Expert: Dan Liddy - 12/18/2005

Question
-------------------------
Followup To
Question -
hello,
i know that in an f1 car when u want front end grip u add frontwing. Why cant we place weights of some sort in the nose without adding more wings so that we get more top speed in the straights.
thanku.
Answer -
Hello, and thanks for an interesting question !

There's a simple reason for not adding weight to the front end. Weight slows you down.   The engine has to pull all that extra weight out of the corners , slowing acceleration, and ultimately reducing top speed at the end of the straight.  Wings add negligible weight and still create the downforce needed to increase front grip.  For instance, the wings on a F-1 car at 100 MPH generate over 2000 Lbs. of downforce.  If you added that much weight instead, the car wouldn't be much faster than your Dad's Toyota !

Best wishes

Dan Liddy
Sarasota, Florida USA   


Hello,

thanks for the answer....but i always thought that downforce(newton) and weight(newton) are same. So i thoght that instead of addin wings in front which obviously creates drag(reducin speed) we can add the 2000lbs weight
as u said.
Anyway thanks. Waiting eagerly for ur reply....bye.  

Answer
OK  
The drag doesn't affect acceleration, so the car gets out of the corner faster. Also drag doesn't start to play a part until the car has passed about 80-90 MPH.  And the real secret, and the one the engieneers battle with, is creating downforce withOUT drag. and they are able to do it.  That's why, if you take a close look at an F-1 car, you'll see all manner of little wings and tabs here and there on the body to create downforce in areas where air flows, perhaps inside the tires, inthe radiator openings, the top of the roll bar, and other odd places.

Basically, weight detracts from acceleration, and drag detracts from top speed. The engineeer has to create a balance between weight and drag to achieve top performance.  However, weight is such an important consideration that F-1 teams spend millions of dollars on exotic metals to avoid even the additional gram or two of excess weight.

Nearly every racing series has a weight rule and certainly F-1 does .  I don't know what the limit is but you can bet that none of the teams exceed it any more than they have to.   They even limit the amount of fuel they put on board during a race, cuz a pit stip costs them less time than the excess weight.

That's about all I know

Dan Liddy