GP Racing - UK (2020-04)

THE MERCEDES ENGINEERS WON’T BE TAKING THERACING

POINTENGINEERS ASIDE TO SAY ‘LISTEN,BY THE WAY, THIS IS

HOW WE SET UP THECAR, AND HOW WE MANAGE THE TYRES’

GP RACING APRIL 2020 101

RACING POINT HAS MUCH

TO LEARNABOUT ITS

‘PINK MERCEDES’

There’s always a learning curve in terms of

setting up a new car, especially if you’ve made

a big change to the concept. So, the similarities

between Racing Point’s new RP20 and last

season’s Mercedes W10 are no guarantee of

instant success.

Consider that in Barcelona testing we saw

the RP20 was capable of doing a verystrong lap

during qualifying simulations, even though the

drivers were clearly holding something back.

But in terms of racepace on thelong runsit

wasn’t as strong as the Mercedes was last year.

RENAULT’S NEW APPROACH

Over thewin ter therewas an other technical

restructure at Renault, with Dirk de Beer

returning as head of aerodynamics and Pat Fry

joining as chassis technical director. Although

Fry didn’t take up his post until February, having

served gardening leave after working with

McLaren as a consultant, these two hirings were

announced together in early November last year.

Apparently, Fry valued de Beer’s work highly

when they worked together at Ferrari.

While these newpersonnel arrived too late to

have a major influence on the RS20 concept, the

new front end carries a lot of the hallmarks Fry

brought to McLaren. While there, he massively

simplified the design, going back to basics in

many areas, and favouring a lean car that was

easy to design and assemble.

Last year’s Renault carried fundamental flaws

in its aero concept which stemmed from the front

end. The centre section of the car – bargeboards

and sidepods – and the rear wing and diffuser

all have to work with the air flowwhich is

displaced and conditioned by the nose and front

wing. In this way, we sawthat upgrades to the

bargeboards, floor and rear bodywork didn’t

generate the right results because the front end

wasn’t ‘speaking’ to them properly.

Renault has therefore focused on the front

end, adopting a Mercedes-style narrow nose

with a grea ter degree of curvature across the

top, together with a more coherent front wing in

terms of directing airflow around the car rather

than outsidethe tyres. Clean, fast flow through

the front suspension gives more potential to

develop the aero devices downstream.

The next challenge is to review and

understand theperformance of this new front

end to check that thecompletesystem is now

working, becausethere ’s alwaysthe possibility

that a change in philosophy such as this

introduces other problems.

Tyre management seemed to be an issue.

That’s not surprising becausewhen you take a

design like this – fundamentally copying another

car – what you don’t get isthe e xperience of

the engineers who were running that car in the

mothership. And the Mercedes engineers won’t

be taking the Racing Point engineers aside tosay,

‘Listen, by the way, this is how we set up the car,

and how we manage thetyres.’ Plus, the different

styles of the drivers has an effect.

In terms of pure performance, engines, tyres

and aerodynamics are the significant factors.

These are the things that areworth seconds.

When the differences between cars comes down

to factors such as tyre wear and consistency,

suspension is a major influence. This is where

the big teams have an advantage atthe m oment,

because they’ve been ableto develop very

sophisticated systemswhich optimise the ride

dynamics and ride height value for the best point

of the aero map in anygiven area of the track.

You can copy the aerodynamics and even carry

over some of the suspension design, but you

need experience and understanding too, which

is why the Racing Point isunlikely to be at the

same level as last year’s Mercedes.

PICTURES

TheRP20’snoseandfront

wingareverysimilartolast

year’sMercedesW10

THE MERCEDES ENGINEERS WON’T BE TAKING THERACING

POINTENGINEERS ASIDE TO SAY ‘LISTEN,BY THE WAY, THIS IS

HOW WE SET UP THECAR, AND HOW WE MANAGE THE TYRES’

GP RACING APRIL 2020 101

RACING POINT HAS MUCH

TO LEARNABOUT ITS

‘PINK MERCEDES’

There’s always a learning curve in terms of
setting up a new car, especially if you’ve made
a big change to the concept. So, the similarities
between Racing Point’s new RP20 and last
season’s Mercedes W10 are no guarantee of
instant success.
Consider that in Barcelona testing we saw
the RP20 was capable of doing a verystrong lap
during qualifying simulations, even though the
drivers were clearly holding something back.
But in terms of racepace on thelong runsit
wasn’t as strong as the Mercedes was last year.

RENAULT’S NEW APPROACH

Over thewin ter therewas an other technical

restructure at Renault, with Dirk de Beer

returning as head of aerodynamics and Pat Fry

joining as chassis technical director. Although

Fry didn’t take up his post until February, having

served gardening leave after working with

McLaren as a consultant, these two hirings were

announced together in early November last year.

Apparently, Fry valued de Beer’s work highly

when they worked together at Ferrari.

While these newpersonnel arrived too late to

have a major influence on the RS20 concept, the

new front end carries a lot of the hallmarks Fry

brought to McLaren. While there, he massively

simplified the design, going back to basics in

many areas, and favouring a lean car that was

easy to design and assemble.

Last year’s Renault carried fundamental flaws

in its aero concept which stemmed from the front

end. The centre section of the car – bargeboards

and sidepods – and the rear wing and diffuser

all have to work with the air flowwhich is

displaced and conditioned by the nose and front

wing. In this way, we sawthat upgrades to the

bargeboards, floor and rear bodywork didn’t

generate the right results because the front end

wasn’t ‘speaking’ to them properly.

Renault has therefore focused on the front

end, adopting a Mercedes-style narrow nose

with a grea ter degree of curvature across the

top, together with a more coherent front wing in

terms of directing airflow around the car rather

than outsidethe tyres. Clean, fast flow through

the front suspension gives more potential to

develop the aero devices downstream.

The next challenge is to review and

understand theperformance of this new front

end to check that thecompletesystem is now

working, becausethere ’s alwaysthe possibility

that a change in philosophy such as this

introduces other problems.

Tyre management seemed to be an issue.

That’s not surprising becausewhen you take a

design like this – fundamentally copying another

car – what you don’t get isthe e xperience of

the engineers who were running that car in the

mothership. And the Mercedes engineers won’t

be taking the Racing Point engineers aside tosay,

‘Listen, by the way, this is how we set up the car,

and how we manage thetyres.’ Plus, the different

styles of the drivers has an effect.

In terms of pure performance, engines, tyres

and aerodynamics are the significant factors.

These are the things that areworth seconds.

When the differences between cars comes down

to factors such as tyre wear and consistency,

suspension is a major influence. This is where

the big teams have an advantage atthe m oment,

because they’ve been ableto develop very

sophisticated systemswhich optimise the ride

dynamics and ride height value for the best point

of the aero map in anygiven area of the track.

You can copy the aerodynamics and even carry

over some of the suspension design, but you

need experience and understanding too, which

is why the Racing Point isunlikely to be at the

same level as last year’s Mercedes.

PICTURES

TheRP20’snoseandfront

wingareverysimilartolast

year’sMercedesW10