Those who know aerodynamics argue that the vortex generators which appeared under the floors in defining the shapes of the keel of the ground-effect single-seaters, will be destined to disappear when Formula 1 will find the efficiency that the technicians are looking for in wind tunnel, a sign that we are only at the first stage in understanding the rules that have brought the Venturi effect back to the center of the research with the 2022 Formula 1 cars.
And it is interesting to observe the direction followed by the two top teams: Red Bull Racing and Ferrari have started from completely different concepts of cars and little by little we discover that there are convergences which push the technicians to develop ideas that make single-seaters less and less different.
When the RB18 adopted the floor curb with a transverse area in front of the rear wheels similar to that of the F1-75, it caused quite given the fact that Red Bull copied the Ferrari car, but without greatly benefiting from a solution which was later abandoned. On closer inspection of the car red we can say that the opposite effect is much more obvious, that is to say that it was the aerodynamicists led by Diego Tondi who mounted on the F1-75 car ideas that had appeared on the RB18 car of Milton Keynes for the first time.
It is not a criticism, but a simple fact of a situation that allowed Ferrari to develop the F1-75 over the course of the season, maintaining a competitive level that, unfortunately, was not seen only in the Hungarian GP, where Maranello was not able to build a comeback against the very fast Max Verstappen.
Giorgio Piola’s drawing for Motorsport Italy allows us to analyze the F1-75 car as seen from below, highlighting the latest developments that have been approved in the wind tunnel in search of greater aerodynamic efficiency.
According to the data collected by the Maranello team, Ferrari has a more powerful engine than the Red Bull RBPTH001, albeit less reliable, given the repeated failures also on the power units of the customer teams (Alfa Romeo and Haas), but it “spent” a few horsepower too much for a more resistant aerodynamic configuration than the RB18, a single-seater designed to be the “queen” of top speeds at the end of the straights, while the red car excels in traction out of the corners.
The lower downforce configuration wing which was used for the first time by Charles Leclerc in Canada allowed for improved air penetration, but it is with the development of the floor that the most important results have been achieved.
The inlet of the Venturi ducts have been redesigned and in the outermost portion (1) there has been a significant reduction in the out wash flow to be channeled beyond the rear wheel, preferring to increase the upper air flow, so from Paul Ricard we have saw a flat “roof” and no longer oblique as before, going in the direction that Red Bull had already taken.
The flow diverter (2) has also grown over time with increasingly larger dimensions: this vertical bulkhead, in fact, allows to more clearly divide the dirty air disturbed by the noxious vortices generated by the front wheel, from the clean ones arriving from the front. Yet this evolution takes up ideas that are the product of Adrian Newey’s mind.
Giorgio Piola also points out that Ferrari has modified the design of the F1-75 keel, now equipped with a vortex generator in one of the most delicate points of the car: the chief designers admit that the lower part of the car is perhaps the most subjected to modifications, but the updates can hardly be punctually listed without being able to see the floor of the car, for example when lifted with a tow truck.
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The RB18 shows humpbacks in the keel both in the front part of the floor (1) and (2) and in the rear area (3) while also maintaining the element (4) that the Scuderia had used in free practice for the Australian GP and was then also tested during the Pirelli 2023 tire tests in Imola immediately after the Emilia Romagna and Made in Italy GP.
The Red Bull anti-porpoising skate has found a fixed application not only on the F1-75 but also on many other Formula 1 cars, demonstrating the validity of a solution that is giving excellent results.
The season, after the summer break, will resume with the Belgian GP and with the Italian GP that will be interspersed by Zandvoort: the fast tracks therefore arrive so we will see the cars with the lowest aerodynamic configurations, proposing one of the latest packages of development of the season. And it will be interesting to find out which paths of convergence the future development solutions will follow.
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