2008 Bahrain GP Technical Review

The last of the season-opening flyaway races, Bahrain presented a similar style of track to the opening races. Yet still Sakhir presented its own little quirks.

Hosting its fifth F1 race, the desert track challenges the cars with its climate, dust and layout. Having come from Malaysia and an unusually hot Australian race, the teams were well-prepared for the heat.

Without any track testing, the teams have only been able to work on details, mainly to improve reliability problems picked up at the first races.

When F1 first came to Bahrain the problem of the sand was considered to be a reliability issue, with engines and gearboxes suffering from the fine abrasive dust. In practice the engine air filters only needed changing more regularly, and it proved to be the dusty track surface that presented the greater problems for the teams.

Before the track rubbers in and if the driver goes off-line, the sand sticks to the tyres and the driver needs a lap or so to clean them up. Sakhir's layout is a classic modern F1 track - corners conspire to allow overtaking, with long straights ending in slow corner sequences.

Thus, the car's set-up tends to be more focused on straight-line speed compared with Sepang. We saw teams running with smaller wing sets for straight-line speed and then having to find enough grip to negotiate the slower corners.

Many teams found that the layout unbalanced their cars - the need for grip and weight over the front axle inducing rear tyre wear, while the green track surface brings understeer.

Ferrari

Ferrari arrived with a revised aero package. This was not the long-rumoured new nose cone, but a set of very subtle revisions. Outwardly, the car appeared to identical to the Melbourne/Malaysia specifications. Although reported elsewhere as new, the front and rear wing shapes were effectively the same as before, although the front wing flap was slimmed to reflect the lower downforce demands of Sakhir.

Also the bargeboards were revised - the stepped upper edge to the main board retained the same profile, but the way the board tapers towards the top edge was changed. Additionally, the floor was reported to have changes, but again these were undetectable from the previously raced parts.

BMW Sauber

Maintaining its ever-improving pace both in the race and qualifying, BMW made no visible changes to the F1.08 for Bahrain.

McLaren © Scarborough (Click to enlarge)

One detail missing from Malaysia was a revised front turning vane. The horizontal fin that sits on top of the vane and sweeps over the lower wishbone was extended. This works with the shaping of the wishbone and the inner fairing to direct flow low around the side of the car.

McLaren

McLaren reported that it had some new aero parts for Bahrain. Any new parts were either very subtle or not raced, as the car appeared largely in the same guise as in Malaysia.

Additionally, McLaren reported some new developments with their brake partner Akebono to cope with the heavy braking demands of the track.

Unseen in previous races, but revealed by Lewis Hamilton's practice shunt, was a small fin fitted behind the main bargeboards. This fin was first adopted by Ferrari last year, and subsequently run by Renault this year. Acting as a vortex generator, the fin helps the flow pass around the undercut in the sidepods.

Another detail not seen before this year was the gear paddle arrangement on the steering wheel. Usually the clutch and gear change paddles are arranged in pairs, four in total, two for the clutch and one each for upshift and downshift.

Renault © Scarborough (Click to enlarge)

This year, McLaren has doubled its gearshift paddles. Both the upper and lower paddles are hinged in the middle so each can act as an upshift one side and downshift the other side. Presumably, the new McLaren set up allows one hand to either upshift or downshift by pulling in a paddle.

Renault

Renault has an unusual arched under-nose. From beneath, the shape from the nose tip backwards and between the wishbones mounts the appears like a vaulted ceiling. To make use of this space, Renault runs the centre part of the front wing right up under the nose cone.

When races demand a higher level of downforce, the front wing outboard of the nose cone needs to be higher too. Thus we see the unusual arrangement of the front wing flap having two U-shaped cut outs to clear the lower edges of the arched nose.

Force India

It's impressive that Force India was able to develop and race new parts for Bahrain - a clear sign that the team has better funding this year.

Force India © Scarborough (Click to enlarge)

An evolution of the new front wing endplate was raced. This does away with the unusual curl on the top of the endplate first run as part of last year's B-spec car. Instead, the top edge of the endplate has a simple rolled detail as used by most other teams, and a new flick-up has been added towards the rear of the endplate.

This flick aims to direct the flow inside the tyre. Detail work in this area helps to keep the wing working even when the wheels are turned or the tyres are deflecting under load. Bridgestone supplies rubber tyres for use on the wind tunnel model to allow the teams to investigate this. Making the wing less sensitive to the front wheels should make the car more predictable to drive.

Also, the team ran the donut-shaped outer brake duct commonly used by other teams. This duct feeds air directly to the outer pistons on the brake calliper and improves flow out of the wheel.