Wings - drag v downforce

[RB7ate9]

Re: Monza/Spa

While I'm not trying to take sides here (I'd like more pictures from the test, TBH), an argument for the max -CL crowd is that at Spa and Monza, you have such high speeds that you can create the maximum OPTIMUM downforce with less appendages compared to Monaco, where the slower speeds necessitate gathering as much as you can from elements such as the front and rear wing.

While you could, say, take a Monaco-spec car and race it around Monza (and might improve some of the performance through the chicanes), the added "weight" of the downforce being produced would decrease your overall balance and effectiveness.

Another way to look at it (I'm supposing) is to imagine the rooster-rail wake of air through the rear wing. My guess is that the designers want the same size wake (maximum downforce) at each respective track. A Monaco-spec car with Monaco speeds would be designed to create the same wake as a Spa-spec car with Spa speeds. Same aim for downforce, but different requirements.

Essentially repeating myself? You betcha.

[hollus]

Very nice point about the same wing generating different downforce in different corners due to the different speed.

For the record: following F1 for 27 years now, and it has always been about downforce, downforce and downforce. Read any interviews, and it is about downforce. Ask the driver, and they miss more grip. Look at the cars, and the Minardis lacked one thing, always the same, downforce. Last year's Ferrari lacked downforce (Alonso's words). The 2009 Force India lacked downforce. In it's designer's own words, they got the design targets wrong, they put too much into reducing drag and they could not generate enough downforce as a consequence. We know what happened, slow in all but 2 circuits famous for lacking corners, i.e. slow in 90% of the season. And the red bulls time after time are the fastest in the corners, the slowest in the straights... and the fastest on lap time.
More downforce allows you to be faster in: Braking areas, corners, acceleration areas (meaning grip limited), the parts of the straights immediately around braking and acceleration areas, as you can carry more speed from/to then. Less drag (generally meaning less downforce) allows you to be fast in between the middle and 3/4 of many straights, where you have the fastest speeds and hence spend the smallest amount of time.
So, you get it, it is about Downforce, followed by downforce, and next downforce.

And yet, cars go into the race able of adjusting, often increasing, the angle of attack of both the front and the right wing. They balance the car with the wings. It is not that one wing is maximized and the other has to reduce the angle of attack to keep balance; more often than not, both wings are set at less than their maximum AOA.

Someone explain that to me...

[hardingfv32]

So, you get it, it is about Downforce

No... It is all about get the downforce vs drag compromise correct for the track and conditions you are racing under.

There is a very small range of optimization in F1 for this compromise. That is not to say the range has a peek. There were many timed last year when a few other cars were as fast as RB in lap times but had different trap speeds. I am assuming that in these cases all other things were equal and that we are talking about different downforce vs drag combinations.

So, in F1 there is a very precise compromise being made for those running at the front. Drag holds an equal importance with downforce.

Brian

[N12ck]

So, you get it, it is about Downforce

No... It is all about get the downforce vs drag compromise correct for the track and conditions you are racing under.

There is a very small range of optimization in F1 for this compromise. That is not to say the range has a peek. There were many timed last year when a few other cars were as fast as RB in lap times but had different trap speeds. I am assuming that in these cases all other things were equal and that we are talking about different downforce vs drag combinations.

So, in F1 there is a very precise compromise being made for those running at the front. Drag holds an equal importance with downforce.

Brian

+1

[marekk]

Those "cars" have 750BPH/700kg > 1 BPH/kg.
Let's imagine for a moment one of us (average guy, 180cm, 80kg) has more then 85 BPH in his legs and races around the block
Do you REALLY mean your frontal area and drag coefficient will be the biggest problem ?

Ultimate lap time will be almost always (probably even on Monza) better with more downforce - but even much higher cornering speed doesn't help much, if you are passed by all the low-drag cars on first straight.

I bet any F1 aero guy will buy 10% downforce gain for 30% (or even more) drag increase.

[jordangp]

Those "cars" have 750BPH/700kg > 1 BPH/kg.
Let's imagine for a moment one of us (average guy, 180cm, 80kg) has more then 85 BPH in his legs and races around the block
Do you REALLY mean your frontal area and drag coefficient will be the biggest problem ?

Ultimate lap time will be almost always (probably even on Monza) better with more downforce - but even much higher cornering speed doesn't help much, if you are passed by all the low-drag cars on first straight.

I bet any F1 aero guy will buy 10% downforce gain for 30% (or even more) drag increase.

750BPH/700kg doesn't cancel down into 1 BPH/kg

But seriously, 10% downforce for 30% drag is fair enough. I wouldn't have thought too much more. I'm not saying drag and downforce are equally important. I believe it is about balance, but favoured towards the downforce end. 10% for 30% sounds believable IMHO.

[N12ck]

Those "cars" have 750BPH/700kg > 1 BPH/kg.
Let's imagine for a moment one of us (average guy, 180cm, 80kg) has more then 85 BPH in his legs and races around the block
Do you REALLY mean your frontal area and drag coefficient will be the biggest problem ?

Ultimate lap time will be almost always (probably even on Monza) better with more downforce - but even much higher cornering speed doesn't help much, if you are passed by all the low-drag cars on first straight.

I bet any F1 aero guy will buy 10% downforce gain for 30% (or even more) drag increase.

750BPH/700kg doesn't cancel down into 1 BPH/kg




But seriously, 10% downforce for 30% drag is fair enough. I wouldn't have thought too much more. I'm not saying drag and downforce are equally important. I believe it is about balance, but favoured towards the downforce end. 10% for 30% sounds believable IMHO.

All I have been trying to say that drag is important, there have been people saying drag is unimportant, however it is very important when designing a car, downforce is the ultimate goal, but drag also needs taken into consideration, if we had a season full of monacos no-one would really care that much about drag, but due to monza, spa and canada, drag is a major factor in the design of a car,

[jordangp]

Those "cars" have 750BPH/700kg > 1 BPH/kg.
Let's imagine for a moment one of us (average guy, 180cm, 80kg) has more then 85 BPH in his legs and races around the block
Do you REALLY mean your frontal area and drag coefficient will be the biggest problem ?

Ultimate lap time will be almost always (probably even on Monza) better with more downforce - but even much higher cornering speed doesn't help much, if you are passed by all the low-drag cars on first straight.

I bet any F1 aero guy will buy 10% downforce gain for 30% (or even more) drag increase.

750BPH/700kg doesn't cancel down into 1 BPH/kg




But seriously, 10% downforce for 30% drag is fair enough. I wouldn't have thought too much more. I'm not saying drag and downforce are equally important. I believe it is about balance, but favoured towards the downforce end. 10% for 30% sounds believable IMHO.

All I have been trying to say that drag is important, there have been people saying drag is unimportant, however it is very important when designing a car, downforce is the ultimate goal, but drag also needs taken into consideration, if we had a season full of monacos no-one would really care that much about drag, but due to monza, spa and canada, drag is a major factor in the design of a car,

I know, I agree with you. Never argued your point.

[hardingfv32]

I bet any F1 aero guy will buy 10% downforce gain for 30% (or even more) drag increase.

"Not for drag reasons - no-one really cares about drag in F1 - its all about downforce." From the beginning of the thread the thread.

Let us assume your 10% downforce to 30% drag is correct AND the optimum equation/compromise. If the 10% downforce gain comes with a 30.5% drag gain then by definition it is unacceptable. Drag is of equal importance when it comes to making the compromise. It does not have to be of equal numerical value to be significant.

Brian

[N12ck]

I know, I agree with you. Never argued your point.

Drag is a major factor in car design, for example, internal drag, intake drag etc,,,,

[jordangp]

I know, I agree with you. Never argued your point.

I was meaning others who just shoot you down without researching at all, but accidentally quoted you, like no-one can seriously sit there and tell me that drag is not a factor in car design, for example, internal drag, intake drag etc,,,,

I mean I have a fair few books here on vehicular aerodynamics, and open wheel aerodynamics. Hard to find a page where drag isn't mentioned.

EDIT: For years we have been told less drag makes it quicker on straight, more downforce means it's quicker through corners. No track is all tight corners, no track is all long straights, so there is compromise, no? If you think that's completely wrong, then where have you been over the last century?

[N12ck]

I know, I agree with you. Never argued your point.

I was meaning others who just shoot you down without researching at all, but accidentally quoted you, like no-one can seriously sit there and tell me that drag is not a factor in car design, for example, internal drag, intake drag etc,,,,

I mean I have a fair few books here on vehicular aerodynamics, and open wheel aerodynamics. Hard to find a page where drag isn't mentioned.

same, Race car aerodynamics by simon mcbeath etc.... and also there is internal drag caused by the inlets, that gets optimised by teams,

[jordangp]

Sometimes you can make very little downforce improvement, so instead you must try to reduce drag. If drag wasn't important. We'd have HUGE intakes, to make sue cooling was sufficient. Instead we use a lot of cooling outlets, because as well as other things, they are a lot less draggy, and can also help contribute to downforce, if positioned as such.

[N12ck]

Sometimes you can make very little downforce improvement, so instead you must try to reduce drag. If drag wasn't important. We'd have HUGE intakes, to make sue cooling was sufficient. Instead we use a lot of cooling outlets, because as well as other things, they are a lot less draggy, and can also help contribute to downforce, if positioned as such.

I agree completely, the internal aerodynamics are all about neutrality and drag reduction, which is a major point in car design, if it wasnt, then we would have massive intakes (as you say) non angled radiators, and everything would be square inside and not smooth inside

[Jersey Tom]

There's obviously some point at which it's ridiculous. Like if you added 1 lbf of downforce at the expense of 500 lbf of drag - sure, you're probably going to slow down the lap times. One could make that purely hypothetical / theoretical argument.

But we don't live in fantasy land.

Realistically I'm sure there's some ratio... if you can add 10 lbf of downforce there's probably a realistic range of what drag penalty is associated with it. Maybe its 10 lbf, maybe it's 1 lbf. Whatever the ballpark ratio is, I don't see why it's unreasonable that the addition of downforce outweighs the drag penalty. And has been mentioned, you can't just throw pieces at the thing and expect to always get a gain in the total SYSTEM.

Incidentally, poor end-of-straight speed is NOT necessarily always a too much drag / too little engine power issue. Can just as well be a lack of downforce. Every additional 1 mph you can carry through a corner due to additional aero loading, is an additional mph you can carry down a straight.

There are some tracks and series where the L/D or just 'D' are overpowering. Cup car at Daytona or any flat-out IRL track is a good example - where the in-plane grip does nothing for you.

If F1 raced at the Indy oval, there you'd see an interesting aero package I bet. Or at Martinsville. Bahaha.