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Indycar Aero Kit Safety Test Set For IMS
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The premise of Wednesday's aero kit safety test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway is simple: Chevy and Honda must run any items they intend to use during the 100th running of the Indy 500 and prove its cars are sound and stable.
"The reason they're calling it a safety test is new parts kept coming out last year during the month that hadn't been run before, and the mandate from IndyCar was that any part that will be run in May needs to be run at the test," Andretti Autosport team manager Rob Edwards told RACER.
The most accurate description for the test would be the "low-downforce and low-drag qualifying specification aero kit safety test," because that's the range where last year's spins and flights started taking place. Three incidents occurred once Chevy teams began experimenting with qualifying aero setups, and while the root of those three flights were not necessarily attributed to being in low drag/low downforce, the lack of pre-event testing with the new-for-2015 aero kits revealed an unmistakable shortcoming in the series' planning for the Indy 500.
Chevy- and Honda-powered teams were not required to test and learn about their Indy-specific bodywork at the Speedway prior to opening practice and, as a result, IndyCar did not require its aero kit manufacturers to prove their custom aerodynamics were safe in qualifying or race trim at the 2.5-mile oval.
Those oversights exposed a need to conduct a pre-event test this year where teams, in concert with their respective manufacturers, run any 2015 or 2016 Indy 500 aero kit parts and work down to qualifying trim to ensure takeoffs will be avoided. It's worth remembering that after 2015's third and final spin and flight, the series stopped practice, then came back and required teams to use the higher downforce "race" aerodynamics and reverted to the lower race turbo boost settings for qualifying.
The last time a car ran in low drag/low downforce at Indianapolis, it spun in Turn 2 and sent Ed Carpenter for a scary series of airborne rotations before crashing back to earth. With Carpenter's unforgettable ride, learning about Indy cars with aero kits in low drag/low downforce Indy 500 configuration halted.
With ample time to plan for the 2016 race, and key new members in charge of IndyCar's competition department, the series has, to its credit, made a concerted effort to learn from the procedural mistakes of Indy 2015.
"There were some things that happened at Indy last year, obviously, and this is an opportunity to make sure that doesn't happen again," IndyCar competition president Jay Frye told RACER. "The teams that are coming [to the test] are the Leader Circle teams, minus the rookies, and Ed Carpenter will attend. It isn't an open test, per se; it's a systems check."
Frye, who replaced Derrick Walker during the off-season, recently appointed veteran IndyCar engineer Bill Pappas to replace Will Phillips as the series' VP of competition. Through Pappas' experience with the Dallara DW12 and aero kits, he and IndyCar aero boss Tino Belli were able to devise a plan that should, if the weather permits on Wednesday, give the series newfound confidence in Indy 500 low drag/low downforce qualifying configurations.
"We just sat down with Honda and Chevrolet and asked them to give us a list of combinations we could potentially see in the month of May, and out of that, we and them picked what we thought would be applicable for where they think they will be in qualifying trim," Pappas said. "It's getting it to where they think their qualifying trim [will be] and making it stable. Obviously, weather is going to have a massive impact. There's a lot of work to do to work through those issues before we come back in May."
With rain predicted for Wednesday, the aero kit safety test could be pushed back to an alternate date in April. Teams were able to get out for Tuesday's Manufacturers' test at Indy in the early afternoon once the temperatures reached an acceptable point, and Pappas anticipates any running on Wednesday could require jumping to the higher priority test items as the weather permits.
"We'll be down there monitoring and listening, and both manufacturers have been great in providing us an outline they feel covers the bases," he continued. "We'll have to be able to adjust for conditions, so it might be where we don't do this, this, and this, but when the weather's good, let's move to this."
Andretti's Edwards says their team will be able to work through the test however they prefer, and with dome skids on Tuesday's test menu, teams could be asked to run with or without them on Wednesday, depending on the feedback IndyCar received.
"As it sits right now, the day is for us to do whatever we want as a team," Edwards confirmed. "There's no mandate from IndyCar or Honda on what we have to do. That's not to say that won't change, but at the moment, it's up to us to use the day as a team however we decide, and we'll keep an ear out for any pieces they might add or remove."
"The reason they're calling it a safety test is new parts kept coming out last year during the month that hadn't been run before, and the mandate from IndyCar was that any part that will be run in May needs to be run at the test," Andretti Autosport team manager Rob Edwards told RACER.
The most accurate description for the test would be the "low-downforce and low-drag qualifying specification aero kit safety test," because that's the range where last year's spins and flights started taking place. Three incidents occurred once Chevy teams began experimenting with qualifying aero setups, and while the root of those three flights were not necessarily attributed to being in low drag/low downforce, the lack of pre-event testing with the new-for-2015 aero kits revealed an unmistakable shortcoming in the series' planning for the Indy 500.
Chevy- and Honda-powered teams were not required to test and learn about their Indy-specific bodywork at the Speedway prior to opening practice and, as a result, IndyCar did not require its aero kit manufacturers to prove their custom aerodynamics were safe in qualifying or race trim at the 2.5-mile oval.
Those oversights exposed a need to conduct a pre-event test this year where teams, in concert with their respective manufacturers, run any 2015 or 2016 Indy 500 aero kit parts and work down to qualifying trim to ensure takeoffs will be avoided. It's worth remembering that after 2015's third and final spin and flight, the series stopped practice, then came back and required teams to use the higher downforce "race" aerodynamics and reverted to the lower race turbo boost settings for qualifying.
The last time a car ran in low drag/low downforce at Indianapolis, it spun in Turn 2 and sent Ed Carpenter for a scary series of airborne rotations before crashing back to earth. With Carpenter's unforgettable ride, learning about Indy cars with aero kits in low drag/low downforce Indy 500 configuration halted.
With ample time to plan for the 2016 race, and key new members in charge of IndyCar's competition department, the series has, to its credit, made a concerted effort to learn from the procedural mistakes of Indy 2015.
"There were some things that happened at Indy last year, obviously, and this is an opportunity to make sure that doesn't happen again," IndyCar competition president Jay Frye told RACER. "The teams that are coming [to the test] are the Leader Circle teams, minus the rookies, and Ed Carpenter will attend. It isn't an open test, per se; it's a systems check."
Frye, who replaced Derrick Walker during the off-season, recently appointed veteran IndyCar engineer Bill Pappas to replace Will Phillips as the series' VP of competition. Through Pappas' experience with the Dallara DW12 and aero kits, he and IndyCar aero boss Tino Belli were able to devise a plan that should, if the weather permits on Wednesday, give the series newfound confidence in Indy 500 low drag/low downforce qualifying configurations.
"We just sat down with Honda and Chevrolet and asked them to give us a list of combinations we could potentially see in the month of May, and out of that, we and them picked what we thought would be applicable for where they think they will be in qualifying trim," Pappas said. "It's getting it to where they think their qualifying trim [will be] and making it stable. Obviously, weather is going to have a massive impact. There's a lot of work to do to work through those issues before we come back in May."
With rain predicted for Wednesday, the aero kit safety test could be pushed back to an alternate date in April. Teams were able to get out for Tuesday's Manufacturers' test at Indy in the early afternoon once the temperatures reached an acceptable point, and Pappas anticipates any running on Wednesday could require jumping to the higher priority test items as the weather permits.
"We'll be down there monitoring and listening, and both manufacturers have been great in providing us an outline they feel covers the bases," he continued. "We'll have to be able to adjust for conditions, so it might be where we don't do this, this, and this, but when the weather's good, let's move to this."
Andretti's Edwards says their team will be able to work through the test however they prefer, and with dome skids on Tuesday's test menu, teams could be asked to run with or without them on Wednesday, depending on the feedback IndyCar received.
"As it sits right now, the day is for us to do whatever we want as a team," Edwards confirmed. "There's no mandate from IndyCar or Honda on what we have to do. That's not to say that won't change, but at the moment, it's up to us to use the day as a team however we decide, and we'll keep an ear out for any pieces they might add or remove."
