What the new Haas reveals about 2019 F1 design trends

As Haas launched its new striking black and gold colour scheme, replacing the more-pedestrian grey-black-red scheme from its past three seasons, it also answered one of the most pressing questions ahead of the new Formula 1 season: just how will the 2019 cars look?

Let's be honest, the wheel hasn't been reinvented here. It looks like a contemporary F1 car. And, since the car is only a render at this stage (and black-on-black seems like a conscious effort to hide the details), it's hard to make out the more intricate parts. It's even harder to know what's going to make it to the circuit once Haas touches down at Barcelona.

But the render of what seems to be a VF-19 does grant us a good look at what we can expect for this year, and could potentially become a bellwether for 2019's F1 design trends as each of the 10 teams seeks to recoup the downforce slashed by the new regulations.

The front wing is probably going to be the real key to success this season, and it's great to have a first proper look at what the new ruleset has prescribed. Force India and Williams trialled representative wings in last year's mid-season Hungary test, and they provide a benchmark to compare against Haas's interpretation. But it should be noted that those wings weren't optimised around a full 2019 package.

With plenty of restrictions over the curvature of the wing elements, there are no more vortex tunnels and the like to generate outwashing vortices, so each designer will have to use what they can to develop the same effect. Haas has, as other teams undoubtedly will, poured its attention into the inboard section of the front wing. A vortex develops here, and in the past designers have liked to roll it up and use it to act as a buffer between the tyre wake and the front of the floor.

This year, with the redefined front wing, the vortex is going to have inherently less energy and will be weaker. Each team must develop in this area; given the outwash capability of the front wing is severely reduced, and the vortex can assist hugely to direct tyre wake away from the rest of the car downstream. The middle flap of the Haas's wing has been shaped to manage that, linking up the top two flaps and the two mainplane elements to give that vortex the right shape and create the necessary downforce too.

The endplate is, as mandated by the 2019 regulations, a lot simpler and is made from a single piece of carbon fibre - unlike last year's segmented affairs. Haas has emerged with something similar to Williams's '18 test wing, with some curvature towards the trailing edge to recoup the outwash effect lost with the new breed of wings.

On the outside, the footplate interestingly stops abruptly as the endplate begins to curve, suggesting that the vortex developed underneath is able to be lifted up and carried around the outside of the front tyre.

There's also a small pod on the inside of the wing, most likely a tyre sensor or thermal imaging camera, which teams will be milking for as much aerodynamic benefit as possible.

Moving further back, the brake ducts are a lot harder to look at in detail - such is the nature of the images provided - but the smaller radius area that they must fall within is showcased. Any small flicks used to drive airflow around the tyre are gone, which means Haas must rely on the front wing to deliver flow patterns to make up for that.

The further-forward bargeboards will do that, although Haas seems to be keeping its cards close to its chest on that particular front; including a design in the renders that seems to be distinctly similar to the bargeboard design it ran last year. This is expected to be quite an important area, especially as the effect of tyre wake on the underbody flow is going to be a greater hurdle to overcome this season. Furthermore, the wheel centre has been covered off, removing any potential to create a blown axle at the front end.

Haas's final gambit in reclaiming this year's lost downforce comes with an aggressive-looking rake angle

On the sidepods, the bargeboard geometry retains Haas's Venetian blind-like slat designs, although lowered to satisfy the new ruleset. As this loops around to the top face of the sidepod, the highly-positioned inlets continue the design ethos pioneered by Ferrari, which Haas - in its capacity as Ferrari's customer of listed parts - has also followed. This appears to omit the split in the inlet that both Ferrari and Haas used last year, suggesting a reduced demand for cooling.

An S-duct features on the chassis bulkhead, and here the airflow - presumably picked up from an inlet further down the nose - is repurposed and fired across the top of the car to improve flow attachment. Curiously, the wing mirrors are positioned further outboard, perhaps in an attempt to get the mounting to work in tandem with the bargeboard extensions over the top of the sidepod.

More svelte than last year, the sidepods have been brought in while the engine cover has been tightened up too, inviting the designers to reprofile the associated fin. A small notch behind a small winglet allows the airflow coming from the rollhoop intake to be cleaned up, assisting the rear wing's efficiency. Like last year's car, a T-wing appears further down on the fin, albeit curved downwards for this year much like the 2018 Ferrari design. This seems to tie in more with the greater flarings in the rear wing endplates, a result of the larger wing geometry required for '19.

Although simplified on the top half, the endplates feature overhanging strakes - much like those pioneered by McLaren in 2017 - although Haas has opted for a design with nine even teeth, hoping to draw out a lower-pressure zone underneath the rear wing and redefine the trailing vortices behind the car. This is intended to boost the rear wing performance by increasing its effective span.

With a 20mm increase in the DRS slot-gap height, the rear wing will open up much more compared to last year, but there's very little to mention other than the change in dimension in this case. The swan-neck wing mounts remain, which reduce the flow separation experienced by mounting the wing at the underside.

While the front suspension looks conventional, perhaps limited by the allowed workable area for the brake ducts and wheel uprights, the rear suspension moves towards what Ferrari used last year, cementing the links between the two teams. A raised mounting point lifts the wishbone up to clear air around the top of the diffuser, offering a more consistent pressure differential between the top and bottom.

The final gambit in reclaiming this year's lost downforce comes with an aggressive-looking rake angle, where the front of the floor is inclined closer to the ground. It wouldn't be altogether surprising to see other teams pursuing a higher-rake set-up, especially to extract as much performance as possible from the car's floor and diffuser.

Ultimately, it remains to be seen what Haas will actually emerge with during the Barcelona pre-season tests, but the images released on Thursday are a fantastic guideline for how 2019's fleet of cars will shape up. Rather than going for a complete clean-sheet design, Haas's technical team has built on its successful '18 concept and adapted the design philosophy for the newest raft of rules.

And if nothing else, at least it looks good.

Gary Anderson says

Firstly, the front view of the car shows what will be the now-common five-element wider front wing package. Yes, it initially looks big and brutal, and the endplates are a simple vertical panel with a horizontally-tunnelled lower footplate, but that's what the regulations require.

The wing elements are all fairly similar in cord length with the leading one more or less working like a leading edge slat perpetrating the airflow for the following flaps. These go all the way to the endplate and essentially butt into it. Controlling front wing airflow separation when the wing gets closer to the ground will be a little more difficult with the reduced quantity of wing elements. If the airflow separation is too much we will see the car porpoising at high speed, but if it's not enough the car will be very pointy in high speed corners.

Even if these changes don't improve the racing, at least the teams and sponsors should be happier

Looking at the inboard end, this tells us more about the fact that Haas has been struggling to get the required front downforce. Instead of the 2018 trend of having the inner end of the flaps tapering outwards as you go rearwards from the mandated central FIA wing section, they are much straighter - meaning that they require that area to improve the overall performance of the wing assembly. They then twist downwards fairly dramatically, diffusing the pressure differential between the upper and lower surface of the wing flap profiles, which will act as an endplate containing the low pressure under the wing surface. But it will also reduce the intensity of what in the past has been called the Y250 vortex.

As it looks now, it's nice to see a fairly simple solution, but I'm pretty sure we will see a few additions appear before long.

Although it seems that the engine cover fin looks like it has increased in size, that's because the team has put the engine cover on a diet, squeezing it in around the engines plenum area. This is all to improve the airflow to the rear wing, improving the performance.

The Haas' sidepod inlet and sidepod undercut, which is massive, and radiator inlet comes from the Ferrari concept. I suppose that with their technical relationship it's no surprise but it also shows that even with the reduced size bargeboards required for this year's regulations that opening up that exit area to allow the barge boards more room to work is still critical.

The vortices that were induced by the trailing edge of the bargeboards worked in conjunction with the louvred floor section in front of the rear tyre, helping to seal the underfloor and improving the performance of the diffuser. These louvres have also been reduced in quantity, suggesting that the vortices are not as strong and not sealing the underfloor as well, so reducing the louvres effectively increases the floor area.

It's still early days to form an opinion, but even if these changes don't improve the racing, at least the teams and sponsors should be happier; when did you last see a sponsor decal that you could read on a front wing endplate or chassis side?