Winning formula
Technology has always formed the basis of F1. Despite the introduction of new equality rulings, it’s still the few teams with the most money who rule
Technology has always formed the basis of F1. Despite the introduction of new equality rulings, it's still the few teams with the most money who rule
The ability of F1 teams to get around the rules is virtually boundless. Hardly had the FIA, motor racing’s official ruling body, forced strict limits on circuit-testing in 2007, than the teams decided to upgrade their wind tunnels. So instead of merely bolting models to a running floor and studying how the wind flowed around them, as before, they turned the tunnels into virtual racing circuits, albeit at great expense.
The cars are now made to roll, yaw, pitch, rise and fall as aerodynamicists – the unsung heroes of motorsport – study the data to evaluate the relative merits of many design configurations when tested in extremes. They are measuring down forces, side forces, drag and anything else that might help keep these 300kph-plus missiles firmly on the tarmac.
The result is that this season’s cars are faster around corners than they were in the days of nearly unlimited circuit-testing. The declared purpose of the FIA’s original ruling was to even the odds between the richest and poorest teams but, once again, money triumphs. Although costs vary greatly, it can cost $40m (€28m) to set up a state-of-the-art tunnel.
This is why Virgin Racing, which hoped to do the job much more cheaply using only software-based computational flow dynamics (CFD, known as “wind tunnel in a computer”) bowed to the inevitable and recently signed up to use McLaren’s facility. McLaren works its tunnel 24/7 while Red Bull doesn’t share its own top-secret facility in an old RAF base at Bedford, UK.
It’s no accident that the teams with the most advanced tunnels lead the charge in F1. At Ferrari’s tunnel at Modena, for instance, aerodynamicists can alter at will the wind’s speed, direction and turbulence.
F1 engineers are acknowledged to be world leaders in the study of high-speed, tortured, fan-blown wind even though the concept originated over a century ago in the aeronautical industry – the Wright brothers created a rudimentary version before they made the first powered flight in 1901. As CFD specialist Henrik Diamant, formerly of Honda Racing, has said: “In its detailed geometry, F1 is regarded as the cutting edge with its wings, complex bodywork, cooling arrangements, engine bay and very complex geometry inside the wheels.”
F1 is also in much more of a hurry than the aviation industry. “The lead times for aircraft design might be five or 10 years,” adds Diamant. “But in F1, we’re introducing update kits on a monthly basis.”
Specifically, F1 tunnels are low-speed (up to 400kph), closed-circuit versions using re-circulated air. Yet the speed is only low compared to the supersonic ones used by NASA to figure out how rockets should behave in the stratosphere. And it’s even lower, at about 30mph, when professional cyclists with tufts of wool and sensors attached to their bodies use them to find the best aerodynamic position in races against the watch. As Cadel Evans, winner of this year’s Tour de France because of a blisteringly quick time-trial, can attest, there’s money in that too.
