Thursday 27th January 2011

The F1 Of 2020: Designer Pat Symonds Imagines

The return of ground-effect, less downforce and 250bhp KERS - Symonds gazes into his crystal ball

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F1 Racing magazine reckons Formula 1 car design will undergo more radical change in the next 10 years than in the past decade, so it has teamed up with Renault F1 chief designer (now Lotus, surely?? - Ed), Pat Symonds to give their take on what the F1 car of 2020 will look like and how it will perform.

Low-profile tyres on bigger wheels, the return of ground-effect aero, KERS that produces 250bhp and a standard, non-downforce rear wing will be key components, says Symonds.

How so? Well, the results take into account the likelihood of future rules on fuel consumption and CO2 emissions, but assume that F1 will remain an open-wheel, open-cockpit formula.

F1 teams already have to reduce their fuel consumption by 35 per cent in future cars, while a more environmentally-friendly 1.6-litre turbo engine will be introduced for the 2013 season.

"A few simple assumptions can determine the basic architecture of the car," says Symonds. "By the time we add a few changes, such as larger wheels and low-profile tyres, we start to get a fairly clear picture of what the car might look like.

"The illustrations we've produced are certainly an artistic impression, but they capture the essential characteristics of a car that will be contesting the Formula 1 World Championship in 2020."

Environmentally friendly? All sounds slightly depressing to us. But it does raise an interesting question - what would your ideal F1 car of 2020 be like? Answers on a postcard, please (or in the thread at the bottom of this article, whichever's easiest...)

[Luca Brasi]

Bring this back
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwmvVWSvSpg

[Eric Mc]

I have never seen predictions of what a GP car might look like in "x" year's time ever look remotely look like what eventually emerges.

Having said that, I like the idea of a very small front wing.

[GingerWizard]

V12
max capacity 6000cc,
rev limit 25k,

[vintageracer01]

...and these kind of dog fights.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kl2tIFxSEGA&fea...


Hardly anyone is interested in fancy technology.

All we want is spectacular motor sport!

[MrKipling43]

Limited fuel for a race, but otherwise completely free engine.

Ban carbon brakes.

Aerodynamics regulated based on the wake the car produces, rather than what is allowed on the car.

NO STUPID LOW PROFILE TYRES!

[callyman]

GingerWizard said:

V12
max capacity 6000cc,
rev limit 25k,

With forced induction.

[GingerWizard]

callyman said:

GingerWizard said:

V12
max capacity 6000cc,
rev limit 25k,

With forced induction.

thast just silly!

[RPastry]

[quote]By the time we add a few changes, such as larger wheels and low-profile tyres, we start to get a fairly clear picture of what the car might look like.
[/quote]

fking horrible? why not just make them electric? why don't the drivers just run round the track? take the engine out completely and push the cars round? that would be green.

seriously, this is idiotic, as if making the cars more economical will have the minutest effect on the carbon footprint of the global circus that is F1. Will other motorsports like drag racing follow its lead? /facepalm.

more power / less grip = exciting.

Edited by RPastry on Thursday 27th January 10:32

[callyman]

GingerWizard said:

callyman said:

GingerWizard said:

V12
max capacity 6000cc,
rev limit 25k,

With forced induction.

thast just silly!

And AWD.

[ccr32]

MrKipling43 said:

NO STUPID LOW PROFILE TYRES!

Why not? I seem to remember Ant Davidson thinking that they would be a good idea, as they would potentially give more mechanical grip and allow for less reliance on aero and the bespoke tyre technology in F1 today...

[johnhenry]

looking forward to turbo's being back, albeit abit more 'dull' than the previous era i would guess.
i dont understandard why low profiles are being brought in though to be more green?
anyone?

[GingerWizard]

callyman said:

GingerWizard said:

callyman said:

GingerWizard said:

V12
max capacity 6000cc,
rev limit 25k,

With forced induction.

thast just silly!

And AWD.

we both thinking group-b insanity levels turned upto 11 aren't we....?

[CraigyMc]

ccr32 said:

MrKipling43 said:

NO STUPID LOW PROFILE TYRES!

Why not? I seem to remember Ant Davidson thinking that they would be a good idea, as they would potentially give more mechanical grip and allow for less reliance on aero and the bespoke tyre technology in F1 today...

Le mans cars already use them. They aren't stupid.

[Rusty-C]

GingerWizard said:

callyman said:

GingerWizard said:

callyman said:

GingerWizard said:

V12
max capacity 6000cc,
rev limit 25k,

With forced induction.

thast just silly!

And AWD.

we both thinking group-b insanity levels turned upto 11 aren't we....?

Ground effect and 1500bhp, pls.

[Alfanatic]

"Right, gentlemen, here are the car regulations for 2020. Your car, fully assembled and race ready, must fit in this box. Any moving bits on the car mustn't make the car not fit in the box. The driver must be secured to the car when racing, and must be a human. This paper has the driver's protection requirements. And, um, that's it, really. I'll see you all at Spa for the first race. Good luck!

Oh, and the circuit owners have requested that if you're going to use rocket power, please make sure it won't melt the tarmac."

[senna007]

johnhenry said:

looking forward to turbo's being back, albeit abit more 'dull' than the previous era i would guess.
i dont understandard why low profiles are being brought in though to be more green?
anyone?

Low profile tyres are not more green, but the tyre manufactures want to use low profile tyres as they are more like the sports tyres they produce for road cars and will apparently make it F1 tyre technology more road relavant.

[[AJ]]

DELETED: Comment made by a member who's account has been deleted.

I was speaking to Adam Parr last week and sadly the sport is under increasing pressure, not only to go greener, but to bring the formula cars more inline with what's relevant on the road. By that I don't mean that they will emulate road car technology, but rather develop technology that will be more inline with what road cars will be adopting in the near future.

Williams are already working on flywheel tech for road cars as we have seen in the Porsche GT3 R Hybrid and 918 RSR. It won't be long before we start seeing 'off the shelf' packages that car makers and aftermarket tuners will be able to stick in almost any car.

We have F1 to thank for ABS, traction control, stability management etc, but it has been quite some time, relatively speaking, since F1 has had made such a profound contribution to road car tech. It will be nice to see another flurry of such innovation. F1 engines are already hugely efficient, so it will be very interesting to see how engine technology develops over the next few years.

I'm not looking forward to lower revving, turbo charged 4 pots though. Surely there's a way to make high revving V8s and V10s more efficient till? I'm sure the average family hatch would be far better with a small capacity V8 than clunky forced 4s!

[ccr32]

Here's the thread on PH about low profile tyres I was referring to - unfortunately, it links to the main story on Autosport.com which you need to pay to view, and I am far too stingy to do such things...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

[georgetuk]

Errr why do we care what he thinks? A disgraced engineer from Renault.

Maybe his would have built in auto-crashes that the team can turn on to fix the race.

[ccr32]

[AJ] said:

I'm not looking forward to lower revving, turbo charged 4 pots though. Surely there's a way to make high revving V8s and V10s more efficient till?

Yep, turbocharge them!