Mercedes W09 (text by tw) February 22, 2018

On February 22, 2018, Mercedes' new machine, [W09] was released.
For this photo of [W09], see F1-Gate.com.
Now there are few pictures and few overviews are seen, but below, I write my opinion little by little.



The biggest point in their aerodynamics is that the narrowing down of the second half of the side pod is rapid.
It handles the flow inside the car body well.
We can also understand the concept of minimizing the adverse effects necessary for cooling.
But on the whole it is a conservative machine and I can see.
I can perceive their great evolution.
There is no innovation aspect in this year's Mercedes.

Mercedes has no protrusion of the nose cone this year and the air flow rate on the bottom surface of the nose is still small.
Basically it seems to follow the package of the front end adopted from last year's Spanish Grand Prix.
But this year, the shape of the air flow on the nose upper surface is separated slightly to the left and right.
This slightly affects the airflow through condition of the nose hole.

As in last year, different from the other teams at the nose is that the narrower curled canards are mounted on the side of the nose, which is curled up and down.
This probably will have a slight Wing effect on the air current under the low nose and then adjust the flow.

Front suspension is high mount Wishbone which lasts from last year.
This is connecting diagonally upward from the upright, upper corner of the upper, connecting the upper arm.
As a result, the lower arm can also be raised to a higher position.

The point I doubt than the low nose is that there is no new ingenuity in the front part of the side pod upper surface, and the conventional lifting force has occurred!
There are parts that generate downforce and parts that generate lift force on the car body.
If the lift is small, the downforce will increase. It has not been done in this year's Mercedes side pod.
Regarding this area, clearly Ferrari has an advantage.

Stay of the rear wing is one type in the center.
A thin monkey sheet is visible on the exhaust pipe.
This is not a trendy gearbox wing (low T wing) this year, it will be a category of monkey sheets wide.

The rear wing is a spoon type which is a regular use of Mercedes.
The middle of the wing is large, and the left and right are thin. This has the effect of alleviating the tip vortex.
I remember that it was McLaren in 2003 that first introduced this type of 3D rear wing.

Summary.
Where is the other team self-interpreting the idea of Ferrari's side pod and incorporating it, is not Mercedes too conservative?
Evolution plus innovation is not the fascination of Formula 1 Grand Prix machine?

Driver is a combination of Luis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas,
Depending on the fighting power of Ferrari which appears after this, and the degree of improvement of Renault's power unit of Red Bull,
Mercedes may lose title this year.
(However, depending on the reliability advantage, Mercedes' title may be defended.)


(Updated on March 23, 2018)

Opening game Australia GP After free practice on Friday, I was able to see the picture of the front suspension unit of [W09].
In the following conceptual diagram, the upper part is a copy sketch from the photograph, and the lower side from the torsion bar is my conjecture.

Green is push rod,
Yellow green is rocker (bell crank),
Orange is a damper,
Pink color is torsion bar spring,
Blue is anti-roll locker,
The middle yellow is the anti-roll link.

This is similar to the front anti-roll mechanism used by Ferrari since around 1998.
The material of Mercedes this time has higher roll stiffness.
This is a form of a locker that never deforms.

Depending on the structure of this suspension unit, the roll angle during cornering will depend on the stiffness of the yellow yellow anti-roll link member.
First of all, on Sunday's race formation lap's onboard camera, you should observe how the car body rolls against the steering operation.
However, Mr. Moriwaki of Japan's television commentator on Friday's free practice commented that the action of the caster angle should also be considered.
Anyway, we must watch the roll angle by onboard camera of all cars including Mercedes in this opening race.
If they have a machine with a strange roll angle it will be subject to debate.



(Updated on March 25, 2018)

[W09] turned out that the rear of the side protector was used as a hot air outlet.
The original ancestor of this idea is Ferrari in 2004, but this year's Mercedes outlet is right after the side protector.


(Ferrari in 2004)

Thanks to this, they can not stall airflow at the back of [halo].

Today, I watched the image of the onboard camera of the race.
The rolling angle of the body during cornering has not caused intentional and strange action by the steering operation.
That means that Mercedes is a way of attaching a push rod that complies with technical regulations from this year.
As a result, the mounting position of the push rod on the upright side is coaxial with the kingpin.

Mercedes wants to suppress the front roll as much as possible. It's almost like rigid on the left and right.
During cornering, it seemed that it was just rolling slightly due to slight deformation of the roll link member.

However, the member of W09 's anti - roll locker looks like carbon, but what is the member of that link?
In the photograph, it looks like the color of carbon, perhaps it might be black and flexible metal.

Well, about the performance of [W09], but the qualifying performance was overwhelming than I had predicted.
In the qualifying in the dry condition, is not Mercedes acquiring Paul in all qualifying?
If Ferrari and Red Bull did not work hard at all, it will be a boring season this year.

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