When is the time to switch to 2012 car development?

[raymondu999]

I think a key argument in 2012 development vs 2011 and how to split resources is that you need to focus more on the components that CAN be transferred over. I remember that late in 2010 McLaren was updating the F-duct quite a bit; which took me quite a bit by surprise. I would've thought that it would be better to work on "other" components that were transferrable to the 2011 challenger so that the late-season push isn't wasted for the next year

[marcush.]

to go back on the original question ...
you have some constraints here with some parts carrying not only a long lead time in production but also along leadtime to develop.
there are parts you need to finalise -have a design freeze- quite early in the project to allow other departments to do their work .

So you may be sure able to change minor details of the tub later in the year but a switch of short to longwheelbase will not be possible without major compromise.

So I´d guess your Tubs general shape and layout is done now and the guys will start to produce the molds s for it.Clever guys will integrate changeable inserts into the mold which opens the door for detail design changes without affecting the prototype production and allow for aa seamless build phase even when some departments struggle to find an end to some discussions.
But in the end you need to be ready with the first tub end of September .In other words the talk about switching recources towards the next year now is total blabla
it´s necessary to start much earlier ,say May or early June to decide on concepts
and even if you have 2 or three possible directions still going early on I´m sure in july you are so far advanced that it is only onne direction yoiu are pursuing.

the one thing you might stop or not stop early is the aero kit for Spa/Monza .Those chaps who struggled to produce a competitive machine out of the box will of course have delayed the development for that or split the development in two (taking interims solution to Canada)and push forward with new parts to gain some speed ..this is obviously slicing off chunks of development time in a crucial phase for next years contender -especially in aero .with only one tunnel ,you cannot run two cars at once.(Can you?).that would make for a nice idea under RRA rules
Having a tunnel with two test sections and you can switch the flow from one to the other via opening gates ....this could reduce down time due to thwe tunnel speeding up and slowing down and would ebable you to work on this and next years car at the same time..


But in reality you need to start when it´s time to start.Planning is derived from the date you need the car at the very latest...and you take it from there.To me it´s amazing that a team like Mercedes is not finished with the car in time.You got a clear understanding of what takes how long to design and manufacture ,you got ideally a PLM tool with project management and requirements management,compliancecheck,BOM,Change management and management of suppliers. bearing in mind you have build formula 1 cars since 2000 in that facility...
check Honda introduced plm by Siemens only in 2006 to switch to Dassault in 2010..

http://www.plm.automation.siemens.com/e ... nent=30477

[marcush.]

To give a hint when you need to switch your focus:

Williams started as early as march with their radical gearbox ...which must be one of the longest lead time items .
Ok you would not do a radically different design each year but when exploring new routes there is just no way to compromise and put recources into the current campaign.

[ESPImperium]

The breakdown for resources for new car to current car is as follows;

January: 90% 2011 car and 10% 2012 car
Febuary: 90% 2011 car and 10% 2012 car
March: 85% 2011 car and 15% 2012 car
April: 85% 2011 car and 15% 2012 car
May: 75% 2011 car and 25% 2012 car
June: 70% 2011 car and 30% 2012 car
July: 60% 2011 car and 40% 2012 car
August: 60% 2011 car and 40% 2012 car (however with the suimmer shut down they may devote more time to tither car)
September: 45% 2011 car and 55% 2012 car
October: 25% 2011 car and 75% 2012 car (However they can put as much as 90%+ to the 2012 car)
November: 10% 2011 car and 90% 2012 car (However they can put as much as 90%+ to the 2012 car)
December: 100% 2012 car

At present, id recon that most teams are developing for 2011 at a decent rate, however they are looking at their last update at Singapore for all cars but McLaren, Ferrari and Red Bull. They will all have Monza only packages, so will be developing for that race, however id expect one or two teams to go with a Anti Monza set up to try and protect the Pirellis and use the DRS a bit more in Quali and try and take a step into a diffrent race strategy and try an one stopper.

The first 2012 chassis to roll off the production lines are usually arround September to mid October, Honda has their first RA109 roll off the production line in September 2008, that chassis is now a show car as they didnt adpot it for the Mercedes power plant when the team became Brawn on 2009.

The first Mercedes MGP W03 tub will be rolling off the production line in Mid-November as the MGP W02-01 came off the line in the line in the week between Brazil and Abu Dhabi last year. WIlliams had their first gear casing for this years car off the production line in September for full dyno testing that same month, and they had 5 thru the dyno plant before the first one was put on to the test car in January.

Id expect that most teams will have their 01 tub off the line for end of November this year as i think that most teams will be trying to put at least 5,000km on their 2012 cars before the season starts. Especially the smaller teams who had problems with new equiptment, failed to get ther 2011 car on the test track for the first test or went tyre testing at Monza for Pirelli that set them back.

However 2012 will see 3 test weeks and not 4 as the 3 day test is going to be pushed into the 3 week break between Bahrain and Spain and will be held at Monza where the teams will test young guys in their 2012 equiptment.

Its not about when development is switched, its about getting the right data out of your car, if you fail to get the right data, your development on your current car will be hamstrung. And with limits on CFD power and tunnel usage with next to no testing, teams have to actt with quality data to put quality developments onto cars now. You no longer can put 50 wings thru their pases in CFD now and then manufacture the best 10 and then spend 3 days back to back testing them all over 5 lap runs at a test track to find out the best one for that car. Teams now choose to find out where the problem may lie on the car else where and change that to suit the wing as that may yeild a better performance gain than a single wing.

Also timing the developments is key, get the right development on the car at the right time, you can gain as much as half the grid in race pace, and by the time your adverseries have figured out what it is, you have updated the area that was ta weak point to keep ahead.

Its about getting the right things in the right time at the right time now. Thats whay drivers are sent out for arround half race distance in FP1 and FP2 now, and not just 5 to 9 laps to install and base line the car and let the third driver take the car thru its path for the weekend on a Friday.

57,000km a season for a team is gone, its more like 25,000km a season is their total distance.

[donskar]

marcush and ESPImperium -- great stuff on F1 design/construction timelines. Thank you.

[marcush.]

I think one of the key objectives is the lessons learned aspect to integrate into next years car.
How would you be able to decide if a evolutionary design will be sufficient to keep your product at the sharp end of the grid or are you already in a position after the flyaway races to decide to drop your current concept and satrt all over again...
Frankly speaking with 3500 parts to be designed for a complete car you cannot redo everything every year for the hell of it.The smaller teams will need to carry over substantial amounts of hardware simply to keep on the timeline...but :a lot of bits are not affecting performance ,others just need minor dimension adjustments or a new machining process so things may look more dramatic in places than real world.
what I find amazing is the sheer logistic of dealing with molds ,bucks,and mastermodels for the real car AND for the Aeromodel as well .You produce a set of parts some spres and heck after this you got a bunch of BIG molds and pieces you will need to store them and make room for next years car ,which is not even sharing a sinle big element of the molds maybe...The teams must have real horror storeys to accomodate the flood of these parts ...I´d assume teams like Mclaren keep all this somewhere (as seen in that Button /Hamilton video last year)

[ESPImperium]

It may not have been covered yet but marcush has touched on it above. The ammount of technichal carry over now from one year to another is pretty high now. Once there was about a 10% carry over. Now its pretty close to 50% or more, this is due to the SECU and the fact that many of the dimmentions are pretty standard for the cars in terms of monocoque and such. Thats why De La Rosa could just fir straight into the C30 with the aid of his C29s seat at Canada this year.

Carry over of parts is more and more common now, so this saves alot of resource and this means this valuable resource can be channeled into other areas of the car that will reap more performance.

Areas of carry over are as follows:

* SECU
* Breaking systems
* Wheels & Tires
* Steering rack (Generally)
* Engine
* Gearbox (Unless you are manufacturing a new rear solution)
* KERS systems
* Inboard suspension pices

Most parts now can last for up to 5 or 6 races in some cases if maintained properly they can last a season or more, some parts could effectivly last 2 seasons if a good mantananince record and practice is used.

[marcush.]

I´d be a bit more cautious with that statement.
sure the design will start with a power copy of last year ..with all constraints coming from regs or best engineering practise etc etc already in place so you can´t change bits that are not allowed to change and you will not be able to put parts into forbidden zones.
But ,for example engine ancilliaries are free ...so there might be an upgrade in oil pumps ,plumbing ,generator position ,size technology ,you may decide to rework the whole oilsystem includiung sump and its attachment to the tub.The airbox and all internals -fuel rails injectors plumbing -cluch ,you name it a lot of things including the complete exhaust system are free to work on ....
the revised maximum height of the forward bulkheads and nose height will force everyone bar Mclaren ,Virgin and HRT to redo everything from the frontwing backwards weighing up the possibility to reposition the steering rack especially now when teams gradually morph back to more square tub forward shapes.

I think detail designwise this is a lot easier nowadays and led to the teams being prepared to go into that much detail .
In the 1990s Formula 1 cars were a lot cruder in manufacture and technical detail as the manufacturing and ability to creat complicted shapes was just too time consuming and even the best teams had not the strength in depth to design everything new year after year.

[raymondu999]

What I don't understand is; why are some teams at this point still working on things that are banned for next year? We saw it last year for example with McLaren; brining a new F-duct for testing into Korea; which then didn't work; and they only finally got it working and installed in Abu Dhabi. Surely that is effort that is "wasted" if you take the view of carryover parts?

[marcush.]

What I don't understand is; why are some teams at this point still working on things that are banned for next year? We saw it last year for example with McLaren; brining a new F-duct for testing into Korea; which then didn't work; and they only finally got it working and installed in Abu Dhabi. Surely that is effort that is "wasted" if you take the view of carryover parts?

I think you also carry over knowledge and expertise.If you don´t test the bits you will not know if they had the predicted effects and even more crucially the "why" remains in the dark .
You may be able to ban the technology but the effects you found in inventing all this will be put in your next car as desireable charecteristics or characteristics to be avoided..

crumpling all your work into the bin year after year will not lead to sucess .you just rid yourself of the aspects of your work that limited progress before reaching your goals.
Mclaren has developped their front wing over the last years into what they have now and understand it good enough not to drop it now and start with a REDBull wing or Renault .the snowplow and front suspension arrangement is very much a thing they kept and they are happy to only finehone it..even though they obviously still experiment with the flexiaspects for example.

Other teams seem to be unsure just where to leave things as they are and what to change ..