Red Bull improve cornering speed through new suspension design
F1 News
Red Bull have been running a unique front suspension since the start of the season in a design which features two seperate legs instead of the conventional single one. It is thought that this will help their performance in the corners and could give them an advantage.
Autosport technical expert and former Jordan, Stewart and Jaguar technical director Gary Anderson explained why the team would do this.
"There can be two or three reasons for this design," says Anderson to Autosport. "Firstly, as the wheel rim comes around at the rear, it gets lower so to get the steering lock you need either to have a cutout on the trailing edge of the wishbone to clear the rim, which means that you lose some of the braking stiffness, or you lower the complete upper wishbone. Again, this will reduce cornering stiffness.
"Secondly, it could be what is called a multi-link suspension where all the links are independent. This means they can be bolted through their individual pivots to achieve the effect mentioned above."
"Thirdly, a multi-link suspension can also be used to alter kingpin angles, which in turn will alter cambers with varying steering lock.
"This can be achieved by having the pivot locations positioned slightly differently on the outboard end of the top assembly. It can also offer weight transfer across the axle with varying steering lock.
"I think it is probably the latter and that Red Bull is reducing cambers with high steering angles to increase the tyre contact patch in low speed corners."
It will be interesting to see if other teams start to copy this idea and if Red Bull have gained an advantage from doing this.