F1 wants to introduce faster, more "aggressive-looking" cars
Wednesday 30 September 2015 15:25, UK
The deadline for agreement on 2017's rule changes for faster, more "aggressive-looking" cars has been brought forward to October because of their significance.
More usually it is the case that technical changes need to be agreed upon and rubber-stamped by the previous March, in this case March 2016.
However, the scope of the changes - the FIA announced in July that agreement had been reached for 'faster and more aggressive looking cars for 2017, to include wider cars and wheels, new wings and floor shape and significantly increased aerodynamic downforce' - means that the deadline has been brought forward to October in order to give teams more time for design work.
"I think they've got to be confirmed by October 2, I believe, within the Technical Working Group," Red Bull team boss Christian Horner said at the Singapore GP. "And then it all has to be ratified within the World Council by the end of October."
Horner said teams had agreed to bring the deadline forward "because we're already getting late. It's a significant change. Everybody's agreed by the end of October that we need to know".
Speaking in the summer, Williams' technical boss Pat Symonds even suggested delaying the changes until 2018 given their size, pointing out that he and his counterparts had spent two years formulating 2009's changes, which were intended to increase overtaking, but with only limited effect.
What is seen as the main problem with making cars faster - a target of five or six seconds per lap faster has been mentioned - is that the increase in downforce would affect their aerodynamic wake, making overtaking more difficult.
However, solutions put forward rely more on 'ground effect' airflow under the car to boost downforce, which lessens the wake.
One, put forward by Red Bull, is for large underbody tunnels while the FIA's Charlie Whiting has suggested the simpler solution of lowering the stepped floor and keeping the current diffuser.
"It really is quite late," Symonds told Sky Sports recently. "If you go back to when we had the last big bodywork rules shake-up for 2009 - something I was quite involved in as part of the Overtaking Working Group - we spent a long time on the rules themselves and then there was quite a long gestation period while the rules were polished and people sort of picked them apart before we got to the final iteration.
"I must say for 2017 time's running short now. There is a lot of detail to do and we really need to be closing down on it in the next couple of months."
