RB Traction Control yin yang

[turbof1]

@Krisfx: Yeah, I made that mistake too in the past. It does help, but the main advantage is that it "pulses". Still, it has the same effect: bringing more constant downforce.

I think it would be very difficult, if not outright impossible for Red Bull to have any illegal TC-like features: the FIA has full access to telemetry and the ECU is standarized. To hide illegal engine settings would effectively require a second ECU not only to bypass information recording and having extra engine settings, but also feed the standard ECU false information. Information coming from the second ECU has either stay in the car (so unmonitored) or be send out on a coded channel. All of this means if true that Red Bull would send NSA home crying like a little b*tch. Way too difficult to keep it hidden.

[The Driver]

I think that the speed advantage Vettel had in Singapore was exaggerated - it was nowhere near 2 or 2.5 seconds. Realistically, it was more like 0.5-1 second, which of course is still a lot.

The reason why it appeared to be much higher is that in the initial laps of the race, Rosberg was losing time because he had to defend, and the others could not overtake so were running at the same speed as Rosberg.

After that initial phase, Vettel could take it easy and was not much faster than Rosberg, but this gave him the margin to pit last and stay ahead.

After the pit stop, he was just the "usual" 0.5-1 second faster.

After the safety car, Mercedes were concerned about tyre usage and did not push fully, and had an understeer problem due to debris, whereas Vettel was giving it all he could. The speed of all others including Webber was determined by Rosberg as overtaking was not possible. So really the 2.5 seconds per lap were quite artificial.

After his final pit stop and after switching to his unused set of supersofts, Vettel really only pushed for one lap directly after coming out of the pits to build a gap to Alonso. After that, he took it very easy. If he had kept up that pace, which may well have been possible, he would have been 45 seconds faster than he was and would have ended the race 75 seconds ahead of Alonso. Of course, had he done that he would have had to lap a lot more cars, which would have slowed him down so it would not have played out quite like this. In any case, in this last stint, he was on much better tyres than all his opponents and in clear air, so the times are not comparable at all.

So I think in proper "clean air", Vettel was "only" 0.5-1 seconds faster than his closest rivals.

In my view the specific circumstances of Singapore mean that 0.5-1 second there might only mean 0.3-0.5 seconds elsewhere. First, it is a very long lap so in percentage terms the difference is not as much. Second, there are many slow corners, which is where Vettel's advantage seems to come from, so on a per-slow-corner basis, there is only a small difference.

In summary, while it felt like there was huge dominance, there was only normal dominance, which I feel can be explained quite well without resorting to claims of illegality.

[Kiril Varbanov]

In your opinion then, does that settle any speculation of foul play on RB`s part?

Yes.

I also spoiled the sexy rating of TurboF1 (was 69 ) - you cannot just hide illegal pieces of code. This is the type of cheat that sends the entire team into oblivion for a long time, not to mention the bad PR (yes, there's such thing, old books have been re-written).

More or less I agree with @The Driver that the advantage of Vettel wasn't that big, given the track length. Vettel's abilities to score fast lap times are no surprise, so this 'seals the diffuser' for me and I'm looking to Korea.

[Harsha]

Also to add The Driver's Point There is no Traffic at all ahead of Vettel for Entire track after SC which means he has nothing to deal with even that would add lot more speed in the tracks like Singapore, Monaco where overtaking Back marker also makes you loose lot of time.

[turbof1]

In your opinion then, does that settle any speculation of foul play on RB`s part?

Yes.

I also spoiled the sexy rating of TurboF1 (was 69 ) - you cannot just hide illegal pieces of code. This is the type of cheat that sends the entire team into oblivion for a long time, not to mention the bad PR (yes, there's such thing, old books have been re-written).

More or less I agree with @The Driver that the advantage of Vettel wasn't that big, given the track length. Vettel's abilities to score fast lap times are no surprise, so this 'seals the diffuser' for me and I'm looking to Korea.

Hahaha; well you know what they say about 69: no matter how much you do it, you eventually will have to move on to the next part .

Benetton back in the day still got caught having illegal code (evidence wasn't there to prove it was actually used, as data could only be viewed by the team itself. A big difference with nowadays), even though teams all ran their own ECU's. The standard ECU effectively ended any hope to make second attempts on that. Anything that is being handled electronically gets registered and the FIA always has direct access to the data.

[charlex]

Seb Vettel's car sound Singapore 2013 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eH4RxQx7J4c

Seb Vettel's car sound Monza 2011 (blown diffuser) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOrk-VEOD0E

2-3seconds/lap??!....cmon RB are you kidding us? FIA failed again..next year we are all going to watch the Nascar races or some other sh**. F1 is dead

[doogie]

Seb Vettel's car sound Singapore 2013 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eH4RxQx7J4c

Seb Vettel's car sound Monza 2011 (blown diffuser) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOrk-VEOD0E

2-3seconds/lap??!....cmon RB are you kidding us? FIA failed again..next year we are all going to watch the Nascar races or some other sh**. F1 is dead

Any questions? http://www.autoweek.com/article/20130807/f1/130809878

[doogie]

2 sec. on the field with better tire wear than all is a big pill to swallow to be convincing that all is legal with Sebs car. Something is up! I agree with Minardi. I think politics are very much involved in the success of Seb and RB team.

[SectorOne]

I think that the speed advantage Vettel had in Singapore was exaggerated - it was nowhere near 2 or 2.5 seconds. Realistically, it was more like 0.5-1 second, which of course is still a lot.

That´s just not true..
The only time he was 5 tenths faster was when he took it easy, saving tires.
When he pushed it was between 1 second and 2 seconds.

He could have lapped the whole field quite easily if he wanted without a safety car. Just destroyed everyone.

[The Driver]

I think that the speed advantage Vettel had in Singapore was exaggerated - it was nowhere near 2 or 2.5 seconds. Realistically, it was more like 0.5-1 second, which of course is still a lot.

That´s just not true..
The only time he was 5 tenths faster was when he took it easy, saving tires.
When he pushed it was between 1 second and 2 seconds.

Of course you are right just looking at the timing. However, as I said, he only had that advantage because Rosberg had to defend (and was hampered by debris later on) and was losing more time than he would have had he been able to drive in clean air and without threats from behind like Vettel.

Qualifying was more representative - Vettel was generally around 0.5-0.6 seconds faster than the others when on the same rubber and when driving at the same time.

[SectorOne]

Of course you are right just looking at the timing. However, as I said, he only had that advantage because Rosberg had to defend (and was hampered by debris later on) and was losing more time than he would have had he been able to drive in clean air and without threats from behind like Vettel.

Qualifying was more representative - Vettel was generally around 0.5-0.6 seconds faster than the others when on the same rubber and when driving at the same time.

But Rosberg did not have to defend at the start, on lap 1 Rosberg was 1,1 seconds ahead of Alonso.
The two laps after Vettel pulled away with 2 seconds and 1,5 seconds.

The stint after SC i´m not too bothered about, they had different goals at that point, the first stint however is all "equal" in a sense.
He was running seconds faster per lap and they lasted longer and on top of that he was faster on 26 laps old tires then Rosberg on his fresh tires by something like 5-6 tenths.

I don´t believe the car and Vettel just found a rythm that allowed them to do that, i think they have something legal that is helping them in some way. We have seen it since SPA, same sound and largely the same dominance.

Take the Merc vs Red Bull at SPA. The Merc had more downforce (visibly at least) yet the Red Bull was faster in the twisties.
It just does not add up for me.

Laptime chart of singapore. Just look at that.
http://en.mclarenf-1.com/index.php?page=chart&gp=906

Quite impressive by Red Bull.

[krisfx]

@Krisfx: Yeah, I made that mistake too in the past. It does help, but the main advantage is that it "pulses". Still, it has the same effect: bringing more constant downforce.

I think it would be very difficult, if not outright impossible for Red Bull to have any illegal TC-like features: the FIA has full access to telemetry and the ECU is standarized. To hide illegal engine settings would effectively require a second ECU not only to bypass information recording and having extra engine settings, but also feed the standard ECU false information. Information coming from the second ECU has either stay in the car (so unmonitored) or be send out on a coded channel. All of this means if true that Red Bull would send NSA home crying like a little b*tch. Way too difficult to keep it hidden.

Ah thanks

Yeah, I doubt with the level of control there could be anything massively wrong but stranger things have happened. I think everyone is forgetting that this car is a constant evolution from 09, it's only ever got better with every iteration, I'm not the biggest RB fan but I don't think after three consecutive titles they would just start cheating.

[charlex]

When Briatore worked in Renault did a research. This research was used to know the difference between the times per lap that there was in an experienced pilot and a pilot from twenty-second position. The results showed that the gap was half a second per lap. Now, does anyone know explain why Webber in Singapore took two seconds per lap (he was also slower than Alonso) by Vettel? Why that noise, while having the same car, in the Webber's RB there is not? why?? Same diffuser, same exhaust, same everything, but two very different sounds. it s obviously something electronic!!! now u can thumbs me down again vettel's fans

[Tommy Cookers]

How exactly does KERS help with traction? Honest question. Are you suggesting that they're reversing the KERS motor direction to hold back the forwards torque?

as I said, the inherent characteristic of the KERS machine amounts to substantial opposition to wheelspin or locking
so it does some of what TC and ABS would do
eg for KERS motor action eg between 9000 and 18000 rpm the applied voltage would be swept proportional to rpm at all times
eg (say) 95 Volts at 9000 and 185 V at 18000 rpm, and have rather constant EM torque (or torque proportional to ICE torque)
the EM torque being proportional for all rpm to the 5 V margin of applied voltage over the back emf that is proportional to rpm
if there was wheelspin eg suddenly raising rpm to 9500 the EM torque would fall to zero
wheelspin to 10000rpm would automatically cause negative EM torque (ie generating and storing electrical energy)

a totally standard feature of any motor drive is inbuilt adjustable limiting of the sweep rate ('slew rate'), for many practical reasons
our slew rate would be set around maximum acceleration without wheelspin, this would be mapped
the KERS machine 'knows' its own rpm and even rotational position anyway
so no wheel speed sensor is involved, so it's not TC

this basic characteristic in 'generating mode', tends to oppose rear wheel locking, lowering KERS torque as wheels suddenly slow

internally to the motor and drive, other advantageous behaviour could be arranged without breaching any rules
a few races ago didn't we see footage of Mr Webber's car and Caterhams ? leaving tyre chatter marks ?
it has been said that RB use less KERS power (peak) than allowed, isn't this consistent with low-level KERSing in corners ?

[Phil]

Qualifying was more representative - Vettel was generally around 0.5-0.6 seconds faster than the others when on the same rubber and when driving at the same time.

That might be correct, but *if* Redbull is using some system that is giving them a big advantage, it may (or may not) make sense to only use it in certain circumstances, perhaps only during the race. This is of course assuming that the system (if there is such a thing) can be controlled somewhat and is not impacted by parc-ferme. If I was using such a device, and I knew that it has a big advantage and could possibly be deemed illegal (lets face it - a lot of the regulations are down to clever intepretation, so as long as you can get away with it before it gets 'clarified', you should) - I would try to make use of that advantage but in a way that is the least suspicious. In other words - be only that much quicker than the opposition than you need to be.

And as I said in the other topic (that got closed) - IMO, running only one car with it might reduce the suspicion substantially.

Not to add to the fire or conspiracy theories, but I have always wondered why Vettel is 'baby-sitted' (sorry, but I can't find a better word that meets the description) as much as he is during races. Maybe it's not over concerns that he does not know how to win a race, use the tyres or optimize his strategy - or managment being afraid that he might bin it on the last lap in trying to get his "fastest lap" - but to not raise suspicion on what kind of pace they might have?

I can imagine this kind of topic is not a very popular one among fans (especially fans of Redbull or Vettel), but I just wanted to say that topics like these are the reason I signed up here in the first place. It's not about criticizing another team or crying foul-play - but the technical nut in me is more curious in understanding where this kind of advantage is coming from. At the very least, I think exploring some theories makes sense, at the very least to give us all a better understanding in how lap-times or Formula 1 cars work and how different designs can lead to an advantage.