F1 innovations and inventions

[krisfx]

What has F1 done for road car technology

Hardly anything.

Does F1 still need to be relevant to the road car industry?

Never has been, never will be. It exists for entertainment, pure and simple.

Arguably, F1 was probably more relevant to road car developments when it wasn't trying to be

[santos]

What has F1 done for road car technology, specifically which cars, and does F1 still need to be relevant to the road car industry?

It doesn't need to be relevant, but it is.
Carbon fiber, ceramic brakes, systems of recovering energy, engine manegement, sequential gearbox, active suspension, tyre technology, materials development... They all started in Motorsport, most of them in F1. So yes it is relevant to road car industry.

[Tim.Wright]

What has F1 done for road car technology, specifically which cars, and does F1 still need to be relevant to the road car industry?

It doesn't need to be relevant, but it is.
Carbon fiber, ceramic brakes, systems of recovering energy, engine manegement, sequential gearbox, active suspension, tyre technology, materials development... They all started in Motorsport, most of them in F1. So yes it is relevant to road car industry.

Carbon composites came from the aerospace industry. electronic engine management came from aerospace, ABS came from aerospace. Sequential gearboxes aren't even in use on road cars (or at least negligible amount of the market). There is more active suspension in a road car of today than any race car. I doubt there is any crossover at all on tyre technology apart from the PZero label on the sidewall.

Furthermore - hybrid energy recovery systems of today started in the road car industry and have "trickled down" into F1 and other motorsports. Mercedes used their road car R&D departments to help them develop their turbos and clutches. I know of several instances where road car R&D departments were used to help F1 teams in all areas from drivetrain to vehicle performance and handling.

[SR71]

(a) Surprisingly little,directly, and (b) no. I'd say they've pushed aero analysis forward but aero is fairly unimportant for road cars.

Aero is unimportant for road cars? Wow.

You know a Prius probably has more aero development than an F1 car right?

I didn't say that. I said fairly unimportant, so I struggle to assume good faith in your question. The difference that a good Cd makes in quoted mpg compared with a rubbish Cd is tiny. Go on, work it out (if you can).

My mistake. "Fairly" unimportant. We should let the teams at Mclaren, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, perhaps even the Ford GT team know that "aero" is fairly unimportant and that they should probably start looking for new jobs.

Also, we should ring the other global automakers, GM, Mercedes, VW, etc, and let them know even with corporate average fuel economy becoming more and more important that their aero teams are "fairly" unimportant so they should save some money and fire them all since their improvement to MPG is negligent.

AND...

With the new electric startups, Tesla, etc. We should ring them and tell them their precious battery life and significant weight won't be assisted by clever .CD solutions and they as well should save their investors some money and fire their aero teams because it is "fairly" unimportant.

Wind tunnels must just be a write off for these companies I assume? I'll go "work it out" if I can.

[Tim.Wright]

I'll take that rant as a confirmation that the marketing strategies of Mclaren, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, perhaps even Ford are working a treat.

Would you agree Greg?

[SR71]

I'll take that rant as a confirmation that the marketing strategies of Mclaren, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, perhaps even Ford are working a treat.

Would you agree Greg?

just a rant from a guy who knows employed car designers and listens to how their original concepts have to change due to aero inputs.

Aero learnings from F1 are "fairly unimportant" to road cars yes - but it would be hard to unlearn process and accidental discoveries.

I'd say F1/Road aero is more fluid, things learned on both sides of the fence pass through and have impacted both sides of the fence throughout the decades.

Same applies for material science, manufacturing, computer simulation, electronics...

Just because something isn't "born" in F1 doesn't mean F1 hasn't been a relevant proving grounds for something new.

[DiogoBrand]

I'm pretty convinced that most of the aero development on road cars goes into noise rather than drag, and that drag reduction, if relevant, definitely doesn't come before styling.
If drag reduction was so important, please tell me why the vast majority of cars don't come with an undertray?

[Greg Locock]

Sorry, I deal with aerodynamicists in the auto business, they have valid jobs, but they don't have much power. One of my jobs is to model cross wind stability and aero balance at high speeds. They usually fix that with some little rubber flappy things near the wheels and things like that.

As someone else said windnoise (and cooling in fact) are the only places where they regularly get to cause significant changes to the car.

True story about a supercar. The stylists wanted to add a rear wing. The development team were told that it must not reduce the top speed. That's it.