Solving Ferrari’s latest car problems took ‘longer than I wished’ – Leclerc

10 comments on “Solving Ferrari’s latest car problems took ‘longer than I wished’ – Leclerc”

1. 

   Roger Ayles (@roger-ayles)
   22nd August 2024, 0:21

   Don’t agree with COTD’s call to return to the weird looking 1.8m wide cars or smaller tires.

   The cars should never have been reduced from 2m to 1.8m in 1998 to begin with. The narrower cars never looked right and as drivers of the time said they hurt the racing. That been as they felt the narrower cars were producing less drag which meant the slipstream was less effective.

   And larger tires in theory should produce more mechanical grip which is a positive for racing. I remember when the tire size was reduced in 1993 a lot of drivers said it made racing worse.

   The only issue with thesize of the cars is the length and I think something often overlooked in terms of the length is that a key reason for it is that teams all put spacers between the engine & gearbox to lengthen the cars for aero reasons. If they banned that cars would get shorter and a bit lighter.

   Thats all that needs to change in terms of the size, the length and not the width. They are no wider today than they were up until 1998 and nobody was complaining about the width until then because the cars looked fine and in fact it’s the 2m wide cars of the 90s that are often cited as been some of the best looking which also produced some good racing without the need for artificial gimmicks.
   1. 

      Fletch (@fletchuk)
      22nd August 2024, 2:02

      Which drivers complained the 1.8m cars damaged racing?
      1. 

         Nick T.
         22nd August 2024, 7:56

         None of them. The cars also looked great and the smaller wheel and tire sizes along with narrower cars would making racing easier and better.
      2. 

         MacLeod (@macleod)
         22nd August 2024, 8:16

         1.8m wide means less grip that would be something the drivers would complain over.

         The safetycell (cockpit) is 2m long put a engine+gearbox behind it 1m then you see the problem already. So if we say length 1m less they would have about 0.5m over for the nose.
         1.9m wide should help but the front wing should stay between the front wheels and not in front or over the wheel to generate vortex’s. So the front wing will be smaller.
         Active aero is going to be heavy too. Return to the 13″ tyres would reduce weight a lot, 18″is too large and heavy.
         1. 

            Nick T.
            22nd August 2024, 8:33

            1.8m also means more agility and less weight. So, I doubt there would be any complaints. I don’t remember hearing drivers complain about less grip when they switched to a narrower chassis in the past. Less grip, also means the competition moves more toward driver skill instead of downforce advantages.
      3. 

         Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
         22nd August 2024, 9:38

         @fletchuk Damon Hill wasn’t happy about them, although he argued that it was his job to adapt to the car, and also said that going to grooved tyres was the biggest part of the problem of the 1998 changeover.

         The change to grooved tyres also means that others who were unhappy with the changes weren’t necessarily so due to the width of the cars, unless they specified that.
   2. 

      Keith Campbell (@keithedin)
      22nd August 2024, 12:38

      That been as they felt the narrower cars were producing less drag which meant the slipstream was less effective.

      @roger-ayles It’s swings and roundabouts though. Narrower cars produce less of a slipstream, but also less dirty air in the corners. I would venture that the dirty air effect is more of a detriment to racing than the improvement gained by the increased slipstream. DRS would also be less effective with a narrower car, as you would be dropping less drag from a narrower wing, though this can be tuned by increasing the gap width if they wanted.
   3. 

      Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
      22nd August 2024, 14:45

      Car length is important as well. But on the width, there was plenty of good racing between 1998 and 2017. They need to reduce the weight of modern cars any way they can.
2. 

   notagrumpyfan
   22nd August 2024, 6:45

   That been as they felt the narrower cars were producing less drag which meant the slipstream was less effective.

   That’s a novel way to look at the motorsports; require cars to be oversized to reduce their own speed and create a slipstream for the cars behind.
   1. 

      lynn-m
      22nd August 2024, 15:13

      How is 2m oversized when thats how wide they were for most of the sports history?

      They were only reduced to 1.8m wide to reduce speeds & it was something many at the time complained about. Drivers weren’t happy with how they made the cars drive & many fans at the time felt it made the cars look too boxey (A view many in the media & I recall a few of the cars designers shared).

      I personally always felt the 2m wide cars looked better, especially with the wing dimensions they had in the 90s. Cars just looked better proportioned & more aggressive & it’s not as if the 2m cars made the racing any worse or that the 1.8m wide cars made it any better.

      I think the bigger problem with the current spec cars is the width of the front wing. If they took them back to the sort of width they were in 1997 I think current cars would look better.

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