Anatomy of a 2022 car: ‘The floor still makes room for creative ideas’

In a few months we will know which teams the 2022 cars made within the rules. More rules, fewer freedoms FORMULA 1 tech expert Rob van den Heijkant points out where the possibilities lie. “Due to the ground effect, drivers will break the floor faster.”

Van den Heijkant was not too happy with the limitations of the front wings. “It looks futuristic, but there’s almost nothing you can do with it anymore: almost all profiles and corners are ‘fixed’.” In other areas of the vehicle, there may be room for designers to differentiate themselves.

Also read: Anatomy of a 2022 car: ‘Front wings are futuristic but nothing is allowed’

Tires
“Where there is still a lot of freedom, there is the wheel suspension. Perhaps some teams will come up with an interesting discovery, rather than the current standard solutions. However, you are not allowed to do much about the tires in terms of wings and birdsong,” says Van den Heijkant. “The kind of ‘caps’ that roll around will drastically reduce tire resistance.”

“As mentioned earlier, turbulent air from the tires can no longer be regulated (see ‘Front wing’) and so it goes straight back instead of going underground or being pushed out. That costs downforce, but that’s exactly that. Polluted Air Coming from the tires and – across the floor – from the diffuser, which made it difficult to follow each other. Now it comes under your car and you suffer it yourself, but it’s supposed to make overtaking easier.”

floor
“This is one of the few areas where there is still room for improvement in terms of creative ideas. Then I basically look at the front of the floor and the part in front with the sidepods. The new cars have a kind of underground ‘tunnel’, to Earth effect To recover from the past. How does this work? There is still a shelf in the middle like now. Next to it is a neutral zone – at a fixed height – and then rises and reaches the tunnel, before the floor drops outside again.”

Read also: Newey dislikes the 2022 rules: “I haven’t found anything yet to make it exciting for myself”

“This tunnel sucks or pulls the car into the ground, which produces a lot of downforce. What’s the point: the floor on the sides will soon be lower than it is now, and the cars will probably increase due to the ground effect. roll through bends. So count on drivers who break a lot of floors. Although there is debate as to whether they can make the ends of the floor a stronger material.”