Chinese Grand Prix 2012, Shanghai - Race 3/20

Depends who it was. If it was that long train of about 10 cars then it would cost a lot of time. I think they caught one of the Caterhams at one point and they ended up slowing down to a crawl and going around the outside of about 4 corners to let them all past.

MB suggested the pitlane time (without a stop) was about 17 seconds.
 
Well, the Merc has now proved itself in battle.

I'm not sure though, whether the stellar performance of the car was in any way down to the double DRS. Consider that the double DRS is only active when the button is pushed. In qualifying, it used throughout the whole lap, but in the race - I think the Merc was genuinely good as it rarely used the DRS button.
 
sunama said:
Well, the Merc has now proved itself in battle.
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Indeed. Whilst there is no doubt in my mind that Rosberg was flattered by events both in qualifying and the race, there's also no doubt that he carried genuine pace throughout both. There are few wins in F1 not favoured by a bit of luck so that shouldn't be strongly counted against Nico.

I hope, and expect, to see the Mercedes take further wins this season. Hopefully, sometime soon, Michael will manage a clear race.
 
sunama said:
Well, the Merc has now proved itself in battle.

I'm not sure though, whether the stellar performance of the car was in any way down to the double DRS. Consider that the double DRS is only active when the button is pushed. In qualifying, it used throughout the whole lap, but in the race - I think the Merc was genuinely good as it rarely used the DRS button.
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So you can have a part that isn't worth copying on a car that's good overall, but you can't have a part worth copying on a car that supposedly isn't very good because you've deemed it so?

Glad we've cleared that up.
 
Weebull said:
So you can have a part that isn't worth copying on a car that's good overall, but you can't have a part worth copying on a car that supposedly isn't very good because you've deemed it so?
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Lets say you have TeamA, who innovate DeviceA.
Lets say that TeamA are finishing near the back.
The amount of resources which TeamB should spend attempting to copy TeamA/DeviceA should be less.

Why do I believe this?
Because if TeamA who are innovating the DeviceA are struggling, TeamB should not take the risk of possibly falling into the same trap that TeamA have fallen into. They are better of spending resources on another Device.

In the business World a similar philosophy is adopted. When a big company buys a smaller company, they value it. If the smaller company has produced a product/service that is not selling or performing as expected, they will value that company lower. However if that small company has produced a fantastic product that is selling like hot-cakes, the bigger company will have to commit a lot more resources to buy that smaller company.

In a nutshell, if a Team has produced a device and have proved that it is working great and delivering, teams should commit more resources into copying it. If however, the device is not proving itself, the Team should spend less resources on attempting to copy that device.

In actuality we have seen this happen. For example, in 2010 (I think it was), McLaren innovated the F-Duct. Once it was proved conclusively that the device worked, other teams copied it very quickly.

In 2009, BrawnGP produced their double decker diffuser. That moment it proved itself in battle (not before), teams started taking it seriously (Ferrari went to court) and soon after other teams developed their own.

Now, lets take a look at the failures. Williams produced the incredibly small back end in 2011. This design might've been great. But Williams did not prove that the system worked and had their worst season in their history of F1. How many teams copied this? I'll give you the answer. Zero.

In 2012, Ferrari have developed the pull-rod system. The device itself might be good, but Ferrari are having a disaster with it. How many people are going to attempt to copy it? I will tell you right now. Zero. If however, Ferrari had opened the season with the best car, I promise you that other teams would look into perhaps copying it (either for this season or next season).

What I'm saying is that in order to commit resources towards copying a system/device, it has to be proven in battle. Otherwise, other teams will do best to develop their own/other systems.

The moment that a device/system is proven in battle, its value/worth increases exponentially.

It would be great if every team could copy every single device being used by every other team. But resources are limited and a team must prioritise the distribution of their resources.
 
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Wasnt the double diffuser already on a few cars (obviously Brawn was the most successful over the first few races)...... slightly different case because of that I would suggest

There is still a cost / benefit analysis which needs to happen in regards to each seperate team - so far the performance in the race hasnt been confirmed imo (how can you know the track temps didnt allow for the Merc to win rather than the ddrs - for one example of possibly many)

Given that at some point through the season most teams will develop a new front and rear wing, it still depends highly on getting those dev lines married up perfectly and any additional design time throughout the car to get it working
 
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FrankJH said:
Wasnt the double diffuser already on a few cars
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Yep Williams and Toyota had the same system, although I don't know if anyone knew whether it was as good or not or if the Brawn car was very good in other areas as well.
 
The reason why it was BrawnGP car which was being attacked/targeted (especially by Ferrari), was because they were leading the way and had the fastest car.
 
Mr Jack said:
Indeed. Whilst there is no doubt in my mind that Rosberg was flattered by events both in qualifying and the race, there's also no doubt that he carried genuine pace throughout both. There are few wins in F1 not favoured by a bit of luck so that shouldn't be strongly counted against Nico.

I hope, and expect, to see the Mercedes take further wins this season. Hopefully, sometime soon, Michael will manage a clear race.
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how was nico favoured by luck? luck is damon hill winning spa 98
 
I have to agree with arknor.
Nico did a fine job. He embarrassed his team-mate in qualifying. And then from lap1, he pulled away from MSc. He couldn't have done better.

Remember, one of the most important things is to beat your team-mate. And Nico did this in a comprehensive manner.
 
arknor said:
how was nico favoured by luck? luck is damon hill winning spa 98
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Hamilton's penalty prevented him from challenging, the timing of Nico's pole lap gave him a clear margin while the others who might have challenged him floundered. This meant Button was held up in the early stages and then his pit stop problem finally killed his challenge. With a more normal qualifying, Nico would have faced being chased down by two faster cars, Button was looking good to catch Nico before his stop.

He may have won anyway, but he wouldn't have had the margin he did.
 
Maybe without the penalty Lewis would have crashed in turn 1? Qual was the same for everyone, not sure what you mean more normal? Don't think there is any reason to make excuses as to why McLaren never won really.
 
Would've....could've....should've.

Mr Jack, Button may have caught Nico and may have passed, if he had a good stop. We'll never know.

Fact is that Rosberg won the race by a big margin, without really being troubled. he also got pole by a big margin.

My feeling is that he was genuinely fast on both tyres, at all fuel levels, on Saturday and on Sunday.
 
sunama said:
Lets say you have TeamA, who innovate DeviceA.
Lets say that TeamA are finishing near the back.
The amount of resources which TeamB should spend attempting to copy TeamA/DeviceA should be less.

Why do I believe this?
Because if TeamA who are innovating the DeviceA are struggling, TeamB should not take the risk of possibly falling into the same trap that TeamA have fallen into. They are better of spending resources on another Device..
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Well it's a good job team bosses and heads of design do not think like this or they would find themselves woefully behind the teams that do copy and alter and further improve designs.

It's a good job williams didn't feel that way in the early 90's when they looked at the leyton house and decided they needed adrian newey. You only have to look at how much the Newey Leyton House cars transformed into the dominate williams cars of the 90's from an aerodynamic standpoint.

You seem obsessed that if the car doesn't have points on the board then the car shouldn't be looked at for innovations. It's a good job you are not a team boss. The whole package could be a failure but that doesn't mean there isn't even a single item that could transform their own car. Plenty of people have already told you that and you ignored them so I will waste no more time on it, clearly the teams that consistently run at the front ignore how you would run a team.

sunama said:
In the business World a similar philosophy is adopted. When a big company buys a smaller company, they value it. If the smaller company has produced a product/service that is not selling or performing as expected, they will value that company lower. However if that small company has produced a fantastic product that is selling like hot-cakes, the bigger company will have to commit a lot more resources to buy that smaller company.
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Completely irrelevant, you are taking a company as a whole non performing and not that they may have one individual genius idea in a sea of rubbish. You fail to be able to separate the two for some unknown reason.

sunama said:
In 2009, BrawnGP produced their double decker diffuser. That moment it proved itself in battle (not before), teams started taking it seriously (Ferrari went to court) and soon after other teams developed their own..
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Teams where upset before the car ran and won a race or as you call it battle.

sunama said:
Now, lets take a look at the failures. Williams produced the incredibly small back end in 2011. This design might've been great. But Williams did not prove that the system worked and had their worst season in their history of F1. How many teams copied this? I'll give you the answer. Zero..
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Again wasting my finger tips because the last time you trotted out this rubbish others corrected you and you didn't even listen. You are confusing how they mounted the gearbox with a tight compact rear end. They pretty much all have the compact rears as was pointed out to you before which you ignored. If the gearbox has been copied this year I have no idea, perhaps you should read this as an explantion why it wasn't copied last year...

http://scarbsf1.wordpress.com/2011/02/10/williams-fw33-lowline-gearbox/

sunama said:
In 2012, Ferrari have developed the pull-rod system. The device itself might be good, but Ferrari are having a disaster with it. How many people are going to attempt to copy it? .
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How can the device be good and they are having a disaster with it :confused: If the device was good and the rest of the car was giving them issues then teams would be seriously looking at it. They still might, you and I don't know.

The bottom line is you wrote the Merc off and said no one should even be looking at it for innovation as it didn't have enough points.

How silly do you feel now?
 
Mr Jack said:
Hamilton's penalty prevented him from challenging, the timing of Nico's pole lap gave him a clear margin while the others who might have challenged him floundered. This meant Button was held up in the early stages and then his pit stop problem finally killed his challenge. With a more normal qualifying, Nico would have faced being chased down by two faster cars, Button was looking good to catch Nico before his stop.

He may have won anyway, but he wouldn't have had the margin he did.
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button showed nothing that suggested he had the pace to win even early on schumacher started to pull away from button , button was the lucky one lucky schumachers wheel nut never got tightened or he would have been stuck behind schumacher again anyway.

i dont understand how you can even consider hamilton getting a gearbox penalty nicos luck either...

maybe nico should consider himself lucky hes not in the fastest car on the grid? maybe button and hamilton are the lucky ones in that nice mclaren? maybe vettel only won last year because of luck? lucky rbr was the fadstest car? maybe senna was lucky he had so much talent? he only ever did well in racing because of luck?

lets stop clutching at luck because it was far from a lucky win , nico controlled the race there were no unusual circumstances throwing a gamble into the mix.
 
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Tweaker said:
Should we expect a lot more cars to copy the Merc system, or is this a next season thing for most teams, or not at all for smaller ones?
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Ferrari technical director Pat Fry, who currently has several problems to solve with the F2012, said his team had been considering the system for some time and is likely to push forward following the FIA ruling.

"We've been looking at it for a while," he said. "I think it's just a case of weighing up what the performance is on our car. It's bound to vary differently from car to car and particularly if you've had that system in mind and developed your car to work around it, you're further up the development curve.

"It's not just a case of applying it to our current aerodynamic characteristic, it's then trying to exploit it further after that, so I expect there will be a two-fold thing: we will know instantly - or we know instantly - what it's worth in terms of lap time and we can weigh that up in the cost performance and the effort needed. And then we also need to look at what's the ultimate potential of that device. We've been looking at it for a month or two. Now it's clear we can at least start working for sure, weighing up everything properly."

McLaren technical director Paddy Lowe said one major consideration is that the DDRS has limited use in the race.

"In these days of really very limited capacity - whether that's people or time in wind tunnels - to develop aerodynamics, you do have to carefully select where you put your effort to make the most profit in performance, so this will fall into that camp," Lowe said. "We have to decide how much we can get from it, how it ranks compared to other areas we may work on. It does have the immediate downside that it really is only a qualifying benefit as far as we can see, so immediately it has to earn quite a lot to make that worthwhile."

Meanwhile, Sauber, which has made a strong start to the season, is not likely to throw its resources at the system.

"We're looking into the system to try and assess it fully, to work out the lap time, or qualifying lap time gain, versus costs," chief designer Matt Morris said. "I think at the moment for us it doesn't balance out. We're probably better off spending our money on more conventional lap time."
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I think Ferrari will be keen to get it working, if they can get a decent qualifying gain would greatly help them as their race pace is not too far away.
 
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