FIA pushing to rid the sport of stepped noses in 2013

The ugly look of the current generation of F1 machinery has drawn stinging criticism from fans and insiders alike - a situation brought about by a push to lower the noses of cars for this year while not bringing the height of the chassis in that area down to the same level.

Discussions took place at the tail end of 2011 about the possibility of the cars not looking good for this year, and some consideration was given to introducing a mandatory cover to hide the height transition.

Those plans failed because there was not universal support for such a move - which is required for a rule change of that nature to take place at that time of the year.

However, with there still time to make a change to the 2013 regulations without the need for every team to agree, the FIA's head of the technical department Charlie Whiting has said that he plans to bring up the matter again soon.

"It will doubtless be discussed," said Whiting ahead of the season-opening Australian Grand Prix. "In 2014, the rules will be entirely different and there will be much, much lower noses so that problem will disappear in 2014 I imagine.

"But of course I will raise the question [for 2013] with the TWG [Technical Working Group] when we next meet. Everybody would like to see something nicer."

Whiting said that there may have been more appetite to change the noses even last year if people had realised just how widespread the noses would be.

"At that point I don't think anyone outside of the very small group of designers that were designing the cars knew what the cars might look like," he said. "It was pointed out that there could be a bit of a step there, as it was put, but frankly it didn't seem important for us to get excited about.

"Hopefully we can resolve the situation, but by the time we do everyone will have got used to what we have got anyway."