No Wings?
By Andrew Cutler
December 13 2009
This past week SpeedTV reporter Robin Miller talked to Ben Bowlby, the former Lola designer & current Ganassi engineer who is working on the radically new concept IndyCar chassis that I first wrote about on November 22: Here, in a nutshell, is what he learned.
Bowlby's proposed car will be considerably lighter than the current Dallara without sacrificing any of structural integrity/excellent safety qualities: It should also prove to be just as fast. He envisions the chassis being mated up with a non-stressed, turbocharged four-cylinder engine (which is already the IRL's plan for the 2012 specifications change) that will cost a mere $140,000 per unit.
The teams currently lease their Honda engines for almost $3 million per car per season.
The most interesting - and, so far, the only concrete - thing that was revealed about the car's physical appearance is that it will not feature the front and rear wings that have been 'standard issue' on nearly every Indy and F1-style open-wheel car for the past forty years.
Bowlby has been hard at work on his car for the nearly a year now, and has been in constant communication with officials from Honda, Firestone and the IRL, all of whom have shown enthusiasm for the project. Engineers from other IndyCar squads have reviewed his weight/power/down-force simulations & signed off on them.
Ten of the team owners have gotten together and formed Delta Wing LLC, which will manage the production of the first full-scale prototypes - should Bowlby's car get the IRL's official blessing - come next June or July.
Hopefully, we won't have to wait nearly that long to see some schematics/artist's drawings of this mystery car!
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The age of fuel economy/alternative fuels/environmental concern is well & truly upon us. The IRL's new engine specs were drawn up after asking the auto companies (those who wanted to supply engines, anyway: none of which are American) what they would be interested in making/promoting.
As for the wings:
The current Dallara really has three wings, with the car's basically flat underside being the 3rd (I assume that the concept is the same for F1 cars). Maybe Bowlby has found a way to maximize this effect to the point where the front/rear wings are no longer needed? - Only time will tell.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2009:12:14:01:04:51 by IndyAndy.
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