[ 2020 ] Mclaren F1 Team - Renault

[ALO_Power]

If we want to daydream a bit, let's think that if McLaren manages to have a similar pace to Monza come Sunday, then with 1 weaker Merc we could see great things. But of course, let's wait and see, we could just be having another decent scoring streak like few days ago, which is also enough.

[diffuser]

On a slightly different note. not sure how many of you were watching the race via the SKY sports. If you did, did you notice how unexcited David Croft sounded when Sainz passed the 2 Renaults?

[M840TR]

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.


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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.

Bigger tyres.

[ferkan]

It was a wooly quote, but Ferrari have said on a few occassions that 2021 will be like 2020. Whether that is all smoke and mirrors I don't know, but they have indicated that the cars issues may continue into next year, at least in some part.

It’s still to be seen what Ferrari can do, but even when they are struggling more than expected this season, they have had some decent races too and they still have the one of the largest (if not the largest) budget in F1... So, it is to be expected that they will improve... How much? Remains to be seen, but most of their deficit seems to be coming from their engine and if the recover some of the loss for next year, they will probably be in contention to fight for P3 at least.


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There is only so much they can do to the car I guess, budget or not, the rules are quite restrictive, so unless they have designed chassis changes now in readiness for next year, I can't imagine they will move on too much. I'm also yet to be convinced that Leclerc isn't able to extract more out of a car then almost every other driver on the grid and that the car actually is very poor (For a Ferrari).

I suspect that in a Mclaren this year he would have achieved more than he did at Ferrari, but that is just my opinion and until his career unfolds and sheds a little more light on his talent, we won't really know.

I'm looking forward to Leclerc v Sainz next year, sadly, I think I know the outcome.

IMO, what Ferrari has shown this season, as well as their customer teams, and what Vettel shown in comparison to Leclerc, I would be very surprised if there was more in that Ferrari then what everyone thinks there is.

If you look at it, both Mclaren drivers should have been quite a bit ahead of Leclerc in standings and yet, neither of them is (and probably won't finish the season ahead).

[SmallSoldier]

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 am most probably mistaken, but what I recall from that season is that the problem was actually in the execution part, I honestly don’t know if it was on the design side or the manufacturing side, but the distance from the front wheels to the bargeboards was “smaller than expected” and it wasn’t by a lot, but with this cars been so sensitive it seems that a few millimeters could make quiet the difference.

The reason why there wasn’t an MCL33-B was because of how late in the season the actual problem was found... The fix wasn’t just some suspension parts or new bargeboard pieces, it required a new chassis and the cost of implementing one for a short amount of races at the end of the season wasn’t justifiable (considering the change of regulations upcoming in 2019).

As you pointed out, the problem with the MCL33 was consistency while cornering and that was because of the loss of downforce when they couldn’t control the front tire wake as expected, forcing them to run more front and rear wing to compensate (which ultimately made the car excessively draggy).


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[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’

Won't Perez have penalties?

Wouldn’t like to say, I’ve seen he’s used all his elements that are available to him for the season but even so, if he had to take a new MGU-K I’d imagine he’d still start the race inside the top 10 with a 5 place grid drop and with the race pace he had in Bahrain I’d expect him to get back to P3-6 by the end of the race

[mwillems]

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.

The issue was related to how the air behaved in the wake of the tyres when the car was turning. The tyres were too close for the car to be able to deal with the turbulant air under those conditions (It was fine in a straight line or with mild steering angle). SmallSoldier is also right about why it wasn't fixed, it was indeed because they couldn't understand the issue properly until some time in the season. It was a few races after Barcelona if I recall after they introduced the nose and the team just starter to unravel when things didn't make sense.

[mwillems]

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?

Wouldn’t like to say, I’ve seen he’s used all his elements that are available to him for the season but even so, if he had to take a new MGU-K I’d imagine he’d still start the race inside the top 10 with a 5 place grid drop and with the race pace he had in Bahrain I’d expect him to get back to P3-6 by the end of the race

Maybe, I think if we start ahead of Perez we have a decent chance of keeping ahead or in similar positions.

We don't need to finish ahead now, just need to collect some solid points I think. If we finished 7th and 8th in the next two races we'd get 20 points and I should think that might be enough to get us over the line. Hopefully I'm not getting ahead of myself.

[mwillems]

It’s still to be seen what Ferrari can do, but even when they are struggling more than expected this season, they have had some decent races too and they still have the one of the largest (if not the largest) budget in F1... So, it is to be expected that they will improve... How much? Remains to be seen, but most of their deficit seems to be coming from their engine and if the recover some of the loss for next year, they will probably be in contention to fight for P3 at least.


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There is only so much they can do to the car I guess, budget or not, the rules are quite restrictive, so unless they have designed chassis changes now in readiness for next year, I can't imagine they will move on too much. I'm also yet to be convinced that Leclerc isn't able to extract more out of a car then almost every other driver on the grid and that the car actually is very poor (For a Ferrari).

I suspect that in a Mclaren this year he would have achieved more than he did at Ferrari, but that is just my opinion and until his career unfolds and sheds a little more light on his talent, we won't really know.

I'm looking forward to Leclerc v Sainz next year, sadly, I think I know the outcome.

IMO, what Ferrari has shown this season, as well as their customer teams, and what Vettel shown in comparison to Leclerc, I would be very surprised if there was more in that Ferrari then what everyone thinks there is.

If you look at it, both Mclaren drivers should have been quite a bit ahead of Leclerc in standings and yet, neither of them is (and probably won't finish the season ahead).

Vettel has either been spectacularly poor and made Leclerc look amazing, or Leclerc is amazing. I suspect the truth is in-between.

[Morteza]

[diffuser]

There is only so much they can do to the car I guess, budget or not, the rules are quite restrictive, so unless they have designed chassis changes now in readiness for next year, I can't imagine they will move on too much. I'm also yet to be convinced that Leclerc isn't able to extract more out of a car then almost every other driver on the grid and that the car actually is very poor (For a Ferrari).

I suspect that in a Mclaren this year he would have achieved more than he did at Ferrari, but that is just my opinion and until his career unfolds and sheds a little more light on his talent, we won't really know.

I'm looking forward to Leclerc v Sainz next year, sadly, I think I know the outcome.

IMO, what Ferrari has shown this season, as well as their customer teams, and what Vettel shown in comparison to Leclerc, I would be very surprised if there was more in that Ferrari then what everyone thinks there is.

If you look at it, both Mclaren drivers should have been quite a bit ahead of Leclerc in standings and yet, neither of them is (and probably won't finish the season ahead).

Vettel has either been spectacularly poor and made Leclerc look amazing, or Leclerc is amazing. I suspect the truth is in-between.

He kind of did the same thing at RBR when Riccardo was kicking his butt there. Not sure if it was motivation or what. There was a huge drop off in his performance. Think he might just be a one trick pony. No strong rear and he's nada.

[Macklaren]

Multiple media sources saying Russell is now the top candidate for HAM's seat but Williams have not released him yet. REALLY hoping that he gets it. Going to be an epic scrap between him, ALB, LEC and NOR for P3-7 this weekend

[diffuser]

Won't Perez have penalties?

Wouldn’t like to say, I’ve seen he’s used all his elements that are available to him for the season but even so, if he had to take a new MGU-K I’d imagine he’d still start the race inside the top 10 with a 5 place grid drop and with the race pace he had in Bahrain I’d expect him to get back to P3-6 by the end of the race

Maybe, I think if we start ahead of Perez we have a decent chance of keeping ahead or in similar positions.

We don't need to finish ahead now, just need to collect some solid points I think. If we finished 7th and 8th in the next two races we'd get 20 points and I should think that might be enough to get us over the line. Hopefully I'm not getting ahead of myself.

I seem to remember that RP wasn't very good with top speed circuits like Monza.

[Macklaren]

Lance got a podium in Monza but only because he got lucky with the free pitstop

[djos]

Lance kinda reminds me of Mark Webber, when he’s on fire he’s excellent, otherwise he’s merely a very good driver.

I think he really got robbed by his own team in that recent q2 tho and that just killed his weekend.