McLaren MP4-18

[marcush.]

that is a very good point,indeed !
All leading members of the design team always say,you cannot just copy other peoples work as you would immediatelly destroy all the work you have done before,and especially the front wing was of mayor importance as it sets up the flow for the rest of the aero devices.
Well ...if your concepts don´t work in the first place ,maybe you are forced accept to return to the start and try again.....

[marcush.]

in all honesty ,I would have sacked Mr coulthard a long time ago.
In my opinion he is one of the problems mclaren faces as his performances in qualifying render mclaren a one car team after qualifying weekend after weekend.And how many hours would you need to gain those 5-10 seconds lost by starting from 10th position if you tried to find these seconds in the windtunnel....a good 4 months,I´d suppose.
Maybe they should hire Mr Gascoyne ...he has lowered the CGheight of the new toyota significantly in only 4 months...wonder where they put their ballast before,maybe they did copy the sauber sloution and put it on top of the rollhoop.....

[Spencifer_Murphy]

The thing about the change in mclaren's front wing has had me thinking for quite a while. I mean I am sure that Mclaren are able to make a fron wing which matches the rest of the aero-package suitably but When you change such a fundamental part (the front wing) and by such a drastic amount, it must have some sort of knock-on effect over the rest of the areo setup. Yes this new front wing must generate more front-end downforce (why else would they put it on the car?) But how is it effecting the airflow over the rest of the car? The whole piont in the shape of Mclaren's W-wing (not just the W-shape but also the shaping of the wing as a whole) was that air was channeled over it and around the twin keels...the new wing is not shaped in a manner that does this...this cannot be too good for the areo as a whole can it?

[Steven]

Not only is it therefore a laborious task to manufacture this gearbox but after successfully bonding the titanium and carbonfibre it is still suseptable to delamination (in this case the carbonfibre delaminating from the titanium NOT the carbon delaminating from the carbon as you might have though) Really this gearbox is causeing Mclaren a hell of a lot of problems for very little benifit.

Well actually, I thought Titanium was heavier than Carbon fibres, so I don't see the benefit here. Could anyone help me on this?

[marcush.]

well,it could be they use the titanium to suport the bearings /shafts of the box,and you need something to build the flanges to mate the box to the engine (flanges) so there is a need for inserts ,also for all the threads to hold screws for caps,flanges etc...

[Irvingthien]

I got a few questions here..
what does pitch sensitive means??
and why do they have to bond titanium with carbon, can't they just have carbon gearbox?
Well, to my point of view, the 19 is one of the most beautiful cars around.
But there are too many flaws. Their brakes are to ancient. Unlike Ferrari, they need big brake ducts for cooling punished the cars aeroeffeciency. Altough the nose is thin and slim, it's too low, so less air flow over the wing meaning that the front wing is generating less downforce than it potentially can.
Their biggest problem is their engine. Low on power and down on reliability. I think McLaren and Merc have better things to spend on than comissioning Mario Illen to design their engines.
Well, I hope the drivers will be patient and hope Raikkonen doesn't leaves, because Ferrari's time at the top will end someday.

[Spencifer_Murphy]

To answer your question pitch sensitivity is a trait that a car can have which is particularly destabilising for a car.

When you accelerate or brake the weight of the car shifts backwards and forwards respectively, you'll notice this in your road car. When this happens the suspension allows travel so the back and front ends of the car rises or lowers on the suspension travel. This is a change in pitch. A car which is described as being pitch sensitive is one where as the pitch of the car changes (when accelerating or braking) the areodynamics change drastically. For instance an example would be when braking into a corner your cars front end lowers to the ground and for some reason this causes your front wing to generate less downforce, you suddenly start to understeer, this is a pitch sensitive car.

I hope that helps answer your qustion, Irvingthien. Btw I agree wiv you, even though the MP4-19 is slow and unreliable...it looks great!

[Enzo]

well,it could be they use the titanium to suport the bearings /shafts of the box,and you need something to build the flanges to mate the box to the engine (flanges) so there is a need for inserts ,also for all the threads to hold screws for caps,flanges etc...

This was something that Ferrari have used with success so if the story about McLaren using a "mix" of both CFRP and titanium is true then can we assume that they are not in a situation to succeed as Ferrari has? Actually Ferrari used a combination of CFRP and titaniun where the rear structure and bellhousing were made of carbon fibre composite and the central part which carries all the loads from gears made of titanium. The suspension was mounted on both the two sections.

So, is that the revolutionary thing about MP/18-19 we have heard of? Something that Ferrari have already used with success?

P.S. To be honest this solution is not ideal as the difference in heat expansion of the 2 different materials being mated together can cause serious problems.

[marcush.]

as far as I know Ferari uses a investment casting process to build a titanium gearbox casing with a carbonfibre endcover ,that is a totally different story.
In earlier days they had a welded casing (designed by barnard)first made of steel later in titanium .they had belhousings and endcovers made of caronfibre back then,I believe..

Pitch sensitive is related to aerodynamic sensitiveness to ride height variations at the front.
To reduce this sensivity you have to increase the ground clearance of the aeroparts at the front at the loss of some ground effect(aero forces very close to the ground surface are sinificantly higher then at say 100mm ,where all tunnel and venturi effects diminish to a point of irrelevance.

[tipcapman]

I got a few questions here..
and why do they have to bond titanium with carbon, can't they just have carbon gearbox?

Composites, whether they be carbon, fiberglass, or Kevlar reinforced, have little strength in the Z direction, that being perpendicular to the fibers. This leads to delamination if the interlaminar stresses are too high.

Thay also have relatively low "bearing" strength, i.e. resistance to crushing when a contact force is applied.

Metals have neither of these problems. Therefore, the engineer is sometimes tempted to integrate metal into his design, especially in the case of bearing strength where bolted attachments and the like are required.

The delaminations mentioned earlier in the thread, and then possibly clarified as disbonds of a metal part from a composite part, are also affected by the stresses in the joint, as well as the temperature. So it could be a combination of the strength reduction due to temperature as well as the bond stresses that caused the failures.

And finally with regard to preparation of titanium for bonding, it is very finicky, but can be done, and can be successful, depending on the strength requirements. And of course weight (an dapparently not cost!) is one of the prime driving parameters in F1!!!!

Regards,


Len