According to the Italian media, the Ferrari SF1000 has been revised in two key areas of the car (the floor and the front wing) after experiencing an issue with the gearbox: important aerodynamic solutions that should reduce the negative effect of understeer.
“At an aerodynamic level, interventions with the highest priority were selected. Following this criteria, the development of the lower part of the car at nose level and the floor was approved. While not changing the appearance much, Ferrari tried to better integrate front wing under the nose, which, in the original version, followed that introduced last season on the SF90 starting from Singapore.
The extent of the floor, although already part of the development package, was conditioned by a non-secondary problem, which required a new design of the floor in the area where the bodywork shrinks around the transmission. The need emerged after discovering a micro flexion / twist of the gearbox. The phenomenon concerns the carbon fiber outer shell, where the rear suspension attachment points are located. The transverse loads during the curve would produce the twist by shifting the attacks by a few microns.
The geometry of the suspension would change imperceptibly. But enough to optimize the set-up and, as a consequence, improve the understeer in the center of the corner, the main issue which was pointed out by Charles Leclerc and Seabstian Vettel in the tests at Montmeló.
To solve the problem it seems it was sufficient to strengthen the outer part. The section of the Venturi channels running along the bottom of the sides of the gearbox would be slightly reduced. To guarantee the previous level of efficiency of the extractor, it was therefore necessary to redefine the section of the channels, implying an almost total remake of the bottom”.
Paolo Filisetti , Gazzetta dello Sport , 25 May 2020
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