14 replies to this topic

[BradSpeedMan]

my god, look at this nose

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[JHS]

Looks pretty decent, nice to see someone bucks the trend with a low front wing. Still not convinced that CFD only is the way forward, but they are my local team so I'll support them anyway.

[freaky2]

Is that the same way you support Hamilton?

[JHS]

Ha, that's different. Virgin Racing haven't done anything to p**s me off so far.

[Quiet One]

JHS, on 07 February 2011 - 04:59 PM, said:

Ha, that's different. Virgin Racing haven't done anything to p**s me off so far.

Don't thank me.

[Insider]

Hmmm..............

[HandyNZL]

Wirth must be chasing something with that low nose (the nose JHS, not the wing...the wing is at normal height).  Wasn't it John Bernard that started the whole raised nose thing...or was that Newey at Leyton House? Any ways, this could represent a new approach...clean slate thinking, not just following on from previous cars...guess a new team can do this better than an established team which as evolved designs.

Then again, Macca's nose isn't so high anymore...

[HandyNZL]

OK. So have had more of a nosey at this car and it's got me wondering.

First off, I will freely admit and believe that what Nick Wirth is doing with CFD is world leading, and in the medium term, will produce a competitive car.  Of the three new teams, I would expect it to emerge further up the order of things than the others.  Perhaps not this year, but at least before five seasons are done with.  With a limited budget, CFD is truly the best way forward.  All the team needs is the data coming off the car at the track to compliment their brainiac calculations in the workshop.  A lack of testing, and therefore data, is what is stunting the current growth.

Now, to the car.  At first appearances we all most likely went, "err, wheres the flash, wheres the pazazz, it doesn't look like much", or to quote our favourite ex Renault wrench "hmmmm..."

But this has got me thinking...are we missing something because we expect the ultra sculptured air covers and sidepods? Is this approach a little too much "complication looks cool", and too little "keep it simple stupid"?

Noses went upward in the mid 1990's.  Rules dictated a few things, namely ground effects was out, and lifting the nose by regulation meant ground effects would be reduced at a swipe of a pen.  And since then, noses have lifted skywards, gotten thinner, and even pointier, Williams Walrus nose's not withstanding (which apparently showed better numbers in the wind tunnel than a "normal" nose).

And now, here we have a new team bucking the trend.  This nose is low.  I would assume it is on the bottom end of the dimension scale that meets the regulations.

Also, the car is plain.  Very plain.  Even the radiator intakes look overly bulky.  However, the front wing elements are interesting with their swooping inward curve.

So maybe we are missing something? K.I.S.S might result in, well, results.  There is less complication to hide what may or may not be the cause of a problem.

I said last year that the Lotus looked like a brick, and I think I even likened it to a 1980's Volvo.  Of course, Lotus ended up the best of the new teams, and, by and large pegged the gap to RBR and McLaren etc throughout the year, meaning that their development kept pace with the bigger teams on a much smaller budget.  Virgin also pegged the gap.  The only team that didn't was HRT, and relatively speaking, STR fell backwards.

Likewise, I should have remembered that Volvo produced a pretty good flying brick back in the late eighties in Touring Cars.

So sleek body lines are not necessarily all that they are cracked up to be.

Sure, some will say that all the new teams sucked egg last year.  And if you are an ill-informed munter, then you are correct.  But that is not the case at all, and I for one think they did a great job, in six-months to design and build a car (HRT not withstanding, but Dallara still managed something) and bring it to the track, to compete against cars that had been on the development board for at least a year, and in the case of some components, years and years.  And then they kept pace with the competition gap, and at times even reduce it.

Wirth has done a lot in prototype racing...all from CFD.  Heck, his design won Le Mans by six staggering laps.  I see no reason, other than time, that would not suggest he can replicate some of that success in Formula 1.  Will this car do it? No.  I doubt it.  Will it be closer.  Yes, I should think so.  Baby steps as they say.

So in conclusion, this car is no less good looking, or no less ugly than the rest of the 2011 crop.  It is certainly being developed a different way, and the design brief is, on the outside at least, going along a different path.  But so too McLarens latest charger.

I think with a year under their belts, this team will perform better.  The car is more developed.  The teams understanding of the cars just that little bit better.  I expect that STR will get a hurry up by them.

Edited by HandyNZL, 08 February 2011 - 07:09 AM.

[BradSpeedMan]

HandyNZL, on 08 February 2011 - 07:08 AM, said:

So in conclusion, this car is no less good looking, or no less ugly than the rest of the 2011 crop.  It is certainly being developed a different way, and the design brief is, on the outside at least, going along a different path.  But so too McLarens latest charger.

What can I say, but that you made me think again.    The part in bold I really like, they're sticking to their guns in developing a different way....hope it start to show some results.

[Senna's Ghost]

HandyNZL, on 08 February 2011 - 12:34 AM, said:

Wirth must be chasing something with that low nose (the nose JHS, not the wing...the wing is at normal height).  Wasn't it John Bernard that started the whole raised nose thing...or was that Newey at Leyton House? Any ways, this could represent a new approach...clean slate thinking, not just following on from previous cars...guess a new team can do this better than an established team which as evolved designs.

Then again, Macca's nose isn't so high anymore...

It was Harvery Postlethwaite and Jean-Claude Migeot that pioneered the raised nose and anhedral front wing on the Tyrrell 019 of 1990.  The underside of the monocoque was swept up at the front and they introduced the splitter, that we still see today, that extended to the trailing edge of the front wheels so as to conform with the regualtions for having a flat bottom.  John Barnard developed this idea further the following year by having the raised nose with a full width front wing.  Postlethwaite and Migeot's thinking was very simple yet very clever and the principles are still being used today, 21 years later.  

I disagree with the point you make in your subsequent post that you think Nick Wirth is doing "world leading" stuff with CFD.  As I've mentioned in a previous post what Nick Wirth and his team is doing is admirable but their CFD software will not be any better than that of the leading teams and of course these teams have other performace and development tools to hand, such as the use of a wind tunnel and rolling road.  Virgin are going into a fight with the likes of Lotus, STR with one-hand tied behind their back.

If Virgin and Wirth strike gold this season with their design I'll be pleased for them, fair play.  But if they fall short and they find that their closest rivals have stolen a march, then surely they have to look at their philosophy on designing and performace testing their cars before they hit the track in anger.

Time will tell.

[HandyNZL]

Senna, on 08 February 2011 - 08:17 AM, said:

It was Harvery Postlethwaite and Jean-Claude Migeot that pioneered the raised nose and anhedral front wing on the Tyrrell 019 of 1990.  The underside of the monocoque was swept up at the front and they introduced the splitter, that we still see today, that extended to the trailing edge of the front wheels so as to conform with the regualtions for having a flat bottom.  John Barnard developed this idea further the following year by having the raised nose with a full width front wing.  Postlethwaite and Migeot's thinking was very simple yet very clever and the principles are still being used today, 21 years later.  

I disagree with the point you make in your subsequent post that you think Nick Wirth is doing "world leading" stuff with CFD.  As I've mentioned in a previous post what Nick Wirth and his team is doing is admirable but their CFD software will not be any better than that of the leading teams and of course these teams have other performace and development tools to hand, such as the use of a wind tunnel and rolling road.  Virgin are going into a fight with the likes of Lotus, STR with one-hand tied behind their back.

If Virgin and Wirth strike gold this season with their design I'll be pleased for them, fair play.  But if they fall short and they find that their closest rivals have stolen a march, then surely they have to look at their philosophy on designing and performace testing their cars before they hit the track in anger.

Time will tell.

Well, without the money to produce scale models left, right and centre, just to find they are crap, poo, and manure ideas, I think that this approach is anything but tying one hand behind your back.

[rumblestrip]

Bigger pics:

[Senna's Ghost]

HandyNZL, on 08 February 2011 - 09:05 AM, said:

Well, without the money to produce scale models left, right and centre, just to find they are crap, poo, and manure ideas, I think that this approach is anything but tying one hand behind your back.

Virgin have now got backing from Marussia, so you would expect their financial foooting to be stronger now than it has been in the past.  I would imagine that their budget is comparable to that of Lotus, who is most likely to be their direct rival and the team that they will measure themselves against this season .  If Lotus is using CFD and aero tunnel work and anything else they can get their hands on to help hone their design of the car and it's components and the development pieces that will be added to the car througout the season; and Virgin respond by relying solely on CFD for their performace data, then you would have to say that Virgin are needlessly handicapping themselves.

You don't know if the models you produce left, right and centre are crap, poo and manure ideas if you don't build and test them in the first place.  And it's not just the scale  models of the overall car, it's the aero pieces that get developed and tested throughout the year.  They are only taking 1 data set produced from the CFD software.  Other teams will have data coming from CFD and data coming from the wind tunnel.  If the figures corroborate each other, within an accepted margin of error, then the desginer can say with a degree of confidence that adding a new component, or re-designing a piece of the car, will be a step forward.  In Virgin's case it will be "the computer says that this frontwing endplate gives 0.5% impovement over the old version."
"Great lets put it on the car.  Fingers crossed."

Remember that Wirth and his team of designers are only sub-contractors into the project.  If the cars a pup then they could find themselves jettisoned.  Remember the finger pointing that went on when it was announced last year that the Virgin fuel tank was not big enough for the car to finish the race.  It was made very clear to the world that the fault lay at the door of Wirth and his company and that they would have to carry the cost of the re-design.  Lets hope the car is competitive.

[JHS]

Go Virgin Racing!

[berryla]

So have had more of a nosey at this car and it's got me wondering.Tera Online Gold
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