[smashnerd]

Originally Posted by anachronix

Dude, the car in the picture and video is the 2012 Renault

They released 2 different renderings of the car, there is another car that shows off the DDRS but with the exhaust layout similar to 2012 car.

http://www.somersf1.blogspot.co.uk/2...-analysis.html

More here...

It's the new one alright, guess there haven't been any radical changes as far as external looks go. Still the step-up nose remains!

Wonder what the other teams have done.

[Hatari]

Lotus & Kimi's secret weapon - the steering wheel. Brilliant sense of humour!
- Source Lotus F1

The E21 steering wheel features never before used functions which are set to change the way racing and strategy takes place in modern grand prix racing. Many of the commands on the wheel remain a mystery but our in-office technical guru was able to decipher many of the steering button commands which we have listed below:

Mute – to silence irritating race engineers from telling those who know what they are doing, how to do things.
Ice-cream – which prompts the Lotus team’s catering boss to rush off to the media centre with lollies to have the hacks write good things about the driver who presses the button.
Sat Nav – important new addition for a driver who may have forgotten his way around a circuit.
Smile – to keep everyone happy.
Tweet – in keeping with the trend to keep fans informed at all times of exactly what is going on in the cockpit.
Cold Knob – to control the temperature in the cockpit.
Open Gate – for drivers who go off track and find closed gates in their way.
Translate (Anti- Mumble) – useful for drivers who mumble over the radio as function also provides instant sub titles.
Finishing Position – allows driver to pre-determine the position he wants to end the race in.
Nap Mode – for boring races gives a driver time for a power nap while car goes into auto-pilot.
Jump – appears to be a secret option the exact nature of which we are yet to understand.
Mum – gives a driver the option to instantly connects his mother’s mobile phone for a quick chat when the need arises, also, when Mum calls it glows.
Deploy Angry Birds – useful to launch at rivals during close racing situations.
Like – for Facebook and in keeping with the social media craze.
Jenson – we have asked the media people at Lotus to explain what the Jenson button does…

[arun_kun]

^^ When I first saw the steering wheel yesterday, it had me splits. Awesome sense of humor from the team. They take right kind of advantage of Kimi's image. Car had Kimi name on the top of it and I wish they retain it to the race.

And the E21 doesn't look much different than E20. Or may be they will have changes directly for the testing as they did last year. Hope we have great season and I wish Kimi wins WDC

[deetjohn]

The new Ferrari, the F138 will be launched on Friday.

These are the dates for the launches.

McLaren: Jan 31
Ferrari: Feb 1
Force India: Feb 1
Sauber: Feb 2
Red Bull: Feb 3
Mercedes: Feb 4
Toro Rosso: Feb 4
Caterham: Feb 5
Williams: Feb 19

[Mighty_Lothar]

I believe I am waking up the right thread. The Vodafone McLaren Mercedes MP4-28 car reveal LIVE program is just started at 4:00PM IST today. The live stream is available in YouTube at below link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXlbiqVZ4Q8

LOTHAR

[Hatari]

Great McLaren live launch. They brought in the significant cars in their history to finally build upto the MP4- 28.

[sa_kiran]

Paddy Lowe to remain at McLaren - http://www.gpupdate.net/en/f1-news/2...in-at-mclaren/

McLaren Team Principal Martin Whitmarsh has explained that Paddy Lowe will remain with the Woking-based outfit for at least the 2013 season, despite the acclaimed engineer's absence from the launch of the new MP4-28 on Thursday.

[anachronix]

Preview of the MP4-28 by Mr.Windsor and Craig!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dk9o9d4oBz8

[arun_josie]

Originally Posted by deetjohn

These are the dates for the launches.

Force India: Feb 1

Any news on Force India driver lineup for 2013?

[deetjohn]

Originally Posted by anachronix

Preview of the MP4-28 by Mr.Windsor and Craig!

Pull Rod suspension! Very interesting indeed. And tighter body work around the back. McLaren are really 'inspired' this year, aren't they?

Its amazing how the camera could get that close to the MP4-28. Anyways, we shall see a different beast come Australia.

Originally Posted by arun_josie

Any news on Force India driver lineup for 2013?

No idea on that. http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/105187

[D33-PAC]

The Renault/Lotus looks like a black McLaren -_-.


Anyways... THE VJM06 will be launching today . I can't believe it's been six years already (in theory 5 1/12), man time flies!

Will this car also have the platypus nose or will it have a modesty panel, or will it completely have that Ferrari/Sauber/Williams nose?

[vikram_d]

Originally Posted by deetjohn

Pull Rod suspension! Very interesting indeed.

Interesting but not surprising. A lot of folks over at F1Technical had predicted this change for the 2013 car mid way through last year's season itself. But honestly speaking I don't this car even remotely resembles the car that will eventually race. Most F1 car launches are just media events to keep the interest going during the off season times. The actual car will only be seen once the testing starts.

[D33-PAC]

Originally Posted by vikram_d

The actual car will only be seen once the testing starts.

What I don't understand is how can the competition lessen the gap in a matter of a month/month and a half or so ?

Can they go from copying to implementation so quick ?

[arun_kun]

According to the below the link, Paul has been confirmed for Force-India. Still the suspense on 2nd driver. Hope Force-India have good season this year and hope it gets some good sponsors to avoid any financial troubles.

http://www.forceindiaf1.com/paul-di-resta

[vikram_d]

Originally Posted by D33-PAC

Can they go from copying to implementation so quick ?

Well to be honest copying something depends on the philosophy/concept around which the car was built.

Let's say that Ferrari builds a car around concept 'A' and McLaren around concept 'B' which is radically different to Ferrari's concept. In such a scenario it is quite difficult to copy and implement something as it will need a lot of research & development and the copying team will need to re-evaluate what those changes would means to their car and what benefits they would be able to get out of those changes. This is assuming there are benefits in copying. A lot of times there are detrimental effects also.

A classic example of this scenario played out last year with the Mercedes team. They built a car around the passive 'F' Duct system. This system was such an integral part of their car that they could not copy any of the other teams developments and what ever they could copy did not produce the desired results for them as the basic car itself was not designed with those developments/concepts in mind.

This being said F1 is all about rapid manufacturing. They get stuff from design to product stage in really short periods of time as they do not have to worry too much about costs and there are cases where F1 teams have copied designs in a matter of days. So yes they can go from copying to implementation in really short periods of time.

But this year we will not see too much technical changes as the regulations have stayed the same since last year so most of the cars will almost be the same and the gap between teams will be much smaller. The previous statement of mine assumes that nobody has found any new loop holes in the rules.

Moreover, not many teams will invest too much money on this year's cars as they will be completely defunct next year due to the new engine & various other regulation changes coming into play in 2014. 2014 will be the year where F1 goes back to turbocharged V6 engines. I am so looking forward to next year from a technical point of view.