2022 Aerodynamic Regulations Thread

[Stu]

That last paragraph…
When you consider the homologation date for design finalisation, it almost makes me wonder whether there will be another postponement!

Honestly, I think it's being done intentionally to hinder the top teams as much as possible, as they want the grid to be as jumbled up as possible.

You would have thought that the regs around wind tunnel/CFD usage AND the budget cap would sort that out; there is not less ‘intelligence’ at the smaller teams, just less (financial) ability to exploit it. It would be a great shame if the outcome of the lack of certainty of the new aero regs is what decides the next WDC/WCC.

[dans79]

That last paragraph…
When you consider the homologation date for design finalisation, it almost makes me wonder whether there will be another postponement!

Honestly, I think it's being done intentionally to hinder the top teams as much as possible, as they want the grid to be as jumbled up as possible.

You would have thought that the regs around wind tunnel/CFD usage AND the budget cap would sort that out; there is not less ‘intelligence’ at the smaller teams, just less (financial) ability to exploit it. It would be a great shame if the outcome of the lack of certainty of the new aero regs is what decides the next WDC/WCC.

what I meant is that by not finalizing some stuff till late in the season, it renders a big budget useless. After a certain point, it doesn't matter how amazing your facilities are, or how much money you have, you just don't have the time to develop, manufacture, and test components fast enough to gain a competitive edge.

Instead of iterating over a series of designs, teams might only have enough time for 1 or 2iterationss.

[Stu]

Honestly, I think it's being done intentionally to hinder the top teams as much as possible, as they want the grid to be as jumbled up as possible.

You would have thought that the regs around wind tunnel/CFD usage AND the budget cap would sort that out; there is not less ‘intelligence’ at the smaller teams, just less (financial) ability to exploit it. It would be a great shame if the outcome of the lack of certainty of the new aero regs is what decides the next WDC/WCC.

what I meant is that by not finalizing some stuff till late in the season, it renders a big budget useless. After a certain point, it doesn't matter how amazing your facilities are, or how much money you have, you just don't have the time to develop, manufacture, and test components fast enough to gain a competitive edge.

Instead of iterating over a series of designs, teams might only have enough time for 1 or 2iterationss.

My post should infer that I agree with you point of view, however I do think that it would be a great shame if the 2022 titles are decided by luck (choosing the correct iteration to use your remaining tunnel/CFD time!) This sort of thing used to have a minimum time to introduction applied to it. When you consider that they should be racing with these regulations THIS YEAR, it really isn’t great that we do not know what the final regulations are as we approach August in the year that they should have been introduced.

[Hoffman900]

The one thing the top teams have is their library of knowledge in correlation of cfd / wind tunnel / real world. No amount of budget cap is going to make them unlearn that.

They will always need less cfd time because they aren’t going to be chasing correlation issues.

American sports have budget caps, but it doesn’t stop dynasties from forming. F1 is going to be no different.

[JordanMugen]

The one thing the top teams have is their library of knowledge in correlation of cfd / wind tunnel / real world. No amount of budget cap is going to make them unlearn that.

They will always need less cfd time because they aren’t going to be chasing correlation issues.

American sports have budget caps, but it doesn’t stop dynasties from forming. F1 is going to be no different.

James Key said this:

I think what it’s lacking is the approach an F1 team would take with those regs, which is to iterate the hell out of it, basically, and come up with a very refined solution based on a lot of time of development.

https://www.speedcafe.com/2021/07/23/f1 ... e-insight/

Is it really sport or skill to just "iterate the heck" out of something.

Hopefully the regulations will reward design skill over brute force.

...Of course in saying that, many great things (e.g., the theatrical edit of Star Wars in 1977) only got there after many iterations, with the early edits deemed a mess of schlocky sci-fi dross! "Forgive the long letter, I did not have the time to write a short one."

(choosing the correct iteration to use your remaining tunnel/CFD time!)

In the 1980 it wasn't feasible to test 10 different designs, when there was only one person to do the drawings and operate the wind tunnel and analyse the results. Shouldn't that be what F1 aims to recreate?

By all means finetune the stall characteristics, but it needs to be principally the right design straight off the pencil onto the drawing board and sent down to the fabrication shop, surely? Much like Mr. Barnard's Chaparral.

[jjn9128]

James Key said this:

I think what it’s lacking is the approach an F1 team would take with those regs, which is to iterate the hell out of it, basically, and come up with a very refined solution based on a lot of time of development.

https://www.speedcafe.com/2021/07/23/f1 ... e-insight/

Is it really sport or skill to just "iterate the heck" out of something.

Hopefully the regulations will reward design skill over brute force.

...Of course in saying that, many great things (e.g., the theatrical edit of Star Wars in 1977) only got there after many iterations, with the early edits deemed a mess of schlocky sci-fi dross! "Forgive the long letter, I did not have the time to write a short one."

(choosing the correct iteration to use your remaining tunnel/CFD time!)

In the 1980 it wasn't feasible to test 10 different designs, when there was only one person to do the drawings and operate the wind tunnel and analyse the results. Shouldn't that be what F1 aims to recreate?

By all means finetune the stall characteristics, but it needs to be principally the right design straight off the pencil onto the drawing board and sent down to the fabrication shop, surely? Much like Mr. Barnard's Chaparral.

Yeah you don't get bargeboards like they have now by pure design, its just brute forcing the --- out of it. Design a few variants, iterate, do angle sweep, iterate... rinse, repeat...

The 100-200 odd aerodynamicists at each team have to do something.

[MIKEY_!]

What would be the aero benefit of shaping the cover like an old school steel rim?

Wheel covers can have an annoying aero effect when cornering. Essentially the curved shape of the wheel cover relative to the direction of travel can generate aerodynamic forces left or right when lock is applied. This can induce either oversteer or understeer, and is tricky to manage because the driver doesn't feel it the same way they normally feel tire behaviour. I think this was a problem in indycar some years ago.

I would suggest the rippled cross-section that these new wheel covers present to the airflow is intended to reduce this effect. This is pretty speculative on my part, but it's the only reason I can think of since it can't be due to aesthetics!

[FW17]

Haas looks to be staying with wide nose with a stub as seen with many cars for many years rather than the narrow nose which is more in favor off late for 2022.

Will be surprised if Ferrari take a different approach.

The length of the nose cone also seems very conservative, maybe down to the weight of the car.

[jjn9128]

Haas looks to be staying with wide nose with a stub as seen with many cars for many years rather than the narrow nose which is more in favor off late for 2022.

Will be surprised if Ferrari take a different approach.

The length of the nose cone also seems very conservative, maybe down to the weight of the car.

https://i.imgur.com/neHpK22.jpg

That's their test mule for the 2022 tyre test

[FW17]

2022 rear wheel covers

[Blackout]

The tyres are ridiculous. Bigger even than Le Mans. The teams didn't want really low profile so they bulked up the sidewall, typical F1 "compromise".

1.5 tonne touring car with 680mm 18" tyre, F1 with 725mm 18" tyre. Ridiculous.

I think Le Mans Prototypes are more similar to F1 in terms of peak power and downforce, so the stresses on the tyre, they use 710mm diameter tyres. Formula E are 640/680mm front/rear for a single seater comparison. I get it's probably less ideal (not a tyre engineer) to have a really short sidewall, but making the tyres bigger isn't the right way to go. It also defeats the purpose of the short/stiff sidewall to stop big teams having an advantage in CFD/wind tunnel testing.

As they're covering them anyway they could have gone with a 15"/16" wheel with an 18" cover to fake it, most fans would be none the wiser.

Speaking about Prototypes and comparisons, take a look at this...

The f1 car (2018) is as big, or bigger, and will soon have bigger wheels... not to mention the weight...

I also wanted to compare the tire sizes (the 3rd tire is the first 18" wheel Pirelli introduced in 2014 and it has a 690mm diameter)


So I wonder why "teams" didnt want really low profile?
-were they wary of their impact on the susepension or temp management?
-or were they just some teams, the big ones, who maybe didnt want to lose their aero edge and know-how regarding tire deformation?
-or was Pirelli concerned not being able to provide good low profile tires?

so I fully agree with you about the rim size... by imitating the road cars too closely, F1 cars will ultimately look/behave like road cars... 15"-16" rims with reasonably sized tires would have been a much more sensible compromise regarding weight and size...

[Zynerji]

It would be interesting to hear from the experts as to HOW MUCH machine learning/generative design is going on at the teams' factories. There are now supercars that are going this way for structural elements, and I believe aero as well.

I always felt that this was REALLY Mercedes' super-strength. Better iterative generative design software that didn't necessarily pick the "right" direction to develop as much as close the "dead end" directions.

I'm very interested in this subject matter, so any info would be appreciated!

[jjn9128]

Speaking about Prototypes and comparisons, take a look at this...
https://i.imgur.com/i84S6Yx.jpg
The f1 car (2018) is as big, or bigger, and will soon have bigger wheels... not to mention the weight...

I also wanted to compare the tire sizes (the 3rd tire is the first 18" wheel Pirelli introduced in 2014 and it has a 690mm diameter)
https://i.imgur.com/9j0mKWH.jpg

So I wonder why "teams" didnt want really low profile?
-were they wary of their impact on the susepension or temp management?
-or were they just some teams, the big ones, who maybe didnt want to lose their aero edge and know-how regarding tire deformation?
-or was Pirelli concerned not being able to provide good low profile tires?

so I fully agree with you about the rim size... by imitating the road cars too closely, F1 cars will ultimately look/behave like road cars... 15"-16" rims with reasonably sized tires would have been a much more sensible compromise regarding weight and size...

That's a great illustration of how out of control the length of modern F1 cars is.

I've been thinking about tyre size and how maybe the bigger diameter is being driven by FOM. At the same speed a bigger tyre will have a slower rotational velocity at the top of the tyre , so the sheer and separation zone behind the tyre is maybe reduced... I need to think more about this....

[Tim.Wright]

I've been thinking about tyre size and how maybe the bigger diameter is being driven by FOM. At the same speed a bigger tyre will have a slower rotational velocity at the top of the tyre , so the sheer and separation zone behind the tyre is maybe reduced... I need to think more about this....

The tread velocity at the top of the tyre is always roughly twice that of the vehicle speed irrespective of wheel diameter.

[jjn9128]

I've been thinking about tyre size and how maybe the bigger diameter is being driven by FOM. At the same speed a bigger tyre will have a slower rotational velocity at the top of the tyre , so the sheer and separation zone behind the tyre is maybe reduced... I need to think more about this....

The tread velocity at the top of the tyre is always roughly twice that of the vehicle speed irrespective of wheel diameter.

Yeah that's what I'm muddling about with... what's important? Velocity at the crown of the tyre or rotational velocity? I'm not sure I've ever seen a paper looking at aero effects of tyre diameter... It's not an aero driven decision.