I also don;t nessercarily see any significant advantage to be gained by removing the upright brackets. They will only minimally affect the amount of flow over the front wing as their frontal area is so small. In Yaw I can see that this affect would be increased. Structually it would also present a massive challenge as the upper elements are then effectivly cantilevers, each supporting 1/2 of the lower element downforce and this will produce large moments.
I thought about the same solution for the front wing.
Main benefit would be better performance in the yaw conditions. I too think it would be harder to maintain stiffness but with lower levels of dounforce for 2009 maybe it can be accomplished.
timbo wrote:I thought about the same solution for the front wing.
Main benefit would be better performance in the yaw conditions. I too think it would be harder to maintain stiffness but with lower levels of dounforce for 2009 maybe it can be accomplished.
The problem is that even with current downforce levels (I assume) front wings are rather heavy for weight distribution reasons.
a couple of not very technical cents worth from me...
I think with the materials available the stiffness of the structure could be relatively easily managed.
@ Den, I recall some footage (but couldn't find any) of mechanics struggling to pick up nose cones during race meetings.. and i noticed at the Belgian GP this year that the Macca guys definitely seemed to have a heavier nose cone that the Ferrari ones (either that or the red guys were stronger that the men in black!!!)
The nose cone is a good place to put ballast (as Renault found with the TMD) as it overhangs the front wheels, but I have a recollection that FIA were trying to cut down on the mount in the nose as it was felt to be unsafe... I scanned the technical regulations, but didn't find anything there - anyone else have the same recollection?
A heavy nose cone is not ideal. It is actually not a great place to put ballast as it means that the vehicles polar moment of inertia is increased (responsiveness suffers in Yaw).
Renault actually probably ran the most ballast in the nose cone to try and move their, what was designed to be a rear biased, weight distribution forwards as it didn't suit the bridgestones. They put ballast in the lower element of the front wing but this wasn't from Ideal (this posiiton is actually higher than where most teams run the ballast raising the CoG), they just could not get the weight distribution forwards any other way.
