Comments on: Brazilian Grand Prix technical review

By: AP

AP — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 01:00:24 +0000

?? I have seen BMW, Williams, Renault, Toyota and FI all have altered nose cones…

By: Adrian

Adrian — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:40:12 +0000

No, he was brought on board at Honda too late to have any significant input into the basic design of the RA108.

When he saw just how bad it was he elected to focus the, not insignificant, resources of Honda onto this year’s car instead…

Seems to me that he was right!!

By: m0tion

m0tion — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 00:40:42 +0000

I was interested in how much the wet factor comes into play alongside mechanical v aero tracks. RB choices on aero certainly had them a huge advantage even in straight line speed and there must be a reason for it starting at the nose and finishing at the rear suspension.

By: Stephen

Stephen — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 23:32:30 +0000

I’m pretty sure that was at the European GP and Lewis was running a shorter wheelbase than Heikki, who was running the normal one.

By: John Beamer

John Beamer — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 21:34:05 +0000

Yes – that’s right – my bad. Through Rory though he remained very close to the OWG and almost acted as an informal advisor. As Patrickl mentioned he did propose to tighten up the rules somewhat!

By: John Beamer

John Beamer — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 21:30:47 +0000

Yes that’s right. Teams have moved the sidepods back a little to give more space for flow conditioners like bargeboards.

They don’t create downforce directly but DO condition flow around the sidepods to the coke bottle zone, which does create downforce elsewhere.

By: John Beamer

John Beamer — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 21:30:44 +0000

Yes that’s right. Teams have moved the sidepods back a little to give more space for flow conditioners like bargeboards.

They don’t create downforce directly but DO condition flow around the sidepods to the coke bottle zone, which does create downforce elsewhere.

By: Harv's

Harv's — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 20:54:50 +0000

im supried at just how fast that brawn has fallen off the pace advantage that it had at the begining of the year! i watched the australian gp and malaysian gp yesterday and that car was so much faster! if button it would have been almost impossible for button to loose the championship because of that car!

if the brawns continual slide in terms of car development continues as it has over the last 10 races then i fear that it will be a very long year next year for Mr. Brawn and Jenson

By: Patrickl

Patrickl — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 20:44:24 +0000

True. Red Bull realised that this might be their one and only chance at a world championship so they went full out for this season. With even a major update for the last few races. Even with that they didn’t get even close though.

Must be frustrating for the designers. They built by far the best car of the season, but it just doesn’t seem to happen for them.

By: mm

mm — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 20:35:19 +0000

Would be great to see like for like views of the different cars – especially profiles.

Its fascinating how different some elements are when you look closely – the Redbull front is beautifully different to the rest.

By: mm

mm — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 20:33:34 +0000

(Was meant to be a reply to Mark Hitchcocks post.)

By: mm

mm — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 20:32:21 +0000

After half a dozen races brawn looked so far ahead maybe they thought they didn’t need to develop the car much more and so focused on next years changes.

Redbull on the other hand have been changing all sorts all over the place playing catchup on the points.

By: Tiomkin

Tiomkin — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 19:28:54 +0000

The ‘new boy’ is Kobayashi.

By: DomPrez

DomPrez — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:52:17 +0000

the key to these barge boards, from my understanding, is that they;
a-are not generating downforce
and b-withing a certain very specific size range.

i think the slow introduction of vertical airflow directional members will pretty much come to a halt after everyone introduces their own revised barge boards.
although creativity and cleaverness does not rule out any double shark fins we could see pop out of a williams again.

goes to show u these new aero regs go deeper then they appear and theres lots of manipulation left to be brought up.

By: John H

John H — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:52:57 +0000

Thanks for the article.

Quick question… How have the teams been allowed to incorporate these barge boards? The new Brawn one really stands out.

Before I think they were labelled as ‘part of the wingmirrors’ but lately they seem to be stand alone items.

By: Patrickl

Patrickl — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:21:39 +0000

Indeed. He did propose to them to tighten up the rules even. Which they declined.

By: Derek

Derek — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:12:55 +0000

Hamilton, Alonso and Raikkonen are the best drivers out there with Massa and Vettel close behind, then the rest.
I’m not an Alonso fan but he probably just shades it from Hamilton right now. Another year or two and Vettel will be up there with Hamilton, but who knows there may well be a new boy about to be discovered??

By: Patrickl

Patrickl — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:09:05 +0000

Did you forget that Red Bull dominated China and that in Bahrain they were also far ahead until their dumb race strategy brought them down?

Red Bull was the first team behind Brawn at Australia and Malaysia too.

So why not say that Red Bull was easily the best car at the beginning of the year? All season it has been a matter of the car suiting the track.

By: Derek

Derek — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:01:16 +0000

Next year is not going to be so critical on the development than last years “clean sheet”. The aero is the same the wheelbase is slightly longer to allow room for the larger fuel tank. So any developments made to this years car will help next year. remember Lewis ran with a long wheelbase car at a recent GP while his team mate ran the norm. I always thought that was a test for next year. i think this weekend will be a live test session for developing parts for next year.

By: F1Fan

F1Fan — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 16:50:19 +0000

You can’t be convinced if you go by Kovi’s numbers, both this year and last. They suggest quite the contrary. He has blown several podium opportunities and the gap between him and Lewis is just too big, even factoring in the fact that Lewis had a slightly better car in the first 3-4 races this year. Whitmarsh maintains that McLaren will be after the “best 2 drivers available”. There was nobody better available last year, but this year there are several good drivers available, all better than Kovi (Rubens, Nico, Trulli, Glock) … to let alone the obvious choice of one Kimi Raikkonen.