I’m hoping that someone from the Ferrari F1 world (as I’m a huge fan) or any other motorsport team will see this because I’m wondering why they haven’t incorporated some newer technologies that have come forth over the last couple of years.  Especially with the way the rule changes are going aerodynamically and reliability have become top issues.  With aerodynamic advances in other sports, such as cycling and with space-aged heat insulating materials why has Formula 1 taken a side step.  The two specific technologies that I’m referencing are the dimple technology from Zipp and Aerogel, a space-aged silicone infused with carbon dioxide.

Dimple technology from Zipp is “similar” to a golf ball where you modify the low pressure air and high pressure air to reorganize and generate a more controlled.  The cool part about this is that with the new 2009 rules and the removal of the “winglets”, utilizing this technology would help redirect and reorganize the flow of air so that the car in reality would be more “slippy”.  For more information on the you can listen to the  Zippcast (#12 and #31) on Zipp’s website.

Another technology that I brought up was Aerogel, also known as Frozen Smoke.  You can Google this or Youtube this and see what this is all about.  From my understanding it’s silicone that has had all of it’s liquid elements removed and infused with carbon dioxide.  In the past this has been excellent at insulating heat and is something that NASA is working on to infuse in the space suits.  Lining the engine or exhaust system with this material would help with pulling heat from the engine and organizing it to be ejected away from the car in a controlled fashion.  Again this would help with the efficiency of the car and make the car overall reliable.

These are just thoughts on what I think could “help” motorsports in general and would help with the trickle effect that motorsports has on everyday cars.  Often times technology used in motorsports trickles down into our cars when it makes sense.  Such technologies would be All-Wheel-Drive from rallying and paddle shifting from Formula 1.  It’s new technologies that will help drive our economy into a more efficient and hopefully a “greener” planet.