Technical Analysis
The Ferrari SF1000 marks a major milestone for the Italian team as this will be the car that races in Ferrari’s 1,000th F1 grand prix this year. With stable regulations for 2020, the SF1000 is an evolution of the SF90.
‘The regulations have remained stable so it is difficult to transform completely the car,’ says Mattia Binotto, Team Principal at Ferrari. ‘The starting point for this car was the SF90 but we have been extreme with all the concepts as much as we could. The entire project has been trying to get as much aero performance as possible certainly in terms of downforce levels, so the entire chassis, monocoque, gearbox and power unit packaging has been designed to have a very narrow body shape at the rear,’ continues Binotto. ‘The suspension has been reviewed to give us some more flexibility on the racetrack in terms of setup. The internal combustion engine architecture has been changed as well as the combustion chamber to cope with the new regulations where the oil consumption has been reduced by half. So a lot of work has been done on that car which in a way is very extreme compared to the SF90.’
Not only will the 2020 F1 season put the teams through their paces with a 22-strong race calendar, but teams also need to prepare for 2021 as well. ‘We need to be prepared for the 2021 change in regulations which are very significant. So the team back at the factory is really working hard to prepare the car for 2021 but in parallel we need to work on the development of 2020,’ highlights Binotto. ‘It’s a difficult exercise, so we need to make sure that everyone knows exactly what they need to do and we need to manage the resources, timing, planning. We are facing one of the most difficult moments [this year] when you look at past seasons.’
Front Wing
As ever with renderings and launch cars, it is difficult to draw too many technical conclusions because the car that will take part in pre-season testing will usually be very different. However, we can use the launch images as clues to where Ferrari have been focussing their development on.
Despite Binotto’s comments that maximising downforce levels has been a key development area for the SF1000, this is not obvious from the launch images. As you can see below, the front wing and nose matches almost exactly the SF90. The front wing seems to follow the same concept as last year, with the same shaped front wing elements and endplates. The only difference is larger overhangs of the structural components that support the front wing.
Sidepod
The affect of the tighter power unit and cooling packaging can clearly be seen on the SF1000, which features a much narrower sidepod inlet as shown below. This is due to the fact that some of the components of the cooling system were lowered, which has also helped to lower the car’s centre of gravity.
Bargeboard area
The main vertical vane in the bargeboard area is now separate from the horizontal element above the sidepod inlet, which is reminiscent of the early versions of the SF90. There have also been some tweaks in the area just infront of the sidepod, with two main horizontal elements extending from the bargeboard round towards the front suspension.
Rear Wing
Again Ferrari are not giving much away, with the SF1000 featuring a very similar rear end to last year’s car. Although, tighter packaging of the power unit and a reduction in the size of the gearbox casing has resulted in more extreme rear bodywork. However, Ferrari say that this design still produces the same amount of cooling as last year’s car, despite the reduced space.
The design of the so called ‘T wing’ has been slightly revised, but otherwise the rear wing, endplates and the exhaust layout all carries over from the SF90. It will be interesting to see what differences we can spot on the actual car at pre-season testing.
