development on this years car early as they did the year before.

SO the risks this year are lower than they were last year because they knew what engine they were building the car around.

[luca]

As it has just been said here, Ross Brawn just told the following to BBC:

"The Mercedes boss says it is still very early days but he has some revealing thoughts on his team's comparative performance:

"'It's always very difficult to judge. On full tanks yesterday (Tuesday) we didn't look too bad but we're a little bit off on pace and (there are problems with) the handling and balance of the car which we can fix for (the next test in) Jerez. We know what the problem is.

"'Of course the other teams will be progressing as well so we are reasonable, not as quick as Ferrari and Lewis looked quick yesterday. So it looks like we've got a bit of work to do.'"

[luca]

New Rosberg Q&A: http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews ... 10399.html

[FGD]

AUTOSPORT understands that Mercedes is looking at changes to its weight distribution based on the information it has gathered at Valencia this week. The team is also yet to put its definitive 2010 front wing and diffuser onto the car.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/81244

Looks like we have more confirmation that this is not the car we'll see at the first race. Maybe we'll see a new wing and diffuser at the next test. Considering the unique and innovative shape of the Mercedes, wouldn't be surprised to see a very interesting wing and diffuser in the weeks to come. Mercedes and Brawn are clearly playing their cards very carefully.

[luca]

Then let's hope the weight distribution changes will work well.

[luca]

The small hydraulic problem has been officially confirmed: http://www.mercedes-gp.com/newsread.asp ... A5%99lT%7E
Luckily, it happened during testing and not during a race.

[BorisTheBlade]

sorry, but here it is:
A picture-- well in this case 3 pictures-- says a thousand words

Shame on me. I still had the edge in front of the engine starter in mind. Sorry for that, folks. So I take back everything I wrote and will from now on state the opposite

[FGD]

Then let's hope the weight distribution changes will work well.

I wonder if Brawn is talking about aerodynamic weight distribution?

[Timstr]

The car looks a bit front heavy compared to other cars:http://motorsport.nextgen-auto.com/gall ... 052wri.jpg

As short front end puts relatively more weight over the front axle,
could it be that they misjudged the required fundamental weight distribution of the car?

This would be in line with the reported understeery nature of the car and RB's comment about making changes to the weight distribution for Jerez.

[RacingManiac]

Why would more front weight be more understeery? Logically its the other way around...