Force India: Developments

Force India: The undernose hump may reduce lift and also house ballast

Not new developments, merely ones not spotted on the car at its launch.

Under the nose the car sports a hump, similar to that employed in 2009 by Renault and Williams (in early testing at least). This is used to offset the lift created by the neutral central section of the front wing (as mandated by the rules). Additionally Force India appear to have an access hatch in this hump, which suggests that there might be Ballast placed inside it, not as effective as ballast mounted in the wing by usefully a few centimeters lower than inside the main nosecone.

Force India: splines to mount the wheel to the hub speeds pitstops

Then the front wheel and hub assembly is innovative. usually the front wheel is prevented from rotating on the hub by four or so drive pins. In fitting the wheel during pitstops, the holes in one need to correspond with the drive pins in the other. Thus four drive pins means the wheel will fit the hub in four orientations each 90-degrees apart. Thus the more drive pins the less the mechanic has to rotate the wheel to fit it to the hub. This year Force india have specially made wheels with a splined detail, to match that on the hub. I can around 20 splines on the wheel suggesting the wheel will fit in one of 18 positions. making the aim of the sub three second pitstop that little bit easier.

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