2023 Pre-Season Stuff, Launch Dates, Testing etc

[Everso Biggyballies]

OK we have the first new car launch date set, hence the 2023 Pre Season thread. Here is the place for any pre season stuff .

Just I guess start off with the next track action....

When is F1 pre-season testing?

F1 2023 pre-season testing will take place on 23-25 February at the Bahrain International Circuit.
Just the one session of three days this year, so not a lot of time. This will be the first chance to see the new cars and drivers in action. Pretty much evolutionary I would say, with nothing new like this year. We know that the usual thing is we dont see the real thing in testing and have to wait until P1 for the first race for that..... mind you maybe with just three days to play with this will be more like the second / final test and not so much time or need to hide secrets. Maybe Merc will come up with larger sidepods, although I guess they seemed to be getting on top of. the early season issuess they suffered this yer.

Car Launches

I must admit I thought most of the launches would be in pit lane at testing but Aston Martin is the first to announce a date....
Aston will unveil its new AMR23 F1 challenger with a live event from its Silverstone campus on February 13th 2023.

The reveal will take place in front of a small select audience as well as be broadcast across its digital channels.

[Star]

Yes, but Seb won't be there will he?

[Star]

Ferrari are apparently going to unveil their car on Valentine's day, February 14th. So there's a date for the diary.

[Everso Biggyballies]

Did you hear it? Nah nor did I.

Apparently Mercedes is the first team to confirm it has fired up its 2023 car as it continues preparations for next season
Shortly before factory staff disappeared for the Christmas break, Mercedes hit its target of getting the W14 fired up at Brackley before the holidays.

In a short video published by Mercedes, the team teased the firing up of the car – but made sure to reveal no clues about potential changes to its design.

It has been said by Toto analysis of what had gone wrong with the W13 had prompted a change of direction for the team in 2023.

“The DNA of the car is going to change for next year, that’s clear,” said Wolff.

“It doesn’t necessarily mean that our bodywork is going to look very different. But certainly what is part of the DNA of the car, the architecture of the car, will change for next year.”

Maybe they wont continue with this zero side pod concept. Personally, I think they will. They seemed to be getting to grips with everything by the end of season, and they always said they know the zero sidepod is quicker if they can remove the downsides.

I wonder if others might try the zero sidepod thing. Or different shape sidepods.

Who knows. Or cares.


Anyway a video of people playing with cars and pressing buttons and then noisey brmmm brrmmm stuff. Not really that noisey.... its only half of a proper engine though.
Bring back the V12 3litre.

[Aty]

AlphaTauri announced today that they will reveal their challenger for the 2023 Formula 1 season, the AT04 on February 11, 2023.

[Everso Biggyballies]

Im surprised they are being so early and in advance of testing for these car launches. Mind you I suspect they are going to be more livery launches for Sponsors than showing the actual finished ready to race cars.

[Everso Biggyballies]

Im surprised they are being so early and in advance of testing for these car launches. Mind you I suspect they are going to be more livery launches for Sponsors than showing the actual finished ready to race cars.

Just read a bit more on it and they are indeed referring to is as a "Season launch and livery reveal"....



Edit: they suggest in a tweet that the the 2023 car, the AT 04 as it will be known, will be there. However it also includes a #liverylaunch. For some reason the launch is in New York.... New additional sponsor???

[Nononsensecapeesh]

Did you hear it? Nah nor did I.

Apparently Mercedes is the first team to confirm it has fired up its 2023 car as it continues preparations for next season
Shortly before factory staff disappeared for the Christmas break, Mercedes hit its target of getting the W14 fired up at Brackley before the holidays.

In a short video published by Mercedes, the team teased the firing up of the car – but made sure to reveal no clues about potential changes to its design.

It has been said by Toto analysis of what had gone wrong with the W13 had prompted a change of direction for the team in 2023.

“The DNA of the car is going to change for next year, that’s clear,” said Wolff.

“It doesn’t necessarily mean that our bodywork is going to look very different. But certainly what is part of the DNA of the car, the architecture of the car, will change for next year.”

Maybe they wont continue with this zero side pod concept. Personally, I think they will. They seemed to be getting to grips with everything by the end of season, and they always said they know the zero sidepod is quicker if they can remove the downsides.

I wonder if others might try the zero sidepod thing. Or different shape sidepods.

Who knows. Or cares.


Anyway a video of people playing with cars and pressing buttons and then noisey brmmm brrmmm stuff. Not really that noisey.... its only half of a proper engine though.
Bring back the V12 3litre.

I'd like to believe Toto Wolff on that front.

[Everso Biggyballies]

I was undecided where to put this bit of news, but it affects the 2023 season,..... but it is to do with floors and anti porpoising
After the teams suffered last year (some more than most ) the FIA made some short term changes..... we learnt new words like Aerodynamic Oscillation Metric (AOM). The FIA also pushed through changes to the 2023 technical regulations.

One of the key ones was a 15mm raising of the floor edges, discouraging teams from wanting to run their cars so close to the ground where the porpoising problem occurs. They seem to be admitting the rule change might not solve the problem but they believe it will help

Nikolas Tombazis, the FIA’s F1 technical director, is sure that the rule tweaks were essential but would certainly cost the teams performance in meeting the new rules. He has now opened up on the kind of performance loss that teams could be expected to be hit with.

“I’ve got no doubt we did the right thing,” he said about the decision to change the rules.“We tried to find a pragmatic, short-term solution and a medium-term solution. It won’t necessarily dissipate [porpoising] completely, but it will be a step less.”

Asked how much downforce teams will be expected to lose, Tombazis said: “Not too much. I would have thought they’re going to lose about 15 to 20 points of downforce. Maybe

. (The maybe is his word and was added on at the end).

What does it mean in real (time) terms?

F1 2023 floor changes will cost teams half a second in lap time performance for 2023 thanks to floor rule changes aimed at reducing porpoising. That is what he believes anyway.

I think he has not got a clue what the effect will be and has plucked a number out of the air. His use of the maybe word implies that to me. I reckon the teams new designs will no doubt have directly attacked the new rules and they will have found new areas of development. Im sure that by the time they have got their final evolutions worked out it might be less than that.

So the official prognosis is that the cars will be half a second / lap slower. Im not so sure. Its the very challenge the Newey's of this world love and relish. They will have found ways of minimising that half a second already. Its not like the teams have not known about the ride height change.

But I might be wrong. Unfortunately I do think that the more clever teams might minimise the loss better than others. I hope I am wrong because that does not bode well for the midfield and lower cars closing the gap to the bigger / leading teams and giving us a more competitive field.

Unless one of the midfielders finds the secret answer better than the others.

[Michael Ferner]

What does "15 to 20 points" mean? 15 to 20 percent?

[Everso Biggyballies]

What does "15 to 20 points" mean? 15 to 20 percent?

It seems to be one of those 'secret numbers'.... something to do, not with downforce but with lift coefficients which I have no idea about. The implication seem that st's an arbitrary number for us, but a real number to the team.
This is the official explanation of what is a point of downforce quoted below.

It seems more critical is where the x points of missing downforce are as to how it will affect the balance of the car.

I guess in development and design they can 'adjust where the loss is taken to maintain a reasonable balance. But that is me thinking out lound knowing not the intricacies of aerodynamics!

1 point is usually 0.01 of the lift coefficient, and a "count" or "unit" is usually 0.001. These are non-standardized terms so anybody can use whatever they want.

...... the 2022 cars have a Cl*A of ~6, so 5 points is ~1% of the car's downforce, assuming teams don't use their own definitions for secrecy over radio.

or if you prefer another aero dudes thoughts.....

When you test a car in the wind tunnel, or through CFD, two of the most important parameters are the drag coefficient Cd and the lift coefficient Cl.

So, you test your car and let's say you have a Cd * S of 1.157 and a Cl * S of 4.673 a point is 0.01. S is the reference area. So, considering the data as before your baseline, let's imagine you develop a new front wing, test it in the car and get a CdS of 1.168 and a CLS of 4.700

You gained 4.700-4.673= 0.027 so almost 3 points.

@Michael Ferner...... glad you asked?


Edit..... F1 Technical has a section on it. https://www.f1technical.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8250

One of the responses there suggested

in most of the teams 1 point corresponds to 0.000048*(speed in kph)^2 kg of downforce.
i.e @ 250kph 1 point is roughly 3kg of downforce; @ 300 kph 1 point is 4.3kg of downforce

[Everso Biggyballies]

Ferrari 2023 car will have Red Bull influences

So La Gazzetta dello Sport seems to think:

Ferrari’s new car for 2023 will be an evolution of its 2022 car with notable aerodynamic tweaks aimed at addressing their greatest shortcomings....

Some of the changes are expected to copy concepts seen on Red Bull’s 2022 design. Ferrari’s tall-edged sidepods will be shortened, creating more of a ‘double floor’ effect. The rear bodywork will be revised and feature a horizontal section incorporated above the suspension for cooling, again a feature of the RB18’s layout.

So Ferrari are designing their 2023 car to look like last years Red Bull.
I will smile if Red Bull's new car has evolved away from those concepts!

The good news is they believe they have sorted the engine reliability issue that caused a couple of race costing DNFs last year. So they believe they can go back to running it at full tilt rather than the reduced level they had to resort to late last season to get reliability

[Everso Biggyballies]

Alpine to launch their 2023 F1 car in London on 16th February

Alpine have become the fourth team to announce the launch date for their 2023 car..... the A523 being unveiled on 16th February.


So a summary:of 2023 Launch Dates

AlphaTauri: Saturday February 11 livery launch in New York.

Aston Martin: Monday February 13 at Silverstone.

Ferrari: Tuesday February 14 Venue TBC

Alpine Thursday February 16th in London

Red Bull TBC
Mercedes TBC
McLaren TBC
Alfa Romeo TBC
Haas TBC
Williams TBC

[Michael Ferner]

What does "15 to 20 points" mean? 15 to 20 percent?

It seems to be one of those 'secret numbers'....

Thanks for (trying to) explain!

@Michael Ferner...... glad you asked?

Oh, never mind...

[MonteCristo]

@Michael Ferner...... glad you asked?

Oh, never mind...

Something-something F1 cars can run upside down on the roof of a tunnel something-something.