F1 wing adjustments.

[LennyN]

Hey guys, was wondering if anyone is aware of how the adjustments of F1 wings operate and the adjustment range. Do they have a large adjustment range, is it calculated in degrees ect.

After information for a racing simulation.

Thnaks.

[West]

Usually the driver will radio the pits saying if the front end is washing away, or if there is oversteer. Then the pit crew will adjust df at the front accordingly, maybe + or - one degree or even less. I remember Renault a while ago (dunno if they do it now) drew hash marks on the inside of the wing endplates to measure angles.

[modbaraban]

...is it calculated in degrees ect.

After information for a racing simulation.

They refer to it as 'clicks'. For example:
(team radio before the pitstop)
driver: "Huston, we have a problem with severe understeer!"
team: "Roger that. I will give you 3 clicks!"

I believe this means setting the wing angle 3 positions up. So it looks quite similar to racing sims.

[LennyN]

Ok cool. Im wondering what the range of adjustment is, because in racing sims they have somethlng like 40 clicks for the wings which im sure they dont have that much in real life. Im thinking they probably have something like 5-10 'clicks' , for general low-medium-high df levels, but I cant find any information on it.

[modbaraban]

5-10 clicks would be way too coarse if it's the full range from lowest DF (Monza) to highest DF (Monaco) setup (as it is in sims, but in 40-50 clicks).

The thing is that they have different wings for different tracks so for example Monaco-spec wing may not have the possibility to go as 'low' as for Monza and thus have only 10 clicks for fine tunning but within high downforce range anyway.

This is just a supposition. I hope guys like Scarbs can come around and clarify this for us.

[scarbs]

As already mentioned in a race or Q situation front wings can be adjusted by half ‘turns’ of the adjusters on the flap. I haven’t seen more than a couple of full turns adjusted on a wing in this situation. This covers a degree or so of wing angle, judging by the markings on the endplates of some teams. Each wing design is efficient within a smallish range of downforce\drag settings, so you cant simply crank up more angle to get a big change in performance, often a different wing is required.

Changing a wings settings in between races or on a Friday practice session can see the cars front and rear downforce adjusted both by the actual wing, different flaps or gurney flaps, as well as the other aero add-ons around the car. Teams will talk in terms of Newtons of load rather than degrees of wing. On a Friday teams will often try different gurneys (small effect) or different flaps (middling change) or even a different wing altogether (major change on DF). Most of what the team expects to run is decided from previous data and simulations, they will have an aero map of the car, looking up the chart for increasing downforce\drag there will be a choice of different wing\gurney add on settings. The race engoineer will refer to this when altering the cars downforce.

Scarbs

[modbaraban]

Thanks! That's what I thought. Angle of attack setting are mostly for fine tunning on Sat-Sun when you can't change/modify the wing anymore.

[Belatti]

Does someone knows the range of angles used till they change the type of wing?

I imagine that, for example, 45degrees of monza wing has more drag than 30degrees of monacos, with same downforce... (plase aerogeeks, dont get mad! this is just an example for you to make it graphic what I´m asking you to explain me)

PD: I´m more the kind of enginegeek !