GPR-A wrote: ↑27 Jan 2018, 19:17
mmred wrote: ↑27 Jan 2018, 18:11
GPR-A wrote: ↑27 Jan 2018, 18:06
What is the definition of best aero?
more load at slow speed, and not too much drag at top speed ( but that s less important ), that s also what determined the best cars of the previous era in wich pu were similar ( red bull era and brawn and ferraris and renaults before ), still the best solution today
Sorry, you don't make any sense. If I understand correctly, you have picked up what people have been talking here throughout last year and terming Ferrari as the best aero, without clearly defining how a losing car can possess best aero.
It's not like Mercedes PU is 100 hp more powerful than Ferrari (compared to Honda, quite possibly yes). If anything, there is a 20-30 HP between them, which roughly translates into 2 to 3 tenths. Surely, if Ferrari had a superior Aero, that power deficit in PU could have been easy to overcome. Even more so, as you are saying that, Mercedes did not have best Suspension as you say, Red Bull had better suspension, then Ferrari should have been easily beating Mercedes. None of that happened. On circuits like Circuit De Catalunya, Silverstone, Suzuka and Austin, which are supreme examples of high downforce, Mercedes beat the Ferrari hands down. Now, define best aero!
I have been repeating this upteenth number of time, Mercedes W09 lacked good traction out of slow corners, for
most part of the season. But in Abu Dhabi, in Sector 3 (full of slow twisty corners), which was SUPPOSED to be a Ferrari sector; in qualifying, W09 was almost a second faster than the Ferrari in that sector alone!
For those who have followed the Mercedes design philosophy, understand that Mercedes brings most efficient downforce (low coefficient of downforce vs drag), not outright high downforce. So, Mercedes excels on circuits which puts premium on both power and downforce in equal terms.
you committ several errors in your evaluations ( deductions )
1 ) had the ferrari the top aero load at low speed yes or not? YES montecarlo hun. and sin. told us clearly that, even Lauda admitted that in hun.
2 ) u tell that spain and silv, are example of best aero, no they are the example of best compromise, cause they have quite important speed sectors too, and when you have pu adv. you can run with more wing and compromise better, basically what happened there where ferrari had aero adv. on slow sectors but lost too much on fast part ( silv. partic.) these tracks always told the best car all around for the whole season
3 ) abu dhabi is the only exception to this behaviour where ferrari lost also on slow corners, but at the end of the season everyone was basically runnin a lab car for the future ( especially on the suspensions ) and ferrari was so underpowered and with fuel problems in race that quite frankly they could even retire or have pu problem all the time
4 ) hp adv. is quite a debate here, probably your estimate is accurate just on qualy conf. but in race we saw much worse ( probably 50 cause merc. used special maps quite all the time, if you remember brazil you understand what was almost a full race on maps and if you see abu dabi you realize wath low fuel maps mean at the opposite )
5 ) traction is aero and suspension and torque, since torque is quite exuberant on turbos the limit is really aero and how suspension maximizies the aero so traction is a confirmation of better aero load at slow speed, hence (1)
6 ) where mercedes prevailed was not so much on top speed ( they had constantly 7km more that s a lot but still could allow some overtake ) and top speed is heavily influenced by both hp and aero drag
but the difference was heavily evident in the mid part of the straight: see for example spa attempts of vettel with less drag because of wake effect, he could not match top speed, and see in comparison some great progressions from bottas in baku, sochi , or defenses in austria, the clear adv. was mid straight so at medium speeds, better hp there all from engine maps. in some race situations
7 ) you say that 3 tenths from engine just on quali, where the adv. was even minor than in race because of maps and fuel setups, arent enough... well, look, the ferrari aero was better but not 3 tenths better ( that would be too much from aero on all tracks )
8 ) efficiency is not a correct parameter, also if every people tell so usually to avoid explainin too complicated effects
i am an aerospace eng. in cfd, efficiency is good to optimize better drag reduction at constant speed to minimize plane fuel consumption,
but a car has a variable aero setting because of suspensions effect and so variable efficiency at different speeds, it s also a total different aerodinamic problem to solve ( since it doesnt focus on drag reduction to minimizie fuel consumption at equivalent load at a costant speed )
what you want is to maximizie two entire different parameters taken at different speed, load at slow medium speed to run better turns and bring more speed out of turns so to have better traction too, and drag at FAST speed to run faster on straigts
( some cars focus more on the first some others focus more on the second: but quite frankly the first parameter has always been more important with equivalent engines )
optimizing the two parameters requires to optimize aero at two different setups and it is not efficiency related asmuch is a suspension problem... especially in the last years .. and a rake problem
drag overall from the three top cars was quite probably similar ( sure mercedes focused on less drag compared to the others but the other cars had a great load advantage ) so mercedes philosophy was more focused on straights while ferrari and redbull one on turns...
still if mercedes had the better car overall from aero performance it would have won hands free in all the tracks having a 3tenths qualy ( qualy ) advantage just from the engine (assuming you are correct on this some , even Vettel estimated it as more ) , it clearly lacked in comparison to the other twos in aero beside on fast tracks, in races they didnt even show their adv. beside when they were behind... as usual
