BMW Sauber Air Intake

m3_lover · Post 27 Apr 2006, 00:15

Has anybody noticed that the BMW Sauber team is the only team not to run the wings on top of the air intake like other teams do. does anybody have any reasons why this is?

yelowca · Post 27 Apr 2006, 03:21

i dont know, maybe the car is already well balanced, it might not need any more wing

DaveKillens · Post 27 Apr 2006, 06:45

From what I know, that element on the airbox is to straighten and condition turbulent air in that area, the make it better for the rear wing. My guess is that this is still the Sauber chassis, and has just one BMW aero uppdate. They may have one planned for later, or they just feel they don't need one for the rear wing efficiency.

yelowca · Post 28 Apr 2006, 05:42

I dont really think its is the Sauber chassis cause Willy Rampf said that the F1.06 is a brand new car, new concept, and the car is already doing a heck of a lot better that the Sauber car. As well, all 3 drivers have said during the shakedown, that the car is a lot easier 2 drive, and feels a lot faster.

johny · Post 28 Apr 2006, 08:52

bmw purchased sauber during last season so this proyect may be 90%sauber with 10%bmw help

pyry · Post 28 Apr 2006, 11:06

a bit off, but somewhere it was also speculated that the horns on the mclaren in addition to smoothing the airflow also create lateral downforce or more correctly(but not nearly a correct term) sideforce in the direction of the corner apex, so it minimally pulls the car toward the corner when turning.

kilcoo316 · Post 28 Apr 2006, 13:32

pyry wrote:a bit off, but somewhere it was also speculated that the horns on the mclaren in addition to smoothing the airflow also create lateral downforce or more correctly(but not nearly a correct term) sideforce in the direction of the corner apex, so it minimally pulls the car toward the corner when turning.

I would doubt it as the effective angle of attack would tend to induce 'lift' towards the outside of the corner.

zac510 · Post 28 Apr 2006, 13:46

Plus trying to induce sideways 'lift' would fight against the tyre.
It would also need to be assymetrical and favour one type of corner, or moveable for each direction of corner.

wowf1 · Post 28 Apr 2006, 13:53

Exactly! If the horns were symmetrical (which they are!) and they did provide this 'lateral force', then they would provide equal amounts of lateral force, but in different directions! ie. they cancel each other out. The other option would be to have them both providing lateral force in only one direction (ie. asymmetric), but that would destroy the air flow going to the rear wing.

If the horns have any angle of attack on the 'vertical' section, then it's only to manage airflow to the rear wing, not for any other purpose.

kilcoo316 · Post 28 Apr 2006, 15:13

wowf1 wrote:Exactly! If the horns were symmetrical (which they are!) and they did provide this 'lateral force', then they would provide equal amounts of lateral force, but in different directions! ie. they cancel each other out. The other option would be to have them both providing lateral force in only one direction (ie. asymmetric), but that would destroy the air flow going to the rear wing.

If the horns have any angle of attack on the 'vertical' section, then it's only to manage airflow to the rear wing, not for any other purpose.

No, they wouldn't, in a corner they would be providing a force towards the outside of the corner, due to the yawing motion of the car around the rear wheel axle centreline.

However, if the wings/horns were non-symmetric, and producing a lift vector towards the car centreline, then the vortex around the wing/horn tip would change the effective angle onto the rear wing, making the effective AoA of the rear wing near the car centreline greater, thus providing more downforce.

Jason · Post 28 Apr 2006, 16:19

Hmmm, I was thinking of an answer and I came up with this. Some of my friends made a dicussion of that, since they think this car is well balanced so I don't see why BMW Sauber needs the mid-wing like every team has.

I was drawing a picture of the F1.06 car, saw the air flow of it. Not really a mid-wing is concerned, the triangular airbox giving cleaner air flow to the rear end. Not every car needs a mid-wing

zac510 · Post 28 Apr 2006, 16:38

It may be well balanced but it can easily be less efficient (ie worse L:D ratio).

DaveKillens · Post 28 Apr 2006, 18:47

The car Villeneuve and Heidfeld compete in began life as a Sauber. When you compare the '06 BMW with the '05 Sauber it's easy to see the family resemblance. But since BMW now owns that operation, they can call it whatever they wish.
It takes around a year to properly design and put on track a new car, it's a long and complicated process. And usually, teams build on the success of the previous generation, and learn from the mistakes. The new BMW team has a lot of money and new faces, but the core people, the ones still there, came from Sauber. You can't just wipe everything clean and start with a completely fresh sheet of paper. Even SA had to start with something, even an obsolete chassis.
The vertical horns on the McLaren are immovable, they cannot be rotated to push left or right. And if subject to sidewinds from skidding or fast corners, the inside vertical would be blanketed by the airbox. So if the car was turning right, and sliding slightly, the left vertical horn would be pushed by the air, and try to roll the chassis to the right, unloading the outside tires. It would exert a slight push toward the direction of the turn, but since it is so high up, it would have a stronger push unloading the outside tires. Not desired.

Scuderia_Russ · Post 28 Apr 2006, 18:51

DaveKillens wrote:The car Villeneuve and Heidfeld compete in began life as a Sauber. .

F2003 G-A more like it Dave!

kilcoo316 · Post 28 Apr 2006, 19:48

DaveKillens wrote:The vertical horns on the McLaren are immovable, they cannot be rotated to push left or right. And if subject to sidewinds from skidding or fast corners, the inside vertical would be blanketed by the airbox. So if the car was turning right, and sliding slightly, the left vertical horn would be pushed by the air, and try to roll the chassis to the right, unloading the outside tires. It would exert a slight push toward the direction of the turn, but since it is so high up, it would have a stronger push unloading the outside tires. Not desired.

I doubt the inside horn would be isolated to be honest.

I also disagree with the pushing of the air on the horn. The car will be rotating about the centreline on the rear axle, so the component of velocity on the horn will be from the inside to outside of the corner - hence the wing is pulling the car out. Unless the skid is greater than that component value I suppose.

We need numbers

If YR was the yaw rate in the corner, and X the distance from them horns to the rear axle with velocity V the component would be

([2*pi*X]/360)*[YR] + V*sin(YR) [approx]

but that does not include a sideslip angle.

I guess that the sideslip angle would simply subtract from yaw rate, so unless that is bigger, the horns will be pulling the car out from the corner. But the inside horn will be increasing the effective angle of attack of the rear wing.

But F1 cars have yaw rates of around 30 and even above 40 deg/sec, so you'd need a slip angle equal to that, and I think a typical optimal tyre slip angle is around 5 degrees.

http://www.datrontechnology.com/all/sit ... down&did=3