Red Bull RB7 Renault

[Byronrhys]

Not running kers will spur on a few teams to not run it at some tracks now, I think they should have at least run it in the first race before taking it out, 2009 repeat?

[Robbobnob]

Could contribute to the KERS issues, however as it is directly where the exhaust turns back on itself i believe it would be an independent issue as the KERS is situated forwards of the engine (if your to believe the video even with all its inconsistencies)

[Formula None]

[Formula None]

[n_anirudh]

RB7 Vettels car post race

[raymondu999]

Sorry, are you just showing shots of the car, or is there something of note that I'm missing here?

[boci]

To be honest, I don't think they've ever had KERS in the car. It's been all a lie.

[raymondu999]

I think it's a case of like what happened with the f-duct last year. Newey wouldn't field the F-duct until it had absolutely no disadvantages in his implementation, and then he fielded it.

[Robbobnob]

Q: Lewis has KERS on his car. You don’t have KERS on you car?
SV: We do have KERS on the car, but we didn’t use it. It is not that we take it down and then are lighter than the rest. That was in 2009 when you could take it down and play around with the weight. And I was wondering why nothing was happening… (laughs) But let’s be serious again - we have to get it working for Malaysia.

Also Seb was asked by rocky on the radio to use KERS during friday practice..

On the topic of KERS; Martin Brundle said that the KERS regeneration needed the break balance to shift forward otherwise the rears would be prone to locking, and cars such as Massa's suffered from front break temps throughout the Gran Prix.

Could the lack of KERS have helped seb find those 8 tenths by giving him a more stable car under breaking and turn in.

[boci]

I know that "Rocky" told Vettel to use it but they could've been trying to confuse the public. It doesn't cost them anything to lie on the radio.

[raymondu999]

It could've given him an edge on the braking side of things, but it would've cost him the 80bhp over 6.6 seconds in terms of power stakes. It will probably even out over the course of the equation, being a straight fight of cornering vs straights. Newey, in his typical fashion, prefers good cornering than good straightline speed.

Difference is, KERS is also a point of possible failure. And if it fails, your braking bias remains screwed up (which I believe is due to the charging mechanism). But this point of failure is eliminated if you're not running KERS

[l4mbch0ps]

Intakes on the tea-tray? Previous pictures from practice this weekend show apparent openings as well.

[Just_a_fan]

Intakes on the tea-tray? Previous pictures from practice this weekend show apparent openings as well.

A number of teams have this sort of detail. It's about controlling the flow coming off the front wing etc and directing it to the undertray.

[nacho]

RB7 had the smaller cooling outlet in the race and the huge one was tried

Friday:


Sunday:


So the big one is used when KERS is on and the small one when it's out.

Edit: changed link to the enhanced image.

[godlameroso]

Could be they use the smaller kers unit because they can divert more cooling air to create downforce than they would if they used a full kers unit. If this were true it would lead to teams scrambling to either remove kers and take advantage all together, or flex their engineering muscles and devise a solution. This would make kers smaller and more efficient, and it's done as a byproduct of chasing aero.