why are recent F1 machine's nose sticking up?
 

*edit* what I meant was how the machine's nose facing up, not down like older ones.

Is this because of regulations? or is it actually more efficient?

Here are pics of newer F1 machiens..

http://yahagifurukawa-rc.up.seesaa.n...071eac0a-s.jpg
http://www.lincah.com/wp-content/upl...re-588x346.jpg

and here are some older F1 machines..

http://f1-gate.com/media/1/bgp001-photo01.jpg
http://images.forum-auto.com/mesimag...F1-90_1990.jpg
http://news.mercedes-benz.co.uk/img/mercedes.jpg

It's all about creating downforce. They didn't have wind tunnels and computer tech like they do now so any changes you see now are a direct result of high speed camera's and lots of wind tunnel testing. You can be damn sure they have done anything that doesn't increase the efficiency of the car. Downforce is created in 2 ways. With manually directing air over the wings and fuselage of the car and speeding the air up under the car as much as possible. I can't remember how fast an F1 car has to be traveling to actually be able to drive inverted but it's not that fast. The downforce created can actually support the car driving upside down at xxx speed.

Berz out.

Yup, all about aero-dynamics now rather than engine tech now and days (especially with the HP restrictions).

last time I checked F1 cars create 3t of downforce at 300km/h...and the car weighs 600kg including the driver..

Yea that's what I mean they don't have to be going very fast to have enough downforce to be able to drive inverted :)

Berz out.

It's flying into the ground the entire way around the track.

what if the driver is fat :troll:

What are you talking about? F1 noses use to point straight (up) and then it curved down

:troll:

http://www.ultimatecarpage.com/image...-Renault_1.jpg

Short answer, it's driven by aero considerations. Aero absolutely dominates in modern F1.

Result of a quick google search for more info:

http://www.f1technical.net/articles/11

problem is too much downforce = flipping of the car.

yes, my dynamics teacher went over this today in lecture.

then hes not a pro f1 driver.

to maximize airflow to the front wing and underneath the car and around the sidepods

http://www.scarbsf1.com/keels/formula_1_keels.htm

"Too much downforce" will never flip a car. Too much downforce on the rear only, may possibly cause the nose to rise. The bigger problem is the flat bottom of the car while it's cresting sharp hilltop. (ie: GT1 cars at LeMans)

Front wings are limited to a maximum width. Originally, a conventional design saw the wing extending out of either side of the nose. Then a clever engineer realized that the rules did not prohibit using the space under the nose to create downforce. This resulted in the "nose up" look and generated more downforce from a given width.

As other have said the designs keep getting refined to enhance downforce and facilitate air flow both under and around the car.

Actually a higher nose decreases down force on the front, since it pushes less air.

The high nose is due to regulation to reduce down force. It was done in order to make the race more "interesting". The rule is the nose must have a flat profile and cannot produce downforce.

Wow... another car thread on rs created by timbo

What other kind of thread would be in Auto Chat..

This.

Think about it logically: more front wing area == more downforce

^
but also more drag. The key isn't to just create downforce, but to limit the amount of drag said downforce creates.
It's amazing the amount of science and technology the F1 scene uses nowadays. These cars are pretty close to being jet fighters on wheels!

The wings aren't the only part of the car to create downforce. The whole body of the car, including the wings and diffuser, manipulate airflow to create downforce.

Take a cross section of an airplane wing:

http://www.zoo.cam.ac.uk/zoostaff/el...g_pressure.jpg

Look at drawing #1. Now turn it upside down, and add little race car wings to the front and back and some wheels. It looks kinda like a modern race car, with it's upturned nose and huge rear diffuser.

I was gonna say the same thing.. Relying too much on downforce under the car is dangerous since if the front comes up the car will fly...

Aerodynamics this and that blah blah blah...

I want the F1 cars with the V12's of 1994 back :(

The high nose increases under car air velocity and actually helps overall down force fairly significantly. It is very counter-intuitive looking (at least to me).

The closest you get is Superleague Formula.. Each team will have identical cars but the engine will be V12.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikiped...league_Formula

What? Only the Ferrari F1 cars in 1994 had V12 engines (IIRC).....

V12 engines have too much friction so they inherently had bad fuel economy. Ferrari was the last holdout. The V10 seemed to be the sweet spot in F1 back in the very late 1980's and early 1990's. Honda's V12 was powerful, but was thirsty, so wasn't as effective like their legendary V10's. Ayrton Senna had gone on record to say that he thought the Honda V12 was shit.