Red Bull RB6

[myurr]

as I
have doubts that RB is too lazy or short in expertise in adjusting tyre pressures for the race.I think it has to be something not easy to control.interestingly the RB crews play safeguard over the rear of the cars in pregrid...

Which is why I still reckon it's something much simpler than magic springs and the like - the Red Bull is the faster car but has a smaller operating window than the McLaren.

Hence they dial it in throughout qualifying, getting faster and faster through each session, but then come race day they're slightly outside their peak operating window whereas McLaren are still right inside theirs. So in the race the Red Bulls pace slips back relatively to the McLaren so that they're either equal on pace or the McLaren is a little bit quicker. On race day in Spain I think we just saw Webber with his car still just about in the operating window and Vettel with his car just outside.

There will be other small factors influencing it, such as one of the costs of McLarens flexibility appearing to be some raw pace with the softer tyres, possibly some magic suspension parts on the Red Bull that give maybe a tenth in qualifying, etc. But I think the primary factor is simply the versatility of the cars in changing conditions.

[i70q7m7ghw]

The key to the red bull success is the exhausts. It cleans up the ear exiting the car around the rear tyres. The effect on performance this has is probably much bigger in qualifying runs than it is with a fueled up car where things like the suspension will play a bigger part.

Watch some of the videos on the wet races and you'll see the exhausts at work, also see if you can dig out that video of Webber's oil leak at the start of one of the races this year, I think it was Bahrain - look at the route the smoke takes...

[zgred]

Watch some of the videos on the wet races and you'll see the exhausts at work, also see if you can dig out that video of Webber's oil leak at the start of one of the races this year, I think it was Bahrain - look at the route the smoke takes...

Bahrain 2010 - jump to 8:16

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Zgred very well spotted!

The smoke exits extremely wide, almost parallel to the tyre.
I think this widens the area to allow the air to escape, whereas as normal DD's are limited to the airflow that can be forced through it.
Must be 10% bigger the RB way.

[marcush.]

the intersting bit is the exhaust smoke is also IN the difusser and is really staying for very long under the side feet of the difusser if I spotted correctly.
As the exhaust pipe is ABOVE the difusser the slot must be very effective ...

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

But look at how wide the air goes.

That uses all the space between the wheels.

[marcush.]

But look at how wide the air goes.

That uses all the space between the wheels.

and how long the smoke stays just at the outer extremes the footplate or enturi tunnel or whatever you call it..it seals very effectively no ways outside air gets into the diffusser from the sides ..so maxed out difusser performance.cool.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

But look at how wide the air goes.

That uses all the space between the wheels.

and how long the smoke stays just at the outer extremes the footplate or enturi tunnel or whatever you call it..it seals very effectively no ways outside air gets into the diffusser from the sides ..so maxed out difusser performance.cool.

Yup its a bling diffuser for sure!
I think this is where the performance advantage is held. You only need look at how Red Bull have protected the actual design from rivals. Painting fake exhaust on top of the body...sneaky sneaky lol
They know how important it is.

[BreezyRacer]

Can anyone comment on this pic, as to whether there are inlets under the nose of the RB6, above the splitter and pointing into the radiator inlet areas? This looks very curious to me. You do not see these details every day. To me it looks like there's some sort of inner barge boards that channel airflow from the high pressure area above the splitter into the radiator ducting areas but I haven't seen this before.

[Blackout]

That are not inlets, just the space between the bodywork and the bargeboards.

[BreezyRacer]

That are not inlets, just the space between the bodywork and the bargeboards.

Look directly above the splitter and behind the ride height monitor pod, not between the barge boards. Do you see inlets there?

[Blackout]

no

I don't know

[newbie]

hahah...nope

[Blackout]

I have a simple (maybe simplistic) theory about The RB6, its low top speed and its high performances with low fuel...

A comparison between the R30 and the RB6 is very interesting. Both have the same engine, but the Renault has a good top speed when the second has a poor one, we all know that. The R30 one lacks of downforce while the RBR have a lot of downforce. So IMO, there is only one thing that can explain theses differences; the RB6 is not supernatural, as said above. It draws the largest part of its downfoce from its ordinary wings. I don't thik that all its downforce is really generated thanks to a good ground effect (front wing, floor, diffuser), otherwise it would have a very good Vmax ...

But it's still a very good car because it is clear that it relies heavily on its wing, but without damaging its tires... while a Renault clearly avoids to overload its wing in order to preserve its tires. So I think that the RB6 has a much better suspension, but at the same time, it depends much on its wings.

That would explain why the Renault works better when the track temperature is high (the grip increases and compensates the lack of grip) and it could also explain why the RBR works very well even with very little fuel onboard (big ride height) because, as stated above, its downforce comes mainly from the wings and not really fromthe floor/diffuser.

[timbo]

Adding bigger wing is relatively simple.
Yes, RBR have a lot downforce, but the thing is that I'm sure for this amount of downforce the drag penalty is low.
If you tried to add wings to Renault it would probably have even lower top-speed than RBR.