F1technical.net

Are there any studies on the wake produced by the driver's helmet? I mean, beyond "very messy" or "created probles feeding the airbox". I mean real wind tunnel or simulation work. I tried google and could not find a single CFD diagram on it, certainly nothing in between the golf ball model and the streamlined cycling helmets.

Try contacting the companies that supply helmets like Aria and Bell, they might have that data, or a better abstract for you to work with.

Sure there are. Here you have some pics from a few thread on this issue we had some years ago (most of them by courtesy of Manchild, googler extraordinaire):

Role of helmets in aerodynamics

Helmet aerodynamics (prehistoric thread, I'd say)

Helmet's aerodynamics (even older)

Schuberths small wind tunnel to build helmets


ATOS system






Helmet with splitter (similar to the one used by Button and a few drivers back in the 90's)


Some times it's better to use the search feature of this forum (altough most of our threads appear in the first page of Google searches nowadays, sometimes they are interred in page 3000, specially the older ones).

Thanks.
That Schumi pic is the type of thing I was looking for.
By the way, those pitot tubes look familiar

Nico's new helmet may be contributing to this technology. Looks like there may be a channel along the top.