Learn from F1 Coffee Corner - Terry Widdows - our technical correspondent about all things tech and car upgrades during each Formula 1 weekend!
Welcome to Round 9 of the Tech Corner and Canada, a track with not only a threat of rain, but the threat of groundhogs, the legendary Wall of Champions, and that iconic hairpin.
Switching the attention to updates the development race continues as Red Bulls rivals are swirling looking to put an end to the dominance of the Milton Keynes team as the team themselves look to bounce back in Canada.
With most of the teams having introduced updates at the start of the European legs of the calendar Ferrari, Mclaren and Alpine have all declared no changes to their cars so let's look at the top 5 that have caught my eye from the remaining 7 teams.
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Red Bull, whilst sporting some interesting targets on their front suspension for FP1 to test existing parts on the RB20, have made a change to their rear wing for Canada with the introduction of a re-profiled rear wing flap. This update is to extract more load whilst maintaining adequate flow stability for the conditions. This is obviously in response to the changing climate in Canada. Having a versatile option which can work in the wet and the dry is going to be crucial to the teams around here.
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Mercedes have made a change to the front suspension on the W15. This has to do with the double setting we saw so much of in pre-season testing, and involves the realignment of the track rod and the lower wishbone forward leg. This is to reduce the boundary layer loss and improve the flow to the floor. The boundary layer is essentially a skin of air (the technical term is viscous forces) that’s near to the car’s body that is flowing slower than the speed of the car moving forward.
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A team who will welcome the updates are Williams who have made a change to their front suspension and introduced a shorter steering arm that is available at this event. By introducing the shorter arm it changes the ratio between the steering wheel angle and road wheel angle. This is designed to help the driver's handling of the Williams especially with that hairpin.
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This update brings a rear wing profile redesign to provide more efficient downforce generation than the previous versions. The team have said that this will retain the same range of drag suitable for high speed circuits. The aim is simply to increase downforce but not add to the drag - therefore, increasing the performance and speed in the VCARB. This has also been balanced out by the circuit specific front wing.
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A team who have struggled making their updates count are Aston Martin. They have now introduced a change to their beam wing. This has been introduced to increase the load to the tips which are the subject of the update. The team have described it as a twist distribution being revised with lower tips. The beam wing is a crucial part of the car which is located at the bottom of the rear wing and helps regulate the air below the upper rear wing and improve diffuser performance.
Those are the Canada updates that have caught my eye for this weekend! The ever changing weather is sure to play a part especially when combined with that fresh new tarmac that's been laid! We could be in for another Canada classic.
See you all in a couple of weeks for the Spanish Grand Prix
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