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2009: Goodbye to shark gills

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In the winter series developments we'll be looking at the changes incurred by the drastic regulation changes that rule Formula One for 2009 and beyond. First off it marks the end of the shark gills, which came widely into use after the sidepod of the championship winning Renault R25 was completely covered with these hot air exhausts.
While they have caused interesting point of view into the car's cooling, any opening in almost the entire sidepod area is banned with article 3.8.5, except for anything less than 55mm ahead of the rear wheel centre line.
The teams will therefore have to resort to completely different cooling solutions by guiding all hot air within the sidepod towards the rear end. Such solution will surely be less effective and cause more problems with overheating at the rear.

Comments

By j4kwan on 20-11-2008 at 21:42

which absolutely helps with the proposed 3 race engine rule ;)

By wesley123 on 20-11-2008 at 21:54

Yes, how big is the chance that most cars gonna make all 3 races?
The cooling has to be totally different and no engine changes are allowed, only when they can produce the part cheaper.

This will really add more racing as those angines are build for 2 races, the cooling problems will make it 1.5 race so most cars will not make the end of the 3 race.

Im already looking forward to next season...

By F1-Lover on 20-11-2008 at 21:54

there are other ways to coll the engine, just not via gills.

By jamsbong on 21-11-2008 at 02:32

this will just slow the 2009 cars down. I mean sensible engineers would reduce the power of the engine to ensure 3 race durability.

By PNSD on 21-11-2008 at 19:59

The other thing louvers did was energize the thickening boundary layer over the sidepods. The current sidepods were quite cambered so I imagine there was quite abit of boundary layer buildup.

By DanyalDenyo on 23-11-2008 at 05:46

i think it won't be a big deal. they will just use bigger air intakes. if i'm not wrong mclaren can handle the heat with a smaller air intake. i believe this will be the best year of macca.

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