How a Formula One Steering wheel works
There was a time when the steering wheel was one of the simplest pieces of equipment on a Formula One car. In the days before seatbelts, traction control, KERS, gear paddles, hand clutches, fuel maps or any of the other toys Formula One cars evolved to use - the steering wheel’s sole purpose was to turn the car.
When Stirling Moss crashed at Goodwood in 1962, his head was flung forward into the leather steering wheel which left it with a permanent forehead shaped dent. Wheels may have changed a lot since then but it is only within the last decade that we have seen significant changes.
Even today, some of the world’s most advanced racing machines use a very simple steering wheel. If we look at an IndyCar wheel, although it appears complicated, the actual base is available to buy from any motorsports specialist. Teams add custom grips, displays, electronic gear-shift paddles and a few simple electronics but compared to a Formula One wheel, they are all still relatively basic.
IndyCar Steering Wheel
Formula One was still using basic leather or suede steering wheels within the lifetime of most of the drivers on the grid today – the most advanced piece of technology on a steering wheel in the early 1980s would have been a radio switch.
In the 1990s we began to see small technological advances such as radio switches and boost buttons but it was only in the 2000s that we really began to see the emergence of technology that is essential to, what is now often referred to as, the ‘command centre’ of modern Formula One cars. Yet, even in the early 2000s the wheels remained fairly simple. Many of the electronics were not buried beneath layers of carbon fibre and were prone to failures - especially in the wet.
Let’s use the 2011 Sauber-Ferrari steering wheel as an example of modern day Formula One technology.
2011 Sauber Formula One Steering Wheel
On the front, a standardised LED display is used to present information to the drivers. The central display shows the gear the driver is in (0-7) while the screens either side can display various information. The data shown depends on the settings that have been selected by the driver with the multi-function rotary switch - most of the time this will display current speed and sector times. As a driver passes through sector markers, the delta times are displayed - this is especially useful in qualifying and practice as it allows the driver to see which parts of the track they are quick and where they need to find time.
The series of LED lights above the displays show the revs and are colour coded to show the driver the best point to switch gear - the optimal time to switch is when the lights are blue. The form in which these lights indicate the revs can vary between teams and drivers’ setups but very often the lights are ignored as a beep, which transmits from the ECU through the driver’s headphones, also indicates the same information.
The triangles of lights either side of the displays are for FIA messages. They display colour coded warnings that reflect the flags waved by marshals (e.g. Yellow for incident ahead, blue to inform the driver of a faster car behind, red if the race has been stopped etc). In a yellow flag situation, you will often also see the word 'FLAG' flash on either side of the main display. With the introduction of the Drag Reduction Sysytem (DRS) these lights can also indicate when a driver is in the activation zone.
Some teams prefer to remove this display form the wheel and integrate it into the cockpit (Red Bull and Toro Rosso for example). This has the advantage of the driver being able to see the display no matter what position the steering wheel is in, however should it fail then the driver has to drive without its use. If it forms part of the steering wheel, it is possible to quickly replace the steering wheel and therefore also the display.
On the left-hand side are three rotary switches that determine the settings of the differential. These are split into corner entry, mid-corner and corner exit. These will be set during practice sessions to get the best setup for qualifying and the race but may be altered over the race distance. If there is a large change in the grip level of the tyres or if there is an aerodynamic change (due to damage or the front-wing being altered in a pit-stop) the driver may change the settings to compensate. For example, if the car was understeering through a corner, the driver would need to open up the differential at the rear - they would turn one of the rotary dials to a lower position depending on which point in the corner they were experiencing the understeer.
The yellow ‘N’ button is to put the car into neutral. The car’s gearbox is controlled electronically through gear paddles on the back of the steering wheel. Neutral cannot be selected with these paddles, the driver needs to push the ‘N’ button the de-select gears. There is an LED next to this button to indicate when the car is in neutral. On the other side of the wheel the ‘PL’ applies the pitlane speed limiter. The driver will push this button when entering the pitlane and push it again when exiting, the LEDs next to the button indicate that the limiter is engaged and the FIA lights will also show in white.
The ‘OIL’ button feeds extra oil into the engine from the supplementary oil tank. This is mainly used for lubrication to protect the engine.
The ‘B’ button is for KERS boost. In 2011, as in 2009, Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems harvest waste energy from the brakes to charge a battery or flywheel which allows an 80bhp boost for 6.67 seconds over a lap. The ‘KRec’ rotary dial is for KERS recovery and dictates how the energy is harvested from the brakes. The driver can also select how the energy is used with the KERS release map (labelled ‘KRel’).
Below this is the system problem button (sometimes displayed on a wheel as a large ‘FAIL’ button). This sets a marker on the telemetry if there is a problem and can restart a system in an attempt to fix it. It can also be used to communicate with the driver’s engineer if the radio system is not working - it acts as a “No” and works in conjunction with the ‘Ack’ acknowledge button. ‘Ack’ can also be used to acknowledge a message from the pit-wall if a radio-acknowledgement is not required. The ‘Box’ button works in a similar way and is used to confirm that the driver will pit after the current lap.
The large multifunction rotary dial in the middle of the wheel controls various setup and display options. The driver uses the white ‘+’ and ‘-’ buttons to select a specific option and ‘Ack’ to confirm. The type of buttons used will depend on the amount of sub-menus and presets each car has - for example, the Red Bull, Ferrari and Toro Rosso cars use ‘x10’ and ‘x1’ buttons to quickly choose between double-figure menu options. What is incorporated into the multifunction control depends on the team’s preferences - most teams will have a separate fuel mixture dial which affects how lean or rich the engine runs. This is especially important now that in-race re-fuelling has been banned as a driver may need to preserve fuel if running low.
Some cars will have an ‘SC’ button which activates presets for when the safety car has been deployed and the car is running at lower speeds. A minimum lap time, set by the FIA, will also be shown on the main display panel.
The ‘BP’ button is often shown as ‘Bpf’ which stands for ‘Bite Point Find’. It is to test the behaviour of the clutch before it is required - for example at a race start.
The blue ‘W’ button is new for 2011. In 2010, drivers had a front-wing flap activation button with which they could apply more or less front wing angle at certain points in a lap. Rotary dials would be used to set the angle change and the ‘W’ button activated the wing. In 2011, this button has a similar use but it is now to activate the DRS rear-wing system. When this button is pushed, the rear-wing flap opens to reduce drag and allow the car to reach a higher top speed. In a race, this can only be activated if a following car is within one second of the car in front at a DRS marker, an FIA LED will inform the driver if they are within this one second window.
The ‘R’ button is radio communications with the pitwall. Some teams prefer to use a switch that flicks on or off so that the driver doesn’t have to hold the button down - they will usually have a time-limited cut-off in case the driver accidently flicks the switch or forgets to turn it off.
The ‘D’ button is the drinks button - it is the small paddle on the opposite side of the ‘Probl’ button. The driver has a tube that feeds under the lip of the helmet or through a hole at the front. This is connected to a small drinks bottle within the car (usually between 700ml and 1l) which has an electronic pump so the driver can receive a short burst of liquid when required. The bottle needs to be insulated well so that the water does not boil - Keke Rosberg once burnt his tongue as the drinks bottle got too hot from engine heat.
The ‘RPM’ rotary dial adjusts the rev limit of the car. This is sometimes seen as ‘EoS’ on a steering wheel which stands for ‘End of Straight’.
The ‘Pedal’ rotary dial is sometimes labelled as ‘Toque’ or ‘TRQ’. It sets the pedal map for the car which determines how much torque is delivered when the driver puts his foot down. In the wet, the pedal map is softened to reduce the chances of spinning from too much torque being delivered from the engine in low-grip track conditions.
If the weather changes and the team fit new tyres, the driver must reset the steering wheel to work with the new tyres. Wet tyres have a larger rolling-radius than dry tyres to raise the ride-height and reduce the chances of the bottom of the car aquaplaning. The settings need to be altered so that the electronics can continue to perform calculations effectively. The ‘RL’ on the rotary switch stands for ‘Rear Light’ or ‘Rain Light’ which activates the large red LED light on the rear crash structure so following cars are able to see the leading car in adverse conditions.
On the back of the steering wheel are four paddles. Some teams will add extra buttons and paddles to the back when experimenting with new settings so that competitors cannot see their work. The two upper paddles control the gears - right for shifting up and left for shifting down. The two below are for the clutch. They both do the same job, however when a driver leaves the pitlane, their hands can only control one side due to the cramped nature of the cockpit. At a race start, the standard practice for drivers is to pre-set one clutch position before fully engaging the second. As the red lights go out, the second clutch is released and the driver allows a certain amount of clutch slip with the first paddle before they feel the car has picked up enough traction to fully release this paddle also. If the driver spins the car, there is an anti-stall system but it is only effective over a short period of time so one or both of the clutch paddles need to be depressed to keep the engine running.
There is also a quick-release mechanism which allows the driver to get out of the car as quickly as possible. With the steering wheel in place, the driver cannot move their legs beyond the steering column - after an accident they must be able to get out of the car within five seconds.
Each driver will also have extra controls inside the cockpit such as the brake bias adjuster. This sets the pressure applied to the front or rear brakes to provide the best balance when braking for a corner without locking the wheels. KERS harvesting can affect braking characteristics so the driver needs to find the best possible balance.
A lot has changed in the last few years, especially with the banning of traction control and LCD screens on steering wheels plus the implementation of standardised ECUs, but one thing is for sure - the £40,000 wheels on today’s modern machines are a far cry from even the most advanced road car wheel.