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Old 16 Feb 2002, 19:02 (Ref:217273)   #1
Abarnett
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Abarnett should be qualifying in the top 10 on the grid
What is downforce

please could you help me and tell me briefly what is downforce and what is the maximum amount of downforce.
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Old 16 Feb 2002, 21:26 (Ref:217342)   #2
Red Dog
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Downforce is exerted on the wings and body of a racing car as it moves forward and causes greater friction between the tyres and the road surface, allowing higher cornering forces to be generated.

The downforce is developed on the wings by using an aerofoil shape which causes the air to pass faster below the wing than above.(Reverse of an aeroplane wing) The faster air below exerts less pressure than the slower air above, and the wing is pushed downwards. A similar effect is achieved on the body of the car but the proximity of the ground allows a greater efficiency, using the tunnels formed by the shape of the underbody, to act as venturi. The air enters at the front and has to expand to fill the progressively enlarging tunnels to the rear. The expanded air has a much lower pressure than the air passing over the top of the body and the pressure difference causes the body of the car to be pushed down.

Maximum amount? Well if you think of a Boeing 747 it weighs roughly 300 tons at take off (about 180mph)you can see that up or down force can be pretty significant. I don't know what a current F1 car produces but the rules deliberately reduce the cars' ability to develop downforce and a large proportion of an F1 team's budget is spent trying to find more, within the rules.

I seem to remember that figures of 5000kg were mentioned some years ago when the underbody was unrestricted.

A team running a McClaren sports car in the late 60's found that the car lapped faster with a full fuel load! The weight was pushing it closer to the ground and creating a simple venturi. As the fuel was used up the car ran higher and the downforce, and consequently grip, was lost.
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