xpensive wrote:@mep. interesting thought there.
The original idea by John Barnard with the "canard wings" on the MP4-someting in the 80s was to create downforce by utilizing the difference in air speed under the car (high) and the speed ahead of the rear wheels (low), but what the heck is that duct doing?
Increasing airspeed under the canards just ahead of the wheels?
Feel free to post any pictures of that car otherwise I don't really get what you are talking about.
I doubt that very much mep, If you wish to guiide air around the rear wheel in any significant way, you would need a little more than that me thinks. A mystery however, it sure looks like a duct of sorts but to what purpose,
It depends how much air you want to guide. All the parts you put on the car are a trade of between advantage and disadvantage. In this case lets say between drag and downforce. I think the following posts explain the basic idea quite good:
BreezyRacer :
Guys the real reason that Red Bull placed these exhausts where they did was to isolate the diffuser from the rear tire turbulence. It's that simple. In fact, if in doubt, look at the diffuser box .. it's narrower than the regs allow. Why did they do that? Because volume alone doesn't make an effective diffuser. Isolation from turbulence in the floor area and the diffuser exit are critical. BTW, look at the new Ferrari diffuser .. it's even a bit narrower than the Red Bull, for the same reason.
speedsense:
Consider a rotating wheel, in aero terms as a " rotary air pump". The wheel pumps air in both directions, outboard and inboard. The air is turbulent and literally a tornado.
A few millimeters away is the side gap of the diffuser and the ground and this pumped air tornado is "aimed" directly at this gap.
With the rules the sides of the diffuser cannot be "sealed" to the ground, so the tornado of air can freely enter the side of the diffuser, reducing it's effectiveness. The only way to reduce this is and to effect this tornado is with another "controlled" tornado or simply "vortex generation" with purpose built generators. Adding heat to this vortex accelerates it and intensifies it's energy causing less air to get "forced" into the bottom of the diffuser. IMHO
You see, you want to seal the floor against the surrounding air. The air from the tires somehow disturb your diffusor air. So you take air with high velocity (exhaust) to blow that effect away and seal the flow with a air curtain.
The little duct may do the same. The effect might be even bigger as the smal duct makes you belive. There is a high pressure bubble over this duct. I don't actualy think that the bubble is big enough to press the air into the duct but I can imagine that the stagnation point in front of it might guide more air trough the duct.
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Ps: Guys keep up posting pictures the threats live from it. They really help to get an idea of the car and not everybody has the time to search through the whole web for good ones. Threats with several dozen pages are worthless when they don’t have pics.
It'd be interesting to see if Renault adopts it successfully too.
