The vogue for year-long development gimmicks appears set to continue for 2012, with reports suggesting that Lotus F1's new 'reactive ride height system' will become the new innovation du jour for the sport this season.
Reports on Lotus's new innovation sprung up earlier in the week, when the Italian Gazzetta dello Sport publication suggesting that the team had run an early version of the device in November's Young Driver Test.
The new system, which brings to mind the team's controversial mass damper system from 2006, is designed to keep the car's ride height level under heavy braking.
Cancelling out the front of the car's tendency to drop under heavy braking would then likely bring aerodynamic benefits.
Initially, reports suggested that the system was in some way driver-controlled, meaning that the device could be banned on the basis that it was a form of 'moveable aerodynamic device'.
However, a new report from the Autosport website has claimed that the device is in fact controlled by the car itself.
The report suggests that the Lotus device "is reactive to brake torque and is linked directly to the suspension - so cannot be classified as a moveable aerodynamic device".
The FIA has apparently passed the system as legal, leading to a fresh development war in Formula One, as rival teams look to trial their own versions of the Lotus system.
The mass damper system used in 2006 was controversially banned midway through the season, however the Autosport report claims that this new reactive ride height system was passed legal by the FIA as early as January 2011.
Apparently, one team has already submitted their own version of the device to the FIA for approval, and a development race seems inevitable.
Speaking at Ferrari's almost-interesting Wroom event, team boss Stefano Domenicali admitted that he was aware of the device.
"It is a system that I know there have been some documents in writing between the FIA and the teams," he was quoted as saying.
"We are waiting for the final confirmation if this kind of devices will be acceptable or not. But for sure we are looking around these sorts of devices to see if they contribute to a performance."
The race to be the first team to perfect the technology will mirror the big development wars of the last three seasons.
In 2009, double diffusers were pioneered by the likes of Brawn GP at the start of the season, before teams moved on to copying McLaren's F-duct in 2010.
Last year, the blown diffusers and associated off throttle engine mapping were the dominant areas of innovation.
Lotus themselves, as Renault, had a less successful time in that race. They raised eyebrows during pre-season with their front-exiting exhausts, but the technology proved flawed and hard to develop.
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