After Vettel crashed in Practice, pictures emerged of his broken front wing. The interesting thing was that there were wires in the front wing. http://www.formula1.com/wi/sutton/2010/d11tur455.jpg http://i047.radikal.ru/1105/11/45f645abd098.png Last year the front wing flap adjuster would explain it's presence, but why are they still on the car? What purpose does it have? Could it explain why Red Bull's front wing is so flexible? Or is it some sort of sensor?
Sensor. I don't know what kind of device you could conceal within the wing that could generate enough load (well over 100kgs) to bend the wing.
Very interesting Jose. Red Bull's mechanic appears unconcerned at the world's media seeing these wires for the first time. Was this carelessness, forgetfulness or not-botheredness? A wire mechanism would certainly not compromise load testing, and whilst I'm no engineer, it does not take a genius to imagine how altering the tension of a wire might distort the structure encasing it. No doubt we will hear more of this…
Hmmmmm... Good point Jose..... I think it may be just a wire that maybe just adds a bit more weight to the wing or something to pass the load test maybe... But i dont think thats it because surely you would shift the weight somewhere else and not to the front wing.... Anyway what does the wire weigh... only probably 5-10 grams... thats nothing...
Im drunk here but im going to put it out there. Could be that the wing's default shape from manufacture is in the flexed down position and the car doesnt need to produce a load to flex it downward but needs to exert a pulling force on the cables to straighten it. Probably wake up and realise the idiocy of my post but I put my theory out there into the lions den for now.
In the first picture it looks like Ross Kemp, is he the stress test administrator? Does he test it the wings flexibility using ultimate force?
Yea, they are feedback conductors for the data logger system and are connected to force gauges and measure any change in weight, pressure, distortion, movement etc, these things can actually be set into the surface of the wing itself, effectively same type of thing as used in a bathroom scale.
Interesting theory Jacky However to manually release the tension or to retract the wire would be prohibited by the regulations Maybe though it's something similar but with temperature increase causing the material to assume it's normal flexed shape So when cold it's shape is flat, and when temperature increases a little it flexes, this old allow it to pass the FIA tests but would then cause the flex without manual intervention once the exhausts are running perhaps
Maybe a small percentage of exhaust is routed towards the wing I'm sure the other engineers have though of all this though
Aye, I just had a thought that maybe it was being looked at in the wrong angle and they were not bending an already straight wing but straightening an already bent one. Still, the explaination as to what the wires are for has left the theory dead in the water anyhow
