Ferrari to run 'shark fin' in Hungary Tuesday, 29 July 2008 15:53 - ITV Ferrari will race with the shark fin engine cover on its F2008 for the first time in this weekends Hungarian Grand Prix while it has also revealed the reason for its Hockenheim struggle. The world champions became the latest team to try out the Red Bull-inspired extension at last weeks Jerez test, with it featuring on Felipe Massas car in the afternoon on Fridays final day. And the team has confirmed that it will run with the aero component, which improves air flow to the rear wing and helps braking stability, at the Hungaroring this week after positive feedback from its driver. Tomorrow, Luca Badoer will carry out a shakedown at Fiorano of the cars that will be used in Budapest, it said in a preview. For the first time on a race weekend, the F2008 will be fitted with, amongst other new components, the anvil engine cover, after Massa felt in Jerez that it brought some benefits. Ferraris main aim at last weeks pre-race test was to establish the reason for its poor pace at the previous round in Germany, where it was no match for Lewis Hamiltons McLaren and finished third and sixth. The team says its investigation involved a thorough data analysis, including comparison work on set-up and aero and mechanical parts at both the track and its Maranello factory. It has now revealed that those tests concluded that the F2008s German GP struggle had come about as a result of tyre-related issues on the particular day of the race, rather than a direct problem with the car's pace. The synthesis of those investigations is that in Hockenheim, it was not the car itself that had something wrong with it, in that the package was not worse than the previous one," it said. "The major difference was tyre related and for a variety of reasons, Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa were unable to get the best out of the tyres during Sunday's race, even if there had been little sign of this difficulty over the previous two days of practice and qualifying, he said.
I really hope Ferrari is not so despirate to win that they are using a "Monkey see Monkey do" approach to enhancing their development. Its seems they have run out of steam the last couple races. Maybe if I go to church and talk to the priest it might help. At this point they need help from the big guy upstairs.
I think all teams end up like this sooner or later. Trying out known innovations already in use. Lets hope it works if they take the time to use it and also that their problems in Germany were just the tires. We shall see very soon!
Hopefully not, but then again from what has been said it seems that the new aero regulations are geared towards cutting the downforce generated from the aero. Supposedly the fin is designed to clean up the airflow going to the rear wing so it may or may not count as increasing downforce.
Why go with a sixties shark nose when they could slap one of these good looking front ends on the car... Image Unavailable, Please Login
Are they done with the shark fin. Ferrari does not have it and Mclaren does not have it . what going on
I just got finished watching the show about the Italian race in Monza and they said using the shark fin will give the drivers 0.5-0.8 time difference than the setup they have now. Looking at the setup now and the shark fin, it looks like to me the setup they have now would give them better times, the shark fin is straight and the set up they have now is more of a slope.
