McLaren boss Andrea Stella has identified logistics and the easing of the financial burden as advantages of the team's new wind-tunnel in Woking. The team has undergone a period of investment in facilities at the McLaren Technology Centre, with the previous wind-tunnel being tricky to replace owing to the fact it was central to the building structure itself. For a number of years, the team had used Toyota's facility in Cologne, but this involved sending all the parts to Germany, which cost the team in terms of efficiency. The new tunnel is finally open, with the 2024 car already being tested in it, with Stella keen to see some early season learnings pay off for the team, as he also highlighted two key benefits of the new tunnel.
McLaren's wind-tunnel benefit
"Thanks to the understanding and knowledge we generated at the start of the season once we started working on the upgrades, we realised that we do need to evolve the chassis and some other aspects of the car layout in order to further exploit the aerodynamics," Stella told media including RacingNews365. "The more you know, the more you can do further. After year one [of ground effect regulations], most of the layout elements we continued with from year one to year two, because we didn't know enough as to what was possible. "Now we are more knowledgeable, and therefore we will have to actually modify the layout of the car for next year, and cash in on more aerodynamic benefits. "We started working on developing the 2024 car in the new wind-tunnel, and this process has been very smooth, to be honest. "We were ready to face some anomalies and scratch our heads, but in reality, it has been a really good continuity between the work we were doing at Toyota and the work we are doing at the McLaren Technology Centre. "Obviously it comes with a massive advantage from a logistical point of view, and from financial saving."
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