A place to discuss the characteristics of the cars in Formula One, both current as well as historical. Laptimes, driver worshipping and team chatter do not belong here.
That is the reason why Ferrari left out the variable length intake trumpets. The inter-cooler was in the way. If Honda does indeed have variable length intake trumpets then there can be no inter-cooler deep between the V.
On a typical sunny day there's a significant temperature gradient from pavement level on up. The air temp 1000 mm above the pavement is significantly cooler than the air temp 10 mm high.
The engine coolant & oil, transmission oil, hydraulic fluid, etc. do not need to be cooled down to ambient. They'll always run significantly hotter than ambient. They can accept heat exchangers with lower/hotter inlets. The slightly higher temp down low means the heat exchanger might need to be slightly larger, but this will still be able to achieve the desired higher-than-ambient temp.
In contrast, the intake-air for the engine and airflow over any intercooler is desired to be as cool as possible. If a low air intake is 2C hotter than a higher air intake, then the low air intake just lost you a bit of hp. Same for the intercooler because it needs to cool to as close to ambient as possible. The intercooler designer will never be satisfied with lower/hotter cooling flow like the engine-oil heat-exchanger designer.
The other cooler stuff is something I don't know much about, and that's the cooling for the various KERS-type components (energy recovery/storage/release). I don't know if these bits work better all the way down to ambient temp. Quite possibly they do.
So the significance of the McLaren "spine-cooler" is not the position of the cooler, rather it's the high position of its air intake. This high inlet is prime intake real estate, therefore I believe it goes to the intercooler or possibly a KERS component. It would be a bit wasted on cooling engine oil, transmission oil, etc.
Peter Prodromou was heard to be very disturbed, when he saw Mark Webber giving a taxi ride to Fernando, where Fernando had to struggle and sit near the driver. It had the tendency to damage the driver cocoon and this time he has decided to provide more space for such rides.
