The FIA has issued a list of 40 F1 car components that will to have to be ‘frozen’ in their development at a particular point in the season, with teams barred from developing those parts from then onwards. Whilst the teams are free to develop surface area dynamics throughout 2021, tokens will have to be used to evolve other areas of the car. Teams will only have a certain number of tokens they can use throughout the season. This has been done in yet another bid to curb costs, and will be regulated by a token system. What is the 2021 F1 development token system?Īs of 2021, teams will be limited by what they can develop on the cars. Percentage of current aero testing allowed for 2022-25 Percentage of current aero testing allowed for 2021 Teams are adapting their R&D design processes to offset this as much as possible so that they make the most of every minute their cars are in the wind tunnel.Ģ021 F1 wind tunnel allowance Teams’ previous season’s championship position It’s been calculated that Williams will be able to use their wind tunnel roughly 20 per cent more than Mercedes in 2021. The amount permitted for others moving on a sliding scale depending on championship position in five per cent increments. Last year’s bottom-placed team in the standings – Williams will be getting the most and Mercedes the least. In another bid to level the playing field, teams are now only allowed to use their wind tunnels for a certain amount of time. How much can F1 teams use their wind tunnels in 2021? Getting ahead for the start of a new set of regulations could offer an advantage for several years but teams won’t want to completely sacrifice the 2021 season.Īs explained by the James Allison, Mercedes’ Technical Director, in his own take on the 2021 rules, the cost cap has made the jobs of teams that much harder. The immediate dilemma is how much of the budget to allocate to next year’s car. In between now and 2024, teams are also allowed to incur up to $45m in ‘capital expenditure’ for things such as factory machinery. The costs of employees’ maternity, paternity and sick leave are also excluded, in addition to the cost of medical benefits and redundancy packages. It will reduce to $140m (£100m) in 2022 and $130m (£92m) in 2023.Īll costs of running the teams are covered in this budget cap with the exception of: marketing costs, driver salaries, the salaries of the three highest earners at each team. The greatest challenge facing F1 teams this year will in adjusting to the new cost cap, set at $145m (£103m). We spoke to former Mercedes F1 Design Engineer Gabriel Elias and former Mercedes aerodynamicist Miles Jackson, winners of six constructor titles with the team, to talk us through the changes which are coming in this year, how they will affect the cars and the teams, and why some areas are so sensitive for teams.Īs Elias says, the alterations will be significant: “If you look at an overhead shots of 2021 cars, the combination of all those those features in the rear floor do a pretty damning job at ripping performance off the car,” he says. This was violently demonstrated at the 2020 British Grand Prix, when Carlos Sainz, Valtteri Bottas, and most notoriously Lewis Hamilton, all suffered major tyre failures, the latter limping round the final lap on three wheels to only just beat Max Verstappen to the line. Rule makers decided that change couldn’t wait another season, given the increasing stress being placed on the Pirelli tyres from higher cornering speeds. One feature that can’t be disguised is the reduced floor area required this year to cut the downforce it can generate. Which is why all of the 2021 cars launched so far are expected to look significantly different when they line up in Bahrain for the first race of the year. It all added up to a busy winter for designers and the potential for teams to steal a march on rivals.
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