Formula One car development blog

Once upon a time, Red Bull racing hired Adrian Newey as their technical director. The Briton was immediately assigned on the to-be-developed RB3 which would solve all cooling issues that were experienced with the 2006 contender. Initially the car sported chimneys to provide enough air exit for the radiators, but only a couple of races into the season those were replaced by winglets and a small cooling exit at the base of the winglet strut. The system as used and displayed exits air ... Read more

Red Bull have been busy during the summer break and are the first team to introduce a front wing that snatches McLaren's bridged wing idea. While previously the upper elements were attached to the nose, they now join over the nose cone to condition airflow. However, the new wing is more than just that. Every single flap has been redesigned. It is most visibly in the leading edge of the base plane. During the first 11 races of 2007 that was a simple and elegant spoon shape which has ... Read more

The higher downforce settings on F1 cars - as required in the 2 latest Grand Prix' - induce an increased amount of drag. Designing a winning car is therefore a never ending compromise based on the required downforce levels. In their high downforce rear wing, Red Bull have made a small cut in the middle of the wing. The airflow onto that area of the rear wing is actually slightly disrupted by the airbox ahead of it. Cutting this tip out prevents the generation of unwanted drag for ve... Read more

While the Scuderia Ferrari is quickly adding new bits onto their car, Red Bull have lately been stuck with their gearbox problems. Without major new aero enhancements in the last races, the team appears to have closely looked to the red cars. New vertical splitters were added underneath the front wing main place to improve downforce. Surprisingly, they have introduced this at this week's Spa Francorchamps test which is known to be a medium to low downforce track. In contrast to Ferr... Read more

After McLaren showed up at the Spanish test with an upper element on their front wing, Red Bull, Toro Rosso and Honda were the only teams that didn't have any form of upper element on their front wings. Spyker and Super Aguri are both running somewhat old fashioned items as the others have elements running from the endplates to the nosecone (or over it in McLaren's case). This new Red Bull wing changes this with a design that appears to be a mixture of the Renault and Williams versi... Read more

Red Bull have used the Malaysian test last week to improve their aerodynamic package, resulting in a new rear wing. The lower image shows the wing that was used by both Toro Rosso and Red Bull Racing in Australia. The new wing is not curved up anymore in the middle but instead has a dropping leading edge all over the span of the wing, except for both ends where they are a bit cut off. As seen with other teams too, the trailing edge of the upper element has been cut off towards the e... Read more