Waiting for IndyCar tech updates? Some are already here, or coming very soon

IndyCar is on the cusp of a revolution. You could feel it in the paddock at St. Petersburg with new talent coming in thanks to higher wages meant to attract the “best of…”, including mechanics and engineers. There’s the FOX partnership that made those flashy driver commercials your friends and family have been asking you about because they “saw that thing you watch on TV during the Super Bowl.” And it seems like the diehard fans who have been critical of the series for its outdated chassis and technology — hoping to see like-minded changes like those in Formula 1 and IMSA — might finally get everything they’ve been wanting. But the questions now are what will those updates look like, and when will we finally see them?  

Some are already here. Others, will arrive sooner than you would think.

The customized wheel guns that made it to F1

IndyCar pit stops can be incredibly brutal on wheel guns because if you haven’t noticed, the tire changers drop them between tire swaps. Then there’s the outside front tire changer flinging their wheel gun back towards the wall in order to allow a driver to take off once the pit stop is complete. For this reason, Paoli, a leader in making professional wheel guns for motorsport series, looked to IndyCar to figure a basis of design for its Hurricane series which is used in many top level racing championships. Because if a wheel gun can survive use in IndyCar — it will be able to survive use in just about any series.

Scott McLaughlin, Team Penske

Photo by: Penske Entertainment

That toss from the front outside tire changer dictated the basic formula of Hurricane 2.0 development because the case and internals needed to be able to survive being flung on the ground or against the wall from a few feet away. Once the wheel guns were fully developed, they made their way to other series, including Formula 1, where they are stripped down and rebuilt to the custom spec of each team with a variety of different internals and sensors.

Wheel gun customizations made their way to IndyCar’s pit lane with items such as a drop shuttle (large plates that are installed onto the shuttle switch on the back of the wheel gun) which changes the direction of the socket. These started as one-off pieces that were once machined by teams in-house. But Paoli has built a version of their own that saw a successful debut at St. Pete. 

How a drop shuttle works is that once a tire changer has loosened a wheel nut, they can drop the wheel gun on the ground and the plate on the drop shuttle will push the shuttle switch up as it falls so when the tire changer picks up the wheel gun they can go straight to the trigger and tighten the new wheel back onto the car without an additional step required.

A variety of other modifications were apparent on many of the paddock’s wheel guns ranging from custom shrouds around the sockets to custom grips. But the most notable addition was a sensor package that appears on the Meyer Shank Racing wheel guns. They are using the latest Hurricane 2.0 variant of the Paoli wheel gun and appear to be employing position sensors similar to those seen in Formula 1 which helped them to verify that a wheel nut is tight.

The Hurricane 2 Paoli drop shuttle custom shroud in use in the Arrow McLaren paddock in St. Petersburg

Photo by: Bozi Tatarevic

‘Steering’ success in IndyCar’s hybrid era

F1 may be benefiting from wheel gun durability designed for IndyCar, but IndyCar seemingly doesn’t match the technological innovation that the pinnacle racing series achieves. Instead, it’s often criticized for not upgrading certain components like the Dallara DW12 chassis, which has been said to be “old enough to compete in vintage races.” But a stop in Chip Ganassi Racing’s paddock proved that information isn’t entirely true. 

The DW12 isn’t as old as many believe, despite the original chassis’ introduction in 2012. Team manager and strategist Barry Wanser walked me through some of the chances with a firsthand look underneath the body work of the No. 10 car of Alex Palou to see just how it’s changed in its decade-plus of existence. 

He starts with the rear uprights. IndyCar set out to redesign the uprights after an incident at the 2023 Indy 500 which saw the left rear upright and wheel depart from the car of Kyle Kirkwood and over the fence in Turn 2 (which was later found to have landed on a car in the parking lot). IndyCar and Dallara found that a retaining nut was key to the issue and first released an updated version of it before completely redesigning the rear uprights, which became mandatory on ovals starting last May. According to Wanser, the uprights now are stronger than what they were five years ago, as are the intrusion panel upgrades that made the car safer. The chassis itself might not be shiny and brand new as an initial concept, but technological upgrades are still being made to improve the original “mold.”

“Some of that technology that’s developed isn’t wasted, it’s carried over because it’s already new,” Wanser said. “It’s already new, developed stronger parts, so that’s able to carry over to the new car.”

Cosworth’s CCW Mk3 steering wheel for IndyCar

Photo by: Bozi Tatarevic

We make our way to the front of the car, and now stealing focus is the brand new Cosworth CCW Mk3 steering wheel — which was making its IndyCar debut at St. Pete. The biggest benefit of the new steering wheel is its simplification, gaining a dedicated switch for hybrid regeneration or “regen” mapping.

“In order to use the hybrid system in an adjustable way for the driver, we went to 12 position rotaries,” Wanser explained. “You can imagine for each position you have a fuel mixture switch and hybrid level and then on the diagnostic switch you can also change that. So, you can change it to different banks. And again it breaks down to you went from basically just a fuel mixture switch to dozens of mixture switches because it’s not just adjusting the fuel mixture. You can adjust the percentage of regen.

“Imagine on road courses and street courses maximum regen could disturb braking, and as the tires [degrade] and stuff like that, you might want to reduce that to 75% regen, 50%, 20%. That was all adjustable, but it was a massive amount to remember. Now with the new wheel, we basically have that on three switches and we’re able to have one dedicated for fuel again, one dedicated for diagnostics, and now one dedicated just for the hybrid.”

Cosworth worked closely with IndyCar drivers to develop the series’ new steering wheel (which also made it easy for drivers to adapt to using), but a lot of that development started with a wheel already in existence, used in another American series: IMSA. And for good reason.

The update fans and drivers alike have been waiting for

The steering wheel may look familiar because it’s a version similar to what’s already used in the LMDh (Le Mans Daytona hybrid) cars in IMSA’s WeatherTech Sportscar series. And the future of the open-wheel series is very intertwined with the technology coming from the series and its hypercars. 

According to numerous sources in the paddock, the next generation of Indycar is first likely to sport a new Dallara tub which will be built from the ground up to support hybrid components. Where the LMDh formula comes into play is IndyCar’s likely adaptation of a version of the same hybrid system developed by Bosch and Fortescue Zero that is currently in use in the GTP (Grand Touring Prototype) class of IMSA and Hypercar class of WEC.

The Dallara tub will be shaped specifically to allow the hybrid components to be tucked away inside the tub (which are currently stowed away in a tightly-packed bell housing). This new and improved layout would not only move some of the components into a more optimal location from a weight and handling perspective, but the additional space would also allow for larger storage units that could store significantly more energy. More energy allows for more power, as well as additional strategy options for teams to work with for fuel and pitting.

A look at Honda’s current hybrid power unit at the Indianapolis Hybrid Test in 2024

Photo by: Penske Entertainment

An improved hybrid strategy with the possibility of more power is something that at least one of the OEMs in the paddock would like to see, based on my discussion with Chuck Schifsky, the national manager of Honda and Acura Motorsports at American Honda Motor Company. 

“We like the hybrid for a couple of different reasons,” Schifsky shares. “One, from purely an American Honda standpoint, we sell a lot of hybrids. And so we wanted to kind of race what we sell, sell what we race. So that’s important. 

“Additionally, it gives the teams and the driver an additional option in terms of strategy and in terms of the series, in terms of passing and how they configure that. The system that we have now admittedly is small, lightweight. It was the right system at the right time. It may not be the right system going forward. And I think IndyCar knows that. So I think for them, they have to figure out what does that look like, what does that look like going forward? “

That decision is central to the future of IndyCar because the series wants to keep Honda and Chevrolet involved, and possibly attract additional OEMs — all to help improve the health of the series and reduce costs for the current OEMs. When Schifsky spoke with Marshall Pruett at RACER in December 2023, he shared that Honda had concerns with current costs and was considering an exit from the series after their contract ends in 2026. 

“We’ve had a lot of really, as I said at the outset, a lot of really good meetings with IndyCar. What we haven’t done and aren’t going to do, not going to do it today, aren’t going to do it anytime soon, is talk publicly about how those are going, what it looks like, what are the sticking points on either side. And it’s mostly because the conversations are going well,” Schifsky said.

“When I made the comments I did in December of 2023, it wasn’t going as well and we didn’t feel as though we were being heard. We’re definitely being heard. I think that’s a good thing. So if there’s been movement or been progress, it would be that there’s a lot of good conversations going. I think for Honda and for the teams, IndyCar has to be sustainable, not in the green sense, but in the financial sense. And so I think the series has to work on that part of their world, making the series appealing.”

The chaotic start to St. Petersburg race going into the first turns

Photo by: Penske Entertainment

IndyCar’s future is almost here

While the tub and the overall car redesign have not been seen by anyone’s eyes outside of the few involved in making big series decisions, the renderings do exist. And according to Wanser, the rendering looks “pretty awesome” and “great.”

And that exciting bodywork is going to be one of the most important pieces of the new car, which also will allow for better integration for the fairly new aeroscreen, updated in 2024. It has also reportedly taken design cues from other open-wheel series’ cars from other parts of the world. 

IndyCar’s revolution is in the works, and all the new technology already in-hand and what’s rumored to come is set to make fans and its numerous partners happy. We’ll just have to wait… a little bit longer for everything to arrive.