McLaren MP4-26 Mercedes

[Florio]

I was a little confused by McLaren stating that

Lewis wrapped up four days of running at Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya, spending the day focusing on tyre development over a series of long runs.

Clocking up an impressive 107 laps – MP4-26’s biggest single-day mileage – the team worked through a lengthy tyre development programme, eschewing outright laptimes in order to more fully understand how the Pirellis behave throughout a race stint.

Test team manager Indy Lall said: “It was very encouraging to log over 100 laps with MP4-26 today – an impressive conclusion to our four days in Barcelona. We’re still working through a very lengthy development programme – today wasn’t about pure performance, it was about conducting a disciplined series of long-runs – but it’s been a positive end to our test here.”

Seeing as they spent the whole of Valencia focusing on the tyre wear, and understanding the tyres as a whole, why would they need such extensive research seeing as their whole agenda at Valencia was tyres? I know different cars, suspensions and characteristics but I would of expected that they were focusing on race simulations etc.

However I understand they all have different testing schedules, but can anyone enlighten us onto why they'd still be needing tyre testing?

you serious? they have to avulate tyres on the new car, not to do so would be madness.

Of course I knew about that, I just expected something like that would have been carried out in Jerez, as the car's ability with the tyres effects the set up a great deal, I thought it would of been first on the list.

[speedsense]

Looks like they've got two sets of lower wishbones, packaged very close together, and then a normal upper wishbone. Is this unique?

the link in the middle behind the drive shaft could be a toe-link.

similar layout on an older F1 car can be seen here and here

IMHO, I don't think it's a toe link, with the two of them on top of each other like that, you would have to adjust both to change toe. Toe links tend to be on the same Long. axis of one of the a arms, so theres a pivot point.

[zgred]

[747heavy]

IMHO, I don't think it's a toe link, with the two of them on top of each other like that, you would have to adjust both to change toe. Toe links tend to be on the same Long. axis of one of the a arms, so theres a pivot point.

fair enough, what do you think it is then?
not sure why you would need to adjust both, can´t really see a reason for that.

sometimes they are , sometimes not

http://www.mulsannescorner.com/Peugeot9 ... 08-MS3.jpg
http://www.mulsannescorner.com/Peugeot9 ... 08-MS2.jpg

IMHO, it depends on what you would like to achieve kinematic wise.

[RacingManiac]

Looks like they've got two sets of lower wishbones, packaged very close together, and then a normal upper wishbone. Is this unique?

the link in the middle behind the drive shaft could be a toe-link.

similar layout on an older F1 car can be seen here and here

IMHO, I don't think it's a toe link, with the two of them on top of each other like that, you would have to adjust both to change toe. Toe links tend to be on the same Long. axis of one of the a arms, so theres a pivot point.

It just needs to be offset from the kingpin axis, even if the LBJ and the toe pick up sits on top of each other as long as the UBJ is not it is still a viable toe link....

[HampusA]

Of course I knew about that, I just expected something like that would have been carried out in Jerez, as the car's ability with the tyres effects the set up a great deal, I thought it would of been first on the list.

They never stop analysing the tyres either, it´s a process they do all year to learn as much as they can.

[myurr]

"Mercedes has poor traction, McLaren looks shocking as if on cold tyres, Red Bull+Ferrari+Renault Lotus Lada+Williams all pounding round"

Not looking great
At the end of the day if any team are gonna make a bad car good then it's McLaren

Wonder if McLaren looking like it's on cold tyres is a good thing. They could be setting everything up for hot weather, where others will be overheating their tyres and they'll be making them last.

[murtoidf1]

[...]

[Richard]

The long runs will also be testing reliability including all the internal systems such as engine management, KERS, gearbox, hydraulics, brakes, etc...

Once they have that sorted, then they can crank up the sped an dial in the performance. Remember they are a whole test session behind everyone else.

[HampusA]

"Mercedes has poor traction, McLaren looks shocking as if on cold tyres, Red Bull+Ferrari+Renault Lotus Lada+Williams all pounding round"

Not looking great
At the end of the day if any team are gonna make a bad car good then it's McLaren

Wonder if McLaren looking like it's on cold tyres is a good thing. They could be setting everything up for hot weather, where others will be overheating their tyres and they'll be making them last.

this is either very clever, or truly grasping for straws haha.

I´m thinking the latter. Either you have built a car that handles the tyres well or you dont.

[kalinka]

I know it's not strictly technical, but a very good insight on what is McLaren doing actually with their test program ( and some other interesting stuff too ) :

McLaren’s Jonathan Neale on tyres, test form and overtaking :

http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews ... 11766.html

[myurr]

I´m thinking the latter. Either you have built a car that handles the tyres well or you dont.

That's not true at all. All cars have an optimum operating range. Some cars are fast in a range of conditions, others are ultimately faster but more on a knife edge so that when outside their optimum temperature (for example) their performance is much worse.

A recent example was last years Red Bull that was the class of the field for most of the season, but when the temperatures got too high there was a window where other cars were still okay but the Red Bull overworked the tyres and suffered. In 2007 this was true of the McLaren and Ferrari where the latter was ultimately the faster car when everything was perfect but the McLaren coped better when things weren't quite right for the car. We've also seen years where McLaren were quick to get temperature into the tyres but Ferrari struggled. This lead to McLaren having a qualifying advantage with the Ferrari being the better race car, and the Ferrari being the faster car in really hot weather.

Pirelli are making a lot of noises about the tyres being much better in hotter weather. At the same time if teams that are able to work the tyres well in this cold weather continue to work the tyres as hard in the hot weather then they could well overheat the tyres. McLaren, in contrast, if they're too gentle on the tyres now and aren't getting enough heat into them could come into their own when the temperatures are higher.

Whether that is or is not the case we'll need to wait and see, but it's definitely a possibility.

[speedsense]

IMHO, I don't think it's a toe link, with the two of them on top of each other like that, you would have to adjust both to change toe. Toe links tend to be on the same Long. axis of one of the a arms, so theres a pivot point.

fair enough, what do you think it is then?
not sure why you would need to adjust both, can´t really see a reason for that.

sometimes they are , sometimes not

http://www.mulsannescorner.com/Peugeot9 ... 08-MS3.jpg
http://www.mulsannescorner.com/Peugeot9 ... 08-MS2.jpg

IMHO, it depends on what you would like to achieve kinematic wise.

IMHO, The rear most "round" bar is the toe link on the Peugeot. And in the same Long plane as the arm.
Think about the two Mclaren lengths, adjust one longer, the other one would resist the lengthening of it as there isn't a pivot point between the two. You would have to change both lengths to change toe.
As far as why it's that way (double arms)...can't say, never seen anything like it...

[boydy19]

I'm thinking the car is unfortunately going to be a dog. Brundle and Gary anderson have said the car is lacking grip. Also, a few people from another forum who have attended the test have commented on the car is visibly struggling to get on the power through corners and looks disastrous at some points.

Mclaren have went to radical. I'm no expert but i think there's to much 'going on' at the back rather than concentrating on a clean smooth back end like RB and Ferrari. I'm not looking forward to this season.

[Pup]

But from the comments I've read, the corners they are looking at are the slow ones, which points to more of a mechanical grip issue. Combine that with comments from McLaren that this year's car is more flexible in it's setup options than last, and one could surmise that their grip problems are primarily due to just not having enough track time to find the right setups for the different compounds.

That's an optimistic take, but not an unreasonable one I think.

Frankly, I think with what we've seen from the Pirellis so far, you could strap them on a brick and not be too far off pace.

Back to the tech stuff, can we guess that McLaren have settled on the slotted exhaust layout? It's certainly the most interesting I've seen, and seems something of a no brainer once you see it. My hope is that with that out of the way and the reliability sorted, they can get on with the program. Any chance of them organizing a little private test in this two week break to claw back some of that lost mileage?