Flexible wings controversy 2010

[747heavy]

to the drawing board.. err cad workstation!

Yeap - and selling it to MGP

Have a nice day

[wrcsti]

Lately in NHRA theve been using flexi bodies on the funny cars. At a preset speed the nose tilts downward to provide a bigger angle and thus more downforce. I have seen it on TV slow-mos but cant find it on the net. Maybe they can use a symilar system on the nosecone itself to tilt the entire front wing maybe 5 degrees or so for more front DF at higher speed reducing high speed understeer.

[marcush.]

ey thats one nice business idea ...f1copyandpaste...with all relevant explanations.

[Richard]

I imagine the description of NHRA means they are using actuators?

Also, the various mentions of flexible nose cone connections are making me shout "crash test" at the screen. Colleagues sitting nearby are starting to look uneasy

[Afterburner]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4Wro6SY ... r_embedded[/youtube]

[vall]

So either they let people go down this route now, which means everybody has to try and copy the concept and spending extra money and maybe risking some wing failures in places like Monza.
Or they come up with a stricter load test after Hungary, to keeps things in check.
They have both options.
As much as I respect and admire the creativity of the guys at RBR and Ferrari, IMHO the later option is the more sensible one, from a cost and safety perspective.
The RBR and Ferrari guys have had there advantage, fair enough, but now, they should stop the thing, before it get´s out of hand.
At the end everybody will copy it, like the F-Duct,DDD and EBD, it will just cost extra money and nobody will gain a huge advantage. Some will be able to copy it faster then others, but at the end of the day, everybody will find a way to do it.

I don't think they should ban it this year (if illegal at all!). F-dunc, DDD and EBD gave huge advantage and it took a while for the other teams to copy it. During that time McL and RBR enjoyed huge advantage over the others and are significantly ahead of Ferrari for example.

[segedunum]

As for handling, surely they would want to move the load to the inner unloaded wheel? That would give 4 wheels in full contact with the ground, not 3? In that case you'd want the inner wing to be closer to the ground not higher?

This is the Red Bull in winter testing:



Obviously everybody missed this one.

To me it doesn't really look like a flexible wing. It's adjusting to the yaw of the car.

[segedunum]

There is a thread for this and frankly that picture tells us nothing because the front tyres are in different height positions. What's more interesting is the wing's ability to adjust, via flexing or other means, depending on the yaw of the car in a corner.

[NAREN64]

I am not techinically sound as you guys are, but see this article.

Photo exclusive: Red Bull “flexi” front wing, judge for yourself in

http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/

[Richard]

Some comparisons with screen grabs from the last two races.

It would have been nice to have pics for stationary and then fastest point on a flying lap, but I've been able to find that yet. I could only find stationary and first few corners for Silverstone. Then only the flying lap from Q3 from Hockenheim.

I did the same exercise with Ferrari during FP1 today but accidentally deleted the file - sorry! The Ferrari wing didn't appear to move (at this resolution anyway!)

[marcush.]

the camera position is fixed to the car ,right?
So anymovement you see is relative to the camera position.
Put the cursor on any point of the car and watch ...quite simple.
In essence you will see a downwar motion of the cascade wings and a very pronounced ownward movement of the wing endplates.
Looking between the wishbones you can see some(rearward?) movement of the middle section as well ..but no sidemovement here.
I think the wing does move under corning gs to the side as well..
to me the flipfloppics tell the story very well as only the parts that move do move!

[Richard]

I think Naren meant this link ... http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2010/07/p ... -yourself/

frankly that picture tells us nothing because the front tyres are in different height positions.

Try comparing the wing endplates to the red lines and the chassis not the tyres?

[wrcsti]

I imagine the description of NHRA means they are using actuators?

Also, the various mentions of flexible nose cone connections are making me shout "crash test" at the screen. Colleagues sitting nearby are starting to look uneasy

No they arent. They built it to flex under enough load (250+ MPH). So maybe F1 can try something similar to this with the front nosecone where it would flex backwards increasing the angle of the wing. It was also a snap not a gradual flex.

[segedunum]

Try comparing the wing endplates to the red lines and the chassis not the tyres?

All it's proving is that the car is moving up and down with different parts in relation to each other under different circumstances, not that the wing is flexing. It's not conclusive but other pictures of what the wing is doing pretty much are.

[forty-two]

Taken from the Force India VJM 03 thread:

there are two schools of thought ,i believe:

RedBull,Lotus ,Ferrari have fat endplates housing the actuators

Renault ,Mercedes,FI have the actuator housed in a rib situated considerably closer to the centreline of the car.
this bears a lot of mechanical advantage ,as the actuators for both solutions will be about the same weight ,the endplate solution will have much more leverage on the wingassembly so either you have to stiffen up the wing itself or you will have to live with bigger amplitudes of wing vibration...see REDBULL...

I just clocked your post marcush, and I think this is quite telling.

If placing the actuators, you need to stiffen the wing to handle the extra load. If you WANT the wing to be bendy under certain loads, it can't be stiffened, so you'd better move your actuators inboard to a position which is still stiff!

Hmmmmmm.