Goran who is member of this forum asked me if I could post in his behalf images and link to blog he ran into with two solutions applied to next Ferrari car of front wing.
Altough for the first I am pretty sure is not legal because top element cannot connect to nose cone. But main idea is inwash solution as now wing is narrower so maybe this could return as way to direct air around front wheels. There is also other wing with simulation of air stream around front wheels.
Sadly for that idea, there is more to underbody downforce and the car's efficiency as a whole than just getting air under the car.
The outwash front wing does a great job in turning air away from the front tire, the low pressure it creates improves airflow out of the front wheel and drags the wheel wake outwards, away from the floor. I have explained it before; A lot the outwash front wing does is making sure the dirty wheel wake does not reach the floor, this happens together with the vortices shed by the front wing.
The inboard end-plate only brings downsides. The only positive thing I can think of is reducing the effect the front wheel has on the front wing.
Other than that, it will bring nothing good. It requires larger AoA's for the same amount of downforce, it pulls air onto the front wheel only bringing more dirty wheel wake to the floor. And for what, a little bit more air? This air cannot do it's work because the whole floor, and especially the outer edge, will be filled with the dirty wake from the front tire. Any gains made by sending more air under the car will be completely destroyed by the dirty wheel wake.
So no, I do not see any reason why to return to inboard end plates
jaba.hut wrote:Goran who is member of this forum asked me if I could post in his behalf images and link to blog he ran into with two solutions applied to next Ferrari car of front wing.
Altough for the first I am pretty sure is not legal because top element cannot connect to nose cone. But main idea is inwash solution as now wing is narrower so maybe this could return as way to direct air around front wheels. There is also other wing with simulation of air stream around front wheels.
The first FW is nothing more then cut 'n past from the 2008 ferrari.
I think it's interesting to think about why teams opted for inboard wing pre-2009. Wings were shorter, higher from the ground and cars were front downforce limited, instead of now rear downforce limited. Back then they couldn't sacrifice FW surface for agressively bended endplates; that would have costed more in downforce then the reduction in wheel drag and other benefits would make up for.
Today the situation is different. They can create much more downforce at the front then at the rear. In order to maximize rear downforce, they have to reduce turbulent air coming off the wheels. They can do that; the FW's in 2014 still create so much DF potentionally, that they can sacrifice surface in order to bend air away from the front wheels.
wesley123 wrote:
So no, I do not see any reason why to return to inboard end plates
The only benefit I could conceive is to push more air towards the inlet of the sidepods in order to slightly improve cooling and keep the sidepod inlets ever so slightly smaller.
If it's worth it?
I doubt it but who knows...
turbof1 wrote:Back then they couldn't sacrifice FW surface for agressively bended endplates;
I think it was a bit more complicated that that - for example mclaren and redbull before 2008 sacrificed a big chucnk of the front wing surface (all the of wing in front of the front wheels) in order to have a better inwash solution (less curved endplate). Ferrari were less aggressive in that.
turbof1 wrote:Back then they couldn't sacrifice FW surface for agressively bended endplates;
I think it was a bit more complicated that that - for example mclaren and redbull before 2008 sacrificed a big chucnk of the front wing surface (all the of wing in front of the front wheels) in order to have a better inwash solution (less curved endplate). Ferrari were less aggressive in that.
Yes, of course I simplified a bit the truth - mclaren used a bit less surface, but in response had more elements and a higher AoA, which created roughly the same front DF for more drag, but the bigger endplates diverted air better away from the tyres, which in turn created less drag. It's more a difference in philosophy that played the differences between the 2.
Here is CFD analysis of a 2014 car with the narrower FW, focusing on the FWEP's and teams using aggressive designs to turn the airflow OB of front tyres. Also there is some analysis from Gary Anderson, James Allison & Andrew Green.
shelly wrote:Note how many times Andrew Green repeats the word "structures" - meaning vortices.
Yep. Interesting he uses that terminology to speak of vortices, but there's no denying that's what he's referring to. I think it's pretty evident teams will indeed continue sending air OB of the tyres. As Anderson says the key will be getting both flows go merge as soon as possible. Voids behind the wheels accounting for more than 1/3 of the cars overall drag level is quite important. Will be interesting to see the solutions each team come up with.
i think teams will mostly have outwash wings, but with some turning vanes midspan which turn some air from inboard to outboard to help fill in the void behind the tyres.