BRAKES

Updated 2022 - 2024

Did you know?

FACTS: When drivers first get inside an F1 car, the extreme deceleration delivered by the brakes is the most noticeable feature. Force under breaking can exceed 5G, and in order to do so, the brakes discharge a massive quantity of energy at temperatures above 100 degrees Celsius.

How does a Formula One car's braking system work?

Formula One cars, like road cars, have brakes on all four wheels. So, how does the system work?

When the driver presses the brake pedal, it compresses two master brake cylinders, one for the front wheels and one for the rear, generating fluid pressure.

The system appears to be extremely simple at first. Fluid pressure is applied directly to the front brake callipers. Inside each calliper, six pistons clamp pads on the disc, causing friction that slows the automobile down.

The situation in the back is far more complicated; at the back, the wheels can be decelerated by three separate sources: friction from the brakes, resistance from the spinning engine - known as "engine braking" - and, finally, electrical braking caused by the hybrid electric motor - the MGU-K.

https://www.racecar-engineering.com/articles/f1/tech-explained-2017-formula-1-brake-by-wire-systems/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrnbqUc6v9c

This performance is obtained by the use of carbon fiber composites, brake disks, and pads. The driver's goal when braking is to apply enough braking pressure to keep the tyres on edge. Of adhesion generally keeps braking as the car bends into the corner, only releasing the brake pedal at the apex.

FUN FACT

FACT: The Gilles-Villeneve circuit in Montreal, Canada, is the most challenging track on the Formula One calendar. The combination of straights, chicanes, and two hairpins results in braking zones that are quite close together, with a steady 5G force.

FRONT BRAKES

Most F1 vehicles oversteer on first turn-in, which can be managed by using the BBW system to fine-tune the front-to-rear brakes, hence improving 'breaking stability'.

Breaks the discs and pads.

18-inch wheels, larger front and rear brake disc sizes, and a reworked caliper design (BREMBO).

Discs:

Made of Carbon-carbon composite material (carbon fiber reinforced in a matrix of graphite), an have a diameter 275-280mm and a thickness of 32mm with 1400 coding holes. (OICTURE 160)
The enlargement of front brake diameter increased the available braking area on which the brake pads act, thereby adding stopping power, though to some extent this was negated by the extra weight of the cars from 2022

As you can appreciate in the Figure above, the discs have drilled internally for ventilation by airflow from the forward motion of the car. Air is blown over the outer faces of the faces through the discs.
The discs are fully floating and slide over flanges on the axle. The flanges have a 'sawtooth' pattern on both their inside and outside circumstances, to provide a greater surface area to support the discs and to transfer the substantial braking torque from the hub to the discs.
Teams are given enough sets of set of brake discs and pads for every race in the season, and if a driver needed to use an extra set of discs in the season, a three placed grid penalty was imposed

Brake Caliper Holes are shown, showing the comparison from a Sporty road car and a F1 car.

Calipers:

Made of an aluminium alloy and supplied by Brembo
A normal configuration in an F1 car is to use six-pistons calipers at the front, but due to the hybrid power units there has been reduced hydraulic braking.
Each caliper is secured to the relevant suspension upright, and the calipers are designed to be as light as possible while still providing the required stiffness to prevent flexing when the brakes are applied.
The mounting position of the calipers, in terms of the angular position in relation to the brake discs circumference, varies from team but usually its mounted vertically at the front (to save weight distribution)

Pads:

As with conventional disc-brake system, each caliper is fitted with two pads, one on either side of the discs, The pads are also made from carbon-carbon and variety of different pad compounds is available to suit set-up requirements and driver preference.
Different pad materials have different heat conductivity and in general it is the heat conductivity of the material that is changed to give the driver a different brake feel.
The brakes operate efficiently above +500C. This is why is important for the drivers to ensure that the breaks are warm before the start of the race.

TECHNICAL AKCRONYMS:

EBC: Electronic Brake Control: The introduction of hybrid power units and Energy Recovery System (ERS), it become necessary to introduce an electronically controlled rear break system. The reason for this is the significanlty effect that the both ERS and the engine braking torque action on the rear axle.

Energy is used to charge the Motor Generator unit-kinetic MGU-K under braking condition the MGU-K effectivelu contributes to the braking effort.

MGU-K: Is driven by the engines cramshaft, and when the unit is harvesting energy it creates drag on the cramshaft that is transmitted through the transmission to the rear wheels, providing additional braking effect (copy below p163)

BBW: Brake-by Wire

SENSORS

Temperature and Wear Sensors:

Temperaturs: Fitted to the breakes on all four wheels. Infra-red sensors are used to measure the heat radiation produced by the brake discs.

Wears: Used are LVDT (linear variable differential transformer) sensors. Mounted in the calipers, these sensors measure the movement of calipers pistons. Brake war increases stroke increases.

BRAKE COOLING

ANT-LOCK BRAKING (ABS)

INTRESTING FACTS:

Brake Cooling Ducts:

The primary method of controlling brake temperature is altering the size and geometry of the brake cooling ducts.

This, of course, is a circuit specific adjustment, which is part pf the car set-up process and adjustment cannot be done during a race.

When an F1 car wheels are removed, very little can be seen of the brake componets and suspension upright, because a large cylindrical carbon shrud/reffered as a 'cake tin', is fitted around the whole assembly, enclosing the brake components upright and hub.

Design details vary widely from team to team.

Hot air from there shrouds can be vented out through the outer faces of the wheels, and can be used to aerodynamics advantage to influence the waste gereated by the wheels. Some design route air directly through the ducts, effectively bypassing the brake-cooling system and venting air towards the rear of the car, again helping to modify the airflow passing towards the rear of the car.

In recent years, the brake ducts that feed air into the cyclindrical shroud have also become an important the aerodynamic device, used to create downforce and to manioulate the airflow around the wheels and bodywork, with complex design featuring a variety of winglets and vanes. However the size and design of the brake ducts is a compromise between effective cooling and aerodynamic consideration( p79-80). While large brake ducts provide more cooling, the inevitable bring an aerodynamic penalty in terms of drag and distribution to airflow inboard of the weels. The positions and sizing of the brake-cooling dicts was more rogorous, in 2022 by FIA, REDUCING THE SCOPE OF CREATIVITY IN THIS AREA

Brake bias to control temp.

If the rear brakes are running hot, the brake bias can be adjusted to increase braking at the front, reducing the load on the rear brakes, and therefore lowering their temperature.

However this option is not designed to control brake temperature, but rather to increase the tempperature of the front tyres so by having negligibe braking at the rear of the car, will help to bring the front tyres closer to their optimum operating temperature window, usuallt dine in a safety car ir in the parade lap before the start of the race.

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