Construction continues at Silverstone on the new Aston Martin F1 base, and one of the most important is the new wind tunnel. Some of the team has already moved to new buildings, and many of the units celebrated housewarming last year.
Building No. 3 itself, where the pipe is located, has also already been completed, and today, January 8, model production will move into it, and the installation and commissioning of equipment associated with this complex system will take place during the first three quarters of the year, and it should be put into use in the fall.
The team has used Mercedes’ wind tunnel in all previous years, but Aston Martin technical director Dan Fallows is confident that the switch to its own aerodynamic research equipment will make a big difference. Fellows knows what he is talking about, because he once worked for Red Bull Racing.
“I have experience of working in environments where there was additional flexibility (in research) due to our own wind tunnel,” Speedcafe quoted Fallows. – Now we have to share the pipe with someone else, although this is very good equipment. But the in-house wind tunnel offers more opportunities for research in addition to the usual chassis modernization program.
This is especially important for a more complete understanding of the aerodynamics of new cars. For example, if we move to the 2026 technical regulations, such studies will take up a large part of this work.
Very interesting times await us, because there are many projects that we would like to do, but now that we are working in the Mercedes wind tunnel there is no time for that. Our research departments are now literally burning with impatience; everyone is eager to get started with the new pipe. The only question is: will the number of hours spent on these studies each week be enough to tackle all the projects? In any case, this will be a big step forward for us. I think the wind tunnel will be fully operational by the end of the year. Such equipment inevitably requires debugging. We need to ensure that it functions properly so that we can carry out our normal modernization programme. Therefore, we will pay maximum attention to this work to ensure the necessary preparation of new equipment.
Clearly, the sooner we start using it the better, and these benefits will continue to be seen for many years to come.”
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
