When teams are deprived of certainties and components used to generate downforce, they always try, in every way, to recover the lost downforce. Even if only partially. And it happens in all categories of motorsport, be they 4 or 2 wheels.
The WRC is no exception. As we know, with the introduction of the new technical regulation apart from 2022, hybrid Rally1 cars will necessarily have to do without numerous appendages and systems capable of generating downforce. One of them is the rear diffuser.
For the engineers, but also for the drivers, this is certainly not a small shortcoming in view of a season that promises to be one of the most uncertain ever. For this reason, the technical departments of Toyota Gazoo Racing, Hyundai Motorsport and M-Sport Ford have given vent to all their imagination to find legitimate solutions and recover at least part of the load lost from the lack of the diffuser.
The positioning of the electrical package consisting of a 100 kW motor, inverter, batteries, radiators and fans was placed above the rear axle of the Rally1. This allowed the teams to study solutions by exploiting the presence of the hybrid in the rear part of the car body.
The three teams chose different approaches to exploit the hot air from the electrical system. The Korean car stands out among the three cars, namely the Toyota GR Yaris Rally1, the Hyundai i20 N Rally1 and the Ford Puma Rally1 Hyvbrid EcoBoost.
Hyundai i20 N Rally1
The i20 N Rally1 features 2 horizontal slits arranged on either side of the rear bumper and, in the center, is the exhaust pipe. The only visible parts of the system are the air intakes and this is a clear intention of wanting to equally distribute the hot air that comes out from the rear, but also the hot exhaust gases.
The goal is to drag the air from the bottom of the car out, creating less pressure (therefore more air flow speed) right under the car. This is a stratagem to remedy the absence of the rear diffuser, thus creating downforce while having to do without systems that were fundamental on the WRC Plus.
For Hyundai, then, it is good to remember that this is an important change of philosophy, considering that on the i20 Coupé WRC Plus the exhaust pipe was positioned on the right side of the bumper, set in the diffuser. This led to not exploiting the blowing exhaust effect on the diffuser given its positioning. The team, a few months ago, had tried the central exhaust, but then on the WRC Plus it never made its debut in the race.
Toyota GR Yaris Rally1
Completely different philosophy that adopted by Toyota on the GR Yaris Rally1. In the rear bumper there is only one slot, very large and in the shape of a “smile” in which you can see the two fans that are close to the radiators and the electrical package.
It is interesting to note that the GR Yaris exhaust pipe is no longer in the center like on the Yaris WRC Plus – which used the blower exhaust on the diffuser – but is placed on the right, next to the 6 small teeth that comb the flow of air coming out of the bottom of the car.
In the case of the GR Yaris, an interesting aspect must be noted, namely the choice of the car’s rake set-up. When viewed from the side, the Japanese girl has her nose glued to the ground, and then gradually rises from the center of the car and reaches its maximum peak in the rear.
A choice that Hyundai and M-Sport Ford have not made, but it will be possible for them to adopt in the course of the year or the next few seasons even without using the development Joker, Returning to Toyota, the height of the rear of the car should make it less influential the exit of hot air from the electrical package, generating less load with that solution, but going to make up for it with the choice of the rake setting, which progressively reduces the pressure under the car to let the air escape more quickly.
Ford Puma Rally1 Hybrid EcoBoost
Whoever has followed part of the path of both of their opponents is M-Sport Ford. The Puma Rally1 Hybrid EcoBoost has no rake set-up, yet it has chosen to move the exhaust terminal to the right, while in the five-year period that has just ended it had placed it exactly where it could be found on the Yaris WRC Plus: in the central part of the bumper to blow on the diffuser.
On the Puma, the hot air vent resulting from the electrical components is single and central, as is the GR Yaris, but it is much smaller and in any case appears higher than the two slits proposed by Hyundai on the i20 N Rally1. The goal of the Ford Performance engineers is certainly to recover downforce, but perhaps they have focused more on a rear wing that appeared more refined on the day of the presentation which took place on January 15 at Hangar 7 Red Bull in Salzburg.
Having shown the three definitive solutions that will be used by the teams and drivers starting from the Rallye Monte-Carlo (20-23 January), we will see in the long term which of the three will have been the most suitable solution for these Rally1s. But to see it, we will have to wait for a few rallies and see how the teams will move. Who will be the most copied house?
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