Mercedes GP - Inauguration and 1st season

[aral]

Thet Force India overtake was just pure embarrassment. I know FI had probably the best car through Eau Rouge all weekend, but to blast past a car without giving a driver any chance to defend with the same engine is pure embarrassment.

It is difficult to understand the problem. We are led to believe that it is the handling of the car that is at fault, yet, in a straight line drag race, the FI, using the same engine, same revs, blasted by. This would seem to indicate that the gearing was incorrect, or the engine is being stifled in some way. Aero drag could not account for the vast difference seen.

[marcush.]

physics ,maybe?

if you would happen to come out of eau rouge with a deficit of say 15kph you would of course ,with the same engine and all carry that deficit till the point of running out of revs or assuming the terminal speed of the other car .You could still have the same terminal speed at the braking point ,length of the staright permitting...so ..add this
to a small topspeed advantage and you got Sutil blasting by Schumacher with 20or so difference at some point of the track..but you need different corner exit speeds to make this happen .
Of course it cannot be like the merc is down on exit speed constantly by 15 or so kmh ..as it is all in all not that slow...so it simply is a matter of incident playing in the hands of the car behind.
So would have to count this towards driver error only showing 10 seconds later

[marcush.]

here the footage from Sutil snapping up Schumacher ..clearly exit speeds eau rouge ..no moment for Schumacher ,no traffic...

He was coming from around 4 or 5 car lenghts behind and completed the pass in around 10 seconds ....so that was a good 30metres gained in 10 s so his speed needed to be a massively quicker throu Eau Rouge in his wake !

as both have comparable engines i assume they accelerate comparably ..also both were on prime tyres.

http://k1.ua/uk/video/episode/Formula-1 ... util_schum

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Aero drag could not account for the vast difference seen.

Why not?

[rich1701]

Thet Force India overtake was just pure embarrassment. I know FI had probably the best car through Eau Rouge all weekend, but to blast past a car without giving a driver any chance to defend with the same engine is pure embarrassment.

Aero drag could not account for the vast difference seen.

Hmm, The Mercedes is a bulky device compared to the FI, and the FI F-Duct is working much more effectively it seems. I don't think you can entirely discount drag difference here. Although in qualifying Rosberg and Sutil had similar straight line speeds, which may prove you are right. It will be interesting to see Monza top speeds without the F-duct variable distorting results. At Spa though Schumacher's top speed was slower all weekend. So perhaps Schumacher was fuel saving at the time of the over take or his engine was much older than Sutil's??

[marcush.]

you can see from the video footage that Sutil is back .5s at the finish line and is carying a lot more speed through the compression up the hill reeling in on MS slotting into his sleepstream and slingshotting past so may be for a 1 or 2 seconds he has a considerably better drag..contributing to his better acceleration .a 5kmh speed differnce in trap speed is not even worth considering in these circumstances....Michael was done in eau rouge already the key was the huge cornering advantage there

[747heavy]

I would not discount a difference in gear ratio.
If the FI has a higher terminal speed, their is nothing Schumacher can do.
If we take into account, that the FI is less draggy, you could gear it a tad taller, to gain overtaking opportunities against your opposition, and to make better use of slipstreaming/drafting conditions.

On a side note, would that mean M.S. was "lying" a bid, when ask about that overtake?

[marcush.]

I would not discount a difference in gear ratio.
If the FI has a higher terminal speed, their is nothing Schumacher can do.
If we take into account, that the FI is less draggy, you could gear it a tad taller, to gain overtaking opportunities against your opposition, and to make better use of slipstreaming/drafting conditions.

On a side note, would that mean M.S. was "lying" a bid, when ask about that overtake?

no ....he was asked about the pass of rosberg .. which seemed to have had the starting point having to lift for avoidance action....i think there was no question about sutils blast by..quite frustrating .that ...he was just snapped up by sutil...who did have the perfect run on him ..maybe Schumacher should have slowed down before eau rouge ...that would have been the only chance..to kill his speed and do a drag race on equal machinery...

[747heavy]

Yeap.....
You are right Marcus, I mixed that up - sorry (Rossberg vs. Vettel overtake)
and Schumachers response to the question.

[marcush.]

I just reread it on rtl...his rear tyres were blistering already and he got cought up at the restart...with Rosberg.

[raymondu999]

What I wonder most about is... had that been Button at the wheel of the Mercedes, would he have won in Australia and China?

[747heavy]

not if they would have used the same strategy, as they did with Schumacher - IMHO

[marcush.]

tbh I think Button would fare better than rosberg ,as he is at ease with a understeering car...but would he have won ? Never ever.
button new early on that he had to leave ,but clever man did not let people draw him into negotiations etc but kept his head down and bagged the championship .

[xpensive]

I read that Haug has found a way to supply RBR with engines for next year, MGP will switch engine-contracts with them,
rebranding his team to AMG-Nissan in the process. Intriguing prospect, no?

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

I read that Haug has found a way to supply RBR with engines for next year, MGP will switch engine-contracts with them,
rebranding his team to AMG-Nissan in the process. Intriguing prospect, no?

Is this a stab at humour?