FERRARI LOOKS AT ‘NEXT STEPS’ WITH NEW WINGS
So far in 2019, Ferrari has had to take a back seat to Mercedes – watching the Silver Arrows storm to every victory in an irrepressible display of dominance.
Although its engine is strong, the SF90 has not been a match for the W10 through the corners, so Ferrari arrived in Paul Ricard with a new aerodynamics package: fresh front and rear wings and a new floor appeared in first practice.
The target was not necessarily to provide an immediate turnaround in performance. According to team principal Mattia Binotto, it was “important for the next steps” to set and evaluate a new development course.
Post-practice, the experimental new floor was removed, but the front and rear wings remained. New endplates for each offered a different approach to working the airflow.
At the front, the endplate featured a small fin on a newly flattened footplate, aiming to provide more guidance outwards along the top at the expense of squashing the vortex produced underneath. The endplate also had a small rectangular cut-out, a common addition (or rather, a common subtraction) across the grid. That gives a little more space for the airflow in the top corner of the wing to spill outwards and combine with any vortices produced.
At the rear, the mass of strakes at the bottom of the endplate had been clipped off. This is a tactic Renault tried for Canada, and seems to allow for a little extra airflow expansion at the rear – making more use from the low-pressure zone produced inside and aft of the diffuser.
“The data we got is matching what we were expecting,” said Binotto, “so in that respect we
are happy. The reason why at least we are keeping some of the components on the car.
“We know it is not sufficient for what we are looking for but, as I said, it was important for us to understand at least the direction and we got relevant data for that.”