Ferrari F2012 launch, 2012

Ferrari F2012 launch – first pictures and video of Ferrari’s 2012 F1 car

2012 F1 cars

Posted on

| Written by

Ferrari have revealed their 2012 F1 car in Maranello. The team’s latest challenger has been named the F2012.

After Fernando Alonso narrowly missed out on the championship in 2010, Ferrari endured a poor season by their standards last year. Alonso won just once and Felipe Massa never finished higher than fifth.

The team vowed to take a less conservative approach with their new car.

“The main changes when compared to 2011 concern the height of the front section of the chassis, the position of the exhaust pipes and the mapping for the electronic engine management,” said a statement released by the team.

“Practically every area of the car has been fundamentally revised, starting with the suspension layout: both the front and rear feature pull-rods, aimed at favouring aerodynamic performance and lowering the centre of gravity.

“The front wing is derived from the one introduced on the 150 Italia in the final part of its racing life and has been evolved from there. Further evolutions are planned in this area for the opening races of the season.

“The nose has a step in it that is not aesthetically pleasing: with the requirement from the regulations to lower the front part, this was a way of raising the bottom part of the chassis as much as possible for aerodynamic reasons. The sides have been redesigned, through modifications to the side impact structures, the repositioning of the radiators and revisions to all aerodynamic elements.

“The lower part of the rear of the car is much narrower and more tapered, a feature achieved partly through a new gearbox casing and a relocation of some mechanical components. In recent years, the area of exhausts has been crucial in terms of car performance and much effort was expended on this front, based on changes to the regulations introduced this year. The rear wing is conceptually similar to the one used in 2011, but every detail of it has been revised and it is now more efficient.

“Naturally, it is still fitted with DRS (a drag reduction system,) which is operated hydraulically. The front and rear air intakes for the brakes have been redesigned and work was carried out in collaboration with Brembo to optimise the braking system.”

Heavy snow in Maranello forced the team to cancel their launch ceremony and scrap plans for a shakedown run on their Fiorano circuit.

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

First pictures of Ferrari’s new F1 car:

Ferrari F2012 launch video

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

2012 F1 cars

Browse all 2012 F1 cars articles

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

Got a potential story, tip or enquiry? Find out more about RaceFans and contact us here.

257 comments on “Ferrari F2012 launch – first pictures and video of Ferrari’s 2012 F1 car”

  1. Oh my…

    1. Exactly my response as well @Sherlock what a munter!

      But if its quick then Alonso and the Tifosi won’t mind one bit. Interesting that Ferrari seem to be angling their exhausts at the brake ducts. I got this impression from the weird exhausts on the MP4-27 as well. If the RB8 looks like this it might well be the first ‘must have’ of 2012.

      1. peru-kowalsky
        3rd February 2012, 14:59

        http://www.marca.com/2012/02/03/multimedia/graficos/1328275973.html
        This comparative between this and last year is very interesting if some fans want to take a look.

        1. hang on a tick. i thought the new nose regulations were supposed to lower it? from the fron comparison, the 2012 ferrari actually has a higher nose than last year!

          1. @sato113 the F2012; from the bump to the cockpit, is exactly the same height. From the bump forwards it’s lower.

          2. @raymondu999 yes but the end of the nose is higher slightly. the rest doesnt matter. dont forget the new nose rules were introduced in order to stop cars flying up in the air if the nose hits a rear tyre of the car infront.

          3. @sato113 no it’s not. The F150 nose wouldn’t even be legal this year because it’s so high.

            Use the wheelnut as a reference point, and compare: http://autoweek.com/galleryimage/CW/20110128/F1/128009995/PH/1/1/Ferrari-F150_1.jpg

          4. @raymondu999 ok it’s not ‘slightly higher’ but both noses are roughly the same height. here’s the proof- something i knocked up on ms paint.

            http://i41.tinypic.com/2ebhhs2.jpg

          5. seems the 2011 ferrari nose wasn’t that high in the first place i guess.

          6. @sato113 You need to get your terms right. The “nose” is the bit that gets changed when someone breaks a front wing. The part between the driver and front wheels is known as the bulkhead. That is NOT changed (in terms of regs for 2012). Only the nose regs are changed.

          7. @raymondu999 I’ve been talking about the nose all along. I’ve been talking about the end of it (ie. the pointy bit which is the first body part to hit the rear tyre of a car infront). these new rules were made to lower that contact point (end of the nose) so that cars wouldn’t fly up in the air if they hit a rear tyre.

            what my arguement is is that the end of the nose on the new ferrari is barely lower than on the 2011 car.

          8. @raymondu999, to me it seems that @satu113 is indeed right about the tip of the nosecone being slightly higher and the bottom of the nosecone being flatter and a tad higher than last year, probably because the nose section was shortened quite a bit and is now far wider and flatter in total (in front of the jump down from the bulkhead)

            That MARCA gallery with comparisons is really nice, its available in English as well! by the way.

          9. @sato113 I’ve re read a set of the 2011 tech regs again – and I see now. Ferrari’s start of the nose on the F150 was at max height; but they tapered the front off so that the nose tip had a more gentle transition to the nose. The tip and underside aren’t at absolute max height. I do apologize.

            Here’s a better way to compare the heights by the way.

            @keithcollantine you might also be interested in that link – it’s the slider comparing thing; fantastic for making direct comparisons.

        2. @peru-kowalsky great find!

          That slider thing is really useful. It’s interesting to see that both Ferrari and Mclaren have angled their sidepods so that there is a small channel towards the rear wing – obviously a similar concept, if a lot smaller, as the U-pods last year.

        3. Very good link, thanks; awesome comparation with the cursor!

        4. Very cool that they put together that comparison, but I’m a bit confused: the wheelbase looks longer from the side, but shorter from the top.

          Anyone know if the wheelbase has changed at all, and if so, in what direction?

          1. I doubt they would have changed the wheelbase much, maybe a bit of finetuning due to going for a different suspension but that’s it (weight distribution stays unchanged, but Ferrari did have a bit of a problem with the tyres, so they might have done a small shift)

      2. I think there’ll be two trends this year, as I read on ScarbsF1. One is to angle the exhausts as low as possible creating an area of downforce around the brake ducts, which is far from compensating blown diffusers, but is still something. Another, more classical, is to angle them high aiming for the lower piece of the rear wing, creating some downforce there but risking the structure there, something which used to happen years before (See Ralph Firman crash at Hungaroring 2003). I’d go for the brakes solution, seems to have a double advantage (aerodynamics and refrigeration)

      3. You are right, if it’s quick then I couldn’t care less. Funny thing is, the nose has already grown on me, in the same way that high rear wings don’t even look weird anymore.

        I think you are definitely right about the exhaust exit, they are going into the fins where the brake duct is. Surprised more teams aren’t doing it. Supposedly it is difficult because it is near to the cooling duct but I don’t see why, I imagine the hot exhaust gases move so quickly that they don’t deviate much.

    2. Didn’t know Ferrari hired stone masons to design the car…

      1. I guess Ferrari wants to be a notch above the rest!

  2. Hahah someone hit it with the ugly stick.

    1. they said it was going to be ugly… and they were just damn right! this is seriously ugly!

      The ugliest car I’ve ever seen since I watch F1, certainly.

      Now the Caterham doesn’t look too bad and the McLaren looks epic…

      1. I never thought aesthetics were important for F1, allthough naturally I do enjoy pretty cars. However, what strikes me most isn’t the fact that this is ugly (it is), but that every fibre in my body wants to tell me that this can’t be the best solution when talking about aerodynamics.

        I do believe that at least the smoother Force India version must be better, and that McLaren probably figured out how to do it properly. I can’t possibly imagine how a formula car, smashing its forehead into the wind like this can be aerodynamically efficient.

          1. Those were exactly my thoughts! Boy it’s ugly!
            The nose is so square it looks like a scaled Lego Ferrari, those wheels are ok but they also have a fake plasticky look. And I thought that a lower nose would make it look longer but that Ferrari just looks like it had its nose chopped off, it looks so short!!

    2. I think it just looks mean. Better than Caterham and Force India IMO.

  3. Are Ferrari aware that someone nicked their car and replaced it with a combine harvester?

    1. Maybe they built the wintunnel models from LEGO and forgot to tell the guys to refine the front a bit?

      1. I couldn’t stop laughing at that comment.

      2. Hahaha, brilliant.

      3. So far, McLaren is the only one without that ugly Lego Nose? Can’t wait to see the rest!

        1. OMG that’s funny.

        2. LOL the jokes are just flowing today!!

  4. Duck Bill 2-1 Decent Car Design

  5. argh… the nose is horrible, but this was expected

    1. as just everyone laughed at the ‘anteater’ nose of F2001, i hope that the F2012 will shut up the critics.
      He laughs best who laughs last…

      1. In the end of the day, it’s all down to performance. F1 is not a beauty constes :).

  6. Whoa. I mean, just… Wow.

  7. DAT NOSE

    Oh my goodness. I never thought I’d be one to care about how F1 cars look, but that is one crooked conk! I wonder what Enzo would’ve made of it…

    1. When they showed pictures of the nose a couple of weeks ago, I thought that was just schematically showing the boundaries of the new rules. Turns out its not :-(

      But its not the ugliest Ferrari F1 car built (just look at this one)., although it would certainly make it into the top 10.

      Interesting, they point the exhaust outlet towards the rear wheel ducts/vanes. Lets see what happens with it in testing then.
      Also interesting to note that with the exhaust outlet, the backside of the sidepods is not much different from last years McLaren with the U-shaped channels.

      1. Honestly, @BasCB, I prefer the 312 B3 “Spazzaneve”!

        1. LOL, at least its a complete box!

    2. After more than 60 years the red goddess decided to have cosmetic surgery .. and it turned out like most old divas.

      I’m already kind of getting used to it though.

    3. It has Alonso’s Nose. The ugly duckling.

      1. Alain Prost, the new Ferrari Chief Designer, exacts his revenge on his former employer.

  8. Good lord. F1F crashing in 3….2….1…..

  9. It has a witchypoo nose.. why lord why…

  10. I have to admit, I did flinch slightly as that nose was revealed. The flat red Livery does not flatter it.

    1. OH MY GOD!!! This just gets worse.

      1. Not really, at least Force India and Catheram have a sculpted step. Ferrari just have a big ignorant slope.

        1. I personally prefer the ignorant slope, but not that much.

    2. It is going to be hard picking the 2012 ugliest F1 car. Lots of really good competition this year.

  11. i think its awesome!

  12. Quicker than on there own site.

    ^ Championship winning car ^, RBR and Mclaren will have to fight for 2nd

    1. It’s all relative.. Mclaren have gone for a better looking car, it’s aerodynamic superiority is yet to be assessed. Ferrari have said they’ve gone for an aggressive design, and it certainly looks a lot more agressive than Caterham’s nose.
      All that’s left is to see what Mercedes can produce, and what RBR’s pet Newey can come up with!

      1. I was serious, I think they might leap frog Mclaren and RBR

        1. Based on…?

      2. I was serious, I think they might leap frog Mclaren and RBR, look like the made the nose out of lego bricks though (other building bricks are available) ;-)

  13. i like it different but it was expected same with the force india

  14. Oh my god, my eyes!

    I kind of like the sidepods but that nose…. that’s horrendous!

    1. Imagine it in HD… *shudder*

    2. I know. Worst looking Ferrari ever? I knew I shouldn’t have been so quick to slate the Mclaren. It might actually look good if it wasn’t for that awful dip in the nose even Eau Rouge doesn’t have that much of a gradient change.

      1. I actually like McLaren nose. Better than last year. More like at Renault’s 2010 car which looked great.

  15. The nose is the only bit I don’t really like. Other than that, it’s not a bad looking car! Still, I preferred the F150 Italia thing or whatever it was called.

  16. It looks like Kim Kardashian, great rear but horrendous nose.

    1. @Macca A very good summary.

  17. I think that even worse than the Caterham…very aggressive step and a really flat nose forward of the step. #eeewwwwwwwww

  18. Domenicali wasn’t lying :D

  19. OMG, THEY HAVE IT! THE NOSE!!! LOVE IT!!!

    1. In the sense that is so clearly the worse, most blocky, and extreme way the 2012 rules allow the nose, it is as if they wanted to make a point? It could almost be magnificent in its brutality, I guess.

      Having now seen a shot from the front, they do clearly get a lot of air under it though, quite impressive.

  20. Did MC Escher design this car? It just looks wrong to my eyes. You’ve got all these angles at one end and curves at the other, and it just seems to come across as entirely contradictory. Even if the Caterham CT-01 had a beautiful rear despite its nose, the F2012 is just as ugly at the back as it is at the front. Maybe the FIA should put a rush order on those low noses for 2013 …

    1. @prisoner-monkeys

      I kind of thought the same when I first looked at it. But the fact it’s so different any of the others we’ve seen (in my eyes) is really intriguing. Something tells me it’s going to be either hugely fast, or massively slow.

      1. @electrolite – I can’t help but think that Ferrari and Caterham are only using the stepped nose because they’re obligated to under the rules. Given the choice, they would no doubt run a full nose at the full height. McLaren and Force India, on the other hand, have found inventive solutions to the height discrepancy in the rules; McLaren found a way to avoid the step, whilst Force India took it to an extreme and came up with something very interesting.

        With its blocky angles, oversized front wing and stick-out exhaust outlet, I can’t help but think that Ferrari have looked to a combine harvester for inspiration.

        1. Roll on Melbourne that’s what I say.

        2. I don’t see how Mclaren going for a slope is more inventive in itself than Ferrari pushing the limit of the rules.

    2. @Prisoner-Monkeys Looking at it I would have pretty serious concerns about the incline of that nose as well. The angle is almost as severe as a wing! Surely it’s going to upset flow to the rear wing/over the sidepods being that steep.

      All I can think is that Ferrari have decided the air flow under the nose to the floor and sidepods is way more important.

      1. Same here, I’m still trying to figure out why they would leave the nose like that. Not a clue.

        1. I’m guessing that despite the extreme angle at the step, the flow of air over the car isn’t interrupted. Certainly not to the extent that the images imply they might be. I can only imagine that the the angle “kicks” the air up, where it gets caught by the airbox.

          1. @prisoner-monkeys Really the bump of the nose has a very little aero effect, just a local high pressure followed by low pressure and two weak vortices on the sides

      2. @bleeps_and_tweaks @electrolite as I said above, there is very little aero effect. Just a local high pressure zone followed by a local low, and a couple of weak vortices.

      3. And i think this steeped nose will provide two benefit:

        1. More air to feed into the sidepod and the rear and
        2. Air over the nose will directly goes for the additional cooing inlets nd thus provide more air nd they can be blown into the rear simultaneously as well….

        :D

  21. Kill it before it lays eggs!…although i do like the back part and sidepods.

    1. thats brilliant!

  22. Oh dear….I reckon I can delete the standard reply of “f1 is just so sexy” from my vocabulary.

  23. Jake (@jakehardyf1)
    3rd February 2012, 9:19

    I just spewed in my mouth. The McLaren is gorgeous compared to this :(

  24. I had to look away from my screen when they unveiled that nose, I truly did, looks terrible, but it’s a Ferrari Formula One car, so I’m ok with that ;)

  25. it’s not just the nose, it’s got weird growths coming out of the sidepods, and a bit of a hunchback too

  26. That is probably the ugliest Ferrari I have seen. I don’t really know what to say, this is quite shocking. But as I said about the McLaren, it will most lokely improve a lot when its on a track.

    Anyone remember the tradition that every year when the car was revealed, Schumacher said it was the prettiest car he had ever seen (which was usually true)?! I can’t see Alonso (or anyone) say that. Domenicali was absolutely right when he said it wasn’t pleasing on the eye and its not just the nose. The exhaust construction looks even more extreme than McLarens, I’m a bit surprised FIA didn’t deem them against the spirit of the rules.

    Well, I’ll take that car, it will be ok, but it has to be as fast as its ugly.

    1. @bananarama Juan Manuel Fangio said that, already in the late 1940s, he had understood that the winning cars were always the most beautiful ones. That was after he had won a race driving some utter crocodile :)

    2. The Ferraris Michael Schumacher drove got better every year, until 2004 I’d say. The F2005 was a small step backwards in aestehetics, then the 248 F1 and the F2007 were better and the F2008 was the best.

  27. LEGO NOSE

    1. Thought I was the only one looking at one of those lego ferrari kits

  28. Oh dear, it looks like it’s already crashed and had it’s nose broken!
    (I thought the exhausts were supposed to exit at an upward angle under the new rules?)

    1. Well maybe the actual exhausts are at an upward angle but the bodywork was “coincidently” formed that way .. who knows.

  29. Phew… that is pretty bad indeed. I kind of expected bigger winglets in front of the sidepods though, the drawings showed a lot bigger ones… but I already thought they’d be illegal by today’s rules.

    Yeah, well… let’s hope these noses disappear after 2012… that’s all there is left to say really.

  30. Their merchandise deal with LEGO does really show this time around.

    1. Finally a nose that can be accurately represented in LEGO?

  31. Mikkel Sørensen (@)
    3rd February 2012, 9:23

    Mclaren mentioned they where prepared for a legal battle over their new car.. Have anybody heard some more about this? I guess they are referring to the nose.. I just can’t imagine the Mclaren nose being legal when none of the other teams who have presented their car yet have a similar nose?

    1. Check out scarbsf1’s blog. He explained why the nose is indeed legal. It’s simply lower than the others.

    2. Mclaren used a lower chasis and it was the only team to use it, that was part of 2012 reg there for the nose is legal. Green talked about it on the launching of force india sahara.

  32. UNeedAFinn2Win
    3rd February 2012, 9:25

    This year is NOT one to try get your friends onboard F!…just wow, w-o-w…

    …wait, we’re not trying to break into a major market this season, are we ?

  33. The sad thing is that this is completely unnecessary. Mclaren showed you can still make a beautiful-not hideous car, with the current regulations.

    So so unnecessary…

    1. Time will tell how unnecessary it is. The McLaren, while looking gorgeous, could be a brick with wheels. The Ferrari, while looking like lego bricks on wheels, could perform gorgeously.

      Obviously, I hope not – hopefully, McLaren have produced a championship winning car.

    2. Most important things is Mac is continuing their design philosophy from 2011 to present car, but if other cars want to do the same low nose then they have to completely redesign their car nd have to adopt a new design philosophy. so why to change to a new uncertain design, it is logical to go for the known track and re tuned it. Hope i m right……..

  34. Won’t that bump in the nose will help for more front grip ? Since it is a higher surface against the wind, like a pressure ?