Sign up for our weekly email to stay on top of the latest news and insights!
Source: Brembo post
On a scale of 1 to 5, it is rated 3 on the difficulty index. One of its distinctive features is turns three and 14 banked at around 19 degrees, more than double the corners at Indianapolis. This has a significant effect on the single-seater set-up which also affects the brakes.
Disc size and hole size change
This year, the increase in wheel diameter from 13 inches (33 cm) to 18 inches (46 cm) provides more space in the wheel corner for the carbon discs, so their diameter increases from 278 mm (10.95 in.) to 328 mm (12.9 in.) for the front and from 266 mm (10.47 in.) to 280 mm (11.02 in.) for the rear.
The thickness of the discs is now identical for both axles, 32 mm (1.26 in.), compared to last year when the rear discs did not exceed 28 mm (1.10 in.). However, the architecture of the discs has also changed because the new technical regulations impose a minimum diameter of 3 mm (0.12 in.) for the ventilation holes, whereas in the past Brembo pushed the envelope as far as 2.5 mm (0.10 in.).
No to thermal shocks for road cars too
Although they don’t reach the 1,200°C of Formula 1 cars, road car braking systems can also overheat. To avoid this, Brembo has been researching disc ventilation and the shape of the ventilation chamber in particular for over a quarter of a century. By using thermo-fluid dynamic calculations, the best traditional fins and pillar ventilation can be selected for each disc type.
The latter are ideal when there is not a constant air flow within the disc and are arranged on three circumferences along the braking band with geometry designed to ensure the best performance for fluid dynamics. In these conditions, the pillars increase resistance to thermal cracking by up to 30 percent, ensuring longer disc life.
142 kg (313 pounds) load on the brake pedal
The Formula 1 drivers do not use their brakes on four of the 14 corners on the Dutch circuit: three of these are in the run of corners 4-5-6 which have a radius that does not require the use of brakes plus the last corner which does not need brakes because it is uphill. On one lap, the drivers use their brakes for a total of 11 seconds, 16 percent of the entire GP race.
The extremely smooth flowing of the track is confirmed by the presence of only two turns where braking lasts for more than two seconds: turns nine and 11 with drivers being subjected to 4.7 g deceleration on the latter while they apply 142 kg (313 lb.) of pressure to the brake pedal. From the starting line to the checkered flag, each driver exerts a total load of over 73 metric tons on the brake pedal, almost double the Belgian GP.
Sign up for our weekly email to stay on top of the latest news and insights!
