Lotus’s double-DRS concept won’t make its race debut until the Japanese Grand Prix at the very earliest, technical director James Allison has confirmed.
The team had hoped to race the ‘device’ in Hungary, but opted against the idea due to a lack of understanding. It was then hoped they could run it last weekend in Belgium, but the wet weather meant they couldn’t gather any data and therefore opted against it once again.
Lotus’s DDRS explained
The Lotus system has nothing to do with the DRS, in fact it shares much more with the F-duct from 2010. Air enters the two small ducts either side of the engine duct and, at high-speed (i.e. on a straight) it is channelled over the rear-wing, stalling it and reducing drag, but at low-speed it simply leaves the rear of the car through a second channel.
Allison confirmed it wouldn’t make an appearance this week at Monza due to the nature of the circuit.
“Although we would like to have it at Monza – because it is the type of circuit that rewards such a thing – we don’t have the DRS device configured to cope with the Monza level of downforce,” he confirmed. “So it is not even on the table.”
Nor will it be seen in Singapore where it would offer little benefit due to the lack of long-straights. Japan however offers the perfect opportunity, weather permitting, to debut the F-duct style system
“In Singapore you won’t see it either, because it’s too high a downforce circuit with insufficient straights for it to be worthwhile. The earliest you might see it now is Suzuka,” he added.
