The F1 2022 cars suffer from dolphins: we explain everything to you

The return of the Venturi effect implies the return of a well-known phenomenon among F1 teams and drivers between 1978 and 1982: "porpoising". But what is it referring to?

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Rédigé par Par

That’s it! The kick-off of the 2022 Formula 1 winter tests took place yesterday morning in Barcelona. The teams are therefore actively working on the development of their cars based on the true revolution that is the 2022 regulations. Among these regulations, which aim to enable the single-seaters to follow each other better and therefore have more closely contested battles on the track, is the return of ground effect through Venturi tunnels placed under the car.

From the first day, most of the teams encountered a problem that they had not really anticipated during the simulations conducted at the factory: porpoising, or “porpoising” in English.

What is “le porpoising”?

On a Venturi ground effect car, the higher the speed, the more the aerodynamic downforce increases, resulting in an increased suction effect. However, as the car lowers, it approaches a point where the air flow in the tunnels around the diffuser begins to separate. This separation of air flow leads to a decrease in air pressure, causing the car’s ground clearance to increase. This increase in ground clearance results in a renewed aerodynamic downforce, leading to the reproduction of the suction effect and the car being pressed against the road surface again. Thus, the suction/raising process repeats at a more or less stable frequency until the driver brakes and slows down the car. This process is also accentuated by the fact that the suspension systems in modern F1 cars are very stiff in order to keep the cars as close to the ground as possible and increase the suction effect and, consequently, the aerodynamic downforce.

This process makes the car bounce back and forth, like a dolphin that dives into the water and then emerges, hence the term “dolphining” to explain this bouncing phenomenon.

This phenomenon is first known by airplane pilots, as airplane wings also have this problem:

Aircraft lift effect.

© Motors Inside
And given that modern race cars now generate over 75% of their aerodynamic downforce through ground effect, the entire car ultimately becomes a giant inverted wing. The difference here is that the car’s purpose is to create downforce rather than lift, unlike an airplane.

Yesterday, the single-seaters were heavily affected by this phenomenon and caused a lot of damage to the asphalt of the Catalunya circuit.

The tracks caused by the 2022 F1 cars at the first turn of the Barcelona circuit.

© Motors Inside
Therefore, some drivers even deviate from the ideal straight-line trajectory to avoid the bumps it contains! If this problem of bumpiness is not resolved by the end of the season, we can already wonder what will happen to the Circuit of the Americas, whose pavement is subject to chronic bumping due to the marshy ground on which the circuit was built.

It is astonishing to note that no team was able to anticipate this phenomenon. In fact, “porpoising” is not something new: it was already encountered by the early Venturi effect Formula 1 cars (between 1978 and 1982), as well as by the Group C prototypes. At that time, the “porpoising” was so violent that the front wheels of the single-seaters would lift up like a dragster. Peter Wright, an engineer at Lotus and the designer of the first “wing cars” in the history of F1, explained in an interview with Auto Reverse that Mario Andretti could see daylight under his front wheels when the “porpoising” was at its peak. Gary Anderson from The Race witnessed with his own eyes the front wheels of a ground effect Ligier lifting at least 5 centimeters off the ground on the straight of the Monza pit lane.

More concretely, here is the Ferrari F1-75 performing a skid.

Why is dolphin hunting problematic?

The vibrations caused by “porpoising” can severely damage the underbody: yesterday, almost half of the teams had to change the chassis of their single-seater, and Alfa Romeo and Haas were the most affected by this issue, driving very little during the day. There are even whispers that Alfa Romeo was so impacted by this phenomenon during the Fiorano shakedown that a hole was discovered in the car.

Also, these vibrations make the car unstable in a straight line and braking even more complicated than they already were (drivers also have to deal with the “brake by wire” system, which makes the car unstable in the rear during braking). And the drivers’ visibility is also affected by these vibrations, in addition to being impacted by the new 18-inch wheels. Not to mention the state of the drivers’ backs at the end of each race (what about Singapore?).

What are the solutions for dolphin bycatch?

In the 80s, the solution had been brought by Lotus and their double-chassis 88: only the aerodynamic kit would be affected by the porpoising, but not the driver who would be in a different chassis. The solution was so innovative that the FIA hurried to ban it even before the Lotus 88 could complete a single lap in a race.

If we cannot avoid making the driver feel the bumps, then we must focus on how to mitigate or even eliminate these bumps. To do this, we must prevent the car from reaching that “point of no return” where the airflow separates and causes it to lose aerodynamic grip.

The teams have noticed that the DRS, since it reduces rear aerodynamic downforce, consequently causes an increase in ride height and thus contributes to reducing porpoising. As porpoising is alleviated while the front wing is lowered when the DRS is open, one can therefore assume that the issue lies at the rear of the car, where the airflow separates.

Therefore, one of the possible solutions would be to make the rear suspension more flexible. However, this could have a detrimental effect: reducing the efficiency of the diffuser and therefore making the car slower on a lap. Teams will therefore have to find the best compromise between stability and bouncing.

If the teams were unwilling to make any compromises, the solutions existed:

– Les amortisseurs de vibrations ou “mass dampers”: la solution, introduite par Renault en 2005, se situait dans le museau de la monoplace et permettait d’absorber les chocs et les vibrations. La FIA est intervenue et a interdit les mass dampers durant la saison 2006, jugeant qu’il s’agissait d’un élément aérodynamique mobile.

– La suspension “modulable”: Mercedes avait mis en place cette suspension novatrice sur sa W10 en 2019 et elle reproduisait le rôle des mass dampers. Cette solution a été interdite par la FIA a la fin de la saison 2021.

– La suspension active: dernière innovation de Colin Chapman et perfectionnée par Williams, la suspension active contrôlait en permanence la garde au sol de la voiture et donc permettait de rendre la voiture beaucoup plus stable sur les bosses. Donnant un avantage manifeste aux monoplaces anglaises et réduisant le rôle du pilote dans le pilotage, la FIA sévit fin 1993 en l’interdisant, ainsi que toutes les autres aides au pilotage électroniques.

It will be interesting to see how the F1 teams will have to manage this new issue, which will add spice to a 2022 season that is shaping up to be the most uncertain in the past ten years.

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