If you analize the long stints times (if all the teams are with the same fuel and tyres. yeah, i know that´s a big IF) it´s not a bad analysis. But you know, as Mark himself says, there are too many variables to make a valid analysis.

I think that McLaren do have something not quite right with the car, but at the same time the above article does not in any way say definitively that McLaren are having problems. If anything it raises the same questions everyone has been asking.

To me, it seems that by now, it would be too short a time span for teams to copy McLaren's wing if one super new, best secret wing was out there and if it was enough time, why wouldn't teams copy it during the season to try it for a few lap of practice? IF copying was so easy.

It just seems a bit odd, that with one test left, a possibly rainy one, that McLaren have not got something of an 09 design running. Surely if the 09 wing they have in the works is so radical and evolved, that they could at least have some sort of functional, non-revealing design proving somewhat competative.

Performance hasn't been stellar even with the 08 wing and we have McLaren drivers answering "I don't know" when asked why the 08 wing is still on the car.

It all just seems a bit odd.

Editor to journo: "Write something about who is where in the testing"

Journo: "But none of them are running Melbourne cars or even trying to set fast times".

Ed: "I know, put a long disclaimer at the top then write it anyway".

Two tests for McLaren, Barcelona and Jerez.

Mar 9-12 - Barcelona
Mar 15-18 - Jerez

Aren't Mclaren only doing two days at Jerez, so they have 6 days left before Melbourne (very likely some shakedown as well)

Let's hope the next two tests go better and some good progress is made.

Two weeks is plenty of time, if there's definate value in the revision and you're willing to throw lots of money and people at it. The teams go to the trouble of hiding their revisions until Melbourne because once they fly out to Australia, they won't return to the Europe until Spain, to save costs. This is when you see the first round of major revisions. A new rear wing isn't something you can just bolt on to the car to make it go faster - it requires a wholesale change to how you handle the rear-end aero.

Anyway, the change that Mclaren have coming is probably a diffuser, not a new wing. Likely the 09 wings you see on the car now are the final or near-final ones.



They have two different 09 revisions running - see above!



Well ... the team aren't going to just tell you their secret testing strategy just because you asked them. They may even ... wait for it ... lie.

Hamilton's going to spray his over 27 metre-long Sunseeker 90 yacht in McLaren's colours

Emm, bulls***.





http://www.lewishamilton.com/news/2009/03/...tement-20090306

Or is he ? Good Old The Sun

http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headlines/news...306144228.shtml

Yeah, that's what you and I and most other teams would be doing.

My current, daily adjustable theory is that McLaren decided to put more emphasis on hiding what they think to be a genius solution from the others, even at the risk of not testing it extensively on track (like they normally would).

Instead they try to get some of the data with half-a**ed interim solutions, which don't really work as a package on the car, therefore the mediocre times in testing.

Now it all depends on a single thing: IF they found something noone else has AND that really provides a big benefit AND that doesn't fall apart after 10 laps, THEN they will indeed look like geniuses and did everything right.

BUT, if one of the three points doesn't work out, they will look like the opposite...

Someone in Woking must have decided it's worth the risk, and I wouldn't want to be in that persons shoes right now.

After two seasons of success, largely on the back of getting reliability right at the expense of outright speed, I find it incredible that they would throw out a successful methodology in favour of grand secrecy that may or may not bring them a big performance boost.

If you look at how much testing Ferrari had to do with its holy nose for example, it's very dangerous bringing untested aero to the track and believing it will Just Work. Because while in the tunnel and on the computer it may seem fantastic, the real world is really tough to model and you can't model feel.

So I dunno, I doubt McLaren are sitting on anything truly ground breaking, I think they have a problem with their car that they aren't happy about. I don't think it's terminal either, it's probably a bit like BMW last year.

But for the great hope theory of them having something huge in the wings and just delaying it to keep it hidden from other teams could well damage McLaren more than the other teams.

well I'm not a fan of McLaren at all and I'd love to see Hami in the mid-field. I want to see how he copes and reacts to the situation etc.

ok now coming to this reaer-wing thing. Well as much as I'd like to predict that they are in trouble, it might be that they are testing all sorts of solutions for different GPs, as there'll be no in-season testing. But then the point that they haven't put a single credible lap time with 09 rear wing... It's just very hard to predict anything right now. But I believe that they are in trouble and they are trying XTREMELY hard to fix it. 2 front-wings, 3 rear wings, multiple diffuser designs etc... McLaren - Hamilton ->

I agree with much of what you're saying kar. My gut instinct tells me McLaren would not resort to the sort of 'high risk' strategy that is implied if you keep untested secret parts and bolt them on at the last minute. That is not the McLaren way from what I've seen in the last 20 odd years of following them. The problems are real I reckon. But hopefully they are sorting them.

they still have about 6 to 8 days of testing for them so its not really last minute...same time as BGp


if at the end of barcelona testing, their times are still shitty/running wit 08 wing, then ill start to truly believe they are f**ked

That sentence is contradicting itself.

The thing is Ron (and Martin hopefully) is a risk-taker. Like all the garagistes, they go for it without the negative "what if" thoughts.

On Monday if Lewis is driving he will be fastest. Trust me

I can tell you, from a source close to one of the Mclaren drivers' (I'll let you guess which one ;)) , that Mclaren is indeed experiencing some important problems, and drivers are having to spend lot of time in the simulator at Woking, more than normal.

However, that doesn't necessarily mean that they will be at midfield during the season, nor that this problems can't be solved before Melbourne.

ayt

Well if McLaren do have any kind of problem then that means they're not as fast as the top performing team whoever that might be. When they do solve the problem the pace setter will also be improving so it looks like a season playing catch up. Im afraid to say wins will be rare and championship is out of the question right now.

Its 2006 all over again,damn it. :\

I just can't understand why they can't build a consistently solid nothing spectacular type car like BMW or ferrari and take it from there,McLaren have had a problem with aero since 2001. I use to think the problem was with Coughlan,the moron they hired from arrows and his downright ridiculous attempts to design a car but the problem lies deeper. Reshuffle the design department and poach some staff from other teams,and get some damn consistency in their designs year in year out!

Sure, why not?

Really, it wouldn't surprise me the least if he clocked the fastest lap (or very close to it).

What would surprise me is if they would manage a 15-lap stint that matches or beats Ferraris (or Toyotas, or BMW's).



.... without using 2008 aero parts, that is.

The BGP 001 sidepods radiators look way smaller than the Mp4-24s!

I read somewhere, the launch sidepods (radiators inlets) were made earlier with 19,000 rpm engine cooling in mind. So the final ones might be smaller, but we'll see. So maybe they haven't adapted them to the new engine regulations yet, but I don't find the current inlets too big. The opening races might be very hot.

J-Raid is very credible (at least in BMW case, I suppose it's the same with McLaren) so I'd be a bit worried if I was in place of McLaren fans. But still there's some time left till Melbourne.

Strange comment. A problem with aero since 2001? They were fine in 2007 and 2008, and 2005. Also, mentioning BMW is odd as McLaren have out-performed them in previous seasons. Ferrari had a dip in 2005 and 2006.

Signore Pat Fry

x2


seems theyve overcooked and fked it up again

from the first look of the car, it seemed like a hit or miss.... jury is still out but signs are pointing to a miss.


IMO they should jus try to make a fast enough car as the best of the competition, make it reliable and let Lewis take it from there. Not easy to do, but should be possible with their resources. They just seem to try to hard attimes.

I may have jumped the gun with this post as it aint Melbourne yet, I hope I did

Ferrari had fastest car in second part of 2006 season. McLaren definately had more dips in last 10 years than Scuderia.

Yes but that's because Ferrari have been the best in the last decade.

Mmm well J-raid has made me a little bit less confident now, a source close to Pedro reporting problems. Still I can't imagine what it would be, while they haven't actually fitted the Melbourne diffuser to the car. But then history shows even good sources can be less than reliable. It might just be that Pedro is very busy, and the rest inferred fom that.

I agree the stint times are what matters, obviously. I'm still 80+% for a Mac lead in that, though, come Monday.

Maybe Pedro is busy to test the virtual diffuser.

I still have a good vibe about the car.

Well I hope you are correct and hope you post more in here! as usually what you say is reassuring!

Lets hope the next test also shows some light on the horizon (it can't come soon enough!)

Chek PM, please.

If indeed they do have a problem I wonder if it has anything to do with the way they're venting the hot air at the back of the car, a totally different way to most other teams. They are venting it low down on the floor, just above the diffuser rather than around the side and top of the gearbox area, maybe this is giving them some incosistent flows round there that didn't appear in the wind tunnel.

You could be right there. I remember Andy posting about venting hot air over the top of the diffuser very early on to strengthen it's downforce i guess.

I'm expecting some more news around that area with the new diffuser package, because the sidepod apertures are huge, and the outlet at the moment looks far too small to exhaust that much airflow. And Norby mentioned an interaction between the floor and the diffuser. Or would it make sense to put up with a lot of drag from the apertures in exchange for a jet of air applied to the diffuser? How would that tradeoff look?

Anyway, if there is a problem with flow, why haven't they put it on the car to have a look?

Actualy this winter we saw McLaren changed their testing habits - they doing only long runs, without the qualy runs, that we`ve seen before in almost every test sesion.
And I think they still have planty of time (6 days) to test new parts, if there is any of course. I remember them last year, testing shark fin for less then 20 laps, and decide not to use it... so I think McLaren still have time and chances if they don`t have big problems, that required lot of time to resolve.

PS: Did anyone here knows if McLaren still using the same engine with low revs (because of vibrations by KERS), that someone reported here?

I previously suggested that the exhaust outlets looked to be involved with 'driving' the rear aero.


As to what is going on, I think it looks like the taller, narrower, wing(s) aren't performing in the way that the design/simulation/tunnel data suggests that they should.
That could explain why they were reluctant to use them - not necessarily that they weren't working, or couldn't be made to work better -- rather that they weren't working as expected.
And why they were doing rather a lot of 'calibration' type experimentation. Trying to figure out where their expectations were deviating from the reality on the track.
Whereas, if the lower, wider wing was behaving as expected, (or at least closer to expectation), then I think it would very much be the 'Woking Way" to work with the bits that they seemed to understand, rather than to persevere with bits that they didn't.

And there's plenty of stuff they can be working on, boring reliability stuff, KERS dynamics, etc, rather than exploring the ultimate in quali performance, which would kinda NEED the proper wing.

However, pretty damn soon they are going to have to pick some sort of tall, narrow wing to race with ... and get on with maling the best of it.

I don't think they are necessarily deep in the mire, but I simply can't believe that they are where they expected to be.

And I really do wonder whether the secrecy after LH hit the barrier was because they were hiding something, or that they were hiding the fact that they had nothing to hide?




Regarding the diffuser and the wing being an "integrated" package, working together - I think that's what the new regs are explicitly designed to prevent.
Not saying that they aren't designed as a package, merely that they should act independently.

ignorance is bliss

At one time we heard they were only using 2/3 kers power, 40kW, because of crankshaft stresses, now Kovy says he was using full power, so hopefully that is fixed.

It seems like McLaren has not adapted its MP4-24 to the new regulations/loopholes (sidepods, diffusers, etc.)...

Aren't they supposed to bring new material to Barcelona? If yes, I'll wait until next week to judge, but I agree that it does not look good for the Woking team right now.

However, if the 2008 wing/current diffuser combo truly simulated the exact same downforce that the new 2009 wing/new diffuser combo will achieve come Melbourne, then McLaren is not so much in deep ****. If this holds, they will probably only be a couple of tenths off the leader(s), which I expect will be Ferrari and Toyota/Renault.

Yes if Hamilton doesn't have a front running car he will probably go crazy and retire after 3 races at most!
So Mclaren make this car fast!

You can the new season is approaching just by quality of comments here, sadly.

or, because he's the world champion, he'll drag the piece of sh!t to the podium.

And instantly, and miraculously, the car will be deemed as one of the best in the field.

exactly!

Is it true that McLaren will go to the final test with just Renault, Williams, and the new Brawn GP team ? because they might be more likely to play there hand while Ferrari and BMW are packing up for Melbourne.

If they don't play some sort of hand by the final test, then they are well and truly screwed.

http://www.f1technical.net/news/11732?sid=...180cc55682950ff

is this the flow viz dispenser?

Hamilton is so super awesome if the car continues to be sht, he will just carry it and run around the circuit....Hamilton on pole!!!


:yawn:

x2