Williams FW38 Mercedes Speculation Thread

[turbof1]

This is the speculation thread about the 2016 car. Rumors, articles, ideas and fantasies about the car can be posted here. Once the car gets officially launched, this thread will be closed and discussion continues in the official thread.

[Sevach]

Development of the FW37 was stopped quite early, performance noticiably dropped in the last phase of the championship, Force India in particular closed the gap significantly, so i'm curious to what Williams has in store for 16, i don't think a developed 37 will go anywhere but back.

[Mr Brooksy]

I remember reading somewhere that both Massa and Bottas were saying that one area that Williams needs to improve massively was the suspension setup and tire management. I hope that they do get on top of this area! The Monaco and Hungary performances where woeful for a 3rd position in the constructors world championship!

[continuum16]

I thought somewhere Pat said that there was a fundamental flaw in the previous cars that was being rectified. (This was mid-season, maybe around June/July) I wonder what exactly he is referring to. It seems like williams' cars have the tendency to be suddenly good for one race of the season (Spain 12, Austin 13, Austria 14, maybe Britain 15). maybe something in the suspension that only has a really narrow window of working effectively?

[Raleigh]

The current car is the last of a design lineage. From what Pat Symonds has said, the FW38 will be revolution not evolution, aimed at fixing certain fundamental flaws such as lack of traction that have been holding Williams back in the last few seasons.

[Mark4211]

I recall someone posting in the FW37 thread earlier this year saying that this year's car has too much anti-dive in the front and making the front too stiff?

Could this be a factor in their relatively worse form compared to last year, this year?

[LookBackTime]

Williams stopped car development ‘a long time ago’

http://www.formula1blog.com/f1-news/wil ... -time-ago/

...

“The last few events we haven’t gone as well as we would have liked,” said Smedley.
“We stopped development on this car quite a long time ago having projected we would have a comfortable third position in the championship and second wasn’t going to be possible.
“So naturally what we’re seeing is due to the fact we haven’t developed the car in such a long time.
“The end of the season has been slightly lacklustre compared to last year. But last year, we developed the car right up until the last moment.
“This year, having consolidated third, our focus switched to 2016 and 2017.”

...

[ChrisF1]

You would think Williams will have a better 2016 because they stated they were quite compromised by the nose changes and had a lot of downforce to recover. I know this affected most teams, but Williams were pretty vocal about it in pre-season.

I also remember the fundamental flaw discussed above, and if they've worked something out it would be great to see more improvements. I'm expecting this car to be a solid top 6 again in 2016.

[Sevach]

http://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/willi ... nt-661247/

Williams performance chief Rob Smedley said: "The car we have in the wind tunnel for 2016, and the 2015 car at the end of the season, are significantly different – so we could not do anything this year from an aerodynamic point of view."

"In terms of other parts of R&D, and mechanical design, yes we have been trialling things all the time, and you need a package of upgrades with the mechanical car to see if there is any lap time improvement."

"But all our significant lap time improvement is back in the wind tunnel in Grove."

Let's wait and see what Smedley calls significant...
It's also said in the article that the new designs are hitting it's targets (whatever the hell those targets are).

[Hail22]

If only next years warhorse looked something similar to this, but darn it'd be near impossible to achieve such tight sidepod inlets...that and the rear wing isn't technically compliant (a long with a few other tid bits)

[Jolle]

Let's wait and see what Smedley calls significant...
It's also said in the article that the new designs are hitting it's targets (whatever the hell those targets are).

He could be talking about crash tests?

[Mr Brooksy]

Let's wait and see what Smedley calls significant...
It's also said in the article that the new designs are hitting it's targets (whatever the hell those targets are).

He could be talking about crash tests?

Unlikely as Maldonado isn't with them any more...

[ringo]

The problem with williams is their design philosophy for their chassis. They keep on making cars that are poor mechanically and biased towards top speed. If they come back with those bulby looking sidepods and cut tail engine cover again next year you will know things haven't change.

[Stalker1]

I agree. With Mercedes PU advantage and Massa and Bottas behind the wheels, they have extracted almost maximum performance from their last two chassis. This year, if I recall correctly, they sometimes tend to have tyre wear issues, so I think they tried some minor changes in the car setup, tweaks in suspension, but with no significant results.

I think their main problems are lack of mechnical grip and low levels of overall downforce. The lack of mechanical grip has to do something with their suspension geometry. Their chassis have never been hard on the tyres, from the other point they have had problems with heating up the tyres and lack of grip.

The low overall downforce... Hard to stay, what is causing that. I hope someone with greater knowledge would comment on that!

[adrianjordan]

This reminds we very much of Mclaren before the 2013 season: last year of a set of (more-or-less stable) regulations and going for revolution because they have reached the end of the development path for a relatively competitive car...

Hope their 2016 is better than Mclaren's 2013!!