Since the acquisition of the Jaguar in 2004, Red Bull made use of the wind tunnel that had belonged to Arrows, a structure adapted for Formula 1. The building had in fact been a laboratory for the development of aircraft since 1946, when it was put into operation as a RAE Bedford, a site of the Royal Aircraft Establishment (an old British research institute founded on the initiative of the local Ministry of Defense and active with that name until 1988).
Precisely for this reason the Red Bull Team Principal, Christian Horner, has even defined the gallery as a ‘Cold War relic‘, which is why, since the beginning of this year, it would seem that the Austrian team has laid the foundations for the redesign of the entire complex.
A decision, the latter, taken well before the controversy over the overrun of the spending ceiling – the Austrians were punished with a 10% reduction in aerodynamic tests, as well as with a fine of seven million dollars – and has now become indispensable. Indeed, the obsolescence of the gallery currently in use no longer seemed sustainable in light of the developments and technological evolution required by the Circus to compete at the highest levels. Horner himself, in an interview with the portal TheRace.com he has declared: “It was one of the commitments that Dietrich Mateschitz had taken with the company, planning an investment aimed at the construction of a new complex for aerodynamic studies“.
At the same time, however, beyond the financial aspect to grip the Circus there are other great uncertainties, given that among other things it was even discussed about completely ban the use of tunnels from 2030, a choice endorsed by Red Bull itself – Adrian Newey has in fact expressed himself on several occasions in favor of a completely CFD design, on the model of the then Virgin between 2009 and 2010 – and which initially seemed to be shared by the majority of stables. “Of course – Horner added – when you consider the way the world is going, simulation is now playing an increasingly dominant role, which is why we should have been brave enough to implement the idea of leaving tunnels in the future. Unfortunately – concluded the British executive, without great illusions – the prevailing culture tends to flee the fear of change rather than push itself to face it“.
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