Aston Martin’s quantum leap: what makes the new AMR23 so quick?

The first Grand Prix of the season highlighted, in addition to the Red Bull RB19 we have already talked about, the excellent performance of the new Aston Martin AMR23. Thanks to the favorable layout of the Sakhir track, the English team has established itself as the second fastest on the grid: the improvement from last year has an extent never seen before in the turbo-hybrid era in Formula 1. Let's find out in our technical analysis where the AMR23 makes the difference compared to its rivals.

The 95% renewed concept is paying off!

At the unveiling of the car, technical director Dan Fallows surprisingly announced that compared to last year, 95% of the bodywork had been changed from last year's AMR22. These innovations, as we have seen, are distributed throughout the car body, and are working organically as a concept.

Starting as usual from the front end, Aston Martin followed the technical trend in vogue this year , i.e. using a long nosecone, hollowed in its lower part - which can therefore free up useful space to feed the Venturi channels behind. The same nosecone, which until 2022 was connected to the second flap of the front wing, is now incorporated into the mainplane: a solution exactly at odds with what was done, for example, by Ferrari on the SF-23.

Steven Tee / Motorsport Images

The front wing has a rather different design compared to the other single-seaters on the grid, which seem to focus merely on the search for outwash. At Aston Martin, while not giving this objective, the upper flap has a central portion with a rather wide chord, therefore with a high aerodynamic load.

The outwash effect, indeed, is obtained via the connection of the last flap to the endplate, through an outwardly curved support in an area in which various teams are looking for alternative solutions (Mercedes, for example, is using rapid prototyping to carry out a number of back to back tests).

Twitter / Albert Fabrega

The front suspension keeps the already known push-rod layout, with some tweaks to the wishbones' geometry, only for aerodynamic purposes (cleaning of the airflow approaching the Venturi channels). In particular, the rear wishbone of the upper triangle, seen from the front, is offset with respect to the front one: in principle, the mechanical advantage achievable via this solution is that the vehicle becomes less sensitive to longitudinal pitching movements.

The real strength of the AMR23 is under braking!

By carefully observing the Bahrain GP qualifying and the behavior of all the racecars on the track, it was noticed the great stability of the Aston Martin in the deep braking zone of turn 1. The data relating to the micro-sectors of the Sakhir track later confirmed this sensation, with Fernando Alonso indisputably the fastest in all (!) the areas of the circuit characterized by medium or high intensity braking.

Twitter - F1 Telemetry Bot

So it is worth analyzing which elements of the AMR23's braking system give it a performance advantage even over an all-round single-seater like this year's Red Bull...

#F1 | #AstonMartin: questa AMR23 è davvero... sfrenata#Formula1https://t.co/tZs8YNWxwE

— Motorsport.com Italia (@Motorsport_IT) March 10, 2023

As also analyzed in this Motorsport article (in italian), regardless of the Brembo brake caliper located horizontally in the lower part of the brake disc, the real innovation is the complex ducting of the brake cooling circuit.

Bear in mind, in fact, that the thermal management of the large amount of heat expelled from the braking system - especially in the most demanding braking sections - can be used to heat the tyres by conduction, through the brake drums and the wheel rim. And, ultimately, warmer tyres lead to better grip, which is why Alonso was so dominant in the braking zones in Bahrain.

Sidepods with a huge tunnel in the upper portion: Coanda effect at the n-th level

Right from the presentation, the element that most amazed observers and insiders was the extreme geometry of the sidepods, equipped with such an hollowed upper surface as to give to the same AMR23's sidepods the nickname of "tunnels".

Mark Sutton/Motorsport Images

As can be seen in the image above, the aerodynamic philosophy of the team led by Dan Fallows is much more than inspired by what Ferrari and Alpine did last year; in fact, the "tunnels" continue up to the rear end, where they channel the airflow towards the upper side of the diffuser. Assuming that this joining of airflows is ideally obtained without aerodynamic losses, I simply cannot imagine a better way to make the diffuser work properly.

That's not all: the same tunnels that feed the diffuser are very prominent in their external surface, which provides a double advantage:

• It is possible to shield the frontal surface of the rear tyres, minimizing the aerodynamic drag that comes with them;
• Turbulences are kept away from the car bodywork, once again creating outwash: in this regard, it should be noted that Aston Martin abandoned the "X-Chassis" chassis first introduced by Mercedes, which we will be able to talk about in another article;

Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

The only feature, talking about the sidepods, borrowed from Red Bull is the inlet. As on the RB19, there is an extended lower "lip" which aims to clearly divide the airflows intended for cooling the Power Unit from those which instead are directed to the large undercut, starting from which they will head towards the floor.

Letterbox cooling with downwash effect and “clever” endplates are the secrets behind the AMR23 rear end

Even at the rear end, there is no lack of innovations compared to the competitors: the technical department of the Silverstone-based team continues to show a lot of ingenuity, after the clever interpretation of the rear wing brought to the Hungarian GP last year.

Mark Sutton/Motorsport Images

The engine cover has a fairly large outlet for hot air (we have often mentioned the "letterbox cooling"), but with a feature in common with the Alfa Romeo C43: a descending trajectory of the outlet duct itself, whose The objective is to get rid of the hot gases by exploiting the free volume between the beam wing and the rear wing.
The advantage of this solution lies in not feeding the rear aero surfaces with hot and turbulent gases, which instead would make them work in less aerodynamic efficient conditions.

The pull-rod rear suspension configuration hasn't changed compared to 2022, but the wishbone geometry has been tweaked - in the same way as mentioned at the front. This time, however, in addition to the airflow smoothness, also mechanical advantages have been exploited, i.e. a suspension travel such as to contain the porpoising phenomenon. Judging by the performances expressed in the first race of the World Championship, we can certainly agree that they have fully succeeded.

The phenomenon of aerodynamic bouncing is intrinsic to this philosophy of single-seaters with Venturi channels, and can only be completely eliminated with a radical aerodynamic change"
Eric Blandin (Aston Martin Deputy Technical Director)

It is important to remember that the rear end of the AMR23 is heavily borrowed from that of the Mercedes W14, with the English-German team that, as we know, supplies the Power Unit to Aston Martin. Speaking of such supply, as can rarely be found, this year the Power Unit at the back of the AMR23 is not identical to the one at the back of the W14: the team owned by Lawrence Stroll requested and obtained a customization of the radiators, both in terms of arrangement (more leaned) than in technology (now there are water-to-air radiators, and no more air-to-air ones).

Finally, the rear wing is equipped with a single pylon support, but for this element it is better to wait for adaptations to the various circuit layouts.

Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

The real "gem" relating to the rear wing can be observed looking at the endplates: a little flap deviates from the normal course of the endplates themselves, allowing the turbulent airflow coming from the tyres to be directed outwards, thus increasing the lateral expansion of the diffuser… What's the final outcome? A diffuser that can generate more downforce, helping the stability and balance of the car.

First controversy raised by Red Bull?

The same balance, as will be clear by now, is one of the strengths of this single-seater. Between the 2022 Bahrain GPqualifying and this year's one, no team has managed to improve their laptimes as much as Aston Martin (-2.4 s/lap).

“Is Aston Martin a surprise? We've known since December that the numbers coming out of their wind tunnel and simulator were positive"
Carlos Sainz

If these outcomes, while surprising, were not entirely unexpected for the competition, the way in which performance was sought - and found - (with a stable platform, rather than through performance peaks) began to raise eyebrows at Red Bull.

“It's good to see three Red Bulls on the podium!”
Sergio Perez

Let's not forget that Dan Fallows had been one of the most high-profile engineers working with Adrian Newey himself, before being hired by Lawrence Stroll: having transferred the know-how from the Milton Keynes team to the one from Silverstone certainly had a positive influence on the development of the latter!

“If you compare the cars, Aston Martin is very similar to ours: it is not only Dan Fallows who has joined Aston Martin, but also other former employees of ours, who obviously have a good memory”
Helmut Marko

The next GP, scheduled in Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), will tell us if the Aston Martin AMR23 will be able to replicate the excellent performance shown in Bahrain.