[ 2020 ] Mclaren F1 Team - Renault

[ThePapayaJaguar]

21 circle is even more than his segment on the medium.

That's surprising to say the least. On the topic of the Mercedes PU, James Allison said that HPP focused on reducing cooling requirements so they can maximize the overall area of the floor in addition to more power. Will be interesting to see what we come up with for 2022.

[mwillems]

Hamilton to miss Sakir due positive COVID-19 test. This could have some bearing on the fight for P3,

Would I be right if I recalled that their backup is Stoffel Vandoorne?

[Ground Effect]

Hamilton to miss Sakir due positive COVID-19 test. This could have some bearing on the fight for P3,

Would I be right if I recalled that their backup is Stoffel Vandoorne?

Correct, and Esteban Gutierrez, but I don’t think he’s license is up to date.

[mwillems]

Hamilton to miss Sakir due positive COVID-19 test. This could have some bearing on the fight for P3,

Would I be right if I recalled that their backup is Stoffel Vandoorne?

Correct, and Esteban Gutierrez, but I don’t think he’s license is up to date.

It will be interesting to see the difference between Bottas and Vandoorne. Bottas has to put him down convincingly or questions will be asked.

I'm happy for Stoffel to get this seat, if indeed he does get it, will be nice to see him back in F1 for a race.

[chrisgr]

It would be great to see Vandoorne in a Mercedes car but not good for us I think. RP seems more capable of being in those first places. We can count on having two (almost) equally talented drivers and in Monza 's form (and Stroll....)

[CjC]

Hamilton to miss Sakir due positive COVID-19 test. This could have some bearing on the fight for P3,

Huge bearing if you ask me.
Any surprise podium from the midfield could now potentially be a second rather than a third and as we know the points jump between finishing positions get bigger and bigger the high you finish and our cushion to the others could be eroded immediately.
Hopefully it’ll be like Monza but I expect Perez to be strong again till the end of the season.
If Bottas doesn’t pull his finger out there’s a huge chance a midfield team can win the race I don’t have a good feeling about Red Bull and to put a dampener of expectations... Lando was his usual confident self about the Bahrain outer when asked immediately after the Bahrain inner on Sky sighting having a good top speed will be key and that ‘something we lack’

[diffuser]

How many laps did Carlos do on the Softs? I think he did just over 20 laps. I ask because they managed the Softs pretty well on a high degradation track.

He did 23 but 7 under safety car conditions. So 16. His sector 2 of that last lap had a big drop of 2 seconds.

[kfrantzios]

I think RP have a, like others said, an edge with buying Merc parts. They are ahead and they'll stay ahead (pace wise). Wether they can execute is another question. I haven't really thought about the effects of Vettel/Stroll driver combo will have. My guess is a negative effect but Vettel has surprised me in the past. He still not as good as his 4 world titles suggest but he still has ability. Even with less points from Vettel, they'll like get more points from Stroll and they will not have the loss of points from Copy gate. So they'll likely finish ahead.

I talked about why More DNFs, They'll have Integration issues. Renault Pu is integrated and you've run it for a few sseasons so you could have worked on getting even more kinks.

I think Renault to be about the same but just a little ahead because our slight tick down.


Ferrari is a really big Question mark. Can they be working on a completly new PU for 2022 and an upgraded 2020 PU for 2021? I don't think that's even allowed. So it depends on what PU they have for next year. I don't see how they could have an all new PU and not have to take tokens for it like McLaren. Like Renault I think thier new PU is said to be split turbo. I haven't followed Ferrari as closely.

The driver changes will offer a significant change, more to Ferrari than anyone else I think. I feel Sainz will perform closer to Leclerc than Vettel this year, which will boost Ferrari a lot- their car has improved in the second half of the season too, although not as much as you'd have expected.

Danny Ric to Mclaren is a boost and of course, driver changes at Renault and RP, but I feel like Mclarens driver line up would be second only to Ferrari in that core group of 4 teams.

But then the changes to the floor may offer a mix up in terms of performance that could make the raw car pace a little more random. It will be interesting to see RPs solution to the floor change. Perez certainly seems to think it might be decent.

Regardind drivers, i agree with you that Sainz will perform better than Vettel. Also Vettel will perform much better in Aston Martin. Is Leclerc in Riciardo level? I think he is. But Riciardo is far more experienced. I think that Ferrari drivers and Mclaren Drivers will be on par. I expect Alonso on Renault to perform good enough for his standards. I really cant tell about Ocon.

[M840TR]

I don’t expect many issues for Mclaren changing PU’s... I understand that the last couple of changes came with challenges, but the change to the Honda PU problems were related to the Honda PU unluckily not been up to par when introduce... The change to Renault afterwards didn’t generate big issues (except for the ones at testing where there were pockets of hot air, which were addressed before the start of the season)... The problems in 2018 weren’t related to the change in PU (even though that was a pretty late call).

There seems to be a myth that changing PU’s means that the teams will struggle by default due to the change, but I fail to understand what is the causality in that situation.

In regards to finish position, next year will probably be very similar to this one, with a group of cars very close to each other (Mclaren, Renault, Alpha Tauri) with a couple of unknowns... Ferrari could make a big jump next year if they have been working on 2021 behind the scenes (they will have a new engine next season and the lack of major upgrades during the season would indicate focus on next year’s car)... Racing Point is the other one that could either be really good like this year or fall behind a bit compared to the rest of the midfield if they don’t manage the change in the floor as well as others.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

The consensus was that the 2018 pu change did effect the car's performance because it was so late and the team had to marshal critical resources that would've otherwise been spent in various other areas.

My understanding is that the 2018 performance issues were due to a mistake made in the chassis where the bargeboards were closer to the front wheels than designed, therefore they weren’t controlling the wake of the front tire as efficiently and forced to run more downforce to compensate for the lack of aero performance when entering a turn.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Well yes, but actually, no. It wasn't as much a mistake as a flawed design direction. Not like there were miscalculations in the wheelbase measurements or anything. Based upon the team's own statements and inferences made from the recent in-season aero testing & development approach, it's very likely the root cause went towards correlation issues.

But Tim Goss said if they had time and regulations weren't changing for 2019, they would've launched a b-spec Mcl-33 around Spa. That leads me to believe that if the car had been a product of a 'normal' development schedule where certain key design elements such as packaging and bell housing/transmission are locked around the previous season's winter tests, they could've corrected the flaws earlier.

It's pertinent to mention that these current car that were introduced in 2017 carried a peculiar trait that, although has always been a part of F1, apparently wasn't ever as pronounced, which is instability during yaw. Andrea Stella even said in 2019 or 2018 that the lead cars were faster not necessarily because of higher peak downforce but consistency during corners. And that was also one of the Mcl-33's fatal shortcomings. So while they probably wouldn't have been able to completely solve the issue, they would've significantly corrected it nevertheless.

[M840TR]

Hamilton to miss Sakir due positive COVID-19 test. This could have some bearing on the fight for P3,

Huge bearing if you ask me.
Any surprise podium from the midfield could now potentially be a second rather than a third and as we know the points jump between finishing positions get bigger and bigger the high you finish and our cushion to the others could be eroded immediately.
Hopefully it’ll be like Monza but I expect Perez to be strong again till the end of the season.
If Bottas doesn’t pull his finger out there’s a huge chance a midfield team can win the race I don’t have a good feeling about Red Bull and to put a dampener of expectations... Lando was his usual confident self about the Bahrain outer when asked immediately after the Bahrain inner on Sky sighting having a good top speed will be key and that ‘something we lack’

Won't Perez have penalties?

[_cerber1]

Won't Perez have penalties?

It can be only +5 positions, because his MGU-K caught fire, the rest may have been saved. A completely new motor can give it a few tenths of an advantage at a given time.

[Macklaren]

It will be interesting to see the difference between Bottas and Vandoorne. Bottas has to put him down convincingly or questions will be asked.

I'm happy for Stoffel to get this seat, if indeed he does get it, will be nice to see him back in F1 for a race.

I don't think it can be Stoffel. He is in Spain and outside the bubble and the mid-east restrictions are quite strict. I hope they put Russell in the Mercedes and Nico Hulkenberg in the Williams - will also give Williams the benefit of an experienced benchmark driver

[Macklaren]

It can be only +5 positions, because his MGU-K caught fire, the rest may have been saved.

That was quite the conflagration though. Ultimately, Sergio's decision to keep driving for half a lap instead of pulling over right away may prove quite decisive.

[diffuser]

The consensus was that the 2018 pu change did effect the car's performance because it was so late and the team had to marshal critical resources that would've otherwise been spent in various other areas.

My understanding is that the 2018 performance issues were due to a mistake made in the chassis where the bargeboards were closer to the front wheels than designed, therefore they weren’t controlling the wake of the front tire as efficiently and forced to run more downforce to compensate for the lack of aero performance when entering a turn.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Well yes, but actually, no. It wasn't as much a mistake as a flawed design direction. Not like there were miscalculations in the wheelbase measurements or anything. Based upon the team's own statements and inferences made from the recent in-season aero testing & development approach, it's very likely the root cause went towards correlation issues.

But Tim Goss said if they had time and regulations weren't changing for 2019, they would've launched a b-spec Mcl-33 around Spa. That leads me to believe that if the car had been a product of a 'normal' development schedule where certain key design elements such as packaging and bell housing/transmission are locked around the previous season's winter tests, they could've corrected the flaws earlier.

It's pertinent to mention that these current car that were introduced in 2017 carried a peculiar trait that, although has always been a part of F1, apparently wasn't ever as pronounced, which is instability during yaw. Andrea Stella even said in 2019 or 2018 that the lead cars were faster not necessarily because of higher peak downforce but consistency during corners. And that was also one of the Mcl-33's fatal shortcomings. So while they probably wouldn't have been able to completely solve the issue, they would've significantly corrected it nevertheless.

I agree whole heartedly. Longer wheelbase was the way they decided to fixit but obviously not the only way. RBR had a shorted wheelbase at the time and didn't have the same issue. So it had soemthing to do with the aero around that area.

The yaw factor had alot to do with the increase in weight. Since these cars are always drivien on the edge, the extra weight gives the cars more momentum. Once a car starts turning, the harder it is to stop it turning.

It is interesting that the new 2022 regs have a max wheelbase of 3600MM. I think that's about 10cm(4" if you lean that way) shorter than the McLaren current wheelbase.

[diffuser]

Hamilton to miss Sakir due positive COVID-19 test. This could have some bearing on the fight for P3,

Huge bearing if you ask me.
Any surprise podium from the midfield could now potentially be a second rather than a third and as we know the points jump between finishing positions get bigger and bigger the high you finish and our cushion to the others could be eroded immediately.
Hopefully it’ll be like Monza but I expect Perez to be strong again till the end of the season.
If Bottas doesn’t pull his finger out there’s a huge chance a midfield team can win the race I don’t have a good feeling about Red Bull and to put a dampener of expectations... Lando was his usual confident self about the Bahrain outer when asked immediately after the Bahrain inner on Sky sighting having a good top speed will be key and that ‘something we lack’

I don't wish him any harm but I'm so tired of the Merc one-two. I will enjoy the next race and hope I don't have to see it again untill next year, at the EARLIEST.