By Austin Lawton, Staff Writer
On June 21, IndyCar announced the long awaited specs for the new chassis formula set to debut in 2028.
“The time has come for a new NTT INDYCAR SERIES chassis,” INDYCAR President J. Douglas Boles said in a press release. “The DW12 served the series so well, as it provided a combination of phenomenal, wheel-to-wheel racing and critical enhancements to safety. But recent significant updates to the car – from the aeroscreen to the hybrid power unit – have helped advance the need for a completely new car. We are pleased by what our engineers and Dallara have collaboratively designed and believe it will appeal to the fans and paddock while also upholding our standards of safety and enhancing INDYCAR’s on-track competition well into the future.”
The new formula, set to begin on-track testing in 2026, will be the first time the series has had a brand new chassis formula since 2012. The current DW12 chassis has seen different aero configurations over the years but a fresh reset is long overdue.
All of the 2028 specifications call for an overall lighter car. The current IndyCar is bogged down with weight from the 35-pound aeroscreen in the front to the 100-pound hybrid unit in the rear.
Dallara will continue to be the sole chassis provider of the series and aims to improve an already safe race car. An ergonomic driver cockpit to improve the position of the seat, integrated aeroscreen and a new roll hoop will be added to the car, per the series.
The new car will be 85-100 pounds lighter than the current car specifications, per IndyCar and will feature a 2.4-liter twin-turbocharged V6 internal combustion engine. The 2.4-liter formula returns to the series after plans were made to introduce this same engine formula in 2024, to pair along with the hybrid, per a RACER article by Marshall Pruett. Instead, the series continued the use of a 2.2-liter twin-turbo V6, introduced in 2012 alongside the DW12 and put the hybrid with that engine formula.
In addition to a new engine formula, expected to provide more torque and power, compared to the current specifications, transmissions will be provided by Xtrac, who has supplied transmissions for IndyCar since 2000.
The new gearbox will be 25 pounds lighter and for those teams that also have Indy NXT by Firestone programs, similar components will be used to streamline usage, per IndyCar.
Brakes will be provided by Performance Friction Corporation, but the big question mark is the hybrid. IndyCar plans to introduce a low-voltage hybrid that aims to have “longer deployment, more horsepower gain and overall improved performance.”
The series has worked with the drivers, going as far as to have a meeting over the winter of 2024 to show drivers a render of a proposed car, to get their input on the car they could potentially be driving.
“I saw a cool picture over the winter at the drivers meetings,” Conor Daly, driver of the No.76 for Juncos Hollinger Racing said. “I guess I was sort of around for when we were getting the DW12, being a budding IndyCar driver and that’s what I wanted to do. I’ve driven every iteration of the DW12, which is crazy.
I’m excited for what they want to do. I think it’s hard to do because of the unique nature of our sport, creating a car that can do 240 mph and also hit the wall at 240 mph, race at Detroit, where every corner is a first-gear corner, that’s hard. Formula One teams aren’t doing that. They’re designing a car specifically for just road courses with the same amount of distance between the track and the walls. It’s a challenge to design a car that kind of fits in all the categories we need. All of the drivers have, for sure, made our officials and our folks aware of what we want to see.
Obviously the fans have been very passionate about what they want, but we’re all kind of all on the same page, right? We would love to see more power, a lighter car, all of those things. I want it to shoot 10 foot flames out the back, but I don’t know if that’s all going to happen or not.
It was a shame to see 2028, but it’s hard. Harder than we would probably expect.”
Daly, along with Graham Rahal and Scott Dixon, are three drivers who are very vocal and passionate about the direction of the sport and the cars that they drive.
Rahal, one of the tallest drivers in the series, even sitting in a wooden chassis some five months ago.
“I’ve sat in the mold that was based off of me,” Rahal said. “I had sat in this wood chassis five months ago , so I was somewhat aware of the objectives. I hope they can meet the objectives. I think it’s going to be hard, especially with the weight, in particular. The aeroscreen and the hybrid are all a lot of weight, but it’s hard to trim down. The engine is already skinny and there’s not a whole lot of fat you can take off that thing. You’re going to have a little larger displacement, which I think is the way it should be.
They need new cars and as Jay Frye used to say ‘Fast, Loud and Authentic’ and I think that’s the direction it’s going. We’ll see if all the pieces of the puzzle come together.”
Dixon, the most recent winner in the IndyCar series, is taking a “wait and see” approach to the new car, but also wants the new car to be worthwhile.
“I heard they were going back to the 2.4,” Scott Dixon said. “I don’t know why they kind of abandoned that. A lot of that stuff is between the manufacturers and where they want things to move for themselves, but I don’t know. I don’t really see a good point in doing a new car unless it’s going to be something better. I think they’ve floated talks about the car being lighter but I don’t think the reality of that is true.”
Time will only tell how the 2028 car will look, sound and drive but until then, fans, drivers, media and teams will have to put faith into IndyCar, Dallara and the rest of the partners that the new car is ‘Fast, Loud and Authentic’.