Flexible wings controversy 2010

[747heavy]

to compare the FW movement in Turkey:

[Joie de vivre]

Look how Vettel's front wing is shaking

http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/1728/29611120.gif

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lyf9siSiSg

[marcush.]

looking at it again you can see that as vettel moves into cleaner air to the right of button,instantly the wing goes down on the right side and as he turns to the left the wing goes down on the left side but raises on the right...
so DF will have shifted from right to left dramatically during this move ..could this quick weight shift have been enough to unload one rear wheel ,making for the
loss of grip at the rear? the massive move Seb does initially leeds to the conclusion he anticipated less response from his car then he actually got ...

[Richard]

It was a silly mistake ...no finesse no feel for the car.

One theory is that the front wing is unusually sensitive, we can see how much it gallops as the RBs appoach other cars. So one could argue there is a sudden change in car performance due to a very sensitive front wing.

Vettel was trundling behind Button and used to poor front grip due to turbulance from Button's car. Then Vettels' front wing is suddenly hit by much larger downforce when he pulls out, that causes the front to have a much more aggressive turn in than expected, hence spin.

[marcush.]

agreed there ..but it´s not like Vettel has had no race with traffic in front of him with the RBR6 so to me he should now know how it behaves ..an f1 car is surely not suited to a reactive striving style you need to sort of know what it is going to do next.If that is not sure to you you cannot make a move ...unless you are prepared to take insane risks.

[mx_tifoso]

One theory is that the front wing is unusually sensitive, we can see how much it gallops as the RBs appoach other cars. So one could argue there is a sudden change in car performance due to a very sensitive front wing.

Vettel was trundling behind Button and used to poor front grip due to turbulance from Button's car. Then Vettels' front wing is suddenly hit by much larger downforce when he pulls out, that causes the front to have a much more aggressive turn in than expected, hence spin.

Snap oversteer in a straightline situation? They were approaching a right hander but neither were turning in just yet

Does the flexing just make the fw' even more sensitive?

Wait, upon viewing the clip a few more times I realize that they're already breaking for the turn. That makes a lot of difference.

[Richard]

marcush - If the RB wing is very unstable then that would explain why their drivers would find it very hard to predict behaviour in these circumstances.

... or both their drivers are very long sighted and find it hard to focus on a car just 2m in front of them.

mx - I thought the instability started when he pulled out, that put a lateral force on the car and the rear continued in that lateral direction. The track was slightly damp, and the car balance changed as the front gained downforce. None of that will have helped. Add in braking for the corner ....

[marcush.]

marcush - If the RB wing is very unstable then that would explain why their drivers would find it very hard to predict behaviour in these circumstances.

... or both their drivers are very long sighted and find it hard to focus on a car just 2m in front of them.

mx - I thought the instability started when he pulled out, that put a lateral force on the car. The track was slightly damp, and the car balance changed as the front gained downforce. None of that will have helped. Also, he may have also pressed the brake, but we don't know that.

I appreciate your view that it is behaving unstable .But then you cannot go for it and roll the dice hoping for the best ...an overtaking attempt is not something you actually do when you are not under control....the overtaking opportunity stems from additional potential avaiable in terms of grip speed and control .as the man in front is borderline on th ragged edge already.

[kalinka]

marcush - If the RB wing is very unstable then that would explain why their drivers would find it very hard to predict behaviour in these circumstances.

... or both their drivers are very long sighted and find it hard to focus on a car just 2m in front of them.

mx - I thought the instability started when he pulled out, that put a lateral force on the car and the rear continued in that lateral direction. The track was slightly damp, and the car balance changed as the front gained downforce. None of that will have helped. Add in braking for the corner ....

+1 , Can't describe it any better.

[kalinka]

Hmmm...suddenly I found another explanation that may be the case :

Vettel and Button are already braking into the corner, when Button moves left to defend his position and take the corner...but that position is right in front of Vettels front wing, and he suddenly feels the loss of front grip under braking, so he pulls out to the left and brakes even harder. The front gains DF again, and rolls the car.....It's just a theory...I'm not sure they were already braking at that point or not.

[mx_tifoso]

I think we should keep this along the lines of the flexi wings, otherwise let's take it to the Belgian GP thread.

[marcush.]

For sure our flexiwing protagonists
Webber and Vettel have shown from day one this season that the RBR6 is quick in clean air but both guys seem to struggle in traffic ,showing subdued races not making up significant places or crashing .
which was the race when Vettel was so far back and only after a while he started to pick up the pace and went through the field..? Maybe he decided then and there to ignore the instability in traffic and now paid the price...

[RH1300S]

to compare the FW movement in Turkey:

One thing this video shows is that when he's in the slipstream the the wing not only wags a little, but it is also higher.

Watch - as soon as he is to the side of Webber you can clearly see the wing drops by quite a large amount. I.e. - it's now regained lost downforce and has flexed downwards.

At this point on the track, both cars were running close to top speed so the wing load should be very high.

[marcush.]

don´t forget:
non flexing wings do loose downforce in the wake as well!they just don´t flex and give visual proof of it.so all we can say is there is a loss of downforce when travelling in the wake of the car in front...nothing new there...
We can say for sure that the REDBULL wing looses as much as all downforce as it goes into unbend state but what happens with a nonbendy wing ? It does the same...
So really the big difference is: RedBull loses not only the normal downforce as anyone but of course the extra newtons they produce by running the wingtips very close to the ground...so their fluctuations may be bigger and oscillating quicker.

[wesley123]

Also we all know that the Red Bull pretty much sucks in slipstreaming, can this be the cause? iic the front wing is moving really weird causing some sort of vortices behind it increasing the drag and upsetting the aerodynamics?