That upsets the ground effect and can easily damage floor and or suspension with it being so stiff/sprung.
Or: work those suspension parts. Good development testing on the car and other components. But, man those cars just look not only stiff but so heavy! And this is reflected in the bouncing frequency and the way the car gets launched off the curbs.
I genuinely wonder what the obsession is with the continuous increasing weight. Drivers keep asking for lighter cars but they only get (significantly) heavier. I mean, the change of weight in 2014 was "only": 48kg heavier than the V8s, 2017 the cars became 10% wider, weight increased to 722...but now we're at 795?! Where is this weight coming from despite the cars becoming smaller (length wise)? It can't all be a bit of (Even more) safety. IMO, go back to 1800mm again, less wide tyres, and get the weight under 700kg for starters.
In 2011 when all teams were to use KERS, the minimum weight went up to 640 kg. This was 20 kg heavier than 2010 when all teams went to longer cars with bigger fuel cells due to no refueling regs. It went up to 691 kg in 2014 for the larger batteries and turbo PU's. In that time, there was big steps in reducing the size and mass of the batteries and ERS systems. Mercedes made a very interesting video on it. Despite that, the min weights kept going up. The Race youtube channel claims that teams are having a hard time even getting the cars down to the 795 kg weight. That shocks me. I get that the 18" wheels are heavier, flexy wings being more controlled requiring stiffer wings, crash structures getting heavier, etc etc. But I too struggle to find why these cars are so heavy now, when teams used to be able to get well under the 600 kg and used ballast to mean the minimum weight limits.
yup...I mean back in the V10 era cars weighed 605...including driver! AND they still were underweight enough to move ballast around! Look back even further to early 90s and cars weighing just over 500kg even (though I do believe this is excluding driver). The Ferrari 642 for example weighing only 505kg...despite a really heavy V12 in the back! Fast forward to 2000 and BMW's first engine weight in at 117 kg. 2 years later, the engine weight an astonishing 86 KG! For a V10! By 2005 it weighed only 82kg. For the V8s a minimum weight of 95 kg for the engine was established. BMW claimed that their engine could weigh as little as 69kg at the time. IMO F1 needs a serious rethink regarding weights, size and getting rid of DRS.
The way that Ferrari bounced off the curbs, it looks like these cars will approach like a GTE car in terms of handling response. The reaction time for drivers must be slowed down. I wonder if this will benefit the “old guys” whose reaction times are no longer up to those of the young lions?
They're not *that* far off GTE cars anymore at this point. Actually just checked, LMP2 weighs only 950 KG. LMP1 non hybrid, 833 (!!!). We're 40kg away from an LMP1 ffs.
Pirelli produce tyres that suit Mercedes. It has nothing to do with both companies having the same Chinese shareholders
[Scarbs] The intricacies of the F1 2022 stepped underfloor tunnels were exposed with a sneaky picture of the AT03. There are new surfaces allowed to get the underloor working and to keep the front tyre wake away. upto 8 floor fences serve a specific function in creating downforce. Image Unavailable, Please Login Front tyre wake is dealt with by the front brake duct deflectors and floor edge wing. Then, airflow is expanded sideways to create low pressure under the front floor edges. The fences direct the airflow and shed vortices, to create downforce. Image Unavailable, Please Login This means the main tunnels are fed by a narrow, ~50cm, channel down the centre of the car. Image Unavailable, Please Login Looking under the nose tip, you'll appreciate how the nose/wing height affects that 50cm channel of air. Also how hard the centre of the front wing is used for downforce affects this flow. Hence a mid loaded wing can be more beneficial, than a wing working hard in the centre. Image Unavailable, Please Login From above, the airflow over the floor edge adds to the lateral expansion downforce. The sidepod undercut is crucial to working the floor edge. As do a curled floor edge & flap. William's found a way to raise the fences above the tunnel and act as turning vanes directing airflow. Image Unavailable, Please Login
I'm starting to think teams have totally worked around the FIA's goal of making the cars easier to follow. All the teams appear to have worked very hard to push the wakes outboard, which is a trend they have done for years. It will be interesting to see how much different the racing is.
With ½ the engine displacement, and ½ the RPMs, the pressure during the intake "event" needs to be 4× atmospheric (probably closer to 5× once you account for adiabatic nature of compression) even more if you account for temperature of the air going into the cylinder.
Don't know how much it has helped but having virtual vortices has, to a certain extent,reduced the problem of porpoising.
What Helmut said holds weight IMO. Glory runs to try and get sponsors in. The car almost has none. First day of the test journos said how agile the car look in changing direction. Running lower weight = porpoising effect is less noticeable (less weight to move up and down).
Mclaren's floor design assessed on along with others - related to porpoising effect - https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/why-mclaren-avoided-f1-porpoising-headache-at-first-test/8646255/ Why McLaren avoided F1 porpoising headache at first test McLaren was widely acknowledged to have been the team that suffered the least with porpoising during last week’s first Formula 1 pre-season test. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login By: Matt Somerfield Mar 3, 2022, 3:58 AM That has inevitably prompted some interest about what it was on the MCL36 that seemed to be working so well to avoid the problem that affected everybody else. Much of the attention focused on the car’s floor, which features a more developed edge surface and ‘edge wing’ than some of its counterparts. The design seen on the McLaren MCL36 takes advantage of the ‘edge wing’ that’s not only permitted under the regulations but is a design feature that we’ve already seen a variant of, as it was fitted to F1’s show car that was presented at Silverstone last year (inset). Image Unavailable, Please Login McLaren MCL36 floor The floor concept could be playing a critical role in helping better control the airflow under the car, so there is no stall as the car gets near the ground. Granted, McLaren’s interpretation is much bolder (highlighted by the dotted line) but that is to be expected, with teams able to use their design ingenuity to exploit this region for performance. The ‘edge wing’, as it’s referred to in the regulations, must also meet specific dimensional requirements, be it a single section that’s closed (ie: no slots or holes) and has to meet the tolerances demanded of it in terms of its proximity to the floor itself. While McLaren appear to have been singled out, there’s one other team with a pretty similar solution, although perhaps it wasn’t noticed owing to its camo livery: Alfa Romeo had a similar and perhaps even more aggressive floor and edge wing than the one seen on the MCL36. Image Unavailable, Please Login Alfa Romeo C42 floor edge Comparing the two, the edge wing seen on the C42 is much longer and twists upwards at the front of the assembly. It also clears the path for a discontinuation of the floor in order that the rearmost section can be subjected to a different load profile. The scrutiny on McLaren’s design was heightened by the porpoising issue faced by everyone. And while McLaren was still susceptible to its effects, it did seem to have more of a handle on the phenomenon throughout the course of the test than its rivals. Teams quickly discovered by using DRS they could lessen the ill effects created by porpoising, as DRS takes load off the rear of the car, making it more difficult for the floor to be sucked close enough to the track to become overwhelmed. Of course, this doesn’t solve the problem entirely. It only mitigates it and only in the sections of the track where DRS can be used. We must also consider that the teams were learning on the job, as the 2022 batch of cars are not only different from an aerodynamic perspective, there’s all manner of changes that affect the car's behaviour associated with its mechanical performance. This is especially relevant when we consider how different the cars are set up compared with their predecessors, as the teams are looking to run the cars as low as possible in order to build a better relationship, aerodynamically, with the track surface and the underfloor tunnels and diffuser. As a consequence, the cars are also much more stiffly sprung, so that the rideheight remains more constant. However, where this is more of an issue for the teams is that they are no longer able to use inerters or hydraulic elements, both of which were tools that previously helped with suspension compliance and dampen oscillations. One suspension mode that’s been hit by these changes is ‘heave’, with the vertical compression and decompression of the tyre under load one of the factors that has to be considered, along with how the heave dampers respond. Without the suspension tricks that teams relied on in the past, they’re having to find other ways to compensate, something that might not be helped by a need to run in a more conservative trim for testing in order to hide their pace relative to their rivals. The issue might also be exacerbated by the teams getting up to speed with the new 18” wheel rims and Pirelli tyres, of which the tyres have a much shorter sidewall than their predecessor. This will not only have an overall impact on damping but also oscillations that are created as the tyre deforms under load. Cookie Settings This content is blocked by security settings. Please allow social media cookies to access the content. Please click on button for showing it. Open settings It will also create a different, perhaps peakier, tyre-squirt profile to the one the teams are used to dealing with. The tyre sidewall deformation can be seen in the video posted to F1’s official Twitter feed, which also shows off the larger porpoising phenomenon, as the car yo-yos up and down. Tyre squirt was already a hot topic under the previous regulations, as finding aerodynamic solutions to dampen its effect on the diffuser were a constant source of development. Strakes, fins, cutouts, slots and fully enclosed holes mounted on or in the floor ahead of the rear wheel were all considered ways in which this could be achieved. The majority of these solutions have been outlawed for 2022 though, and so solutions like the ones seen on the McLaren and Alfa Romeo will become one of F1’s development battlegrounds, as the teams look for ways to increase performance. There have also been suggestions from some quarters that McLaren’s floor might be overtly flexing on the outer edge so it doesn’t necessarily need to run as close to the ground to achieve the same net result. While this might be desirable, the floor is still subject to load and deformation tests and the FIA has already suggested that it will be monitoring this closely and can and will introduce more stringent tests if it feels there’s a need. To round things out, here is a look at some of the solutions seen elsewhere on the grid, in order to see how they might also be dealing with the floor and edge wing, while also considering who might arrive with something very different at the second test. How the opposition stacks up Image Unavailable, Please Login Ferrari F1-75 floor detail Photo by: Giorgio Piola Ferrari installed a new floor on the F1-75 during the final day of the first pre-season test, which featured a cutout and small tongue-like protrusion. This is expected to represent a stepping stone in its development towards a more complex variant that will be mounted on the car during the second test. Image Unavailable, Please Login Nicholas Latifi, Williams FW44 Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images Williams had a more refined version of the floor edge treatment on the FW44 during the first test, with not only the cutout in a similar place to Ferrari but also a long triangular edge wing mounted ahead of it, which seemingly casts a different aerodynamic structure, in terms of direction, to some of the other solutions we’ve seen. Image Unavailable, Please Login Pierre Gasly, AlphaTauri AT03 Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images AlphaTauri opted for a shorter edge wing placed much further upstream. Image Unavailable, Please Login Red Bull Racing RB18 sidepods detail Photo by: Giorgio Piola There was no detached edge wing on the Red Bull RB18 in the first test, with the team opting for a more simplistic approach, including two slots that allow a central panel on the edge of the floor to be twisted when compared to the sections forward and aft of it. Image Unavailable, Please Login Mercedes W13 stiffened floor Photo by: Giorgio Piola In order to improve the floor’s stiffness on the outer edge, Mercedes installed a metal stay on the last day of testing, in the hopes of reducing the floor's flex and minimise any porpoising it might have been seeing as a result. Image Unavailable, Please Login Aston Martin AMR22 floor detail Photo by: Giorgio Piola Aston Martin might not have had the most complex floor edge on display but it was eager to study the relationship between it and the track depending on rideheight, as it used sensors on the floor’s edge to monitor it. Image Unavailable, Please Login Haas VF-22 rear detail Photo by: Giorgio Piola The Haas VF22’s arched floor edge features a cutout in a similar position to the one seen on the Ferrari. Image Unavailable, Please Login Alpine A522 side detail Photo by: Giorgio Piola No edge wing for Alpine in the first test but its floor did feature some interesting geometrical choices, including an abruptly rolled edge in the mid-section.
I find all the new aero obscene. The front wings are like a bad case of Elephantiasis. The side pods are just about as bad. There is no reason F1 can't have cars with minimum aero, non-adjustable bodies, no batteries, and pure horsepower...plus drivers with big balls. It would be automobile racing. Do we all remember that?
Imagine what those cars would look like if they had the aero knowledge they have today. I've often wondered what would be different on the the F2004 and how much faster it would be just from using tricks they do today, but still falls within the rules for that season. I guarantee the floor and bargeboards would be significantly different.
I´m quite OK with the modern look. I think I´ll find easier to deal with the wheel hubs than with the halo. The cars look more "natural", less "tortured" by bounding boxes and restricted areas than in previous years.
Convex hull is the only real way to keep aerodynamics down to the point the average gear head can understand what is going on. It gets rid of the floor, the curly edges, the barge boards, the t-trap, the overly raised front section, the sculpted side pods, and a whole lot more.
Here's some pics of Austria 2018 Ferrari's front wing. Look at all those front wing elements!!! Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Here's Mercedes...same track same year Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
