2026 Aerodynamic & Chassis Regulations

[mzso]

I thought the whole idea of ground effect was that the floor generated most of the overall downforce??

It's weird that the dumbed down supposedly results in higher down-force.

[mzso]

Ah, just look at the nice clean airflow of the top 2 cars.

[vorticism]

In lieu of having our own cars and wind tunnels, we are at the mercy of occasional published simulation work and word of mouth on these DF share percentages. 34% is the same figure mentioned previously in the RE article--maybe he was also involved in that sim. 33:33:33 is a reasonable assumption (front:mid:rear device DF share). We don’t know if the beam wings were counted as part of the floor or as part of the rear wing. We don’t know if the diffuser was counted as part of the rear aero generally, or as part the mid body aero. Note that while the floors in any era of these cars is the largest aero device by area, the front third of the ’22-type floors produce positive lift. While it may lose out on certain measurements of efficiency, a raked flat plane, generally speaking, produces negative lift across all of its surface.

https://youtu.be/1OwHobp4xPE?si=rlgDEu6T6XtmueqX

Second guy on the internet expecting to see rake on these cars after yours truly, though I shall withhold judgement until I see the quality of his Colorful Freehand Drawings.

[MIKEY_!]

I understand wheel rims will not be a spec component for 2026. Has anyone heard who might be supplying which teams?

[De Wet]

How much shorter is the 2026 Nose & Front Wing ?

[f1isgood]

Adrian's a really good aero, but his 22-25 car there is not great. The floor Cps look very wrong, as does the load distribution - only 34% from the floor?! Not since like the 70s.

Yeah I'm also confused about the floor numbers

I thought the whole idea of ground effect was that the floor generated most of the overall downforce??

It has always been the case (at least say in the last 15 odd years) that floor always generated the most downforce. The idea of the current regulations that are ending was to have less reliance on wings and more on the floor as floor also produces more clean downforce that doesn't cause issues with following.

However teams starting in 2023 started to add fancy floor edges, and in 2024 exploited wings quite heavily so most supposed benefits of the regulations were lost. It was also in part because FIA panicked and raised diffuser throats due to a safety concern in the infamous rule change from 2022 to 2023.

[vorticism]

Had half a thought about the current long, downsloping sidepods being used in this formula. No one expected them heading into '22 (least of all Brixworth) and the RB18's wide, long sidepods surprised everyone, as it was an antithesis of the preceding era. Any chance of it? Any chance it could it have been an unexplored option '09-'21? There would be some interaction with the 'Floor Corner' area, and it would be a continuation of the general 'sidepod as sidewall' concept.

[MIKEY_!]

Had half a thought about the current long, downsloping sidepods being used in this formula. No one expected them heading into '22 (least of all Brixworth) and the RB18's wide, long sidepods surprised everyone, as it was an antithesis of the preceding era. Any chance of it? Any chance it could it have been an unexplored option '09-'21? There would be some interaction with the 'Floor Corner' area, and it would be a continuation of the general 'sidepod as sidewall' concept.

I wouldn't say no one expected them in 2022 - 3 teams (Red Bull, Alpine and Alpha Tauri) started the season with long gently downward ramped sidepods. I would guess other teams experimented with this style too but settled on other designs that gave them better performance initially. I predicted this sidepod style too, and even ran a model in my (small, crude, home built) wind tunnel in 2021 - although the flow structures I observed in the tunnel weren't quite right. I also predicted the "waterslide" evolution of the sidepod, but unsurprisingly I always got separation inside the waterslide when I tried these in my tunnel. These predictions were probably luck as much as anything!

We saw hints of this sidepod design approach with the coanda sidepods of 2012-13, but what they were trying to achieve and how they were managing the airflow was quite different to today. Teams would have had a good understanding of how these sidepods performed with minimal exhaust flow over them, so I doubt they missed an opportunity to apply this design after coanda effect sidepod exhaust blowing was banned. Big ramped sidepods just weren't the fastest way to go racing in the era of powerful outwashing vortexes, unless it was a compromise to make the exhaust work.

Could we see this design next year? Maybe. I suspect it depends how teams opt to manage the vortex coming off the bargeboard. My prediction at this stage is teams using a shallow front undercut and your horizontal slat bargeboards to drive the front wheel wake away from the floor's front edge (probably not completely), outwards, upwards, and using a bathtub-style (Ferrari 2022) sidepod upper surface to draw that wake back to the top surface of a sidepod. My thinking is this would carry the front wheel wake through the gap between the beam wing and rear wing, hopefully minimising its aero impact. In that case, a sidepod that ramps all the way to the floor would send this wake over the diffuser and beam wing, so not ideal. I make this prediction with all the same ignorance as my 2022 prediction, so it'll be fun to see if I get lucky again!

[vorticism]

Had half a thought about the current long, downsloping sidepods being used in this formula. No one expected them heading into '22 (least of all Brixworth) and the RB18's wide, long sidepods surprised everyone, as it was an antithesis of the preceding era. Any chance of it? Any chance it could it have been an unexplored option '09-'21? There would be some interaction with the 'Floor Corner' area, and it would be a continuation of the general 'sidepod as sidewall' concept.

I wouldn't say no one expected them in 2022 - 3 teams (Red Bull, Alpine and Alpha Tauri) started the season with long gently downward ramped sidepods. I would guess other teams experimented with this style too but settled on other designs that gave them better performance initially. I predicted this sidepod style too, and even ran a model in my (small, crude, home built) wind tunnel in 2021 - although the flow structures I observed in the tunnel weren't quite right. I also predicted the "waterslide" evolution of the sidepod, but unsurprisingly I always got separation inside the waterslide when I tried these in my tunnel. These predictions were probably luck as much as anything!

We saw hints of this sidepod design approach with the coanda sidepods of 2012-13, but what they were trying to achieve and how they were managing the airflow was quite different to today. Teams would have had a good understanding of how these sidepods performed with minimal exhaust flow over them, so I doubt they missed an opportunity to apply this design after coanda effect sidepod exhaust blowing was banned. Big ramped sidepods just weren't the fastest way to go racing in the era of powerful outwashing vortexes, unless it was a compromise to make the exhaust work.

Could we see this design next year? Maybe. I suspect it depends how teams opt to manage the vortex coming off the bargeboard. My prediction at this stage is teams using a shallow front undercut and your horizontal slat bargeboards to drive the front wheel wake away from the floor's front edge (probably not completely), outwards, upwards, and using a bathtub-style (Ferrari 2022) sidepod upper surface to draw that wake back to the top surface of a sidepod. My thinking is this would carry the front wheel wake through the gap between the beam wing and rear wing, hopefully minimising its aero impact. In that case, a sidepod that ramps all the way to the floor would send this wake over the diffuser and beam wing, so not ideal. I make this prediction with all the same ignorance as my 2022 prediction, so it'll be fun to see if I get lucky again!

Good memory. Though looking at 2013 photos, only the RB9 and E21 used the sort of sidepods we're describing, and even those two used a duct on the side to ingest air, reducing its effect as a sidewall. In that sense, the footprint of those sidepods was still small and tapering, unlike the RB18-type. As for 2022, let's just say no one was copying TR or Alpine in '23 or '24; and if it was a concept that was widely tested, then the case would still be that most teams "didn't expect it..." to work so well, at least. I agree about the unknowns of the '26 bargeboard ("Board"); could be the new Y250 if the wheel wake doesn't dampen it too much.