New Ferrari requires lots of work, Massa says

Shame on me. My money would be on the exact opposite of what a competing designer would advise....

 

Comparing a car as ran and as run now is not always apples to apples.

 

True but the article I read indicated all they needed to do was add a brace to the front wishbones, and the car was immediately precise. For the sake of sharing a good story ...

Pete

 

I don't know how many times I've heard that when you have an issue with one end of the car the problem often lies at the opposite end.
BTW Octane magazine has an excellent series of articles running called Masterclass by Mark Hales that discusses just this sort of thing.

 

That's a cool story about Newey, Pete.

 

yeah, but which designer is winning right!

It's rare that a ground-up new design wins right out-of-the-box. BGP-001 did, and RB5 did at the end of the year, but it took Newey RB1,2,3, and 4 to realise the technique he needed to apply to make 5 and then of course 6. It's a growing process of trial and error and getting the mixture of things just right. I'm can't imagine the frustration some of these engineers face when an idea they poured over for months on end fell flat on its face.

 

I can think of many examples:
The McLaren MP4,
The Brabham fan car for one and that was a radical idea ... first 2 races before it was banned.
Lotus 72,
Lotus 49,
...
Brabham BT19,
...
Mercedes-Benz W125

But yes I get your point.
Pete

 

72decidedly not right to start.
As I remember they went back to the 49 for a race or two while sorting the 72

 

Correct and many modifications were required. They did manage to win the 1970 WDC but hardly the way they would have wanted to with Rindt dying during the season.

Pete

 

A bad year. Lost Piers and Bruce as well. R.I.P

The 72 did come right in a big way of course and literally changed the face of F1 but it was a bit of a handful right out of the box.

 

http://planetf1.com/driver/18227/7529219/Massa-Ferrari-need-the-mileage

 

Fred mentioned at this stage, Ferrari only understands roughly about 20% of their new car.

 

Where did he say that?

 

I hear Ferrari are bringing a really neat new diffuser to Barcelona. Something supposedly special about it

 

I can't wait for testing tomorrow.

 

+1 it will all start coming together soon Smithers!

 

www.f1-live.com

 

Nothing really new on the Ferrari. The exhaust is a little different but nothing interesting

 

Word is the Ferrari is eating its front tires in a big way

 

Sounds like the title of this thread still holds true! It needs work. Let's hope by Friday its looking up.

 

I bet this is caused by the pull rod design ... no way they are going to be able to control the wheel with an almost horizontal pull rod. I believe 2012 will be a poor year for Scuderia Ferrari because of this feature.
Pete

 

Lets hope not. It's crazy to see how they can get this wrong, after putting so much of work and effort in the 2012 car. I also believe they were the first to focus on the 2012 cars since last year? No?

 

Agreed. It was used by a couple other teams in the past and never by anyone else. Why? Because it just not optimaly as a front suspension with a high nose. It has little room for adjustment and it is proving to overheat tires due to it. Arrows used this system last and we all know how well they went...

I bet the Ferrari will qualify decently but will roast the tires on race pace.

 

Ferrari might have been over doing things with the F2012 which left them with too many new variables to tackle both on track and in the wind tunnel.

I got a bad feeling that 2012 could go down as the disaster for Ferrari if we dont get to see some serious long runs by the team this week.

 

I wonder if Ferrari left themselves a back door... they are testing the pull rod suspension because it has aero advantages that they hope will outweigh the mechanical disadvantages. BUT maybe the front of the tub is designed for a push rod setup also? All they need is a few extra mounting points bonded in for the pushrod pivot or shock mounts, is it possible that the car could be converted to a pushrod front suspension easily?