Ferrari in Australia is the team that in the history of the race furthest from Italy has scored the most points: despite the different tracks and then the various configurations that have characterized Melbourne's Albert Park we have always seen a competitive red team that is poles apart. Charles Leclerc's success in 2022 is the last of ten for the Cavalino in history (be careful, only McLaren did better with 11!), and the 412.5 points won are the richest haul, given that McLaren reached 336, Mercedes 276 and Red Bull 217, despite recent periods of dominance.
The Scuderia, therefore, looks to Australia with some confidence: the third round of the season after Bahrain and Jeddah, offers a completely different track from the previous two which could adapt to the technical characteristics of the SF-24. Ferrari, so far, has established itself as the second force in the championship, even if the gap from Red Bull in the race seemed more significant than what Maranello hoped for, so much so that Charles Leclerc in Jeddah and Carlos Sainz in Sakhir took they were satisfied with the third step of the podium, having to give way not only to Max Verstappen, but also to Sergio Perez.
The other opponents, however, seem decidedly further behind. In Melbourne, a medium load track, Ferrari could find the conditions that best match the SF-24, so the rear wing undergone in Jeddah as a necessity (it was the one in Bahrain), should be the most suitable and the red will not have to pay a toll on maximum speed as happened in Saudi Arabia.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-24
Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images
Albert Park is a city with some characteristics of the permanent track: requiring high fuel consumption due to stop-and-go sections alternating with medium-fast corners, it is important to have a good compromise between downforce and aerodynamic efficiency.
The SF-24 has so far seemed brilliant in the medium corners (even faster than the Red Bull RB20), it defends itself in the fast ones and suffers a bit in the slow ones, paying essentially in the traction phase when exiting the corners. It must be said that the red one has changed its soul compared to the SF-23 thanks to the profound interventions of Enrico Cardile's staff who revolutionized the chassis (longer and narrower) and transmission (shorter), which produced a new positioning of the engine to have a weight distribution that favored certain behaviors of the car resulting from a different center of aerodynamic pressure.
The layout of the new Ferrari is certainly better than that of the SF-23, but the red still needs fine-tuning, once the critical points have been identified. If last year tire wear was the most serious defect, this year there was a certain difficulty in triggering the tire temperature.
Ferrari SF-24: here is the rear wing used in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia
Picture of: Giorgio Piola
The engineers in Jeddah tried to load the rear wing (paying in aerodynamic efficiency), while the data from the Pirelli technicians had highlighted that it was more important to work on the suspensions to find the necessary mechanical grip (in Arabia two laps were not enough for Leclerc launch in Q2 to ensure tire warm-up, a sign that it was not an aspect that could be corrected with load).
Detail of the gearbox of the Ferrari SF-24: note the pull rod pivoted higher up (red arrow)
Picture of: Giorgio Piola
The new shorter transmission was designed to meet different needs of the rear axle: the design of Giorgio Piola allows us to carefully analyze what were the reasons that pushed Ferrari to certain choices, while maintaining the pull rod suspension scheme, while everyone gradually converted to the push rod, except Haas, faithful to the Cavallino .
The first aspect that intrigues is the tie rod: on the SF-23 it was very long and inclined forward because the internal mechanisms were placed on the floor in the front part of the box. Now the arm is shorter because the systems have been moved further back and, above all, higher, freeing up the lower area for the Venturi channels. While insisting on the pull rod, the Cavallino technicians managed to give an aerodynamic advantage to Diego Dondi's staff, without moving all the weight of the kinematics upwards as happens with the push rod.
Ferrari, therefore, had the courage to introduce a “hybrid” version, much less classic in concept and, certainly, innovative. The box has been miniaturized because the upper arm is now pivoted very high on a raised saddle. The Scuderia no longer has double triangles at the rear, but the SF-24 adopts a multi-link solution both above and below, leaving track technicians the possibility of having a greater availability of adjustments.
Ferrari SF-24: here are the multi-link rear suspension attachments
Picture of: Giorgio Piola
It should not be surprising, therefore, that they have not yet found the ideal calibration in Maranello and it cannot be ruled out that in Australia we will see that cover of an arm that did not appear in Jeddah. Curious that the axle shaft is not inserted into a single carbon wing element, but there are two different elements that must also function as flow laminators of the beam wing.
The hub holder has also been completely redesigned according to the new suspension attachments: you can see the Brembo caliper attachments and the lightenings designed in an attempt to save weight.
In short, Ferrari will not have introduced a revolutionary car with the Red Bull RB20, but it is wrong to think that the red one is a car with a limited margin for development, because as we have seen the new concepts introduced are numerous and require fine-tuning. point, regardless of the aerodynamic developments that will arrive at Suzuka and Imola.
The SF-24 is a single-seater that has to live for two seasons: in Maranello they are convinced that they have laid good foundations to attack Verstappen's supremacy during the championship, but it takes some time…
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