Gascoyne Hopes Wind Tunnel Work Pays Off

Toyota's technical director Mike Gascoyne says the new TF105 car is the result of the intensive work in the team's wind tunnel.

The TF105 race car has been influenced by the new technical regulations implemented for the 2005 season, which has seen the work carried out in the wind tunnel have a bigger impact than usual.

Gascoyne believes that they can finally extract the maximum performance from their 50%-scale Cologne wind tunnel in order to reduce the gap to the front-running teams in 2005.

"The most significant changes on the chassis lie in the aerodynamics area, with changes to the front wing, rear wing and diffuser the most noteworthy," said Gascoyne. "To combat these changes we have placed a lot more resources into the wind tunnel area over the last year and I hope that the TF105 will represent the fruits of our labours.

"Initially, we lost around 25% downforce with the new aero regulations, but we are striving to reduce this by the largest possible amount in time for the first race of the season in Australia and then subsequently throughout the year."

The car launched in Barcelona is only the first stage in the development of the TF105, and the team are already working on a new aerodynamic package in time for the Australian Grand Prix in March.

"Since the end of 2003 we have restructured the chassis area considerably in order to place more emphasis on our work in the wind tunnel, not simply to increase the number of parts being tested, but more importantly to enhance the accuracy of the results," Gascoyne said.

"In the chassis design office, almost immediately after the TF104 was launched, we opted to appoint two project groups, one focusing on the development of the TF104, latterly the TF104B, and the other concentrating on the TF105, headed up by chief designer Gustav Brunner."

High resolution photos of the launch can be found at the Atlas F1 Photo Gallery.