INTRODUCTION                    

Car racing is one of the most technologically advanced sports in the world today. Race Cars are the most sophisticated vehicles that we see in common use. It features exotic, high-speed, open-wheel cars racing all around the world. The racing teams have to create cars that are flexible enough to run under all conditions. This level of diversity makes a season of F1 car racing incredibly exciting. The teams have to completely revise the aerodynamic package, the suspension settings, and lots of other parameters on their cars for each race, and the drivers have to be extremely agile to handle all of the different conditions they face. Their carbon fiber bodies, incredible engines, advanced aerodynamics and intelligent electronics make each car a high-speed research lab. A F1 Car runs at speeds up to 240 mph, the driver experiences G-forces and copes with incoming data so quickly that it makes  Car driving one of the most demanding professions in the sporting world.  F1 car is an amazing machine that pushes the physical limitations of automotive engineering. On the track, the driver shows off his professional skills by directing around an oval track at speeds

 

 

GENERAL COCKPIT ENVIRONMENT

Every possible button and switch must be close at hand as the driver has limited movement due to tightness of the seat belts. The cockpit is also very cramped, and drivers often wear knee pads to prevent bruising. The car designers are forever trying to lower the centre of gravity of the car, and as each car has a mass of 600 Kg, with the driver’s being roughly 70 Kg, he is an important factor in weight distribution. This often means that the drivers are almost lying down in their driving position. The trend towards high noses led one driver to comment that his driving position felt like he was lying in the bath with his feet up on the taps!

As the driver sits so low, his forward visibility is often impaired. Some of the shorter drivers can only see the tops of the front tyres and so positioning his car on the grid accurately can be a problem. You may see a mechanic holding his hand where the top of the front tyre should stop during a pit-stop to help the driver stop on his correct mark. Rear view mirrors are angled to see through the rear wing and drivers often like to set them so that they can just see the rear wheel.

Around the drivers head there is a removable headrest / collar. This was introduced in an attempt to protect the driver’s neck in a sideways collision. Some driver’s also wear knee pads to prevent their knees banging together during hard cornering.

 

Aerodynamics

One of the most important features of a formula1 Car is its aerodynamics package. The most obvious manifestations of the package are the front and rear wings, but there are a number of other features that perform different functions. A formula 1 Car uses air in three different ways introduction of wings. Formula One team began to experiment with crude aerodynamic devices to help push the tires into the track.

 

 

WINGTHEORY

The wings on an F1 car use the same principle as those found on a common aircraft, although while the aircraft wings are designed to produce lift, wings on an F1 car are placed ‘upside down’, producing downforce, pushing the car onto the track. The basic way that an aircraft wing works is by having the upper surface a different shape to the lower. This difference causes the air to flow quicker over the top surface than the bottom, causing a difference in air pressure between the two surfaces. The air on the upper surface will be at a lower pressure than the air below the wing, resulting in a force pushing the wing upwards. This force is called lift. On a racing car, the wing is shaped so the low pressure area is under the wing, causing a force to push the wing downwards. This force is called downforce.

As air flows over the wing, it is disturbed by the shape, causing what is known as form or pressure drag. Although this force is usually less than the lift or downforce, it can seriously limit top speed and causes the engine to use more fuel to get the car through the air. Drag is a very important factor on an F1 car, with all parts exposed to the air flow being streamlined in some way. The suspension arms are a good example, as they are often made in a shape of a wing, although the upper surface is identical to the lower surface. This is done to reduce the drag on the suspension arms as the car travels through the air at high speed.

The reason that the lower suspension arm has much less drag is due to the aspect ratio. The circular arm will suffer from flow separation around the suspension arm, causing a higher pressure difference in front of and behind the arm, which increases the pressure drag. This occurs because the airflow has to turn sharply around the cylindrical arm, but it cannot maintain a path close to the arm due to the speed of the flow, causing a low pressure wake to form behind it. The lower suspension arm in the diagram will cause no flow separation as the aspect ration between the width and the height is much greater, and the flow can maintain the smooth path around the object, creating a smaller pressure difference between the air in front of the arm and the air behind. In the bottom case, the skin friction drag will increase, but this is a minor increase compared with the pressure drag.

 

 

REARWING

As more wing angle creates more downforce, more drag is produced, reducing the top speed of the car. The rear wing is made up of two sets of aerofoil connected to each other by the wing endplates. The top aerofoil top provides most of the downforce and is the one that is varied the most from track to track. It is now made up of a maximum of three elements due to the new regulations. The lower aerofoil is smaller and is made up of just one element. As well as creating downforce itself, the low pressure region immediately below the wing helps suck air through the diffuser, gaining more downforce under the car. The endplates connect the two wings and prevent air from spilling over the sides of the wings, maximizing the high pressure zone above the wing, creating maximum downforce.

 

 

 

FRONTWING

Wing flap on either side of the nose cone is asymmetrical. It reduces in height nearer to the nose cone as this allows air to flow into the radiators and to the under floor aerodynamic aids. If the wing flap maintained its height right to the nose cone, the radiators would receive less air flow and therefore the engine temperature would rise. The asymmetrical shape also allows a better airflow to the under floor and the diffuser, increasing downforce. The wing main plane is often raised slightly in the centre, this again allows a slightly better airflow to the under floor aerodynamics, but it also reduces the wing’s ride height sensitivity. A wing’s height off the ground is very critical, and this slight raise in the centre of the main plane makes react it more subtlety to changes in ride height. The new- regulations state that the outer thirds of the front wing must be raised by 50mm, reducing downforce. Some teams have lowered the central section to try to get some extra front downforce, at the compromise of reducing the quality of the airflow to the underbody aerodynamics.        

 As the wheels were closer to the chassis, the front wings overlapped the front wheels when viewed from the front. This provided unnecessary turbulence in front of the wheels, further reducing aerodynamic efficiency and thus contributing to unwanted drag. To overcome this problem, the top teams made the inside edges of the front wing endplates curved to direct the air towards the chassis and around the wheels.  Later on and throughout the season, many teams introduced sculpted outside edges to the endplates to direct the air around the front wheels. This was often included in the design change some teams introduced to reduce the width of the front wing to give the wheels the same position relative to the wing in previous years.

 

           

 

The interaction between the front wheels and the front wing makes it very difficult to come up with the best solution, and consequently almost all of the different teams have come up with different designs! The horizontal lips in the middle of the endplate help force air around the tyres, whilst the lip at the bottom of the plate helps stop any high pressure air entering the low pressure zone beneath the wing, as it is the low pressure here which creates the downforce.

 

BARGEBOARDS

 They are mounted between the front wheels and the side pods, but can be situated in the suspension, behind the front wheels. Their main purpose is to smooth the turbulent airflow coming from the front wheels, and direct some of this flow into the radiators, and the rest around the side of the side pods.

They have become much more three dimensional in their design, and feature contours to direct the airflow in different directions. Although the bargeboards help tidy the airflow around the side pods, they may also reduce the volume of air entering the radiators, so reaching a compromise between downforce and cooling is important.

 

DIFFUSER

Invisible to the spectator other than during some kind of major accident, the diffuser is the most important area of aerodynamic consideration. This is the underside of the car behind the rear axle line. Here, the floor sweeps up towards the rear of the car, creating a larger area of the air flowing under the car to fill. This creates a suction effect on the rear of the car and so pulls the car down onto the track.

              

       The diffuser consists of many tunnels and splitters which carefully control the airflow to maximize this suction effect. As the exhaust gases from the engine and the rear suspension arms pass through this area, its design is critical. If the exhaust gases are wrongly placed, the car has changed its aerodynamic balance when the driver comes on and off the throttle. Some teams have moved the exhausts so that they exit from the engine cover instead to make the car more stable when the driver comes on and off the throttle. The picture aboveshows what the complex arrangement of tunnels look like at the back of the car:

 

Engine

With ten times the horse-power of a normal road car, a Formula On engine produces quite amazing performance. With around 900 moving parts, the engines are very complex and must operate at very high temperatures. Engines are currently limited to 3 litre, normally aspirated with 10 cylinders. These engines produce approximately 900 – 850 bhp and are made from forged aluminum alloy, and they must have no more than five valves per cylinder. In a quest to reduce the internal inertia of the moving parts, some components have been manufactured from ceramics. These materials are very strong in the direction they need to be, but have a very low density meaning that it takes less force to accelerate them, ideal for reducing the fuel consumption and efficiency of the engine. A similar material, beryllium alloy has been used, but the safety of it has been questioned.

 

           

 

 

WHAT MAKES THESE ENGINES DIFFERENT TO ROAD CAR ENGINES?

You can often see road cars with engines larger than three liters, but these don’t produce upwards of 750 bhp. So how do F1 engineers produce this amount of power from this size of engine? There are many differences between racing and road car engines that contribute to the large power difference.

F1 engines are designed to rev much higher than road units. Having double the revs should double the power output as there are twice as many engine cycles within a certain time. Unfortunately, as the revs increase, so doe’s friction within the engine, so eventually, a point is reached where maximum power will occur, regardless of the number of revs. Running engines at high revs also increases the probability of mechanical failure as the components within the engines are being more highly stressed.

 

Exotic materials such as ceramics as mentioned earlier are employed to reduce the weight and strength of the engine. A limit of what materials can be used has been introduced to keep costs down, so only metal based (ferrous) materials can be used for the crankshaft and cams. Exotic materials can reduce the weight, and are often less susceptible to expansion with heat, but there can be draw backs. Incorporating these materials next to ferrous materials can cause problems. An exotic material such as carbon fibre will not expand as much as steel for example, so having these together in an engine would ruin the engine, as they run to such small tolerances. Although only 5% of the engine is built of such materials (compared with roughly 1/3 rd Steel, 2/3 rds Aluminum) they still make a worthwhile addition to power output.

 

 

Transmissions

Just like in your family road car, F1 cars have a clutch, gearbox and differential to transfer the 800 bhp into the rear wheels. Although they provide the same function as on a road car, the transmission system in an f1 car is radically different.

 

CLUTCH

The engine is linked directly to the clutch, fixed between the engine and gearbox. Some manufacturers produce Carbon/Carbon F1 clutches which must be able to tolerate temperatures as high as 500 degrees. The clutch is electro-hydraulically operated and can weigh as little as 1.5 kg.

 

They are multi-plate designs that are designed to give enhanced engine pick-up and the lightweight deigns mean that they have low inertia, allowing faster gear changes. The drivers do not manually use the clutch apart from moving off from standstill, and when changing up the gears, they simply press a lever behind the wheel to move to the next ratio. The on-board computer automatically cuts the engine, depresses the clutch and switches ratios in the blink of an eye. In F1 cars, clutches are 100 mm in diameter.

 

GEAR BOX

F1 car gearboxes are different to road car gearboxes in that they are semi-automatic and have no synchromesh. They are sequential which means they operate much like a motorcycle gearbox, with the gears being changed by a 

 

DIFFERENTIAL

To enable the rear wheels to rotate at different speeds around a corner, F1 cars use differentials much like any other forms of motorized vehicle. Formula One cars use limited-slip differentials to help maximize the traction out of corners, compared to open differentials used in most family cars. The open differential theoretically delivers equal torque to both drive wheels at all times, whereas a limited slip device uses friction to change the torque relationship between the drive wheels.

Electro-hydraulic devices are used in F1 to constantly change the torque acting on both of the drive wheels at different stages in a corner. This torque relationship can be varied to ‘steer’ the car through corners, or prevent the inside rear wheel from spinning under harsh acceleration out of a bend.

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Tyres & Wheels

TYRES

 F1 tyres must be able to withstand very high stresses and temperatures, the normal working temperature at the contact patch is around 125 degrees Celsius, and the tyre will rotate at about 3000 rpm at top speed. The tyres are filled with a special nitrogen rich, moisture free gas to make sure the pressure will not alter depending on where it was inflated. The tyres are made up of four essential ‘ingredients’: carbon blacks, polymers, oils and special curatives. During a race weekend, the teams can choose between two compounds of dry tyres to use during qualifying and the race. Normally, a hard and a softer compound tyre will be brought to the track, with the teams deciding before qualifying which compound to use for the rest of the weekend. The softer tyre will give a bit more grip, but will wear and blister more quickly than the hard tyre.

                  The picture below shows the three types of tyres that can be used.. The dry tyre has four circumferential grooves to reduce the ‘contact patch’ that decreases cornering speeds. The wet tyre can only be used when the track is declared officially ‘wet’ by the Stewards of the race. This tyre type must have a ‘land’ area of 75% (the area that touches the track) whilst the channels to remove the water must make up the remaining 25% of the tyre area. The intermediate tyre is used during changeable conditions when it is still slightly damp. If a wet tyre is used when the track is not actually very wet, the tread overheats, losing grip. An intermediate choice channels out water without overheating as much as a wet tyre.

 

                                          

 

Tyres are of paramount importance on a racing car as they are the sole suppliers of grip. Each tyre has about the area of an adults palm touching the ground, (this area is called the contact patch) and this area must be maximized by the suspension to create as much grip as possible. The set-up of the car’s suspension is designed to maximize the contact patch during cornering, acceleration and braking. Although there are some variables involved with the tyres, most of the factors that control the behavior of the contact patch are induced by the suspension set-up.

The pressure of the tyres is a critical factor in the car’s performance. As well as determining the amount of lateral movement of the tyre, the pressures are critical to the movement of the suspension. As the tyre walls are so large, about half of the vertical movement of the car comes from the squashing of the tyre walls, with the rest in the springs or torsion bars in the suspension.

 

       

 

Current F1 tyres must have four grooves around them to comply with the rules which were issued as a way on controlling the cornering speed of the cars. The picture above shows the dimensions of the grooves:

WHEELS

F1 wheels are usually made from forged magnesium alloy due its low density and high strength. They are machined in one piece to make them as strong as possible, and are secured onto the suspension uprights by a single central locking wheel nut. This ‘lock’ is quickly pushed in to release the wheel during a pit stop, and the tyre changer then pulls it again to lock the wheel once the tyres have been changed.

. Once at the track, teams deliver their bare wheel rims to the tyre manufacturers’ truck where the tyres are put onto the rims with special machines. The tyres are then inflated and delivered back to the teams.

WHEEL TETHERS

F1 cars have had to fit wheel tethers connecting the wheels to the chassis. This rule was introduced to try to stop wheels coming free and bouncing around dangerously during an accident. The tether must attach to the chassis at one end, with the other end connecting to the wheel hub.

 The tethers used in F1 are a derivative of high performance marine ropes, made especially for each car. They are made from a special polymer called polybenzoaoxide (PBO) which is often called Zylon. This Zylon material has a very high strength and stiffness characteristic (around 280GPa) much like carbon, but the advantage of Zylon is that it can be used as a pure fibre unlike carbon which has to be in composite form to gain its strength. The drawback of Zylon is that is must be protected from light, so it is covered in a shrink wrapped protective cover. The tethers are designed to withstand about 5000 kg of load, but often they can break quite easily during an accident, especially if the cable gets twisted by the broken suspension members. The teams normally replace the tethers every two or three races to ensure that they can withstand the loads put on them during an accident.

 

The Suspensions

The setup of a cars suspension has a great influence on how it handles on the track, whether it produces under steer, over steer or the more useful neutral balance of a car. On an F1 car, the suspension must be soft enough to absorb the many undulations and bumps that a track may possess, including the riding of some vicious yet time-saving curbs. On the other hand, the suspension should be sufficiently hard so that the car does not bottom out when traveling at 200 mph with about 3 tons of downforce acting on it.

Most of the team’s suspension systems are similar, but they take two forms. The first is the traditional coil spring setup, common in most modern cars. The second is the torsion bar setup. A torsion bar does the same job as a spring but is more compact. Both forms of suspension are mounted on the chassis above the driver’s legs at the front of the car, and on top of the gearbox at the rear. The pictures below left show the typical suspension setup and the spring and a torsion bar: 

           

 

A bump is absorbed by the spring compressing, and then contracting. A Torsion bar absorbs a bump by twisting one way, then twisting back.

 

SPRINGS & TORSION BARS

The springs or torsion bars are the parts of the suspension that actually absorb the bumps. In simple terms, the softer the suspension on the car, the quicker it will travel through a corner. This has the adverse effect of making the car less sensitive to the drivers input, causing sloppy handling. A harder sprung car will have less mechanical grip through the corner, but the handling will be more sensitive and more direct.

To gain more grip, the engineers cannot simply soften the springs all round. This may increase grip up to a point, but there are many adverse effects that will occur. Firstly, the car may bottom out when under the influence of aerodynamic load when traveling at high speed. Secondly, the car will suffer body-roll in the corners which will influence the angle of the tyres with the road, reducing overall grip. The final point is that the car will pitch forwards and backwards under the influence of hard acceleration or braking. This effect the cars aerodynamics, especially the grip obtained from the airflow under the car.

 

DAMPERS

Often called shocks absorbers, dampers provide a resistance for the spring to work against. The purpose of this is to prevent the spring from oscillating too much after hitting a bump. Ideally, the spring would contract over a bump, and then expand back to its usual length straight afterwards.

This requires a damper to be present as without one the spring would contracted expand continually after the bump, providing a rather horrible ride The way that dampers operate can be tuned to alter the handling. The ‘bump’ and ‘rebound’ characteristics can be altered to control how quickly they contract and expand again.

 

THE BRAKES

F1 cars use disc brakes like most road cars, but these brakes are designed to work at 750 degrees C and are discarded after each race. The driver needs the car to be stable under heavy braking, and is able to adjust the balance between front and rear braking force from a dial in the cockpit. The brakes are usually set-up with 60% of the braking force to the front, 40% to the rear. This is because as the driver hits the brakes, the whole weight of the car is shifted towards the front, and the rear seems to get lighter. If the braking force was kept at 50% front and rear, the rear brakes would lock up as there would be less force pushing the rear tyres onto the track under heavy braking.

For qualifying, when longevity of the brake discs is not important, teams often run thinner discs to reduce the weight of the car. Race discs are 28 mm thick (the maximum allowed) where the special qualifying discs are often as thin as 21 mm. Teams often run either very small or in some cases no front brake ducts during qualifying to gain an aerodynamic advantage

The rotating discs are gripped by a caliper which squeezes the disc when the brake pedal is pushed. Brake fluid is pushed into pistons within the caliper which push the brake pads towards the disc and pushes against it it slow the wheel. The discs are often drilled so that air will flow through and keep the temperature down.

These master cylinders contain the brake fluid for both the front and rear brakes. The front and rear systems are connected separately so if one circuit would fail, the driver would still have either the front or rear system with which to slow the car. Also visible is the steering rack and the plumbing for the power steering system.

 

 

Costs

HOW MUCH DOES AN F1 CAR COST TO MAKE?

This is one of the most commonly asked questions by spectators and this section will try to get an overall total to design and build one Formula 1 car. The table below outlines the main parts of the car and how much each part costs:

 

Each part costs:

PARTS AMOUNT    SINGLE PRICE (€)  AMOUNT NEEDED TOTAL (€)

Monocoque               112 360                             1                            112.360

Bodywork                  8026                                1                                  8.026          

Rear Wing                 12842                   1                               12.842

Front Wing                16051                   1                               16.051

Engine                       240770                             1                             240.770

Gearbox                     128411                             1                             128.411

Gear Ratios (set)      112360                            1                            112.360

Exhaust System       9631                               1                                  9.631

Telemetry                   128411                             1                             128.411

Fire Extinguisher     3210                               2                                  6.420

Brake Discs               964                                  4                                  3.856

Brake Pads               642                                  8                                   5.136

Brake Callipers         16051                              4                                64.205        

Wheels                      1124                                4                                  4.496

Tyres                         642                                   4                                  2.568

Shock Absorber       2087                               4                                  8.346

Pedals (set)              1605                                 1                                  1.605                     

Dashboard                3210                                1                        3.210

Steering System       4815                                1                                  4.815

Steering Wheel        32103                              1                                32.103

Fuel Tank                 9632                                 1                                 9.632

Suspension             3210                                 1                                  3.210

Wiring                                  8026                                  1                                   8.026

 

                             GRAND TOTAL                                        € 926.490

In addition to the build costs, thousands of pounds will be spent on designing the car. Design costs include the making of models, using the wind tunnel and paying crash test expenses etc. The cost of producing the final product will be €7.700.000

 

 

 

 

RANDOM FACTS:

 

In an F1 engine revving at 18,000 rpm, the piston will travel up and down 300 times a second.

The piston only moves around 50 mm but will accelerate from 0 – 100 kmh and back to 0 again in around 0.0025 seconds.

If a connecting rod let go of its piston at maximum engine speed, the piston would have enough energy to travel vertically over 100 meters.

If a water hose were to blow off, the complete cooling system would empty in just over a second.

F1 cars have 3 built in pneumatic jacks that can jack the car up in less than a second during the pit stop.

An F1 car has as many as 8 radios in operation at a time.

 

 

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