Ferrari F2013 (pre-launch speculation)

[stefan_]

I think they should first of all make a car that both drivers can actually drive and set-up properly to get good result. I can only think that the F2012 was built 90% for Alonso and Massa just couldn't understand the car and as a cosequence there were terrible results for him in the first half of the season.

[Lycoming]

What would they have designed into the car that was not adjustable that would have made it so that Massa could not "understand" the car?

[stefan_]

I don't know, but Massa's drive was really strange, they even changed his chassis at one point. You can't have a trash season like that at the start and end it up on a high. They must have done something really strange with the F2012 at the start.

This thread is about the F2013 though so...

[Sevach]

They changed chassis, but changing his chassis didn't bring him much at the time it happened...

I also wonder what caused Massa to suddenly "click" in the final stretch of the season, all this while the car hardly improved for Alonso.

[sriraj1031]

Guess the chassis was rigged thus making Alonso look god-like, if its true well it could be some news

[adam2003]

I wont anymore. as speculation is rubbish until the car is launched then i will conduct myself into the correct thread. Whats point in hearing people say "they will keep the pullrod" or they will do this. NOBODY KNOWS their is nothing to be gained from speculation son

*sigh* Adam, if you look at previous speculation threads, you'll see lots of great information was gathered and discussed. Some was right, some was wrong, some was close, some was way off. There's a lot of very smart people in here who follow F1 developments very closely and hence can add an objective and educated guess on what may or may not occur. You shouldn't begrudge them for that and the tone you use is very disrespectful.

Why not join in with what you think Ferrari may do - or just be quiet, as you're not adding any value and you seem to not be learning the lesson from the negative rating.

Im not interested in ratings, doesn't prove anything doesn't contribute to anything in the real world. I come on here looking for information and analysis of developments and factual stuff.

[Coefficient]

Call me crazy for posting such a ridiculous rumour here but here goes anyway!

Apparently, the F2013 will be red. I s#*t you not!!

[wesley123]

I wont anymore. as speculation is rubbish until the car is launched then i will conduct myself into the correct thread

Thats the point of speculation, genius[/quote]

Whats point in hearing people say "they will keep the pullrod" or they will do this. NOBODY KNOWS their is nothing to be gained from speculation son[/quote]

That is the point of speculation. Have a discussion if it stays on the car or not. If we have to go by your statement we would be better off closing the whole forum since 90% of the discussions going on are by 'possibilities', and not by 'facts'

[Nowhereman]

The pull rod idea this year was not completely thought out by Ferrari this year as it integrates into the complete chassi.
Their are advantages in aero though I guess minor.
What Ferrari failed to accomplish is how the pull bar transmits energy into the chassis at high speed turns.
CFD won't help with this.
Loading and unloading of each individual tire / wheel is the most critical aspect of handling turns.
RB was by far the slowest in every race on straights but still slapped everyone around in qualification and race time.
For a car to be great, it must be neutral under most conditions and the RB was.
My guess is that Ferrari will come out with a vastly enhanced cooling system that moves fluid to various points in the chassis to keep neutral balance during fuel usage.
"special shock absorbers" that sense things and adjust ride height should be in the mix also... all within the rules though.
Engine wise, lots of pedal mapping software and engine software to bring maximum torque at the desired points during a race.
RB could at anytime pull both Ferrari and McLaren out of turns with ease.
They got it to the ground better ie. balance + innovative mapping techniques.

[donskar]

Mods, please move if a more appropriate thread exists:

This is my concern in speculating about next year's Ferrari --

Nigel Roebuck: "Ferrari were disappointing, no question about it. They had a wind tunnel problem at the beginning of the year which they found out about quite late in the day. They were never able to understand why their wind tunnel figures were fantastic and on the track their performance was not a match for that. When it was eventually discovered that they had a major calibration problem it was almost 'start again.' So they had a very hard year."

That quote is from Motorsport magazine's review of the 2011 F1 season!

A full year later and Ferrari has not solved the problem. There is something very wrong with Ferrari's technical team.

Anyone out there have any info that indicates that Ferrari is taking the actions required to solve this problem? Bigois? An all-new WT? Move staff permanently to Cologne (Toyota's WT)? Entice Byrne to return full-time?

[Crucial_Xtreme]

Yeah the technical team has seemed to have the same problem for past few years. I wonder if its something Fry is in the process of changing?

I'm wondering if the addition of Bigois(Mercedes) and Sanchez(McLaren Head of Aero) will have a profound effect on the design of the car. These are two different guys from two different teams with different ways of working compared to what has been at Ferrari for the past few years. So I'm wondering if the 2013 car will be quite different in some ways than in previous years even though the Regs aren't changing much?

I definitely see the vertical radiators getting ditched and I'm hoping the car gets a proper undercut.

[Mika1]

Bigois? Haha, he did a terrible job at Mercedes. I am very happy they kicked him out.

[shelly]

@Crucial: I do not think Sanchez was Mcl head of aero. iirc he was team leader (i.e. supervisor of an area of the car or a shift team) and now at ferrari he is, Iirc, principle aerodynamicist. MClaren have another head of aero and have now promoted Marcin Budowski (I do not know if I mispelled his name), who worked for ferrari in the past, is very highly rated and was rumored to come back to maranello in spring, when he took a sabbatical term.
In terms of senior aero acquisition the heaviest, along with Bigois, is Agathangelou. Agathangelou was very highly rated at the beginning of 2000s and he was redbulls head of aero until newey brought in Prodromou. Since then he has been under the radar working for dallara in Italy, up ot this spring when Ferrari hired him.

[Crucial_Xtreme]

@Crucial: I do not think Sanchez was Mcl head of aero. iirc he was team leader (i.e. supervisor of an area of the car or a shift team) and now at ferrari he is, Iirc, principle aerodynamicist. MClaren have another head of aero and have now promoted Marcin Budowski (I do not know if I mispelled his name), who worked for ferrari in the past, is very highly rated and was rumored to come back to maranello in spring, when he took a sabbatical term.
In terms of senior aero acquisition the heaviest, along with Bigois, is Agathangelou. Agathangelou was very highly rated at the beginning of 2000s and he was redbulls head of aero until newey brought in Prodromou. Since then he has been under the radar working for dallara in Italy, up ot this spring when Ferrari hired him.

I had read somewhere that Sanchez was HoA at MaCa but don't remember where. Indeed OmniCorse says he was Team Leader of Aerodynamics.
I read just the other day in OmniCorse that Agathangelou will not work directly with the 2013 car but will focus on getting the Aero guys the best tools and work on sorting the tunnel issues & streamline the results when both tunnels are being used.

Bigois is sort of an unknown factor for me. He's been around for a while and definitely knows his stuff but hasn't accomplished a great deal. Remains to be seen how much he helps the team. A lot I hope.

But it's the fact we have these new Aerodynamic Engineer in the team now which obviously are used to different(maybe better tools), methodology, and just how they go about their work & how they design cars. So what I'm wondering is now that there's new fresh blood in the team, will we see Ferrari go down a different design/development path. How will their different philosophy affect the design of the car? We could potentially see radically(for Ferrari) different front or rear wings, etc.

[shelly]

The omnicorse article you cited crucial is very funny. It seems it was written 10 years ago.