Mercedes AMG F1 W05

[Emerson.F]

The front end is seriously well designed.
http://www.newsf1.it/wp-content/uploads ... 5_nose.jpg

Sorry, nothing against your or the cool graphic (and don't get me wrong) but how is this telling us anything new?
I'd be surprised to see freestream air spillage right before hitting the nose. Those flows are obvious.

It isn't telling us anything new. It just shows they have the best nose solution. The Fingernoses create far to much inconsistant air turbulence when the air is not hitting the car directly from the front. So in corners and on the straights the W05 has very consistant airflow. Thats just my 2 cents.

[timbo]

The front end is seriously well designed.
http://www.newsf1.it/wp-content/uploads ... 5_nose.jpg

Sorry, nothing against your or the cool graphic (and don't get me wrong) but how is this telling us anything new?
I'd be surprised to see freestream air spillage right before hitting the nose. Those flows are obvious.

It isn't telling us anything new. It just shows they have the best nose solution. The Fingernoses create far to much inconsistant air turbulence when the air is not hitting the car directly from the front. So in corners and on the straights the W05 has very consistant airflow. Thats just my 2 cents.

Um, impossible to tell from a single picture.

[Owen.C93]

Gotta get them blog hits.

I have a feeling if RBR had a diffuser starter motor hole like the Merc we might have seen a technical directive on it by now lol.

[.poz]

How can one team be so much quicker than the rest? Are Mercedes doing something different with their power unit compared to customer teams, or is it much better aerodynamics? I ask this because although the car looks a well developed chassis across all areas, it doesn't look as though it has huge amounts more downforce than everyone else. Malaysia backed this up as redbull where marginally quicker in sector 2 with is heavily dependent on downforce.

They are cleverly harvesting more energy under braking and from MGU-H. More than other merc powered team. And they also have a better torque management than other merc powered team.

My idea is that the difference is the ES: Ferrari and Renault engine have to save their ES and probably their loss of power (Alonso Vettel) is just the electronic cutting the ES to save the battery, on the contrary Mercedes looks like can abuse of their ES without any problem.

Can an "hybrid" ES done with supercapacitator _and_ battery explain this difference ? A supercapacitator can be charged/uncharged a lot faster then a battery...

[Emerson.F]

Um, impossible to tell from a single picture.

Its foolish too assume i'm basing my theory on just one picture.

[flyboy2160]

Um, impossible to tell from a single picture.

Its foolish too assume i'm basing my theory on just one picture.

I'm going to try to stop a potential flame war before it starts. Please don't call a post foolish when you haven't supplied reasons for your claim. A detailed aero analysis of why this nose is better than the finger noses would be well appreciated here, especially by aero-heads like me. But please don't be disrespectful of someone who questions an unsubstantiated claim.

Flyboy Steve

[Emerson.F]

Flyboy Steve[/i]

Did you read what i said? I'le just leave it at that.

[thomin]

On a different note, In an Interview after the Bahrain GP, Helmut Marko said regarding the Mercedes dominance:
"When you have the right fuel for your power unit, like Mercedes does, it can immediately make a difference of 30hp."

Could that be part of the reason why Mercedes is so much better than the other teams with Mercedes engines? Are there experts on the issue here? Can a fuel be "tuned" to an engine and would privileged access give Petronas an edge over other suppliers?

[kooleracer]

On a different note, In an Interview after the Bahrain GP, Helmut Marko said regarding the Mercedes dominance:
"When you have the right fuel for your power unit, like Mercedes does, it can immediately make a difference of 30hp."

Could that be part of the reason why Mercedes is so much better than the other teams with Mercedes engines? Are there experts on the issue here? Can a fuel be "tuned" to an engine and would privileged access give Petronas an edge over other suppliers?

Don't listen to Marko, he is doing his best the deflect all the bad press towards Renault and Total. Everyone has done bad job except the Red Bull team. Shell, Petronas and Total all have been around motorsport for such a long time i can't imagine that one of those three companies would be able to get 30 more hp just because of fuel. Of course fuel is important but giving the Merc 30 more hp would i would consider that bogus. They rate that Horner, Mateschitz and Marko are bashing Renault in the media I find it hart to believe that they will stay with Renault next year. Who knows they might partner up with BMW or VW. Red Bull has proven to a successful team so maybe a new OEM will be tempted to join them to make a comeback in F1.

[dans79]

On a different note, In an Interview after the Bahrain GP, Helmut Marko said regarding the Mercedes dominance:
"When you have the right fuel for your power unit, like Mercedes does, it can immediately make a difference of 30hp."

Could that be part of the reason why Mercedes is so much better than the other teams with Mercedes engines? Are there experts on the issue here? Can a fuel be "tuned" to an engine and would privileged access give Petronas an edge over other suppliers?

I'm not a fuel expert, but the regs are pretty tight. if anything this is just Helmut talking out his back side. RBR as a team has been blaming all their lack of pace on the fact that they are down on power compared to the merc.

You don't pull away from the pack at ~2.4 seconds a lap while racing your team mate because you have 30 more HP.

[henra]

You don't pull away from the pack at ~2.4 seconds a lap while racing your team mate because you have 30 more HP.

While I agree that there is probably more to it than just HP, looking at how the Merc powered cars could out- drag the Ferrari and Renault Brigade, I would rather look at a difference of 80 - 100HP.
The gap to the FI and Williams cars will be down to chassis performance but that is not so far from what you would expect based on experience from last years.
The track layout surely is no particularly good indication of High Speed DF Performance. It is a Stop and Go drag racing circuit. Power, Traction and Harvesting/Breaking stability is what it is about. Since these are obviously clear strengths of the W05 the result was not that surprising, except maybe of the size of the gap.

That said, real Aero Circuits might show a somewhat less drastic gap.

[thomin]

Of course fuel alone doesn't explain Mercedes' advantage. That's why I asked if it could be part of the reason. I have also seen an interview with the Shell guy at Ferrari and he said that they brought a new fuel to Malaysia that gave them significantly more power than they had in Australia. So obviously fuel can make a difference (whether it can be as much as 30hp is a different matter of course). What I'm not clear on is whether it is dependent upon the individual engine. Does for example the Shell fuel work better with a Ferrari engine than the Petronas fuel and vice versa regarding Mercedes engines, or are the engines so similar that it hardly makes a difference?

If fuel really can be tuned to a specific engine, then it wouldn't be an extraordinary claim to say that Petronas has a superior product, because they would have had privileged access to that engine whereas Mobil1 for example would presumably have had to work with less data.

In either case, this seems to be an area where the advantage Mercedes has (if indeed it exists at all) will go away over the course of the season as the others will ultimately home in on the same performance levels, even with less data than Petronas. It would be really more an artifact of the new engine formula.

[sectionate]

Could the advantage be from moving the compressor to the front of the engine? Sky sports F1 we're reporting that moving that away from the turbine means the packaging is smaller in the side pods due to a cooler compressor being away from the turbine, as well as less pipe work, leading to less turbo lag. Cue the poor pun but is that the silver bullet for the silver arrows?

Yes - more power, less lag, lighter weight, smaller intercooler giving better internal air flow, moves weight forward which is a benefit this year. There are a lot of benefits to that relatively simple innovation.

But it's worth acknowledging that the entire car is top of its class in all departments, there's no one silver bullet but equally there's not really any one weakness. It's a beautifully designed and put together race car.

Fully with you. However, Ideally I would also like to know why others have not done it the same way.
I mean surely nobody thinks that Renault and Ferrari Engineers may be less capable than the ones in Brixworth.
Very interesting - if anybody knows ...

From what the BBC said, it wasn't the Engine guys that came up with it, it was the chassis people at Mercedes who asked for the move to happen as it freed up space at the back of the car!

BBC Sport's chief F1 writer Andrew Benson in Bahrain:
"During Friday practice we explained why the Mercedes car is so fast, because of a clever layout of the engine, with the compressor at the front and the turbine at the back, which reduces throttle lag, improves weight and packaging and frees up the electrical parts of the power unit to produce more power at the wheels.

We have a bit more info now on the detail behind that. The key is the better airflow into the compressor, because the air has less far to travel from the inlet. Less pressure loss at the compressor leads to more power than is available from the Ferrari and Renault engines. The interesting thing is that apparently the idea initially came from the chassis team, aware of the potential packaging, weight and weight distribution advantages of splitting the turbine and compressor. The engine team realised it was an enormous technical challenge and were not initially sure whether they could pull it off. But they have, and the results are spectacular."

[Aaronque]

To be honest, what is the real strength/s of the W05 in term of corners? Long corners? Sharp corners? Chicanes? High speed? Low speed? Hairpin?

[heimana]

Mercedes will bring new parts in barhain tests today and tomorrow? We will have some pictures?