Williams 'clones' McLaren front wing

[Tomba]

(from another thread)
Tomba, why don’t we discuss about the McLaren test front wing which was shaped like waves and was tested this winter? It could be an interesting issue, interesting topic.
I could not understand what were they tryin’ to do?

Well this might be the right moment to do so, I'm not home now so can't upload a pic of that strange front wing they were testing during the winter. I will try to do it later today.
Why I would find this the right moment to discuss this? ... well have you looked at the newly introduced front wing of Williams in Brasil? Strangely enough... It looks a bit like that McLaren wing

I think it is again another loophole in the regulations, a difference in absolute regulations and ways how they control the conformity of the cars. I suppose front wing height is measured at both ends and the center of the car... which leaves some possible space for interpretation

[Tomba]

voila have found a pic of it
[pic missing]

it's maybe a little hard to see, but the wing is far from curved like it is at the moment on the MP4/17D, and it looks extremely similar to the waved front wing of Williams today
Now who's the inventor of 'the waving front wing' (although I must note that this McLaren spec wing does not bend in the center of the front wing, under the nose conde, where at the Williams is bends a little up)

[ferrarist]

Nice pic....they said that this front wing bring MKL 2 sec. per lap advantage .......and i'm not sure that is true.....but we'll see...

[mini Bernie]

Hi,
your close on the reason for these W shapped wings but not quite there;
as you probably know a couple of seasons ago the from wing regulations where changed, such that it was raised to be 10cm above the refference plane,
however theres a loop hole stating that 50cm either side of the centre line of the car bodywork can extend down to the refference plane,
hence the general trand of curved wings, because the closer the wing is to the ground the more ground effect it can employ and hence more downforce.
What these W shapped wings do is to take advantage of the ground effect, while creating a mini 'diffuser' effect closer to the ground, in the centre of the wing, which generates more downforce.
The problem with these wings is that they create a relatively dirty flow behind them which can upset the rest of the car, this is probably why McClaren arn't using it at races.

hope this helps.
Bernie

[SteveT]

There was an article in the April 10th issue of Autosport by Giorgia Piola and Alan Jenkins that focused primarily on the new transmission. They also talk about many of the changes from the FW24 to the FW25. In the end the comment was made that the new wing might be the more significant than lower cg and inertia benefits.

Has anyone noticed that Williams has been referring to their car as the FW25-02 this week? Have they moved to a new designation?

[LewisHamilton]

Im Confused

[modbaraban]

Im Confused

Look at the dates above the posts when you pick one of the threads from 'similar topics' This one is 2003

[CMSMJ1]

It is like motorsport archaeology...

[ced ampo]

There is an article in formula1.com about that. It is on the technical page. Not sure if 2003 or 2004. Not sure on what race was it reviewed.

[Giblet]

Your answering to old posts is rapidly becomming tedious and annoying. Your latest "contribution" has no info and only bumps the old useless message.