A heads up here that the JKF Race Car Aero Course will be going on 30% off sale for the first two weeks of July, get in while it lasts! Hope everyone enjoys the video!
To me the Red Bull floor looks so much more advanced than the others we have seen. They are doing so many unique things. All the other teams under floors that have been seen so far look almost generic but Red Bull have some great sculpting. You can really see how the outer two barge board strakes work in this picture. And in the rear how they are minimizing porposing.
Kyle you’re amazing. These breakdowns make me appreciate F1 so much more. I’m sure other teams are benefiting greatly from seeing these photos and studying them just like you. However you verbalize it for us. Thank you
Fascinating, I need to watch it a few more times for understanding. I made underbody molds and attached vortex generators for Nissan GTP and Toyota (AAR) Champ Cars in the 90s. I only had limited knowledge then, but it was always interesting.
Could you do a 101-style video on vorticity? I get lift, drag, pressure, separation etc from my undergrad days, but vortices and what they're used for I've never quite wrapped my head around.
If you're interested in the theoretical basics of it, the famous late Prof. Ascher Shapiro of MIT has a two part overview lecture of vorticity including demonstrations. It is fantastic. Available on youtube in potato quality, or on MIT's site in good quality. Search for Shapiro vorticity and go to the MIT link if you're interested.
@@ASJC27 I appreciate this aerodynamic part of the F1 sport since my son was involved in the aero part for developing a "sunny" racer (wordl solar challenge Australia) . If that professoer is so good.......WHY did I nearly never see topresults from MIT solar cars during the WSC? But do claim mostly the dutch solar cars and from Japan the best results? With sometimes also from Belgium a good result. From the usa universities the best scoring is more often Michigan university. And sometimes Stanford.
@@reiniernn9071 MIT and actually engineering stuff don't seem to go hand in hand. They joined the FSAE party only when the electric competition was opened and completely disregarded the engineers development part of the competition before that as well.
Well essentially, imagine a layer of stationary air under the car. That would provide zero downforce. If that layer of air just remained the same nothing would change. The force can be created by pressure difference eg. on an aerofoil. But another way is suction. So now imagine the stationary car with zero air underneath it. Essentially a vacuum. Imagine how much that vacuum would be sucking the car to the floor. The vortices are effectively somewhere between the two. So you create somewhat of a vacuum effect wherever the vortices are. This produces a suction effect which translates into downforce.
@@reiniernn9071 "If that professoer is so good......." He's been recommended as a teacher. He doesn't have to be the best engineer in order to be a great teacher.
Thank you. I appreciate that you don't pretend to be absolutely certain about what's going on with these cars since you don't have the team's data. People who believe their educated guesses to essentially be facts are not good educators but you are..
I love how organic the design looks. Its interesting to have seen this evolution in aerodynamics design that started with inspiration from nature and were now able to mimic and exceed the beauty nature provides
Awesome video. This is exactly the reason I'm a fan of F1. The cutting edge engineering is fascinating. Thank you for all your superb aerodynamic analysis videos. They really help me think through what's happening with the airflow. Great job!
Since you worked for mercedes from 2018 to 2020 I went back to mercedes amg video for celebrating their 2019 WCC and when celebrating outside the brackley factory, I saw you behind Bottas, so cool
Just goes to show the insider knowledge Newey retained from the previous ground effect era and what incredible detail they've put into action. Almost like a bird from underneath with it's wings being the modelling for venturi tunnels as that's what gives them the best aero gliding skills.
When they said they going to make the move to underbody down force, I told my dad "just watch. Newey was around for that era, I'm sure he's got a bunch of prior knowledge and combined with all of the aero talent / computational power available, they'll get the optimal design first" And here we are, RB floor looks like 21st century design and everyone else is still in the 20th century.
It's crazy how even how this isn't a educational course type of channel how much this dude has helped me better understand things in some of my engineering classes intuitively
This is so fantastic because it lets you appreciate the level of detail that goes into these aerodynamics without any actual engineering. Like if a rival team were to decide they liked this they would have to come up with an actual geometry and run analysis to see the numbers it generates and then incorporate that into a full model to see how it impacts the whole system.
It’s funny. On the F1 podcast earlier this season, Pat Fry was talking about the 22 Rules and said some something to the extent of “the rules are written on a way that allows a wing under the floor. Why you’d want that, who knows?” Well…
Excellent professional analysis - all the vorticity reminds me of how the dragonfly's angular wing is actually more effective because of the vorticity it generates, which is counter-intuitive to traditional models of smooth surface lift.
It's very interesting to get explanation for the floor, thanks! You pretty often see the floor of the cars when they are removed from the track and it's very easy to spot the huge difference compared to previous regulations. But exactly what and how the differences are and the purpose of the shape of the floor is impossible for just a fan. So to get this in-depth breakdown is awesome and also give a hint of how complicated the floor is. Especially with all the creating of vortex and how important they are. Also I thought the fins in the front of the floor was there to direct the air under the floor but the outer two directed the air outwards which was interesting since I thought they really wanted as much air as possible under floor to create downforce.
The picture shown at 18:00 shows a very interesting angle on the floor edge wing “skate” too and how red bull have designed it to interact with the folds and cutouts
Do you remember the days that RB had the engine exhaust flow directed at their diffusor? The front strafes appear to be serving a similar function of creating a vortex of outflowing air to the sides that create more "isolation" of underbody air.
Assuming every shape in this incredibly complex floor has a purpose, I’m blown away at what they managed to develop with limited tunnel time. Watching the Red Bulls on track, it’s obvious they nailed more than even the giant Mercedes in floor development. Speaking of limits, what is the tunnel time limit all teams are subjected to for new car development?
Fascinating. Kyle you're amazing. A very exciting video. I had to watch it a few times to understand it better. But very exciting. Hope we can still look under the underbody of the other cars. There are nice pictures of the Ferrari underbody.
Kyle, absolutely brilliant video, as always. Thank you. A question; couldn't the 'ice skates' be serving the purpose of walling off some ait through its vorticity? You mentioned something similar, and I might be misreading the angles, but to me it looks like it could actually block some of the messy air from the floor cut outs, pushing it to the wheel, while allowing lower frequency smoother vortices to keep on towards the rear of the underfloor. And just to point, I know your target demographic is not the general public, but tbh even I at some points in this one lost a bit of my sense of direction while you rotated and moved your models around - when we are agents of the movement it is always smooth and easy to follow, but if other person is rotating the model, the lack of reference can be disorienting. I have no idea how to make it more accessible, but maybe you could investigate it?
Finally I get a full picture of these Cars. A Model in my head I can work with. Interesting to see Red Bull having so many flow energising parts on their flor but still are the quickest on the Straights. I bet Aston Martin made big eyes when seeing these pictures. Though I have to say, seeing such sofistication so early kinda concerns me with future improvability of the Design, seen as they aren't near dominance like Mercedes was. It gives me hope for Ferrari.
throughout their dominance Mercedes were the most complex in many areas, but without as many individual genius ideas sometimes just being ahead on the areas everyone is working on can work, i"m not too worried about Red Bull but true that Ferrari could jump ahead seeing the Red Bull ideas.
Another great vid there! Would enjoy some DTM car analysis, also some very interesting aero vehicles in the Eruopean Hill climb championships. likewise the annual Pikes peak in the US, always an aero delight
Curious if you have any good reading material advice on tunnels vs. pure flat bottom or just tunnel development in general on a 100% track car. Redoing almost all the aero on my car and playing with the idea of developing a tunnel to improve ground effect and downforce over the flatbottom I am currently running.
Another great vid … thanks If I could make one observation… it’s difficult to see what you’re talking about with the legality boxes when you move the mouse around and change the focus of what’s being pointed to so rapidly
What a great video. Be cool to see a comparison of all the floors for which there are photos. Not sure if all the cars from last year exposed their floors, but any comparison would be sweet.
in principle this could be measured in a wind tunnel, right? however the design of it... hell hard, there are so many parameters/things to model... how about the drag?
thank you for the video mate. just a heads up on 2nd part of porpoising video, i'm egarly waiting for it. don't want to sound ungrateful, i really like this video alot.
They have to create two channels the upper channel has to have a faster flow with a venturi at the beginning of the channel to pickup the flow from the lower channel.
Watching this, it’s easy to see why Ferrari sends a whole emergency team of ‘shrouders’ to every instance of lifting their cars. RB just gave away a few months of secrets with this single lift.
You definitely “geek out” on all those winglets and other devices. What I noticed and was looking at was the “plank” and how it was fastened and how the fasteners actually made the plank no longer perfectly flat as the fasteners were tightened they caused dimples in that plank. So that begs the question, as a aerodynamicist have you ever thought of theses types of issues, after all some mechanics are gorillas and others have a deft touch with there wrench’s. This can in one degree or another affect how all of the panels and surfaces interact with one another. Would you agree or disagree? If the teams go through all the trouble to tape up all the seems of all the panels each time they go out so it’s as smooth as possible, if you get a person that is screwing panels in so tight that they change the shape of the panels then what’s the use of all that fine tuning and testing?
Do you have any thoughts on how Red Bull has avoided porpoising? I know it goes beyond pure aero into such loveable topics as aerolasticity of the floor and suspension dynamics. I would hazard a guess that the ice skate helps keep some of the floor off the track and avoids it sealing completely when that part of the floor bottoms out to keep some flow moving through
@TDougs-yj2yp I wouldn't doubt he said something along those lines, but surely not in such a smug way. He's charming and polite. With the benefit of a whole season and another car under the belt, my take is that RB went for a low drag, low downforce concept last year. That gave them great straight-line speed and avoided getting sucked down into the ground effect and bouncing. So, while their rivals were sorting that out, they just refined the car and made it faster. Seems like they have more downforce this year, coupled with more aggressive anti-dive and squat suspension than anyone else to control the platform pitch and ride height more effectively than their rivals. Having bigger side pods than Merc has helped compensate for the loss of barge boards, and keep the floor stiff but I don't think it's the biggest advantage they have over Merc, despite the pundits' fixation on side pods.
Awesome tech video. I believe I know the answer but did this video potentially show Mercedes engineers anything they didn't know about the RB floor? Also seems to me once the they see these photos it should be much easier to simply copy? Or is this testimony to having to match the aero of the rest of the car?
To think that merc could potentially have a faster car than this once they fix their porpoising is MADNESS. This car is a work of art and another Newey masterpiece. If merc will really be faster, they deserve to win the championship period
Please please please make a video on the new aprilia RSGP fairings. It's something that i always imagined could be possible but never thought would be applicable. I suspect they are trying to make downforce with ground effect since their new fairing is so close to the asphalt at max lean, but i don't have the experience to be sure and also a bike is a very different platform from a car.
Great vid Kyle! I have a relatively fundamental question about how the aerodynamics are working here so pardon my elementary explanation. I'm used to seeing vortexes used around the car as somewhat of barriers or methods to direct other flow, such as in the previous regs how you could use Y250 to steer airflow around the car or how teams are using vortices in order to 'seal' off the edge of the floor this year. Based on this video, it seems as though teams are trying to create a lot of vortices in the underbody but I can't picture how they're being using in the same sealing / blocking manner. Is it the case that it is these vortices themselves that are providing the mass flow necessary in order to create the underbody downforce? If that is the case, does the strength of the vortex roughly corelate w/ downforce produced? Is it a case of energizing the air as much as possible in order to derive maximum benefit? Hopefully my question makes sense. Thanks for the content!
From my understanding, the rotation of the vortices produces a low pressure core (weakening as you move away from the core in a direction normal to the rotation) in a similar way to how the curvature of flow under a wing produces low pressure. Providing the vortices are clean and persistent, this will boost suction under the floor. Messy vortices (formed too aggressively or from already low-energy flow) will still produce local suction initially but may break apart, spreading into the whole floor which may cause separation or "block" the diffuser exit (both decreasing diffuser expansion and potentially floor performance). Vortices are lossy by nature, they will never "energise" the air (energy is not necessarily just velocity), nor will any part of the car for that matter.
@@class8007 I hadn't thought about the idea that the center of a vortex would be lower pressure than the surrounding air, that's an interesting idea. I feel like the difference between that and the wing example is that in the wing example, the high pressure and low pressure areas are separated by the wing surface, therefore the pressure gradient across creates the force (lift or downforce) that acts on the body. Never-the-less I think it's a good thought and probably on the right track - thanks for sharing!
In comparing it to a wing, the specific characteristic I am comparing is the curvature of the flow. Anywhere there is flow that is curving/has a change in momentum vector, there is low pressure on the concave side and high pressure on the convex side. A vortex is concave on all sides, hence the low pressure "core".
@@MrZephyr97 the explanation from Class 800 is exactly right. The vortex has a low pressure core that acts on the floor surface. You can think of the whole car body as the wing surfaces, with the low pressure vortex acting on the underfloor surface and high pressure air acting on the upper body surface (top of side pods/floor), creating a vertical differential and therefore downforce. This is especially clear on the ferrari where the sculpted top surface of the side pod will create a high pressure area.
What I'm seeing is that the floor is asymmetrical, quite remarkable! Thus, its probably circuit dependant, thus, circuit changing!! Newey = genius!! Dan fallows will probably be the first to properly adapt am's floor to the rb's.
I was watching a video recently about an rc scale model of a top fuel dragster and it went into the aero or more correctly the downforce generation in them. The rear wing is obviously the most notable aero feature on them and that together with the front wing and it's massive lever effect means there is tonnes of downforce when they get some speed happening. I'd actually love to see a bit of an analysis of the aero forces on a typical dragster. The speeds are ginormous but I doubt there's any other vehicle with such a huge amount of downforce and such an apparent disregard for any reduction in aero drag.
One thing I can´t get my head around is the fact that, at least it looks like, only air passing through between the inner strakes is fed to the middle of the floor and to the diffuser, whereas the rest of the air is being outwashed to the side of the car to help seal the floor. That being said, it seems that the intake area of the air that is fed to the floor is actually smaller than the middle section of the floor, how does the air gain velocity then?
Oh, that's a good question! It's all about the Von Neumann effect interacting with the law of turbulent air force retardatio. Plug the radius of the generated vortex in as theta, and calculate the median (some argue that the mean is better, so I suggest you try both and make up your own opinion about that) outward force of the air molecules (correct for any CO2 levels though) to plug in as omega. Then solve for the acceleration (per second/per second) instead of just doing the formula as is. Now convert back to 3 dimensions again and project the topology onto 2D space. You can find both formulas on Wikipedia if you're not familiar with them.
Just to be clear, the areas of the resulting 2D projection will be the local maximums of efficiency. Fun fact: You can actually read the results and compare using only the 3D topology, if you're good at it (or rather used to that kind of data)!
Considering how much paint the teams have removed this season, I'd doubt it. Especially since RB has previously carried a floor out in open view in the pit lane
Kyle, very interesting as always. Perhaps I have missed it, but it would be interesting to understand the upkicks on the front suspension that seem to lead into the double bargeboard. And how does the double bargeboard work ? Does it load up the sides of the car at speed to help achieve variable sealing (ie reverse effect of the M-B stays as the rules do not rule out body work movement, just wing movement?).
Oh wow, I never thought we'd get a video on the floors. Some really clever details going on here, this was great. I do have a question about the older style floors. How does the F1 style kick work, it seems very aggressive early on with a concave area rearwards. Obviously just generally applying to all teams, spilling the Merc specific details isn't needed just in case. But what is the goal. Is it to work the strakes harder and spool up vortexes perhaps? Or does the low height allow different rules to a conventional car diffuser? Or perhaps to move the CP forwards for aero balance reasons? Its something I've always wondered but haven't seemed able to find an answer. I've seen a few other people asking so I'm certainly not the only one, but at this point its a real mystery to me.
