Mercedes GP W02

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Brawn has said there will be nothing more to come in terms of majopr packages for the W02. it is sadi to have gone as far as possible with this car.


The car has been extensively revised, but the gap is far too much to do anything of value. Resources are already being directed to the 2012 car.
Thats not to say we wont see anything, but expect minor revisions to what you can already see.

[raymondu999]

I think though it might be worth running upgrades on the W02 to use the rest of the season as an extended test session for the W03, unless the W03 is a clean sheet design with a completely different philosophy.

[MIKEY_!]

IMO another clean sheet design might not be the best idea. Means more development and a less refined end product generally. Unless of course the current design has absolutely nothing left to give.

[Hemsy]

Unfortunately it will be a clean sheet because their current design philosophy is flawed. The SWB meant that all the components has to packaged vertically than horizontally ala the double radiators. Sure they will retain some concepts from this year and improve upon it but expect very little of this.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

+1 Hemsy
The lessons learnt from the W02 are clear. Although I wouldnt call a clean sheet design for 2012 "unfortunate".

Extend the wheelbase, dont run contrived cooling systems and sort out tyre wear rates.

Not much they can do with the W02 on that front other than put a spacer in the chassis which can lead to other problems.

The W03 needs to be a clean sheet design incorporating things they have learnt, along with rivals ideas and their own new ideas.
Maybe with Bell in charge we wont see them try outlandish options, just stick to what you know works and build on that.

[raymondu999]

Yeap; a clean sheet doesn't need to be a completely fresh slate. It's like that time in primary or high school when you had an overly-scribbled sheet of homework and you recopied it all neatly into a "clean sheet" of paper

[Hemsy]

+1 Hemsy
The lessons learnt from the W02 are clear. Although I wouldnt call a clean sheet design for 2012 "unfortunate".

Extend the wheelbase, dont run contrived cooling systems and sort out tyre wear rates.

Not much they can do with the W02 on that front other than put a spacer in the chassis which can lead to other problems.

The W03 needs to be a clean sheet design incorporating things they have learnt, along with rivals ideas and their own new ideas.
Maybe with Bell in charge we wont see them try outlandish options, just stick to what you know works and build on that.

That's why I'm so optimistic about the fact that they hired Bell. Bell is known to go with tried and tested concepts rather than go extreme. This is exactly why he quit Renault, because he had a dispute with Allison regarding the forward exhausts. And look who turned out right in the end! Renault have not only fallen behind Mercedes but are competing with the likes of Sauber and Torro Rosso.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

A good point hemsy.

My optimism is based on how all the upgrades put on the car after he arrived seemed to work out of the box.

A definite first for mercedes. Also it seems after he surveyed the W02, he said to brawn to cut their losses and move forward planning 2012.

[Hemsy]

Plus more importantly he's be able to attract some top level designers to MGP, something which is sorely lacking. While all the credit at RBR goes to Adrian Newey, he would never been able to take RBR from the back-marker Jaguar to the championship winning team that it is now without the likes of Prodomou and co.

[marcush.]

nobody likes to take care of a flawed child wich is not your own.
seriously I don´t buy all this.
W02 is not a Virgin or HRT ,the concept may be less than optimum but why the hell is it not fitting to a single track in this season?
Mercedes have opted for a different concept with more topspeed and this should reward them on some tracks .but that´s not the case.
I don´t think they really know where and why they lose these huge chunks of time.
It was the same last year and the year before.they are running in circles.
Last year it was the wheight distribution theyx blamed and got rid of for 2011 but the gap remains as is...
You have to hack that thing to pieces and glue it together along the lines you are thinking to solve the issues.If there is convincing signs you have pinpointed the route cause of your deficits you can start your new project.
It´s completely useless to start all over again before really knowing and understanding what your problems are.Only then you are able to slove your issues.Money spent to gain knowledge is well spent.
So a W02b with longer wheelbase repositioned kers components and lower fueltank makes sense to me even if it were only for testing after the last race.
Alternatively you´d start a lot earlier with your 2012 contender and bring it on already in 2011 and should be smashing the opposition having potential to come to the first races of 2012 with a fully developped W03.

Unfortunatelly again Mercedes believed they had a good car wich was fundamentally right but needed some honing .Reality is the car is useless crap if you want to win races.When Brawn arrived in Honda ,he looked on not for a long time in 2008 before stopping the BS and redirecting everything towards 2007.
Now he seems to ignore the signs and tries to hold on to the product longer than ever.Formula 1 people do not give up easily and it´s something of an asset but clinging to wrong targets when evidence is telling you better is the bad side of having a can do attitude.

[dren]

Marcush, I also wonder why the car hasn't really shined on one track with the speed advantage in the straights. I think we will see the car do well in Spa and Monza. The car is capable of good sector times in areas with long straights, but loses out in other parts. The weight distribution kills their early to mid race pace and the use of the DRS in qualifying by other teams helps to level the high speed advantage. The overall car is just not as good as the top 3. Maybe they will have a better base with the W03. But I'm not holding my breath.

[marcush.]

lessons learned.
what have they learned really?
Not to go fro an extremely short wheelbase- other teams utilise longer wheelbases but are even slower then Mercedes...

Not to go for a midship exhaust -others have done FEE,others have done similar things like RedBull ,others have traditional exhausts .It simply doesn´t matter anymore as this area is facing new regs for 2012 -generally you could say -understood the importance of using the exhaust for downforce generation -but got lost in the jungle and developped the third or fourth best possibility.

Short cars pay a penalty in terms of cof G height ..hardly new but fairly easy to quantify -so why was it signed of in concept but now it´s an issue?

Double radiators carry a weight and CofG penalty...simple maths.

None of it needs a car to be build and campaigned for the whole season methinks.

The main point is that none of their special concepts is really making them stand out really ...apart from high trapspeeds.But obviously this advantage is offset by
major drawbacks in other areas.So the maths suck.

[Hemsy]

Its quite obvious that they went for such an extreme design because they had no technical leadership. Now that the team have Bob Bell they'll have someone to guide them in terms striking the right balance between being extreme and going for a conservative design. Remember you cannot be too conservative either ala Ferrari otherwise you'll always be a pretender but never a contender.

[dren]

I agree there. I don't know if the car just isn't performing to what they expected, or they reached their design goals and the other teams exceded what Mercedes anticipated. Or maybe it is a combination of both.

The teething issues the W02 faced early set the team back relative to the front runners also. This probably equates to some lap time.

Now, like we saw with simple set-up improvements at this point last year with the W01, will we see something similar this year with the W02? If so, maybe the car isn't as bad as it appears, it just isn't being set up optimally.

[dren]

Its quite obvious that they went for such an extreme design because they had no technical leadership. Now that the team have Bob Bell they'll have someone to guide them in terms striking the right balance between being extreme and going for a conservative design. Remember you cannot be too conservative either ala Ferrari otherwise you'll always be a pretender but never a contender.

But the Ferrari the last two years was a race winning (and should have been title winning) car, it just took the team half a season to unleash the potential. Costa didn't do too bad really. I think going too extreme will backfire on them.