2026 F1 Cars - General Thread

[dialtone]

In reality this is stupid though, as renewable energy is expensive to produce and any energy that you spend on making "sustainable fuel" could probably be spent more efficiently on something else, something that doesn't require the conversion of electricity to fuel which is inherently energy inefficient.

This might be a biblically wrong level take.

If you replace the etanol corn fields in the US (about 30% of total corn fields) with solar panels you will make 85% more energy than the US needs daily, measured as using the efficiency of panels in the Chicago area, so quite north.

Solar panels are 97% glass, aluminum and silicon. The remaining 3% is lead and glue and probably other resins.

Solar power is practically unlimited, can easily be used to produce any fuel that F1 needs at the cheapest price of any source of electricity. It also doesn’t need to be active all the time, this isn’t providing energy to a country.

This is a biblically wrong take, full stop.

The closest thing we have to infinite energy is nuclear. Not solar. Solar panels have to be manufactured , installed and maintained and do not have an infinite service life.

There is a reason big oil loves putting money into solar and wind. Because these methods don't have a hope in replacing true energy baseload. Only nuclear does.

You are right, I saw a nuclear power plant sprout off a tree on my way back from work the other day, and uranium and thorium were being sold for pennies in this economy.

LMAO. Are we not all engineers here?

[TeamKoolGreen]

There was literally no reason for any car to pass in 2025 because of the field spread. And there was still mid pack battles front wing to gearbox until someone made a mistake. You can kiss those goodbye. Nobody even remembers what real bad racing is.

And about that pesky thing called physics. If you thought the 2025 car was bad , putting a flat floor on it is going to make it worse.

Let's wait and see. My opinion is that the differences in potential energy usage will allow drivers to overtake, this should lead to some interesting tactical battles and unorthodox overtakes.

We already had this with the 2014 to 2022 cars. Just to a lesser degree. So it isn't something new.

Everyone blamed DRS for easy overtakes when we already had this defacto push to pass. The faster car from behind would use less energy by virtue that it was faster. So it could accumulate more battery power. Then when the time came to pass, it was that much faster when it deployed the power.

[TeamKoolGreen]

This might scramble the field and ppl will say the racing is better in a perverse way. The harder you push the slower you are. The pinnacle of motorsport.

Haas team boss Ayao Komatsu has revealed how the fight for pole could be influenced heavily by small errors made in preparation laps.
...
What Komatsu is referring to is that, with cars not having enough battery to run laps flat out, drivers can't waste any energy on the outlap at all.

That means not triggering any more usage of the battery element of the package than is absolutely necessary.

But that is a very tricky thing to achieve properly – because drivers cannot just drive slowly to achieve that aim. The demands to warm the tyres, avoid traffic issues and keep up to the maximum delta time mean there is a requirement to get a hurry on as well. Furthermore, there is no scope in the regulations to simply run a quick outlap on the internal combustion engine alone, as there are strict rules regarding power demand.

Article 5.12.1 of the Technical Regulations states: “At any given engine speed, the driver torque demand map must be monotonically increasing for an increase in accelerator pedal position.”

This effectively means that the trigger for kicking in battery usage is throttle position - not a button on the wheel. So in effect, the only way to avoid burning up any battery is to be very cautious on the accelerator.

There are therefore a host of conflicting demands of what drivers need to do to cover off tyre preparation, traffic, timing deltas and energy.

[johnnycesup]

Article 5.12.1 of the Technical Regulations states: “At any given engine speed, the driver torque demand map must be monotonically increasing for an increase in accelerator pedal position.”

This effectively means that the trigger for kicking in battery usage is throttle position - not a button on the wheel. So in effect, the only way to avoid burning up any battery is to be very cautious on the accelerator.

There are therefore a host of conflicting demands of what drivers need to do to cover off tyre preparation, traffic, timing deltas and energy.

I was looking at the regulations, and while there is a very clear rule about having a single ICE Mode (C5.23), I can't find anything about a single MGUK mode.

Can't the team simply develop a "regen heavy" mode, or maybe a "no MGU at all" mode, akin to the Modes 6,7,8 for RBR in this past regulation cycle? That would certainly respect the "monotonically increasing torque demand" while allowing for different strategies.

[AR3-GP]

[SSJ4]

find it interesting that 3/4 teams (minus sauber, now audi) that had the most atr (windtunnel) time have chosen to go pull rod front suspension.

[mzso]

I am fine with it being a niche product, which is the likely reality to my mind, for motorsport, classic cars, perhaps even aviation which is difficult to electrify. I can't imagine a future where it replaces petrol at any large scale, and ultimately isn't reducing the emissions into the atmosphere from the exhaust pipe, which is more than just a carbon issue, even if it manages to claim to be 'neutral' on that front.

If you use precious energy to make fuel it doesn't make sense to burn it. Fuel cells are a lot more efficient, and work with simpler fuels. In anyway in the real world cost is king and they don't measure up to battery power. So we'll have BEVs.
The main niche I see for fuel in the future, but even then probably no synthetic but bio fuel from actual agricultural or industrial waste, is airplanes. I don't think batteries will increase energy density by that much anytime soon, if ever.

[mzso]

You are right, I saw a nuclear power plant sprout off a tree on my way back from work the other day, and uranium and thorium were being sold for pennies in this economy.

LMAO. Are we not all engineers here?

How about being a realist? France has long proven that if the will is there, nuclear capacity can be built up very quickly.
In contrast nuclear technology is practically banned nowadays. Smothered by legislation and bureaucracy, and fools who think themselves "green". And lack of state funding.

[mzso]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HAO1Oq0WoAE ... name=large

What was the plus 90kg in 1995?

[AR3-GP]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HAO1Oq0WoAE ... name=large

What was the plus 90kg in 1995?

Probably something to do with the deaths of '94

[TeamKoolGreen]

Just the new wheels and tires in 2022 added 14 kg. They went overkill with those wheels in 2022 and everyone knew it. They also made the ride stiffer. But hey, just blame the venturi floor.

[wuzak]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HAO1Oq0WoAE ... name=large

What was the plus 90kg in 1995?

Included driver in minimum weight.

[dialtone]

You are right, I saw a nuclear power plant sprout off a tree on my way back from work the other day, and uranium and thorium were being sold for pennies in this economy.

LMAO. Are we not all engineers here?

How about being a realist? France has long proven that if the will is there, nuclear capacity can be built up very quickly.
In contrast nuclear technology is practically banned nowadays. Smothered by legislation and bureaucracy, and fools who think themselves "green". And lack of state funding.

This is OT. I’m not against nuclear power at all, need more of it.

Why are you folks against solar is a mystery instead. It doesn’t get cheaper than solar, you can complain about night power, bad weather and so on but it is cheaper and not even at scale yet so potential to be orders of magnitude cheaper.