FIRST LOOK: Red Bull RB17 Hypercar – 1200hp, 15,000rpm, Fast As F1!

this is the rb1 17 a 5 million track only hyper car created by Formula 1 design genius adri Nei and built by the Advanced Technologies arm of the Red Bull Formula 1 team and while Nei is definitely leaving Red Bull at the end of the 2024 season he confirmed to Top Gear that whatever he does next a contract exists that ensures he'll bring the RB 17 to fruition now here's the man himself to tell us all about it Adrian it's wonderful to see you and thank you to well what's this room referred to as I mean obviously all your previous work I guess the museum it's a sort of working Museum we've got the show bit out there and then this is the bit where the cars are already stored and it gives us a a a great opportunity say the RB 17 um the name first of all let's start a little bit about that so it was because of Co interruptions or something yeah exactly right so the the new rules for what was going to be 2021 um were issued in kind of back end of 2019 so we team started working on the on the 21 regulations in 2020 and obviously Co struck uh there's the compulsory Factory shut down for all team for almost three months at which point of course there wasn't enough time to design a new car for for um 21 so the regulations changed to say that we had to run an evolution of the 20 car and 21 which is a 16b for us um and so it meant that the car we had been working on RB 17 was stillborn and and actually the timing also worked out because I rather kind of foolishly gave myself a very busy 2021 in as much as I did the the first drawing for this um in January but at the same time we then had the development program for the 16b through the season because we had that very tight Championship battle with Lewis and Mercedes and of course we were working on the the research and design for the for the brand new car 22 so I've got to ask you um the just is for this I mean this this I'm I'm thinking you must have been thinking about something along these lines way back I mean High far back even to the very early days of of your career you always thought I would like to do the ultimate Road Track Car yes I suppose it was about 200 and also maybe a little bit later I can't remember then Sony PlayStation approached me and um just before Christmas and said would I be interest in designing a a no rules Formula 1 car and that particular Christmas we went um to Switzerland skiing but the snow was poor so I was kind of bit bored sitting around in the shallal and uh and so I started that sketching what became the the PlayStation X1 and so always had that in the back of their mind um tell tell me about the the partry and the chassis the and the intent behind it I think the intent is the most important bit to start with and the intent really was to create a car that was capable Formula 1 lap times but at the same time be accessible to people and for two people at that so that if you're a driver that would like a coach then you can have a coach this passenger seat so share the experience share the joy of the car that and and try to make the car are really accessible and adaptable so those were kind of the fundamental Keys then you say okay what else we like from the car my belief is cars at this level should also be art pieces really that you treat literally as a piece of art or sculpture see that fascinates me I I assumed that the science part of this was just going to predominate um and that how it looks which is amazing obviously um is some some way certainly secondary and maybe quite a long way behind but actually people buy these things because they look super cool don't they in my career which is always been performance orientated um when it comes to the aerodynamics then then you have to go with what makes the fastest car stopwatch is always the the master with this I wanted it to be a bit more kind of a a rounded product in terms of the looks the sound and of course the driving experience and the as I mention mention the range of accessibility can you tell me what engine it will be it's obviously this is a static model doesn't have that yet but what are we talking uh so it's it's a a V10 naturally aspirated uh 15,000 RPM uh 1,000 horsepower the the roots of the engine was in discussion with um our power train division newly formed um as to kind of what we could do how we could achieve it and then from there we we took that and and worked with Cosworth and so they are then taken if you like our specification for what we want to achieve and and gone off and um done the rest of the research and and the detailing it's been running as a single for a while um blocks now being cast and they will be starting to build up the first re engine shortly this one was kind of really focusing even more on weight um so the valkyrie engine was 200 kilos this was be 150 kilo good Lord so it's a what size is it what capacity uh it's only 4.5 4.5 L V10 R to 15,000 RPM no the V10 thing I mean as well as creating something that looks beautiful uh a big driver for this project is the is the noise as well so like like most of us I suspect you're a little underwhelmed by the the sign of the current F1 engine yeah couldn't possibly comment but I think um if I if I kind of over my career then then obviously had a huge number of different engines from kth V8s to to Ferrari v12s and and and the various v10s and I think the V10 it's obviously very subjective for me the high reving V10 was was was the best sounding engine but it does have an e-motor it does have an e and the e- motor that's really a development of of what we did with Valkyrie which it fulfills quite a few functions it means that the clutch it makes pull away very easily because it pulls away on the electric motor um the combustion engine only engages when you're doing sort of I don't know on barer case I think it's about 15 mil hour be slightly more on this it saves you a gear because effectively first gear is is you don't need a a short first gear it also for performs the function reverse so you throw away two gears to start with it gives torque infill it gives extra power boost um 200 horsepower so it's an extra 200 horsepower m in exactly same way as as the current form One cars so it more than justifies itself in terms of the waste and the complication just for all the things that all the functions that can can then perform and the other great thing about this car is that there are no rules part of your reputation Adan is built on the fact that you you see things not necessarily loopholes but opportunities in the rules yeah um and that's where you're you're you're you're you're winning often comes from yeah so how is it doing doing a car where you go can do what I want I mean it must be amazing it is it's it's it's very invigorating because as you say so often we're hemmed in by regulations and on the one hand it's exciting to then kind of spot the loopholes or the or probably most importantly kind of what Solutions lend themselves best to a set of regulations and that's something I very much enjoy um with this that constraint as such is removed of course there are other considerations that come in first and foremost the the low capacity of the tars um we've done a formed a collaboration with Michelin for this particular project um so they've developed tires especially for the car they are they are the primary limiting limiting factor but they are the primary limiting factor on ultimately the downforce you can generate and to an extent the performance of the car so that then suggests okay if Tire load is a limitation you certainly want to focus on weight so there's been a big weight Focus the car um depending on what specification you have it in is around 875 kilos good Lord so it's it's quite light with say 1200 horsepower and also I think the way in terms of the light of the car is the the more driving enjoyment it it tends to give can I ask you why you're you're so keen on making this a two-seater would the ultimate expression of this not be the the ultimate expression would be a single cater but I think it's nice to you know I do track days from time to time um and go along with friends and and it's nice to be able to give them a passenger ride if you take away the the art side of it then then it this has to be about enjoyment of the of the owner the customer and the ability to if they wish to to have somebody in the passenger seat I think is is is part of that it's part of the joy of of of the experience and I wanted it to be a two-seater for for those reasons so the passenger is slightly staggered first of all because it you know the natural shape of a human then shoulders your shoulders and elbows are the if you like the widest part so it actually makes sense to stagger slightly um they also the the the elbows in particular if you if you're sitting kind of um side by side and the driver's got his elbows out slightly then it tends to be getting in the way of the passenger and the driver might be worried that that passenger's elbows are going to get in the way as well so just a small amount of stagger gets rid of all those problems um so it's been I think it's quite an elegant solution the car does have some luggage space in the front so it's got space for two sets of overalls it's in front of the rear wheels there's space for helmet on each side so just practicality if if you want to throw your stuff in before it goes to Circuit then you can cup holders H any cup holders sure on cup holders I'm joking um I kind of expected an lmp1 car but I think this is much closer to Formula One yeah and clearly that that and that's that's really tough to do isn't it yeah so I mean the you know my experience recently apart from Valkyrie has all been form one obviously uh and um some of the aerodynamic Solutions in we have in Formula 1 um particularly kind of side exactly then then I this area here that area there and the and the paracity that creates past the rear wheel is something that aerodynamically is a I think a very good feature um so it made sense to to integrate for that to be part of the car of course a form one car then you have a completely separate rear wheel so then it's the problem okay having done this down washing side pod how do you how do you integrate the rear fender which obviously this has been our solution and it is what I should say is that this car this model um is a point in time we have developed the car in CAD got it DFT point and then made a fullsize model like this um that was I can't remember now probably about last April we what we then did was um using what's called augmented reality which is VR goggles but you can still see the room so you can see the car the the virtual car and in this case what we did is put the the real first model um in a room and then put whichever version we were you working on in in in VR next to it so then and that gives you a sense of scale and proportion and everything else which is nice so from that we started to develop what became this so This is actually a point in time last September um so it's it's it's already moved on quite a bit from what you see here uh oh you must drive your people C yeah well that's I mean that's will it ever be finished it has to be finished at some point so the the cars now develop quite a lot from this it's a bit smaller um in length and width oh really uh yeah we just felt it was a little bit on the large side um it's just over 5 m long yeah 2 m wide the the the final car is um I'm not sure if I'm allowed to say this I think I am it's almost exactly the same footprint in terms of length and width as a ason mar and dbx Okay so it it's you know it's um it it's not as small as a valkyrie but equally it's not a it's not a big car can you can you take us through some of the the highlights you know please feel free I I'll do my best to keep up with your brm but you know I mean there there are forms here I mean I don't think I've ever seen anything quite like this before so the the front Wing is obviously as you say free of regulations um then the arrow really is in many ways it's much closer to a Formula 1 car than a an LMP car so it's a a Formula 1 style front Wing but developed without regulations to to suit and because we have a a ful length and quite forward loaded um diffuser or floor then actually the the downforce requirement from the front Wing is is relatively modest we also have to have a system which is capable of losing down Force um from a a depending on which Tire Choice you have from a relatively low speed with the highest load tires then it's about 250 K MH um uh kilm per hour whatever that is um 155 I think yeah around that everything starts backing off so the front Wing backs off um the rear wi backs off uh the back of the diffuser backs off and we also have uh fans so it's a blown diffuser ah no fan slow down okay okay and the ride height changes because we got access so hang on so that's all that all happens is this so when when when there's the thing I wanted to ask you is ordinary Mortals The one thing that that very few people will have any experience of is is the sort of D force that well that that this can generate I understand it's about 1,700 kgs of D Force at under 150 m per hour and I'm not very good at those numbers what I can say is that the the Aero efficiency of the car um I mean a Formula One car I can't remember the exact number but it's probably around three or four in terms of downforce over drag I think some of the LMP cars before they before they got clipped so the end of the last generation around six or seven I'm not exactly sure somewhere around there um this this depending on the condition and the speed is 16 so it's it's it's when you you know something like a a commercial aircraft now it's not a long way off aircraft levels of efficiency which is as far as I know completely unch the territory for Lord and then with the we'll have three levels of Tire Choice a a what's called a Michelin confidential tar which is the highest grip um a little bit more peaky in its operation so as you say if you do if the car does start to slide you've probably got to be quite quick to to Source it out to a a um if you like the standard Michelin slick which will have a a much broader operating window both in terms of slip angle and temperature so it'll be a easier tar to drive um and then a a treaded tar um more like a road tar which offers a further step in that direction again if you like of less GP but bigger board bandwidth um and so that then combined with the with the active suspension in terms of how much Dam Force you want to choose how much stability you want to choose it gives us a huge range of flexibility want it to be something that everybody can access within reasonable levels of experience and enjoy the car and you know I've driven a huge variety of cars over the years um I do a bit of historic racing G exactly GT40 and the E type and so for what do you enjoy this this is a question I was because I've driven I've been fortunate to drive a GT40 and some historic cars now by any measure they are a million miles away from this but there's still massive satisfaction there isn't absolutely absolutely and that is part of the Again part of the motivation for this car is that when I drive say the GT40 tremendous exciting um enjoy it it's a car that once you've got to a a reasonable level of Driving Experience and you can access you can slide it around a bit and you can feel as if you're AER or whatever and I wanted people that to be able to kind of experience the ability to to to feel a car in the same way as I can feel GT40 but also have the adrenaline and and and experience of what it is like to drive at up to form one levels of of lap time this will this will lap Silverstone as fast as a contemporary F1 car yeah yeah that's crazy man yeah the aerodynamics are really focused around guessing the best performance possible as that diffuser um and so the the you go back to I say the front Wing is is generates downforce of course but it's relatively modest because the the center pressure of the diffusers quite far forward which gives you a very Central downforce a nice stable downforce um the car has does have uh fans on it to augment the downforce at low speed to give it very high levels of performance at low speed uh but the they the fans are done in a very different way to to what has been done in the past and indeed compared to the X1 it's it's not two fans yeah two fans yeah correct uh all all all this Arrangement is uh effectively it's like a barge board applied to to a a two-seater okay so that's all about trying to get the front wheel wake out of the way and not go under the floor and then reattach that air flow to the side of the car and then the the porosity on the inside here is is the flow that then comes through fully ATT so you're tidying up the turbulent eror right here yeah this is this has the job of pushing the dirty air out here okay so and then this paracity through here has the job of of keeping this area energized so the floor Edge energized and then ultimately going back through beside the rear wheels so that any flow um beside the rear wheels is tidy and good energy and indeed heading for the rear wing is is the same no the rear wing any any body a lay person can see that it's completely different in design and configuration to an F1 so what's what's talk talk to me about this Formula 1 regulations a rear wing is very limited in Span um it's kind of only about this wide it's aeromic much more efficient to to make the wing as wide as possible make it the full width of the car which is exactly what this does um because that gives you an end placing of the wing out out to here instead of back into here so that has two effects one it makes the the wing much more efficient in itself just like an aircraft the bigger the span uh the more efficient the wing becomes hence gliders sail planes have very large spans compared to their size um but also by by having it out here it helps to draw the the rear wheel wake outboard and and away from the diffuser so it's it's all about increasing the efficiency of that diffuser I suppose compared to a Formula One car the contribution of downfalls from the front and rear wing is less contribution from the the floor is much proportionally much larger because because we're so free of regulations Rel to Formula One on the floor you can do what we want and packaging a 4.5 L V10 engine I mean you said it weighs 180 kilos did you say 150 150 it's still a big big unit it's a still bigger units package but the the was a 6 and a half L V12 in the valkyrie wasn't it correct yeah yeah so it's it's by going to a V10 of small capacities it's a significantly smaller and lighter engine than the valkyrie engine but it's still as you say it's still the big largest V10 um so but that's that's just the usual packaging problem if if exactly same as form one and that you know you go from what effectively dictates the the wheelbase of the car is um guessing the driver's feet far enough rear Woods to allow a good length of nose impact structure um then the the length of the driver and it himself and in this case a passenger that's slightly staggered ruls of the driver the fuel tank and battery battery underneath the fuel tank same as Formula 1 then the combustion engine uh the E motor and the gearbox and that's what you've got to squeeze in and and the gearbox is exactly the same l L out as as a Formula One car so it's a a longitudinal uh gearbox um with a a bevel drive to a final Drive Unit so all the all the same co-developed between Red Bull Advanced Technologies and xtrack is that correct okay so the the the specification of the gearbox comes from us um the detail design of the gears Etc is done by extract which is exactly the same as we do on the formul one car so all the philosophies that have gone into the car right down to things like that are the same as we've done in formal one so I think it it is very much a Formula One technology that we use dayto day applied to this what you say because apart from the the the constraints that you've imposed yourself which we know the two seats um a few other things that we talked about is this the least compromised machine you've ever done yeah for sure absolutely yeah I mean it's Formula One as we said is is is restricted by regulations the regulations we've got for this are effectively self-imposed um Tire loads of course guessing two people in and safety being the the prime ones um and another important part of this is well for me it's if I had it's 5 million pounds isn't it yeah yeah I mean it's an academic sum as far as I'm concerned but um I get to drive a car that you've done but also you guys are going to supply kind of it's a like you know part of the family is that is that an important driver of this as well I it's one of the reasons for living 50 people um or 50 cars I should say is that uh first of all if we w't more than that then we wouldn't be able to uh manufacturing it manufacture it and assemble it in the same way as we do a formal one car and it's going to be done here isn't it it'll be done here it'll be assembled here um and it'll be assembled in exact same way as we the whole process from start to finish from research to design to to development to Manu to to assembly as I mentioned it's all Formula One and it's Keen that we should have that and and take that approach the great thing about this project is it's in many ways seem Formula 1 but actually compared to Formula 1 in a much more stretched out um time scale so a Formula 1 car typically from when you start researching a car let's say particularly if it's a new set of regulations which is be considered in that way then generally speaking in first size of new set of regulations somewhere between 12 and 18 months before the car has to go to its first test with this um as you mentioned earlier my first sketch for it was was very or sort of over the Christmas period into January 21 so and we've we're now out of the concept phase into the detail design phase so we've been on the in the concept phase if you like for 3 years in Formula 1 you be let's say six months or so yeah um and what that's allowed us to do is is really quiz it um be self-critical be very careful on the direction we've taken um quite often gone off on a route evaluated it said no not happy with that changed pursued another route and that's that's been quite exciting because it's not something we normally ever have the the luxury of doing um on the interior that's now what we're working on so we we've got the the inter we've had a seating mockup from really quite early on to work out the air this stuff is I mean I say it like it's an afterthought it's not it's AB you know being comfortable being able to see being able to play absolutely all that making sure that you got a reasonably comfortable space for both the driver and the passenger that all is part of the basic package so we've we've had a a seating mockup for I honestly can't remember it must be 18 months now um to make sure it fulfills all that and of course nobly then you Shuffle things around a bit to to make your all changes so if you like the hardware the the shape or the available structural space the occupants is now fixed now it's moving into okay where do you put switches the details of the ergonomics where do you put screens all that sorts of stuff um how do you look make it look nice again the the interior obviously from the sort of customer uh enjoyment the interior is an important factor so so we don't want it to just look like a sparen kind of race car well I was going to ask you that you know there is a certain Beauty in you know being minimal yeah but equally a lot of people expect you know screens how many screens you have in there yeah what how how are you on on haptics I mean do you like physical buttons obviously physical yeah I think especially on on a car of this level of performance you haven't got you can't be kind of no you need to know straight away that you need a physical knob that you change um so and in the interior of the car we will then offer different options so massage seats you does it have massage seats I'm afraid it's a bit short well yes it's the car yeah someone did say that yeah 15,000 RPM there's a degree of massaging going on yeah yeah I the question I wrote down was is there a certain acceptable level of kind of you talk about anticipation SL trepidation when you when you approach a car I would say the Aston Martin Valkyrie generates a fair bit of that and I and I have driven it um and it's pretty edgy mhm is that an important component here you know I I think it should be I mean I think perhaps people haven't some people haven't properly understood the the valkyrie I liken it to you can you can either if you're a motorbiker you can buy a Gold Wing and get one experience or you can buy a modern super bike and get a very different experience the valkyrie has clearly aimed more at the super super bike end of things and this is the next level or several levels to be honest on from that if you get in it with that tingle of excitement and adrenaline and nervousness I think that's that I find personally when I get in a race car particularly the faster cars that's what I feel and and and I think um that's part of the excitement of it what's your favorite bet on this car or what are you most proud of package it's I mean for me it's always the package it's no individual feature or something it it's it's about the holistic kind of making sure that everything communicates mechanically aerodynamically vehicle Dynamics Etc one the things on the styling side that I've always I was very keen to make sure is that the it looks as if whoever designed the front fender is the same person designed the rear fender because how often you you see cars where there's there's no obvious communication between the front of the car and the back of the car in all sentences also the nose versus the tail Etc um try to make it so it's it's it's very homogeneous Adrian thank you pleasure thank you very much thank you uh I'll fil in the bank this afternoon okay what uh 10 20% deposit with that secure yeah absolutely thanks thank you [Music]

Channel: Top Gear

Views: 525,217

Keywords: Top Gear, red bull, hypercar, bhp, 1200hp, rpm, 15000rpm, f1, adrian newey, RB17, v10, rb17 hypercar, rb17 sound, rb17 red bull, rb17 engine sound, naturally aspirated v10 sound, red bull applied technologies, track only hypercars, blown diffuser sound, red bull f1, red bull hypercar, adrian newey interview, adrian newey red bull, hypercar vs f1

Id: YLIEeDL2J6M

Length: 30min 48sec (1848 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 12 2024