2007 Hungarian GP Technical Review

Host of the 11th round of the championship, the Hungaroring is the most extreme circuit of all in placing demands on the car.

As tight as Monaco and as hot as Bahrain, the track punishes the car and forces the designers into a one-off set-up for this race.

Unlike Monaco, Hungary only provides one brief respite from tight turns along the start-finish straight.

This means that over the rest of the lap, the car is either on full throttle accelerating towards the next turn, or braking for that turn.

Neither of these demands rank with the outright toughest of the season, but the relentless series of turns means that the engine and brakes do not rest throughout the lap.

The heat build-up in the car is exacerbated by the high ambient temperatures. Thus, the teams run large brake ducts and open bodywork to cool everything.

These tight turns also demand maximum downforce, so the teams bring all the extra wings and add-ons that we saw in Monaco, but they have to be careful they do not inhibit cooling.

Again, the heat and the tight nature of the track dictate the tyre choice, and on this occasion, Bridgestone chose the run the soft and super-soft compound options.

Tyre usage is complicated by the nature of the track surface. As a rarely-used track, the Hungaroring's surface is slippery and green on the Friday, but soon rubbers-in as the cars practice, the heat and soft tyres aiding the process.

Also, the slipperiness of the track is made worse by the sandy soil surrounding the track. Errant cars and wind drag dirt onto the track and can make for unpredictable laptimes.

This year the super-soft tyre struggled, with drivers noting graining and degradation. Once again this consigned the white-stripe tyre to be the option, thus only being run in one stint in the race.

As the Hungarian track makes overtaking such a tough proposition, many drivers juggled their use of the softer tyre.

Some drivers opted to use their option tyres at the start to aid grip off the line and in the opening laps for a short first stint, while others kept them for a shorter stint in the middle or end of the race.

Equally, race strategy was split between two or three stops. The difference between the two strategies was small and no-one really gained an advantage through one strategy or the other at this race.

The pyramid structure (yellow) helps the flow from the diffuser pass around the crash structure © Scarborough (Click to enlarge)

Ferrari

Ferrari further revised their front wheel fairings, which became wider and sported a horizontal fin along the upper section of the disc.

The extra width allowed more air to exit the duct to help cool the brakes, which is critical for Hungary. Meanwhile the fin most likely helps to keep the flow attached to the rotating wheel from spilling over and upsetting flow out of the exit duct.

One other small detail was that the flip-ups on the side were given revised endplates, with the new endplate tucking under slightly at its lower edge.

McLaren

Having run their new rear wing for two races, McLaren added a new feature for some extra downforce at Hungary.

An optional extension (yellow) was fitted to Toyota's rear most bargeboard © Scarborough (Click to enlarge)

The rear crash structure gained a small winglet preceded by a pyramid-shaped flow conditioner. As the flow through the rear wing is affected by both the diffuser beam wing and upper wing, together they create a near vertical flow out the back of the wing.

However, the mandatory FIA rear crash structure sits right in the middle of this flow. The problem is getting the flow from the diffuser up and around the crash structure, and the pyramid structure helps to streamline the flow as it passes out through the wing.

The small flap also helps the upwash through the wing, and adds a little extra downforce in its own right.

Toyota

Despite spending time testing Launch control at the Jerez test, the team still struggled to get Trulli off the line in the race. The team were running their larger front wing flap for the race, and again ran a reworked bargeboard.

This was first run at the European GP, and affects the rearmost turning vane, which now has an extension which passes over the axe-head mounted ahead of the sidepod.

Taking inspiration from McLaren, Honda introduced their new three-element front wing (yellow) © Scarborough (Click to enlarge)

This would affect the flow around the sidepods, but is probably more influential in the flow under the car as it changes the pressure distribution to the diffuser.

Honda

After testing it at Spa, Honda brought their new front to Hungary. The wing is a McLaren-like three-element version (yellow) with a very subtle swept profile.

This continues the theme of McLaren inspiration that Honda first adopted with the pod wings being integrated into the chimneys.

The new front wing also apes McLaren's practice of mounting the wing from the middle element, the mounting pylons having slot gap separator/hinges reaching forward and backward to steady the other elements.

The wing's large and flatter profile should provide more downforce and be less sensitive. This would appear to have been one of Honda's problems for the last few years in getting a front wing to work at all the attitudes it sees on the track.

Red Bull sported a new all-blue engine cover fin © XPB/LAT (Click to enlarge)

Additionally, Honda has found the Bridgestone tyres' aerodynamic profile difficult to work with. Bridgestone's profile and squash characteristics may have contributed to the early season stability issues.

The wing's endplates are important in this respect, and the new wing uses endplates outwardly similar to the versions on the launch car. In recent races however, the team has experimented with endplates similar to previous seasons designs.

Red Bull

At the European Grand Prix, Red Bull introduced a new rear wing,

Adrian Newey subsequently told to autosport.com: "It is a totally new wing design to replace the launch car wing that was also run in Bahrain. and as such is aimed at the intermediate-downforce level circuits."

This wing was run again at the high-downforce Hungaroring race, but allied to a new engine cover. As with many other teams, the Red Bull engine cover's spine now has vertical fin extending above it.

Aguri fitted dive planes (yellow) to their pod wings for extra downforce © Scarborough (Click to enlarge)

Due to the slightly revised paint scheme (all blue and no grey panel), the engine cover actually looks larger than it is.

The hump-shaped fin aids the car in yaw, with the wing providing both side surface area to prevent the rear of the car from sliding, and also shapes the flow to the rear wing when the car does yaw.

Super Aguri

To give the team a little more downforce around the Hungaroring, Super Aguri applied its usual practice of fitting large dive planes to the pod wings on the sidepods.