McLaren MP4-26 Mercedes

[raymondu999]

aha. I didn't catch that comment from Whitmarsh.

[myurr]

redbull is still a monster. When they get their kers working 100%, the season will be over.
This car can come a little closer, but fundamentally i don't think it can equal the redbull or be better. I hope it does, but it doesn't look likely judging by webber's pace in china.

Smaller sidepods is a big step though. It can be tightened up a little more in the rear.

I don't think the season would be over by any stretch. They've shown today that the McLarens can beat them when things aren't going perfectly for the Bulls. Also if you look at Webber's lap time comparisons vs Hamilton, they're pretty evenly matched over the middle of the race, with Webber losing out massively at the start, but then reeling in the rest of the field only on his last set of tyres. Remember he had brand new options for that final stint at the time when the others were nursing fragile and slow hard tyres - there's a second a lap right there. Plus the options last longer so he would have been able to push harder for longer. By the end of that stint though, Hamilton was still equalling his times.

There were two real revelations for me today that are likely to affect the next few races. 1) saving tyres in quali can really pay off in the race. 2) Hamilton did something differently in the final stint that made the hard tyres work - he was by far the fastest driver on the hard tyres and made them last better than the others at the front of the field who were also on a 3 stop strategy. I don't know if even McLaren knows what it was that made that happen but you can be sure they'll be analysing it to death over the next few weeks. If that's something they can recapture every race then you could see McLaren finally being able to really take the fight to Red Bull.

[Giblet]

Not sure if that has been touched on yet in regards to cooling, but now that the radiators are shaped differently, there is less radiator in close proximity to the engine compared to other cars.

Having at least some of the rads further away with the channel of air in between the top of the engine and the top of the Lpod has to be good for cooling, no?

[HampusA]

I have been thinking about this regarding sidepods,

Mclaren has advantages running that kind of setup but it seems to me the car is thicker from the driver´s head out to where the side pod intake start so it seems that there have been some trade-offs as well. It doesn´t look like it´s that much more air getting by to the wing as you would expect.

Anyway, here´s my theory on what might possibly work that is sort of a hybrid between the two. You get the sidepod height a little higher then Mclaren´s but you don´t get that L shape at the end.
And as for Ferrari and the other you get more air going over the intake due to it being shorter but wider then Ferrari´s.

Feel free to shoot it down

[wesley123]

Not working? At McLaren they have built a car that goes through air like a warm knife through butter, they can simply bolt on any downforce they can get, at McLaren the car out of the box might be lacking df but when setup correctly it is barely down to Red Bull's df.

So unless they get these downforce from some kind of magic trick the L shaped sidepod is doing its work correctly.

[Caerdroia]

I have been thinking about this regarding sidepods,

Mclaren has advantages running that kind of setup but it seems to me the car is thicker from the driver´s head out to where the side pod intake start so it seems that there have been some trade-offs as well. It doesn´t look like it´s that much more air getting by to the wing as you would expect.

Anyway, here´s my theory on what might possibly work that is sort of a hybrid between the two. You get the sidepod height a little higher then Mclaren´s but you don´t get that L shape at the end.
And as for Ferrari and the other you get more air going over the intake due to it being shorter but wider then Ferrari´s.

Feel free to shoot it down

The top the McLaren's U sidepod is not higher than the top of the sidepod of any other car, nor is it higher than any of the sidepod's McLaren have had in recent years.

[beelsebob]

I have been thinking about this regarding sidepods,

Mclaren has advantages running that kind of setup but it seems to me the car is thicker from the driver´s head out to where the side pod intake start so it seems that there have been some trade-offs as well. It doesn´t look like it´s that much more air getting by to the wing as you would expect.

Anyway, here´s my theory on what might possibly work that is sort of a hybrid between the two. You get the sidepod height a little higher then Mclaren´s but you don´t get that L shape at the end.
And as for Ferrari and the other you get more air going over the intake due to it being shorter but wider then Ferrari´s.

Feel free to shoot it down

The issue here is that Ferrari's idea neatly directs the air under and round the side of the pods and to the rear wing; the McLaren one neatly directs the air over the top and to the rear wing, containing it in the channel. The homemade design meanwhile would just push the air outwards, create drag, and not drive the rear wing.

[Daffron]

I have been thinking about this regarding sidepods,

Mclaren has advantages running that kind of setup but it seems to me the car is thicker from the driver´s head out to where the side pod intake start so it seems that there have been some trade-offs as well. It doesn´t look like it´s that much more air getting by to the wing as you would expect.

Anyway, here´s my theory on what might possibly work that is sort of a hybrid between the two. You get the sidepod height a little higher then Mclaren´s but you don´t get that L shape at the end.
And as for Ferrari and the other you get more air going over the intake due to it being shorter but wider then Ferrari´s.

Feel free to shoot it down

The top the McLaren's U sidepod is not higher than the top of the sidepod of any other car, nor is it higher than any of the sidepod's McLaren have had in recent years.

I also think that there is a rule for the minimum height of the sidepod, for safety if nothing else. I can't be bothered to find the reg so I might be wrong.

The car looks like it will be good at Spa and Monza when the wings are turned down.

I think these sidepods are here to stay, they look to have genuine advantages.

[finishline]

The not quite complete Mclaren on the grid
from http://adamcooperf1.com/2011/04/17/lewi ... -to-fight/

[Pierre6]

Hello!

http://motorsport.nextgen-auto.com/gall ... medium.jpg

Can anybody explain to me what the the four holes are for at each side of the endplate?

Thanks.

[3one]

Hello!

http://motorsport.nextgen-auto.com/gall ... medium.jpg

Can anybody explain to me what the the four holes are for at each side of the endplate?

Thanks.

Which 4 holes? Do you mean the extension of the rear wing to the level of the diffuser?

[Pierre6]

Okay, i miswrote that completely

I mean the four holes beneath the AkzoNobel sticker It's to channel the air out,... but i don't see how it gives the car an advantage,... I also didn't see it on other cars.

[Pierre6]

Hello!

http://motorsport.nextgen-auto.com/gall ... medium.jpg

Can anybody explain to me what the the four holes are for at each side of the endplate?

Thanks.

Which 4 holes? Do you mean the extension of the rear wing to the level of the diffuser?

Okay, i miswrote that completely

I mean the four holes beneath the AkzoNobel sticker It's to channel the air out,... but i don't see how it gives the car an advantage,... I also didn't see it on other cars.

[Just_a_fan]

Hello!

http://motorsport.nextgen-auto.com/gall ... medium.jpg

Can anybody explain to me what the the four holes are for at each side of the endplate?

Thanks.

Which 4 holes? Do you mean the extension of the rear wing to the level of the diffuser?

Okay, i miswrote that completely

I mean the four holes beneath the AkzoNobel sticker It's to channel the air out,... but i don't see how it gives the car an advantage,... I also didn't see it on other cars.

It's a device seen on cars in previous seasons. If you look closely, you'll see that the vanes are curved with each being slightly different to the others. The obvious aim is to turn the air flow outwards - presumably to try to link the diffuser to the space behind the rear tyres.

The aim is to improve efficiency or directly increase downforce. We can't know the exact details of how it works because we don't know the exact flow in this volume.

[Pierre6]

Great explanation! Thanks a lot