Why other teams cannot fully copy the Ferrari F1-75 car

08/23/2022 09:24 AM

Ferrari has a unique concept at the top of the car In this first season with F1 challengers based on the new ground effect rules and regulation, the cars are evolving rapidly. Whoever is behind in terms of performance tries above all to copy those who are faster, like Ferrari and Red Bull; however, more teams have copied the RB18 than the F1-75. Those who wanted to copy the Italian car did not do it in full, opting for a combo between the characteristics of the two best cars in this first part of the 2022 Formula One championship.

This is the case with Alpine or McLaren while Aston Martin and Williams have more clearly gone in the direction of Adrian Newey’s car. The only one who clearly went in the Ferrari direction is Haas, also because the American team had the technical possibilities to do so.

Ferrari has designed a car around an engine that has undergone important overhauls, such as those of the turbocharger elements, advanced above all in the second component, that of the cooling. The Italian team wanted to free up much of the space above and behind the engine. It is no coincidence that the F1-75 is the car that exposes the fin more than the other cars, coupled to a triangular airbox that works in symbiosis to have a top part of the car as lean and clean as possible.

The “goldfish tank” is a direct consequence, it too works in symbiosis with the upper part of the car and to optimize the flow directed towards the lower part of the rear wing and the beam wing. The flow passing above the diffuser and in the internal area of ​​the rear tires, a nerve center also on this new generation of single-seaters, is moves from the outside thanks to the more conventional design of the sidepods which in the final part close towards the Coca Cola area, calling the flow inwards, as explained by F1 Technical Analyst Piergiuseppe Donadoni for Formu1a Uno.

To fully copy the Ferrari F1-75, opponents would need to modify many macro components of their cars Red Bull, as well as most of the other teams, except Haas and Alfa Romeo which of course have the same power unit as Ferrari, have instead a very bulky top part of the car. This is because the RB18 has kept the large oblique exchanger above the engine, as well as the Mercedes-powered ones, although they have the exchangers positioned more horizontally.

Due to the larger dimensions in the upper part of the car, it is not possible to use the “tub” concept for the other teams as it was technically understood by Ferrari, simply because it would be much less efficient than the Italian 674 project, according to Formu1a Uno.

Thus, Red Bull but also the Mercedes engines have found another way, ie they try to simulate what the “goldfish tanks” do on the F1-75 through an important tray in the upper part of the engine hood which optimizes the flow through below the rear wing and on the beam wing. They then use the sidepods, through a clearly downwash effect, to move the flow towards the top of the diffuser and the inner part of the rear tires, to better extract the aerodynamic load from the rear.

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The important bulkiness in the upper part of their cars made it impossible to fully copy the F1-75 solution for McLaren and Alpine, with the tank that does not tend to rise in the final part as on the Italian car, but to descend as on the RB18. The only teams that can do this easily are just the ones that use the same power units, such as Haas, which in fact uses the same concept, and Alfa Romeo. For all the other teams, the work would be very difficult and many internal macro components would need to be reviewed, a difficult job during a season, even more so given the budget cap limitations. On the other hand, it is easier to copy a car like the RB18 which has the internal components positioned in a more “conventional” way and that is why both Aston Martin and Williams, more generally most of the teams, have gone in that direction with the back area of their car.

All this also applies to the zero sidepods concept of the Mercedes W13, designed around a special chassis that allowed the world champion team to move the installation of the radiators located in the sidepods more internally. Leaving aside the important problems of the innovative concept, it would be practically impossible for the other teams to copy it since they would have to re-design the chassis first of all, something that takes months of time and would require a great deal of resources.

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