The start of the pre-season tests in Barcelona has definitively removed the veils from the 2022 cars. No more renderings and standard models to hide behind, with the real cars busy for three days at the Circuit de Catalunya. The most awaited single-seater was the RB18, jealously kept hidden by the Milton Keynes team until the green light came on in Spain, but there is no shortage of curiosities about the other cars. Among these is the AlphaTauri, which in the launch phase was unveiled in the form of a render. The real AT03 does not differ much from the virtual model, confirming the sides sloping down towards the rear also proposed by Alpine and Red Bull.
The main difference lies in the rear suspension, shared together with Red Bull as it is classified by the technical regulations as transferable components. The AT03 showed a traditional pull-rod pattern at the rear, but the Faenza car seen on the track in Barcelona sports the same push-rod geometry also visible on the Red Bull RB18. Like Milton Keynes’s car, the lower triangle is kept raised from the bottom and thanks to the absence of the intrusive tie rod, replaced by the push-rod inclined upwards on the body side, the air coming from the sidepods encounters fewer obstacles in the its path to the speaker.
The front suspension group, on the other hand, was developed independently by the Faenza team and, unlike the pull-rod adopted by Red Bull, is based on the push-rod scheme seen in the presentation phase, with some differences, including the positioning of the arm of the steering lower, albeit still not aligned with any triangle.
Another difference between the virtual model and the real car lies in the front wing. The nose extends up to the main profile of the wing, with the tip of the nose located below the main-plane. Overall, the main profile of the wing denotes an arched and raised trend in the center, favoring the channeling of flows into the underbody.
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