Mercedes GP W02

[jav]

At the start of the race, Schumacher split the Ferrari's. But if you watch MS's on board video, you see just how much quicker the Ferrari's are when Alonso re-passes him and they just leave him in the dust. And- the Ferrari's are no where near the bulls pace. The W02 sure did surprise some folks... I was surprised they were even worse than I thought.

[Raptor22]

yes its a shame Schumacher still has not got a car that works for him.

At Benetton and Ferrari he had Nigel Stepney and rory Byrne who really worked well with him and were able to deliver the set up he required for any given situation.
At Mercedes, the engineers just don't seem to be able to understand his germanic english. weird because Barrichello had the same problem.

That car is just not able to get traction down so its slow out of the corners.
Schumacher doe not seem have a lot of confidence in it under braking (funny though that Barrichello also had troubles with the brakes in 2009).

If these are really issues that are still floating around then perhaps I must concede Segedubum and xpansive to be correct in that Mercedes have bought a bunch of incompetants.

Sepang was the first proper GP circuit and they went backwards. Its a shame because Schumacher is a hell of a nice bloke and to be stuck with that twaddle of a car after deciding to make a comeback to support the company that gave him his break into F1, is not justice of any sort

[forty-two]

Sorry to be late on this comment, but did anyone else notice that during Qualifying in Malaysia, Michael Schumacher's car was running without the R/H louvre immediately above the exhaust exit hole. In other words, the hole was there but the louvre plate was missing.

I don't know if it was left off on purpose, or gave up during qualifying, or indeed if it was back by the start of the race.

The world feed showed it clearly. I will try to dig out a still.

[pipex]

Its just simple fact that their system is not perfect....it took Mclaren and Ferrari 10 to 11 races to figure it out in 2009.
and moreover their package has some reliability issues with it

The KERS problem on Vettel's car could have lead to Dnf , thats why they were giving him strict orders not to use it!
Weber also had this problem, thats why they didnt use it in Melbourne coz they couldnot justify an unreliable system in their car wher infact they were much faster even without it !

rea this http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/90626

And even Ferrari and McLaren externalized the design of their system to MTS and Zytek, respectively. So if RB is trying to develop the system on their own they have a long road ahead. We have seen the same with Williams and their multiple faults with KERS, and they even have a division specialized in these kind of systems. It seems that they are developing their own version and that its not the same unit as used by Renault.

I think that their problem is overheating. If its the batteries or inverter I don't know.

PS: This should be moved to RB thread...

[Raptor22]

Sorry to be late on this comment, but did anyone else notice that during Qualifying in Malaysia, Michael Schumacher's car was running without the R/H louvre immediately above the exhaust exit hole. In other words, the hole was there but the louvre plate was missing.

I don't know if it was left off on purpose, or gave up during qualifying, or indeed if it was back by the start of the race.

The world feed showed it clearly. I will try to dig out a still.

NBoth cars ran without that panel.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Pipex,

Mclarens KERS is Mercedes-Zytek, not entirely Zytek or Mercedes but a collaboration of both.

Raptor,
Im afraid I dont see Schumachers English being a problem at all.

To shine you need raw materials in F1(talent). Mercedes(nee Brawn) have produced precious little in the way of demonstrating this with the W02.
Thats so far.

Lets see come Europe, if they can learn to turn round their car quickly as I think this will prove wether 2012 will be promising or another dour afair for Benz afficionados.

[marcush.]

Zytek has a long relationship going on with Mercedes (Smart electric vehicle)and as I understand Maercedes have bought into Zytek last year in a stratetic move.
The new Smart EV contains Zytek technology again.

As for now they need to iron out the reliaability issues first.This will take most likely only be with the Euro upgrades ...hopefully god has a soft spot for them and donates some rain and changing conditions for the next weekend...

I don´t know if the short Wheelbase is a dog of aan idea ...Is there a correlation of wheelbase and pace for this years crop of cars ?

Maybe we will be surprised when all things fall in place one day and they can extract the pace they seemed to have found in Barcelona....

[pipex]

Pipex,
Mclarens KERS is Mercedes-Zytek, not entirely Zytek or Mercedes but a collaboration of both.

Well, but they are not alone in its development. You are right about the colaboration, the other day I saw an ad for a job at MBHPE related to KERS.

[jav]

Zytek has a long relationship going on with Mercedes (Smart electric vehicle)and as I understand Maercedes have bought into Zytek last year in a stratetic move.
The new Smart EV contains Zytek technology again.

As for now they need to iron out the reliaability issues first.This will take most likely only be with the Euro upgrades ...hopefully god has a soft spot for them and donates some rain and changing conditions for the next weekend...

I don´t know if the short Wheelbase is a dog of aan idea ...Is there a correlation of wheelbase and pace for this years crop of cars ?

Maybe we will be surprised when all things fall in place one day and they can extract the pace they seemed to have found in Barcelona....

I think Ferrari has the next shortest wheel base after Mercedes. They are having thier issues too... but not like the W02.

I don't know if the short wheel base and difusser contribute to the rear wings flow dynamics but that's more of a qual issue to me. That I know of - unpredictable wing stall hasn't been presented as an issue during the race.

They just seem to lack race pace all together. IF they could sort out all the little niggles, make it reliable and predictable and then concentrate on improvements- we might be able to acheive the goal of improving on last year. BUT, It's tough to progress when at every practice, your fighting cooling problems- and unpredictable aero, and high tire wear. I was actually encouraged that they didn't use DRS much during this practice and focused on race pace... although it didn't seem to help them.

[madly]

[..]
Maybe we will be surprised when all things fall in place one day and they can extract the pace they seemed to have found in Barcelona....

It start to be almost mythological 'peace found in Barcelona'.
If I remember (please correct me if I'm wrong), that 'peace' was on 3rd of tests, where:
- track was rubberised -> better times,
- on 4th day it was raining - no one did speed checks,
- it was tests - teams were hiding their true speed.

I wonder if that 'Barcelona speed' isn't kind of excuse for MGP? No offence!

[raymondu999]

We're not quite seeing any rubbering in with these Pirellis, so I don't think that would've been much of a factor. The weathers were wet too so that would've washed away the rubber. And was it really raining when MGP set their quick lap? It seemed like a dry time to me at the time, though I can't remember what it is right now.

[Mandrake]

[..]
Maybe we will be surprised when all things fall in place one day and they can extract the pace they seemed to have found in Barcelona....

It start to be almost mythological 'peace found in Barcelona'.
If I remember (please correct me if I'm wrong), that 'peace' was on 3rd of tests, where:
- track was rubberised -> better times,
- on 4th day it was raining - no one did speed checks,
- it was tests - teams were hiding their true speed.

I wonder if that 'Barcelona speed' isn't kind of excuse for MGP? No offence!

Somewhere in this forum I read that the new Pirelli tires do not rubber a track like the Bridgestones did.

Even with hiding their true speed, I doubt that MGP gave it a 100%, maybe they had less reserves, but it's not like RedBull only went 50% and MGP flatout.

I see the Barcelona times like this: 3 Days of extensive testing, constant addition of new parts and in the end they had a proper setup for that day / track. With a proper Setup the Merc is quick on 1 lap and relatively constant throughout the stint. But that sweet spot may be very small and I purely believe that MGP have not found it in any other race yet.

I was also hoping that MGP could get closer to the top, fighting Ferrari (I also believed that the McLaren was a dog ^^) and now McLaren and Renault slightly behind the RedBulls.......but unless they increase the Sweet spot's size or add magic parts I don't see them fighting for P4 in WCC

[3one]

Given that they eventually make everything running well, i think only a major update would give them a chance of increasing their race pace and catch up with the top dogs...

I just hope (but very doubtful) that they would make any new upgrades on the car for China... 4 days and counting...

[jav]

Brawn has pretty much said nothing new for China.

My question is... where's Bob Bell?? He was supposed to be on board on 4/1. What's his take on this?

[marcush.]

Not a single word about bob on the website.... - apart from the announcement back in february