Is F1 getting boring?

[Fil]

Dammit! Just found that other topic right after creating this one.

Where's the delete button?!

funnily enough, use the little triangle with the exclamation mark (next to Quote) in it to get it deleted

[Scotracer]

Perhaps this would spice up the racing?



(if anyone fancies an avatar)

Hey there's no need to reinvent the wheel here...



I'll get my coat.

[Earnard Beccelstone]

IS F1 boring? No, I don't think so.

Does it lack some of the close racing of the previous decades? Yes.

But, the question is, so what?

Do people want a series that is perceived as the pinnacle in racing or a series that is hobbled by (more) limitations in the name of better racing/entertainment.

Look at a lot of the suggestions here: Steel brakes, ultra hard tyres, manual gearboxes, drastic changes to wings/downforce levels, skinnier tyres. Its indicative of some desire to push F1 back to some pre-1980s 'golden age' before big budgets and aerodynamics "ruined" the sport.

Personally, my inclination is for LESS regulation and consequently greater diversity, allowing designers to pursue different solutions. F1 has always been a 'formula', limited to lesser or greater degrees, but the diversity seen over the previous 60 years has been ironed out by increasingly tight regulations.

Go back and look at the cars of the 1990 and we see eight engine suppliers, five different engine configurations and several different car configurations. Ten years before that the difference is even greater. Look at the past two years, and the cars are much more homogeneous, and the series is down to four engine suppliers.

I'd prefer fewer limitations, say engine displacement/fuel consumption, some massive safety requirements and no electronic/active driver aids and that's about it. Let designers go nuts for a few years and see where the sport goes.

[WhiteBlue]

I think you guys are on the wrong track completely. The current cars have been fiddled with so much, they're essentially just a bunch of band-aid's piled on top of one another each trying to fix whatever got broken by the last band-aid.

They need to do the best they can with this season, but then scrap the entire car design and start over, with a car that's geared more toward efficiency and mechanical grip, and with a single wing located centrally on the car to reduce both its wake and the effect of other cars' wakes on it. And while they're at it, they can provide better crash protection and protection around the tires with beefier, full width crash structures.

Once again I flog the Sigma concept dead horse...

A nice concept apart from the open engine. I'm sure a proper air box wouldn't hurt the concept.

[WhiteBlue]

I have read this kind of academic opinion by you several times. Unfortunately we have yet to see a high downforce design that facilitates overtaking in F1. My view is that it probably isn't existing. This is based on the experience of watching the game for 20 years and applying some common sense.

"Common sense" is often more "Common beliefs" based on nothing.

Just that because you didn't see overtaking with High downforce cars (probably have missed a part of the early 90's, GE cars and some CART races) doesn't prove your point about downforce level having an effect on wake.

All this talk of diffusor angle and coupling of diffusor and wing wake is just theory without addressing the core problem.

In addition to ignoring the on track tests,the fact that the so called "theory" is the root of basically everything you use all day long for your convenience, you don't bring even the slightest debut of point.


I won't discuss with you until you bring precise point; What you're saying there is just "this is all theory! We have to bring that limit! I know that for i watch F1 for 20 years", which is not more that all those armchair experts you can see in number on all forums full of their "not rocket science" solutions.

There is a common sense in "actio=reactio" as Newton has told us. It means that you cannot achieve downforce without exerting a similar integrated force on billions of air molecules. The more downforce you exert the more violent pressure fields you induce to the surrounding air. This is inevitable if you believe in the laws of physics.

You and your fellow theoreticists believe that you can create a perfect body which will not create pressure differentials in the surroundings of the car that are roughly proportional to the downforce. Given the nature of the car body - which is dictated by arbitrary geometry rules - that believe id rather unlikely to hold water.

So forgive me my scepticism, but the experience of the last 30 years with aerodynamics has told us the lesson that you are wrong. Cars of the early 60ties with zero downforce can overtake quite easily. Anything beyond 1990 with elaborate aerodynamics could not. Even the turbo cars of the eighties which sometimes had 200-300 horse power difference did not allways managed to do it towards the end of the decade while at the beginning there wasn't a problem.

[machin]

I like that sigma concept, and some ideas written over the past few pages do show some merit... the only problem is that they all introduce large-scale changes to the cars and that is something that F1 cannot afford right now... especially if the new teams are to be encouraged, so rules stability, especially where chassis are concerned, is the way to go... that's wy I like the "Virtual slipstreaming" approach (i.e. raising the rev limit when a car is within 1 second of the car infront)... no changes to the cars and therefore no costs for the teams, but great racing for all to view. WIN-WIN.

[carvetia]

Here is my relatively simple proposal:

1. Set a budget (£100m? Team consensus will provide something practical).
2. Establish registered F1 supplier market so team spending can be reliably audited. Market is open, all existing suppliers can register, but then must comply with new F1 book-keeping regulations w.r.t. F1 team purchases, or face expulsion.
Ok that's costs taken care of, now, the important ones to improve the spectacle:
3. Set a fuel consumption level that would make present levels of downforce unattainable. If teams have only a fixed amount of fuel to finish the race they will have to compromise on downforce or never see the chequered flag.
4. Subsequently, open up the rest of the regulations as with a budget-cap, F1 supplier market auditing and a fuel economy target, teams will have a consistent yet open framework in which they can develop their car, and will automatically be driven to pick the most efficient and cost effective solution.

These regualtions, with an emphasis on efficiency, would also help to tie F1 closer to the real world again. Also, there is no need for large scale changes. We can make a smooth transition from compromising the current cars through engine detuning and aerodynamic device removal, to cars built entirely around the new open regualtions over a couple of years, as the budget allows. What areas to develop first? Engine or aero? That is up to the teams, they can't do both, so would bring some much needed technical excitement.

Cheers

[hugobos]

A long time lurker and a first time poster, on this great forum.

My opinion is that it needs to get greener.

In my street i see hybrid and electrical cars to appear more and more.
The cars sold here are categorized in how environmentally friendly they are.
It is soon going to become socially non acceptabel to drive a polluting car.

Now F1 is saying like the great Clarkson, we need Powerrrrrrrrrrrr.

They have to set greener goals, not mucking about with the system they have now.

Why does ferrari introduces a HY-Kers road car when they ban it in racing ?????

There is a connection to the real world, wich has to be obeyed

1.allow alternative engine packages with alternative fuel sytems as off now.
2.Stop and ban using “old” fuel as of 2013.
3.When a car has a new fuel engine system the aero rules should have greater freedom of design
4.As for now all cars should have a maximum weight at the start wich is equivalent to the weight of the car + halve the race distance of fuel. and refueling should be allowed.

Only thoughts, and hopes.

[Miguel]

This is inevitable if you believe in the laws of physics.

Physics just is. It doesn't matter if you believe in it or not. And no matter how much you believe the opposite, if experiments say otherwise, you'll have to either come with a plausible explanation or suck it up.

A couple of centuries ago, some physicist critical of the wave nature of light said something like "But that is crazy! If this were true, a double-slit experiment would yield an interference pattern!" I think we all know what happened after that.

So forgive me my scepticism, but the experience of the last 30 years with aerodynamics has told us the lesson that you are wrong. Cars of the early 60ties with zero downforce can overtake quite easily. Anything beyond 1990 with elaborate aerodynamics could not. Even the turbo cars of the eighties which sometimes had 200-300 horse power difference did not allways managed to do it towards the end of the decade while at the beginning there wasn't a problem.

There is a logical fallacy in your argument. It's the same argument that wikipedia uses to relate CO_2 emissions with pirates. That argument seems to fall lately with piracy in the indic ocean though. Anyway, although lack of downforce could well be the only cause, you are forgetting to mention the better QC we have these days. The grid quality is orders of magnitude better now, and the engineers are better prepared. The lower rate of attrition is a cause of all this.

I'd love to put these drivers in "safety-improved" lotus 49's, and I'm sure it would be a great show. But I wouldn't expect a myriad of passes for the lead if a normal F1 race was organised.

As an example, let's go to MotoGP. This is a racing series in which the follower has the advantage (lower drag, more visible braking points). We do see some brilliant racing, but overtaking in Laguna Seca is still incredibly difficult and passes for the lead are not as common as some say. And that is for bikes with excess power, no aero, advantage for the follower, and narrow track.

[Ciro Pabón]

A couple of centuries ago, some physicist critical of the wave nature of light said something like "But that is crazy! If this were true, a double-slit experiment would yield an interference pattern!" I think we all know what happened after that.

Yeah, a Nobel to Einstein for photoelectric effect... (Miguel will understand it, sorry, private physicist joke).

People, temptation is growing inside me. There is a special place in Hell (Dante, Divina Commedia) for people that tempts others, so beware.

I'm tempted to rename this thread: "Is F1 getting boring? (specially when Ferrari wins)".

I repeat for the umpteenth time: if what give happiness to your racing soul is overtaking, watch NASCAR. No wings there, team competition. It's as mature and entertaning as F1. Besides, they got the best racing commentator in the world, altough he doesn't work in a TV studio... yet (Juan Montoya).

I think that overtaking has been overstudied here (is that a word?). There is no overtaking in F1, period. In average there is ONE overtaking per driver per race. For the last decade! Changing that requires massive investments on tracks, something FIA won't do. There is no association of track owners with some weight inside FIA, so they have no money, so... those of you that want more "emotive" races (read "races with overtaking"), have to pray for rain.

I find an eerie similarity between this kind of thread and people complaining of, I don't know, for example, lack of physical contact in tennis: they use a net between players, duh.

Sure, you can allow tennis players to hit each other with the tennis balls or throw the rackets to each other, but it will never become football rugby.

F1 is about the noise of the cars, the perfect machines, the best aerodynamic engineering, the amount of money spent, the beautiful and sophisticated whor.. erm, I mean, babes, the tradition and history, the British, Italian and German car engineers (and their technique) and the best drivers of open wheelers in the world.

Did I miss something? Oh, yeah, I almost forgot that one: and the most fanatic, perfectionist and one-sided fans the world has known... (of course, I'm not talking about you, I'm talking about me ).

[Just_a_fan]

A couple of centuries ago, some physicist critical of the wave nature of light said something like "But that is crazy! If this were true, a double-slit experiment would yield an interference pattern!" I think we all know what happened after that.

Yeah, a Nobel to Einstein for photoelectric effect... (Miguel will understand it, sorry, private physicist joke).

People, temptation is growing inside me. There is a special place in Hell (Dante, Divina Commedia) for people that tempts others, so beware.

I'm tempted to rename this thread: "Is F1 getting boring? (specially when Ferrari wins)".

I repeat for the umpteenth time: if what give happiness to your racing soul is overtaking, watch NASCAR. No wings there, team competition. It's as mature and entertaning as F1. Besides, they got the best racing commentator in the world, altough he doesn't work in a TV studio... yet (Juan Montoya).

I think that overtaking has been overstudied here (is that a word?). There is no overtaking in F1, period. In average there is ONE overtaking per driver per race. For the last decade! Changing that requires massive investments on tracks, something FIA won't do. There is no association of track owners with some weight inside FIA, so they have no money, so... those of you that want more "emotive" races (read "races with overtaking"), have to pray for rain.

I find an eerie similarity between this kind of thread and people complaining of, I don't know, for example, lack of physical contact in tennis: they use a net between players, duh.

Sure, you can allow tennis players to hit each other with the tennis balls or throw the rackets to each other, but it will never become football rugby.

F1 is about the noise of the cars, the perfect machines, the best aerodynamic engineering, the amount of money spent, the beautiful and sophisticated whor.. erm, I mean, babes, the tradition and history, the British, Italian and German car engineers (and their technique) and the best drivers of open wheelers in the world.

Did I miss something? Oh, yeah, I almost forgot that one: and the most fanatic, perfectionist and one-sided fans the world has known... (of course, I'm not talking about you, I'm talking about me ).

Hear hear!

There is an awful lot of low downforce open wheeler stuff going on in the world (well, there is in Europe) if that's what people want. Sure, it's not heavily televised but that means that "fans" need to go to circuits. In the open air! Not on a couch in front of the TV with a laptop on hand for the LiveTiming? The shock of it!

Oh, by the way, it's "rugby football" not "football rugby" (in case anyone thought I was brown nosing the mod )

[Ogami musashi]

There is a common sense in "actio=reactio" as Newton has told us. It means that you cannot achieve downforce without exerting a similar integrated force on billions of air molecules. The more downforce you exert the more violent pressure fields you induce to the surrounding air. This is inevitable if you believe in the laws of physics.

Bringing N3 law in fluids is a bit of exotic and not relevant to the wake.
The downwash(upwash for an F1 car) is not the wake and what causes the losses;

A simple analysis would show you that a rear wing being the highest point of the car creating an upwash can't influence the following car's front wing, underfloor and rear wing.

The wake is a question of translated energy and only dependant on speed and aerodynamic lift/drag ratio hence why it is said that it is geometry dependant.

The basic equation of wake energy is: mg(v/f) with mg being the weight of the car, v the velocity and f the finess).

You can then see the finess is of prime importance and that you can make this varying only by geometry.

Thus, while the wake i present because of lift, it is not related to the amount of lift/downforce.

You and your fellow theoreticists believe that you can create a perfect body which will not create pressure differentials in the surroundings of the car that are roughly proportional to the downforce. Given the nature of the car body - which is dictated by arbitrary geometry rules - that believe id rather unlikely to hold water.

Sorry but this is very non educated guess. You mix wake with down/up wash and that is not correct at all see above.


You're prone to believe in physics, the above formula is an established one derived from one of the (until now) only 3 laws we believe in in many scientific fields:

-Conservation of mass
-Conservation of momentum (N2)
-Conservation of energy

The latter is the one explaining the turbulence wake.

So forgive me my scepticism, but the experience of the last 30 years with aerodynamics has told us the lesson that you are wrong. Cars of the early 60ties with zero downforce can overtake quite easily.

This is not correct.

The problem was exactly the same that now, physics do not change. The wake was already there, and had the same fundamental properties and same effects: loss of pressure.

The big difference was that the cars of the era were lifting, thus in the wake of another they lost lift instead of downforce giving them an advantage both in drag and grip.

The only change was that bringing car with downforce as a vital element of grip inversed the effect on the car, since he loses dowforce he loses grip.

The physical phenomenon is exactly the same appart from that.

Again, there's no relation between a relative amount of downforce and wake, only speed and finess (and weight of course) enter into play.

The "experience" you quote shows us that GE cars till 82 were perfectly able to follow each other yet that had more downforce than later cars until 90's.

[Jersey Tom]

A long time lurker and a first time poster, on this great forum.

My opinion is that it needs to get greener.

In my street i see hybrid and electrical cars to appear more and more.
The cars sold here are categorized in how environmentally friendly they are.
It is soon going to become socially non acceptabel to drive a polluting car.

Now F1 is saying like the great Clarkson, we need Powerrrrrrrrrrrr.

They have to set greener goals, not mucking about with the system they have now.

Why does ferrari introduces a HY-Kers road car when they ban it in racing ?????

There is a connection to the real world, wich has to be obeyed

1.allow alternative engine packages with alternative fuel sytems as off now.
2.Stop and ban using “old” fuel as of 2013.
3.When a car has a new fuel engine system the aero rules should have greater freedom of design
4.As for now all cars should have a maximum weight at the start wich is equivalent to the weight of the car + halve the race distance of fuel. and refueling should be allowed.

Only thoughts, and hopes.

I just don't fundamentally agree. Since when has grand prix racing (or any racing for that matter) had the intent of being commercially viable, or linked to consumer products and development?

IMO, as I've said many times, the whole 'we must go green in racing!' thing is JUST a marketing ploy, particularly capitalizing on consumer mindset given the gas price debacle (in the US), and all that sort of thing. It doesn't fool me.

[WhiteBlue]

Ogami, I knew you would start telling long stories again. Let's say it simple. I don't believe for a moment that you can create twice the downforce without creating a significant increase of turbulence, drag, upwash or whatever you call the dirty air.

Don't spend any time on fancy explanations. I simply do not want the cars to compete for more downforce. I want them to have fixed downforce and compete on drag reduction by the best geometries or even geometry changes.

[andrew]

During Sundays commentary on Radio 5, David Croft spoke about the number of overtaking manouvres per year. Year on year they have been going down but there have always been processional races. For example Monaco is a total bore each year (unless it rains) yet it has remaind on the calander since the 50s. Bahrain could just have been a one off but it is a track that has some overtaking opportunities.

What I would like to see to improve F1 is:-

1. Ban the double diffusers (I know it's happening in 2011) and other complex aero devices,
2. Reduce braking efficiency and maybe use steel brake discs,
3. Get rid of the current tyre rules and revert back to the choice of hard, medium or soft and the driver sticks woth them in qualifying and the race,
4. Reduce downforce,
5. Revert back to the old engine rules so we can see the drivers pushing their own and the cars limits in every race.
6. Points for the top 6 only.
7. Get rid of the GPs at Monaco, Valenci and Singapore and bring back the Portugese, French and US GPs. Generally, less Tilke tracks and more of teh old style tracks like San Marino.

This might make things more exciting and competitive during the race.