Someone remind me why 18" wheels are a good idea for F1? They look dreadful, will weigh more and will screw up the handling. Apart from that, they seem like a great idea...
Actually, they most likely will be lighter because the weight of forged aluminum or magnesium is much lighter than the additional rubber you would have on a smaller diameter wheel i.e. bigger wheel, lower profile tires, less rubber = less weight And no handling won't be screwed if the rolling diameter is the same, and of course, if Pirelli does not mess up on the compound used. 18" makes F1-tech development more relevant and directly applicable to road going cars. A lot of misguided sentiments here about wheels...
As a general rule, small wheel big tire is lighter than big wheel small tire, so I guess we will just have to see how that one pans out. As for the handling being screwed up, that has nothing to do with the rolling diameter. It is due to the fact that today's tires, being high profile, actually provide a substantial amount of the total suspension capacity of the cars. With lower profile, stiffer tires, this just means the teams will have to spend pointless $$$ engineering completely new set ups to deal with the new wheels. And all for what? I ask again - what is the point of this proposed shift to 18" wheels? I'm not, for the record, completely anti. I just want to know what the purpose is and as long as there is a clear engineering benefit, or cost saving then that's fine with me. If it's to pander to the 'pimp my ride' crew, then I don't see the point.
As has been said, 13" wheels are not relevant to road cars, so this would be the number one reason. As for the handling question, putting the engineers in better control of the suspension should produce better handling. Yes the tires currently provide most of the suspension travel on the cars but this means that that aspect of handling is not in the teams control. Every team is saddled with the same amount of tire suspension, which is dictated by Pirelli. Controlling the travel with the suspension will allow different teams to come up with different ways to control that travel.
This whole relevant to road cars business is sad. F1 cars are meant to be fast not relevant. Designed to lead technology not to follow.
It's not so much that it needs to be relevant to roadcars but it should be better than roadcars, not something left over from 30 years ago. There is no benefit to small wheels so the highest level of motorsports shouldn't be using them. There is no other race series that uses tiny wheels.
And where do you think all the exhilaration and technology that you enjoy in your road going Ferrari came from? Relevance is a win-win and keeps pushing the boundaries, with the hopes of further rather than regression.
It will probably provide more grip and make cornering speeds faster. However, it should not follow road cars too much. Next would be a parking brake.
I'd think they want to do so themselves; smaller brakes = lighter unsprung weight = better performance. Current brakes are already limited by what the tire can take, not the other way round. F1 cars get the majority of their suspension from the tire and it's massive sidewall, so right now it'll do the opposite. The suspension design and philosophy has to be completely changed for it to work on an F1 car. I personally don't think grip will improve with bigger tires.
Wrong. Most single seater race series use 13" wheels, and a whole load of other series do as well. Personally, I think improving the sound of the cars would have way more impact on the quality of 'the show' than switching to (irrelevant) pimped up wheels.
Some really nice shots of the wheels. Anyone still think they look like crap? Image Unavailable, Please Login
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