McLaren has demonstrated that in F1 nothing is impossible if you work well. A race that starts from far away, season 2023, which has reached its competitive peak at this time. The two MCL38 I am up to the task Red Bull RB20 Of Verstappen and only the infinite creativity of Max’s talent is literally keeping the stable afloat Milton Keynes. Dutchman who manages to win by repelling the attacks of the colored cars papayataking advantage of the small strategic shortcomings of the team Woking, undoubtedly no longer accustomed to fighting for the highest objective.
McLaren he certainly doesn’t give up though. Landau Norris he lets it be known that the world championship remains open, because there are still many races and the competitiveness of his single-seater continues to rise, also thanks to the continuous evolution relating to the technical understanding of the car. On the occasion of Austrian Grand Prix edition 2024the historic British team presents some news on the MCL38. Upgrade at the suspension level and on the front wing of the car. Thanks to the shots taken directly from the Austrian pitlane, we can think about these innovations introduced by team.
F1, McLaren: new front endplate for the MCL38
The front wing of the McLaren has undergone some changes. A fine job, as they say, which brings with it a clear objective. The technicians of the English team, in fact, have touched up the front end of the MCL38 to find better fluid management at low travel speeds. In this way the work of the British team continues to try to correct the performance in the so-called low speed corneran area identified by the designers as still not optimal. We therefore try to increase performance in the guided sections of the track where, even if to a lesser extent, aerodynamics still has a certain specific weight in the economy of the session.
The modification to the front wing, taking into consideration our photographic comparison, in itself consists in a reduction of the area relating to theend-plate of the front wing. If we look at the shots we took below, we realize that the trailing edge of the side strip has a different shape in the new version. The line of the vertical bulkhead, in its lower portion, no longer shows a straight line to facilitate the passage of the flow in that area (yellow). Even at the top of this element we notice some small changes in shape, as can be seen from the curvatures in the upper part (green).
In fact, let us remember that with the front wing and with theend plate we try to generate a clear effect outwash, very useful for “cleaning” the turbulence generated by the rolling of the front tire. The structure of the fluids created in this precise area of the single-seater is very complex, but in fact it has the purpose of moving this non-effective fluid mass away from the body of the car. For the rest we can say that the degree of warping of theend plate should have remained unchanged. While observing the appendix that anchors to the lateral surface, a variation is noted although the concept does not change (red).
The optimization and gradual updating of the front wing is very difficult to put into practice on cars of F1He explained it himself. Andrea Star to our editorial team. The reason is very simple: you need to understand which oscillations you want to optimize the performance of front wing. The work cannot be optimized for every yaw angle and therefore precise choices must be made. The regulations relating to the front wing of the current generation of single-seaters are quite restrictive in this sense and do not allow the element in question to be further maximised.
Consequentially McLaren also decided to modify, even if minimally, the arms of the front suspension scheme. Let’s clarify in this case: the kinematics of the front pull-rod have not been absolutely modified, but only the carbon fairings of the arms for a mere aerodynamic purpose. This is because, after l’update of the wing, the fluid that hits the suspension has a different “spatial position”. Reason why this modification must be made to bring the suspensions to work in the correct way, as they did previously.
Authors and images: Alessandro Arcari – @berrageiz – Niccolo Arnerich – @niccoloarnerich
