by 2lo8 on Thu Jun 23, 2016 9:46 am
You can't even articulate how the F8 is not an aero bike compared to the S5, which is what it was being compared to.
Jaguar did lots of wind tunnel work and cfd. They basically designed the thing in the wind tunnel as you put it, short of the geometry and layup. You've already seen the marketing blurbs quoted (yet choose to ignore...). And you'll notice, they visually test the tube junctions to check interference drag to improve on it, where cfd tends to not do as well. They didn't simply mock up a few cfd iterations and test them to see which one was fastest in the tunnel. Truncated airfoil tubes not exotic enough for you? What makes the tube profiles of the S5 more exotic to you? Nothing. The F8 has an aero feature where the S5 doesn't. The hourglass shaped headtube and the beak over the brake. It's been known at least since the Lotus that having a funny looking head tube that isn't straight helps. Don't ask me why the S5 doesn't have it. The specific shape depends on how you want to direct airflow, but the only consideration the S5 gave was to narrow it from the front to decrease frontal area. The beak helps to smooth the airflow from over the brake to the headtube.
Doesn't sound like much? Maybe it isn't, but at least it's out front instead of in the back like the wheel cutout. Speaking of the rear end, the stays shield the rear brake, and that's in a less tubulent area than the wheel cutout. That you think the F8 isn't aero speaks more about your conception of the F8 as a non-aero bike, because despite the fact that F8 was heavily touted for it's aerodynamic improvements when it was introduced, to you the fact that it isn't sold along side a non-aero all-rounder means it can't be aero. Presumably because the aero Madone was only mediocre as an aero bike when Trek did not have the Emonda and the Madone was not pure aero. It's not like the F8 is an ultra-light 700g frame.
The Italian companies have always liked to hide information, and try to carve out a unique image, because they don't like being compared side-by-side with other brands. They know a lot of their marketing power comes from mystique and not being able to be compared to other brands. They're not selling you on the fact that it will save you X watts. They're selling based on the fact that it won the tour, it's even faster and better than before, it's unique, and it has that Italian brand name. If Pinarello told you it saves X watts, the next thing you do is compare it to the next brand that saves you Y watts, and then you try to make a rational technical evaluation. They don't want that, Italian brands have been the choice of certain consumers because there's an emotional attachment and something intangible about them.
That doesn't mean it's awful. It means Colnago could tell you head tube angles if they wanted, but all that would do is make you compare it to a cheaper non-Italian brand. They much prefer you thinking of Colnago handling with superlatives and the reputation for riding like it's on rails. Pinarello is likely doing the same thing. They did market all the aero work put into the bike, whether or not you deny it. But they would much rather you think about it as the best fastest tour winning bike in the world than looking to see if it's 0.2 watts slower than something else. They have never liked being compared to other bikes in their class from other brands. Of course they still like to say that it was a huge jump from the old Dogma. The Italian brands simply do not like to compete based on technical specs. They focus much more on branding power. And if you look at the reasons why people buy Italian frames, you can see why.
Maybe that explanation isn't good enough and you want to know why the technical information on the aerodynamics is lacking? Maybe it's because Pinarello didn't do the aerodynamics, they didn't do the cfd, they didn't do the windtunnel testing. That was Jaguar, and that's no secret. That doesn't mean it was Jaguar that wrote the marketing material. Obviously it was Pinarello. Or maybe they knew their relationship with Jaguar was going to be short lived. Maybe they didn't want to market their reliance on a sponsor that is no longer sponsoring their team.