F1technical.net

ReubenG wrote:Are you referring to the rolling resistance of the tyres or the contribution of the tyres to aerodynamic drag?

Most likely the aero drag; I think its around 25-35% of the total drag of the car.

yeah... open wheel racing's achilles heel when it comes to top speed.

I think he was reffering to the aerodynamic drag more than the rolling resistance...thanx about tht. Your right the tyres would really slow it down.....so aswell as all the other setup changes I think they'd have to make they would also have to put on some really skinny tyres too

Don't forget to chage gearbox ratios so that acceleration 0-100km/h drops from 2.5 sec to 15 or more. Having in mind weight power ratio I think that without downforce package and narrow tyres 900-1000 hp F1 car could go way over 500 km/h especialy having in mind that PPG cart cars with less power, wide tyres, more weight and downforce package made over 400 km/h on fast circuits.

I dare to bet on +600 km/h for F1 car.

The weight of the car has bugger all to do with the top speed. At top speed you balance engine power (well power at the wheels after drivetrain losses) against power consumption due to drag. What's the lower plausible CoD for a F1 car? If you know that, you can pretty easily estimate the top speed.

Edit: Whoops, forgot you have to estimate rolling resistance.

Taking weight out of an F1 car doesn't improve it's top speed unless you are talking about tests in a circuit. If you test in a straight line, like drag races, only aerodynamics count. If you look at the current F1 car performances we can approximately say that:
F1 current engine power is around 950HP;
F1 current top speed should be about 360Km/h with low downforce configuration;
With these two elements we can make some calculus:
Power=Force*Velocity
Considering that only 900HP are used to power the car we get:
900(Hp)*745(W/Hp)=.5*pho(Kg/m3)*Cd*A(m^2)*V^3((m/s)^3), pho=1.225 Kg/m^3 at sea level and V=100m/s so
900*745=.5*1.225*Cd*A*100^3 <=>Cd*A=~1.1;
Given that we take all the wings and "drag making elements" the Cd*A would be about .7 than the maximum speed would be approx=116m/s=418km/h;
Now is a matter of fidding how much the Cd*A would lower when the F1 car would be stripped off of aerodynamics. If Cd*A could be as low as .5 the top speed would be 467.5km/h!

Stik !!! You calculations is right... but you see...
in speeds near 300 km/h
the tyre resistant is MORE then aerodynamics....
so the limit factor is Tyre perfomance and then aerodunamics of cause..

actually tire resstance or rolling resistance is a minimal factor at high speeds.
Rolling resistance is relatively high at low speeds, and lower at high speeds, the rolling resistance doesn't increase much with high speeds, but Aerodynamic drag increases with the square or cube of the speed, so it rapidly becomes the dominant factor.

From what i know about tires, the rolling resistence is depend on the load, so as downforce increases so should the rolling resistence! But since I was considering a neutral car in terms of vertical load(no downforce) the rolling resistance shouldn't increase.
shumiGO->the Cd*A i calculated at 360Km/h includes the effect of rolling tires. In a way I am adding all the drag making elements and saying that they all have a Cd*A=whatever
It's an approximation, if it is good or not, i don't know but it's the only one i could remember!

Cheers, StiK

Well, it looks like you are going to find out..........

BAR are going to run one of their 007 cars at Bonneville this year. As I understand it, they will run a car to full FIA spec, but trimmed out to see just what the top speed could be. That means the car will have wings, mirrors etc. I read that they intend to remove some of the winglets etc. as downforce is not the priority.

Apart from sticking a parachute on the back - that's it............

Estimates of the top speed seem to be around 250mph.

Let's wait and see.

Quite a lot of the answer depends on your definition of an F1 car. In circuit racing configuration an F1 car can do about 230 MPH - I think Michael Schumacher posted this speed past the pits at Monza a few years ago. However I don't think there is anything in the FIA rules which says that an F1 car has to have wings, wide tyres, all sorts of messy aerodynamic flip-ups etc. If you adapted a current F1 car to a super-sleek torpedo shape with very narrow wheels and radiators replaced with an iced water tank wrapped around the gearbox it would probably be knocking on for 300 MPH given a good long run at it.

What's the point of that!? It would not be an F1 car! It would be something else!!

I was wondering too, whether BAR would run a full spec car, or one optimized for top speed. If so, wings and many devices would be removed. The wheels would have some form of bodywork to eliminate the tremendous drag they create at high speed, and they would be narrow and of special design to reduce rolling resistance. Aluminum wheels? And how about the powerplant, would it be "tweaked"? Exotic fuels?
But we shall just have to speculate, and wait and see. It will be interesting.
Considering that this is more a public relations exercise, I wonder if other teams would like to lay claim to bragging rights. It would be fun to see different teams trying this each year, in order to garner "relatively" cheap publicity. I wonder what one of the older designs with the turbos could do?
This will be fun to watch.
Maybe we should all make our predictions now, and see who comes closest.

BAR will be running a car that is modefied for top speed, although it will still be F1 Circuit Legal. Basically I imagine all the litle flick ups will be gone...but the wings will stay.

So the car will still be an F1 car which they could race at any GP this season....nt that they would want to! lol