In August of 2012, a man wearing a fake nose robbed a bank in St. Louis. Police managed to get an accurate description of the culprit, but according to authorities, this particular shenanigan isn't uncommon. The fake nose is supposed to draw the attention of witnesses, who presumably would have trouble identifying the rest of the face, so drawn they are to the fake nose. So, Formula 1 cars of 2014, what did you do with the money?
So hideous are the new noses on most of the 2014 F1 entrants that they could, at least for a little while, distract your attention from the sound of their new 1.6-liter turbocharged V-6 engines. For a little while.
If there's an upside to these aesthetic monstrosities, it's that Formula 1 is perhaps the last remaining motorsport that allows, even embraces, the world of innovative nerds who have too much bandwidth, too much space on their hard drives, too much time in the wind tunnel, and too much education. Yet the responses from the brightest minds in automotive aerodynamics are variations on a nose design reminiscent of something from a masquerade ball. We half-suspect an engineer will tear off one of these phallic noses, revealing something more conventional-looking beneath.
But they're real. The Caterham CT05 and the Force India VJM07 have oddly rounded, uvula-like dangly things hanging between the crash structure and the front wing that are supposed to slow, then channel the wind, we're told, more effectively than a sharp edge. But the rounded, almost spear-like noses are coming under criticism for the sort of damage they might do if they collide with a competitor. And then there's Lotus's "twin nose," which looks like an open roach clip about to join the legal-pot party in Denver or Seattle during the Super Bowl broadcast.
Oh, right, those hybridized 1.6-liter turbo V-6s. Yes, of course, how could we forget? Many over the winter foretold of countless mechanical failures stemming from the new power units, a prophecy that—at the first test in Jerez, anyway—has been fulfilled.
Sebastian Vettel had significantly less to smile about once the portraits had been taken and the testing got underway.
Take four-time defending constructors' champion Red Bull for example. Four-time defending drivers' champion Sebastian Vettel logged just 11 laps in the first two days behind the wheel of the brand-new RB10 before turning over the car to new teammate Daniel Ricciardo for days three and four. Ricciardo managed just three laps on day three.
What's the problem? As is typical in the Formula 1 paddock, no one is disseminating pie charts detailing the dilemmas of their teams, but the buzz seems to center on problems with the Renault and its energy-recovery system. One theory is that the packaging is leading to overheating. Smoke—not billowing, but unwelcome and present nonetheless—seems to be a common accompaniment to Red Bull breakdowns. The switch to the new downsized and hybridized power units has been years in the making, so for the world champions to be caught with their pants down like this is stunning.
Some suggest that Red Bull waited too long to give the 2014 car its undivided attention. Chief designer Adrian Newey has been quoted as saying the team was still focused on last year's title-winning RB9 as of September, giving the team no more than four months to focus solely on the RB10 that will contest this year's championship. Others have put the blame on Renault, Red Bull's supplier of engines and energy-recovery units. Through two days of testing, Renault-supplied teams had completed just 38 laps, compared with 138 for Ferrari-backed teams and 248 laps for Mercedes-powered outfits.
- First Drive: 2014 Porsche 918 Spyder
- Feature: Hyping Hypercars—2014 Ferrari LaFerrari vs. McLaren P1, Lamborghini Veneno
- Instrumented Test: 2014 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG Black Series
Ferrari's Kimi Räikkönen stood atop timesheets on the first day of testing from Jerez, while McLaren's Jenson Button and Kevin Magnussen took honors on the second and third days before rain set in today and slowed the pace significantly.
There's a two-and-a-half-week wait before the next test in Bahrain. It would be fascinating to monitor the sales of energy drinks around the various teams' shops as they frantically address concerns over design and/or power units. Except for Red Bull, of course, who has its own dedicated supplier, which is likely mainlining its goods into the arms of the team's designers and engineers as we speak.
from Car and Driver Blog http://ift.tt/nSHy27
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