Quote from pearcy_2k7 :

So if you had an awesome car part, that no-one else has thought of and it was easy to replicate like say 2 weeks to make it, you would have it on the car at this test??

Well, that's the dilema. If we are talking something that is so much an integral part of the package as a diffuser then yes or only do some basic mechanical/electronic tests.

Redbull is probably staying home for a very good reason.

Quote from pearcy_2k7 :

So if you had an awesome car part, that no-one else has thought of and it was easy to replicate like say 2 weeks to make it, you would have it on the car at this test??

But with every car has a different aero package. So that 'awesome part' would take months for another team to replicate. F1 cars are highly complex aero machines. The concept, to design, to testing take more than two weeks.

You can either test it as soon as possible and develop it so it's ready for the first race, or you can test your car without it and then find the 'magic' part doesn't work in the final few tests. Suddenly you're car concept is broken are you're buggered all because you hid a part you weren't sure about.

For sure teams will be testing different parts and what not, but I doubt very much any team is hiding special parts.

Quote from 5haz :

Perhaps that exhaust area is also an outlet for the air from the radiators too.

That's exactly what it is. By exhaust Tristan wasn't talking about the actual engine exhaust but the heat exhaust for the engine.

I was actually

But it looks as though the engine exhaust is used to create a low pressure area to assist 'sucking' the radiator 'exhaust' out as well... But I still wonder about turbulence in that area, as the air over and around the sidepod won't want to suddenly change direction...

Having said that, it was a pretty quick car relative to everyone else today (but we don't know about fuel loads or anything, so it could be totally meaningless if the Sauber had 20kg fuel and the Ferrari 120kg...)

lol, jokes on me then . I don't think there will be much of an issue with it changing direction, it's probably already "prepared" under the engine cover from air that flows through the sidepods/radiators.

The air on the outside of the bodywork isn't prepared though... if you were a particle of air moving along the bodywork at 180mph, would you want to suddenly change direction and fill that void without going turbulent?

Quote from pearcy_2k7 :

So if you had an awesome car part, that no-one else has thought of and it was easy to replicate like say 2 weeks to make it, you would have it on the car at this test??

The diffuser's at the back of the car. In order to work the diffuser properly you need to decide what you're going to do with the airflow when it hits the front wing. So testing a front wing designed to work with a different diffuser wouldn't make any sense.

Remember last year how long it took the teams to catch up to the double-floor concept? In part it was due to gearbox arrangements and issues at the rear of the car, but apparently the big issue was re-thinking the rest of the whole aero design in order to make a new diffuser work properly.

Quote from pearcy_2k7 :

So if you had an awesome car part, that no-one else has thought of and it was easy to replicate like say 2 weeks to make it, you would have it on the car at this test??

At this time of year it's way too busy to be copying other teams. Many of the teams will already be working 24 hours a day trying to get their own cars ready, they simply don't have the time to be trying to figure out the designs of the other teams and then adapting them. Like I said before, the launch car is a bodged together vehicle; quick fixes will have been made to get around issues caused by parts that weren't made in time or parts that are only just working. The car at the first race won't be much better, and it's only a couple of races in when the car is properly sorted. Then teams will be starting to implement things they've seen on other cars.

However, they will have a department watching the other teams already to try to figure out as much as they can of what their competitors have done over the winter. They won't really make any decisions based on their research until after the first race when the true pace of the cars is first shown. The time between now and a few races in when the parts are first raced is used to properly evaluate the idea, adapt it to their own car, simulate it and its effects on the whole car (wind tunnel, cfd, etc), build it and then test it on a Friday at a race event.

Quote from tristancliffe :

The air on the outside of the bodywork isn't prepared though... if you were a particle of air moving along the bodywork at 180mph, would you want to suddenly change direction and fill that void without going turbulent?

I wouldn't be suprised if the Sauber isn't simply hastily cobbled together using a lot of the previous years design internally, still to early to simply write it off.

Makes me think of Force India's sidepods last year, they had a very sharp 'dip' in them which made me wonder whether that would mess up the air flow off the back off the sidepods, but they didn't seem to have any trouble. Then again, CFD and wind tunnels and knowledge allows them to see things the rest of us can't see.

What I do like is how the cars seem to be becoming a bit more 'diverse' in their designs, like the changing rules hs lead to teams going about solving the same problem in more varied ways than in the last few seasons, which is a good thing IMO. Of course if the rules stabilise for long enough the best design tricks will win out and all the cars will look identical again. (And already, several teams have copied Red Bull's crooked snout, after all).

Quote from pearcy_2k7 :

Yeah i accept that they probably won't put parts on cars to get the other teams guessing. But surely they won't be using their best diffusers etc for the other teams to copy so early on in the testing?

They won't know what their best diffusers, etc., are without testing them on the track. The earlier they test those components, evaluate their solutions, and sort out any problems, the better they will be in the season.

@Tristan: Thats what i mean, the air will probably already have been angled on the underside of the car to blend with the air on the top. Aerodynamics isn't just limited to the outside of the car. The only problem would be dealing with convection.

SO! Day 2 bekons, any kind of video feeds or anything to watch during the day??

Nah, no video feeds, try that twitter link i posted, that gives regular updates of times and posts of pictures etc, pretty good.

Rubens tells Nico to 'get out ouf there':

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKLDE6110OU20100202

Quote :

10:45 - InsideFerrari: A man in black is driving the F10! No worries, he is Felipe! The Brazilian driver is using a new concept of helmet, prepared by Schubert.

It has a huge spring deflector on the front!

I like the new looks of the cars... gives a bit more F1 feeling again to me opposed to the weird designes we had last years. Too bad the front wing is so damn ugly huge!

Thanks for all the info sharing.

I was starting to get worried, until I read this:

Quote :

Lewis Hamilton is making a very long run.

The McLaren driver read on his pit board that he had twenty laps to do before he can begin his inlap and he already has three behind.

And with the heavy MP4-25 Hamilton also improves his time.

So with a heavy car, he's improving his lap time. Top stuff.

Quote from dawguk :

So with a heavy car, he's improving his lap time. Top stuff.

I assume you mean he improved his 'light' time with a 'heavy' one. Obviously he wasn't pushing on his 'light' lap but even if he is just improving on his heavy lap, it's not really a big deal is it? That's what happens when you are lapping a track, you are inevitably going to improve your lap time.

Even if he wasn't pushing on his light lap, that lap time with more fuel on a race setup is very impressive.

The Sauber has been quietly impressive so far. Quicker than I had expected, considering BMW's horrible performance last season, their lack of sponsorship and the effect of limited financial resources in car design and construction, and the relative lack of experience in its drivers.

Quote from pearcy_2k7 :

Even if he wasn't pushing on his light lap, that lap time with more fuel on a race setup is very impressive.

It's not really that impressive. 20 laps of fuel is only a modest load. This season's cars have fuel tanks with roughly 150 litres of capacity. The average fuel consumption per lap is around 2.5 to 2.7 litres per lap on most tracks. 20 laps of fuel is only around 50 to 52 litres. Since a full tank of fuel is estimated to cost 4 seconds per lap on this track (source: Barrichello), that means 20 laps of fuel equates to roughly 1.2 to 1.4 seconds of deficit.

But remember, it's early times yet.

Quote from samjh :

It's not really that impressive. 20 laps of fuel is only a modest load. This season's cars have fuel tanks with roughly 150 litres of capacity. The average fuel consumption per lap is around 2.5 to 2.7 litres per lap on most tracks. 20 laps of fuel is only around 50 to 52 litres. Since a full tank of fuel is estimated to cost 4 seconds per lap on this track, that means 20 laps of fuel equates to roughly 1.2 to 1.4 seconds of deficit.

But remember, it's early times yet.

Are you looking at different timings to the rest of us then? Explain how your maths works please. You've just said that 20 laps equates to 1.2 to 1.4 seconds, and with that taken into account, and considering that Hamilton is running 0.6 seconds slower, it means that Hamilton's effective fastest lap is 0.6 to 0.8 seconds faster than Massa's current fastest lap. How is that not impressive? According to your maths, that is.

Unless Massa had 100kg in the car...

Well no-one knows if Massa's lap was a qualifying lap or not, if it was then Hamilton's lap is certainly impressive, doesn't matter how many laps he ran but to setup a car to run 20laps instead of 2 you have to compramise alot of speed.

We shall see, no doubt Hamilton will have a go at topping the times.

I think we both know that's not the case Unless that sneaky Brazilian has hidden a turbo or two onto his horse.

Sure, there are a lot of unknowns, but it's the same set of unknowns for all the teams.

Edit: isn't Massa's best time today already better than his final showboat time of yesterday?