Khamsin Virtual Racecar Challenge 2014

[variante]

Good news.

BTW saying that you're discussing the new rules means that you've already decided the kind of formula (F1, LMP,...) ?

And don't hesitate to use this forum to discuss the crucial aspects

[cdsavage]

Formula hasn't been decided yet, but most likely the rulebook will be a bit more liberal than it has been so far. Both LMP style and F1 style are being considered with some other possibilities too.

[CAEdevice]

Hope the rulebook will be not too much liberal, I'm still developing my 2014 car and I'm amazed by the amount of improvable details allowed by a good control of the vortices. It is as if there were invisible geometry around the car.

It would be easier to obtain a better DF with a bigger diffuser or disregarding the R75 law, but nothing would change about classification or design freedom after one or two CFD run.

I have a small preference for F1, but LMP style would be ok anyway, but providing the maximum realism.

From a not exclusively technical point of view, the are to point that you should consider:

1) Increasing the number of teams from 4-5 to 10, avoiding teams partecipate only to the first one or two races, providing a generic chassis and generic wings could help
2) Adequately promoting the challange, trying to involve individual enthusiasts, small engineering companies and possibly software houses (CAD, CFD, ...)

Finally: cars should be visible to other challengers by HR 2D images (avoiding completely black colors, witout CFD flows around the car) to encourage the exchange of ideas and mutual control.

[joking] You should you ask FIA for an official recognition of the challenge ... if formula-E can exist, why forumla CFD should not? [/ Joking]

[cdsavage]

1) Increasing the number of teams from 4-5 to 10, avoiding teams partecipate only to the first one or two races, providing a generic chassis and generic wings could help
2) Adequately promoting the challange, trying to involve individual enthusiasts, small engineering companies and possibly software houses (CAD, CFD, ...)

I think it is agreed that attracting more participants and holding on to those participants is a priority. So while its important to hear what you guys would like for next year, we also need to balance that against what will attract new entrants.

The idea of providing optional parts or an entire car as a starting point is a good one - I will aim for this as long as time allows.

Finally: cars should be visible to other challengers by HR 2D images (avoiding completely black colors, witout CFD flows around the car) to encourage the exchange of ideas and mutual control.

Something like this will probably happen for next year. Everything is still in the early stages of planning though.

[CAEdevice]

The idea of providing optional parts or an entire car as a starting point is a good one - I will aim for this as long as time allows

I hope (in case F1 will be chosen) you are not going to provide (as "start model") a car to similar to your Nurburgring 2014 one... I've been trying to reach that performance for months

About LMP1: I've quickly read the rules on te FIA website. The underfloor is more efficient than a F1 underfloor, but I don't think that there is more design freedom, on the contrary it seems almost completely defined by the rules.

[cdsavage]

I hope (in case F1 will be chosen) you are not going to provide (as "start model") a car to similar to your Nurburgring 2014 one... I've been trying to reach that performance for months

About LMP1: I've quickly read the rules on te FIA website. The underfloor is more efficient than a F1 underfloor, but I don't think that there is more design freedom, on the contrary it seems almost completely defined by the rules.

Agreed, there is practically zero freedom on LMP1 floors rearward of the front axle. If we go in this direction, this will be modified to be more liberal.

I wouldn't spend too much time on design just yet, if we have an F1-based formula the rulebook will probably be a bigger departure from the current F1 rulebook than what we've had in 2013 and 14.

[CAEdevice]

I wouldn't spend too much time on design just yet, if we have an F1-based formula the rulebook will probably be a bigger departure from the current F1 rulebook than what we've had in 2013 and 14.

No matter if the rulebook will be very different (although it would be a shame for the realism of the challange), I'm optimizing my old F1 2014 to learn something new about CFD.

[mrluke]

Hi everybody, as promised, here is a "open source" version of CAEdevice MP001. I hope it will be useful as "basic geometry" for new partecipants to the KVRC 2015 (assuming that F1 rules will be choosen next year). It's not an optimized geometry: it's just the basic car I used as start point for each race development. I hope it could help to increase the numeber of partecipants to KVRC, but I'd be curious to know what the other 2014 teams think about my design.

http://www.caedevice.net/SERVER/Khamsin ... _MP001.zip (STEP format)
http://www.caedevice.net/SERVER/Khamsin ... etchUp.zip (SketchUp format)

http://www.caedevice.net/SERVER/Khamsin ... _MP001.jpg

Hi,

I know this has finished for the year but im having a go at building a car that would have complied.

Thank you for the "open source" model. I downloaded really to look at how people are treating the tub around section CC.

The rules state that the tub must be 60mm wider per side than the cockpit template.

Measuring from the widest point of the helmet to the outside edge of the cockpit template is ~113.5mm (at the base of the slope) I have then added 60mm to this distance to give a total of 173.5mm at this point (wider than the widest point of the helmet) or 320mm from car centre line to outside of tub.

If I look at the model you have provided above, measuring from the edge of the helmet at the bottom of the slop all the way across the flat plane to what I guess is the edge of the cockpit template I get ~88.5mm.

This gives a difference of exactly 25mm.

Have you taken a 25mm radius off of the cockpit template and then not added the 60mm as stated in the regs?

Mine appears much wider than everybody else so im just curious as to what I am doing wrong

[cdsavage]

A template was used for that 60mm rule, so it shouldn't be necessary to work it out yourself. If I remember correctly, that width only needs to be maintained over a certain height, above that you don't have the width restriction. If the template isn't publicly available somewhere I can send it to you.

[mrluke]

Aah I see. Thanks.

[CAEdevice]

Hi, as cdsavage wrote in the previous answer, the cockpit is a template part. I hope that these images could help.
Anyway: actually in the "open" car there is a small region where the 60mm rule is not respected (orange circle in the picture).

[Fer]

Hi,

I just wanted to let you know that I (finally) made Khamsin compatible with SketchUp 2014... It is a long overdue update... I have also added some assistance to the installation of the third party. I would very much appreciate feedback on it - is it going in the right direction? Thoughts on how it could be improved?

At the moment, it is only available as a rbz archive, that you can download from http://www.hibouscientificsoftware.com. ... .1-012.rbz

I have made a request to be added to the SketchUp plugin developer group to allow distribution of Khamsin through the Extension Warehouse - it would make everyone's life easier. I am waiting to hear from SketchUp.

I will be looking at integrating the sourceforge repository for the parallel openFoam version (unfortunately it does not include swak4foam). My aim is that Khamsin directly downloads it and set it up if you are running a 64bit Windows OS... More news in the near future...

Julien, is there any news about the integration of the sourceforge parallel openfoam version with Khamsin? Looking forward to it to speed up my CFD calculations

If I can help with any testing let me know and I will be happy to do so.

And thank you very much for the new versión of Khamsin that is compatible with Sketchup 2014. Works great!

[variante]

Hi guys, i just want to confirm CAEdevice's words about the amount of improvements that can still be done with our current regulations...basically, the development chances are still big enough to guarantee a good entertainment.

And a suggestion (that you've probably already though of): if you are going to make "simpler" regulations to attract more participants, it would be better to reduce the complexity of each article (=working on "straight forward" and less formal way to communicate how the car must be done) rather than decreasing the number of articles.

[CAEdevice]

And a suggestion (that you've probably already though of): if you are going to make "simpler" regulations to attract more participants, it would be better to reduce the complexity of each article (=working on "straight forward" and less formal way to communicate how the car must be done) rather than decreasing the number of articles.

It would be perfect if each rule should be explained with a picture.

[CAEdevice]

I'm looking at the links about the CFD solver used during the last KVRC that machine suggested me, but it seems that some of them are offline.

I'm looking for a template OpenFoam file, where wheels, suspensions, helmet and boundary conditions are already set, and the car body and wings can be replaced with our models (with the right file names). Does something like that exist? If not it could be a good idea for next year.