Refuelling 2017

[astracrazy]

One thing i hope doesn't get changed is the current q3 format. Flat out pace. Would it be acceptable to allow the teams to set fuel levels after quali? Would it work? Or of coure the other option would be to nominate there first stint fuel load before?

[Cold Fussion]

One thing i hope doesn't get changed is the current q3 format. Flat out pace. Would it be acceptable to allow the teams to set fuel levels after quali? Would it work? Or of coure the other option would be to nominate there first stint fuel load before?

The qualifying format should remain unchanged hopefully, since the current format is excellent. I don't want to see the return of Q2 showing the ultimate car pace and Q3 looking lethargic.

[iotar__]

The qualifying format should remain unchanged hopefully, since the current format is excellent. I don't want to see the return of Q2 showing the ultimate car pace and Q3 looking lethargic.

A. Why would they look lethargic? B. With refuelling Q2 didn't necessarily show true pace because the aim was to get into Q3, unless it's a competition between team-mates to get a better strategy. Didn't BWM have that? So who gets the better strategy in Barcelona 2015 between Merc drivers for example if it's Q with fuel? It does not matter, it's a change and it's from the past so it must be great.

While people get excited about gimmicky changes the real conclusions are (Fernley, Force India):

"There won't be any consideration given to an equitable distribution of income, and the engines are not going to be reduced in cost."
"The default for going forward in terms of a team failing will be as per contract, which will be third cars, and in the meantime they will evaluate the customer car programme."

[Cold Fussion]

The qualifying format should remain unchanged hopefully, since the current format is excellent. I don't want to see the return of Q2 showing the ultimate car pace and Q3 looking lethargic.

A. Why would they look lethargic? B. With refuelling Q2 didn't necessarily show true pace because the aim was to get into Q3, unless it's a competition between team-mates to get a better strategy. Didn't BWM have that? So who gets the better strategy in Barcelona 2015 between Merc drivers for example if it's Q with fuel? It does not matter, it's a change and it's from the past so it must be great.

While people get excited about gimmicky changes the real conclusions are (Fernley, Force India):

"There won't be any consideration given to an equitable distribution of income, and the engines are not going to be reduced in cost."
"The default for going forward in terms of a team failing will be as per contract, which will be third cars, and in the meantime they will evaluate the customer car programme."

Because they're potentially carrying 33 kg or more fuel as opposed to a couple of kilos. If the goal is to make the cars faster, why would we then want to slow them down in qualifying?

[SectorOne]

Quali should stay the same as it is now. And i´d like to see secret fuel loads so nobody knows anything about when people will make their first pit stop.

Edit: i´d probably get rid of the "Top 10 has to start on Q2 tires". I´d rather see total secrecy there too.

[Vasconia]

Quali should stay the same as it is now. And i´d like to see secret fuel loads so nobody knows anything about when people will make their first pit stop.

Edit: i´d probably get rid of the "Top 10 has to start on Q2 tires". I´d rather see total secrecy there too.

This, I loved when no one knew how much fuel the other cars had.

I think this is great. Back to faster and more agressive cars, refuelling, more tyres,etc... it looks great!!

I only hope to see Michelin coming back to F1.

But I hope these cars will allow to overtake, because I would like to see faster cars but not faster but dull races.

[Phil]

Quali should stay the same as it is now. And i´d like to see secret fuel loads so nobody knows anything about when people will make their first pit stop.

Edit: i´d probably get rid of the "Top 10 has to start on Q2 tires". I´d rather see total secrecy there too.

Would this work? I thought the whole point of compromising Q3 with fuel was to force teams to gamble between qualifying pace and race pace. E.g. to avoid the fastest team being on pole, only then to do a "1 stop" strategy on a track that is difficult to overtake on and bunch the field up behind him. Although, we now have DRS, so maybe it would/could still work...

Anyway, I think I agree, I would love Q3 to remain unchanged in its format and purity. It's strange... a couple of years back while we had refueling, I couldn't imagine how exciting races could be with a full tank of fuel... and ever since they changed to full fuel loads, I've been an avid advocat of bringing back the refueling... and now that it is returning, I'm having my doubts on it producing non artificial racing. It will certainly spice up the show, that's for sure, as teams will be contemplating starting the race with low fuel and being quicker, but losing time in pits, or running longer at a slower pace (relative to those behind), battling for track position etc... there are going to be many many strategic elements introduced by refueling...

I certainly like that the cars will be generally running closer to their full potential rather than on full fuel loads now...

[SectorOne]

Would this work? I thought the whole point of compromising Q3 with fuel was to force teams to gamble between qualifying pace and race pace. E.g. to avoid the fastest team being on pole, only then to do a "1 stop" strategy on a track that is difficult to overtake on and bunch the field up behind him. Although, we now have DRS, so maybe it would/could still work...

No idea but i´d love to see that. I think the main thing i found interesting with having race fuel in Q3 was that you threw a wrench in the system for the drivers.

They´ve been so used to low fuel running in Q1-2 and then you dump 50kg´s of fuel in the car and tell them to go out and deal with it. Balance all over the place etc.

But i prefer seeing the Top 10 go flat out in the most optimized cars possible. Hell i´d even get rid of the Parc Ferme.
there´s probably a good second left in the setup due to them having to run race setup in Qualifying.

[notsofast]

How about getting rid of Parc Ferme for those who don't make it to Q3. Or get rid of Parc Ferme for those who didn't finish in the top 10 in the previous race.

[zeph]

Graham Keilloh does a great job explaining why refueling is a bad idea here:

http://www.grandprixtimes.com/news/display/10254

Personally, I find it too ridiculous to even contemplate. Why bother with reduced fuel capacity and flow rate, increasing efficiency, only to throw it all out of the window by bringing back refueling?!?

Like the writer says, F1 seems to have no faith in its core offering, it is in a perpetual state of knee-jerk.

Popular opinion on this forum seems to disagree with me, but I say the 2014 rule changes were exactly what F1 needed, and now we just need to get rid of gumball tires and DRS. Further resource and aero restrictions should eventually level the playing field a little more, if F1 can agree to leave a set of regulations in place long enough for everybody to adjust to.

[bhall II]

Personally, I find it too ridiculous to even contemplate. Why bother with reduced fuel capacity and flow rate, increasing efficiency, only to throw it all out of the window by bringing back refueling?!?

I've seen this, or variations of it, stated many times, but I don't understand the logic.

If pit stops are unavoidable, which they are, since every driver is obliged to make at least one in order to satisfy the requirement that compels the use of two dry-weather tire compounds, how is it more sensible to carry the full 100kg of fuel from the start of a race rather than incrementally carrying the same 100kg in smaller amounts?

To be truly efficient is to carry only what's absolutely necessary at any given time, because weight is the enemy of efficiency. In that regard, the current rule makes about as much sense as a requirement for each driver to start a race with all the tires he'll use somehow strapped to the car.

[Phil]

Graham Keilloh does a great job explaining why refueling is a bad idea here:

http://www.grandprixtimes.com/news/display/10254

Personally, I find it too ridiculous to even contemplate. Why bother with reduced fuel capacity and flow rate, increasing efficiency, only to throw it all out of the window by bringing back refueling?!?

Like the writer says, F1 seems to have no faith in its core offering, it is in a perpetual state of knee-jerk.

Popular opinion on this forum seems to disagree with me, but I say the 2014 rule changes were exactly what F1 needed, and now we just need to get rid of gumball tires and DRS. Further resource and aero restrictions should eventually level the playing field a little more, if F1 can agree to leave a set of regulations in place long enough for everybody to adjust to.

It's a good article. Funny, I've always been in favour of refueling and thought the full-fuel-loads in combination with the two mandated tyre compounds a driver needs to use during a race kind of artificial. The two tyre compounds are somewhat the substitute of bringing in the element of varying strategies lost through the ban of re-fueling. Before you had this by nature of differing fuel loads (two stoppers catching the one stoppers on track) - now, you have it through artificial high tyre wear to allow a bit of a playing field where as in you might have cars of similar speeds on different compounds meeting on track and allowing for easy passes. I've thought the re-fueling passes were more "legit", more real, less articial in the sense a one-stoppers goal was to keep cars behind and defend his track position to make his strategy work, a two stopper was the quicker car and would need to make the pass if he was to make the best of his strategy. Together with DRS, perhaps this could be the ideal path for the sport.

Or it might not, as the above article points out. Racing with full fuel loads does have its advantages; It forces drivers to pass on the track (mostly) or by doing undercuts in the pits. I've never quite liked the "managing" factor, although to some degree, there is always some form of managing going on, even in the refueling era.

So, I guess my feelings are mixed. I've grown to like the current formula we've had the last few years and it would be a shame if we ruin some of that by reverting back on something like refueling. We did have some great racing the last couple of years. I think I will definately need to watch some races back from 2008 (or so) to see how it compares. Memory is a tricky thing sometimes. Nostalgic memories are often the best, yet when you revisit them, you'll sometimes find that the memory was better than it actually was.

[bhall II]

That article confuses correlation for causation. It also cherry-picks data.

Then, devastatingly for the refuelling formula, in 2010 when refuelling was got rid of and there were precious few other changes the number of passes per dry race immediately doubled to 21.5.

Never mind the reality that widespread adoption of double-diffusers that year resulted in an unprecedented situation in which teams created an overwhelmingly high percentage of total downforce in ways that weren't affected by "dirty air," and the fact that overtaking numbers jumped even more in 2011 after the introduction of DRS and Pirelli-putty tires, not to mention the proliferation of EBDs, components also immune from the effects of "dirty air."



Overtaking is, and always has been, the product of a performance differential. Full stop. Accordingly, as long as teams more or less carry the same fuel loads and develop cars with more or less the same fuel consumption, neither refueling, nor the lack thereof, will have an appreciable effect on overtaking.

Faster, more efficient cars will still qualify closer to the front, and that will still create hurdles for overtaking, because it will still be really difficult for slower cars to pass the faster cars ahead of them.

Moreover, as evidenced by the same numbers seen above, instances of overtaking are currently becoming more infrequent, and those reductions are occurring at a higher rate, because teams are rapidly converging on the same design solutions, which minimizes the performance differentials required for overtaking.

Refueling will make the cars quicker. That's all.

EDIT: I very bad grammar today.

[turbof1]

Ironically, it's more fuel efficient to refuel. Carrying around more fuel means a higher fuel consumption due the extra weight. Like Bhall said, they need to enter the pits anyway.

Less fuel needed on board also means smaller tanks. Quite a bit smaller actually. Again saves weight and space.

I readed the article on grandprixtimes.com, and I do have my remarks on their arguments:
-Safety: The biggest concern of course. It would help that a standard rig was introduced. Although I do remember that back in the time when the fia also provided its own refuelling rigs, these things often malfunctioned. Should definitely be outsourced to highly-reputed firm and one standard system should be in place.

On the other hand: due the cars only allowed to spent 100kg of fuel throughout a race, a lot less fuel then in the previous refueling era has to be put inside the car. It reduces the risk by its own.

-Cost: Again, controllable if a standard rig is introduced. The article mentions costs of training and hiring, but the budgets are of that level 2 extra technicians would hardly make a dent.

-Effect on overtaking: Bhall explained perfectly why the graphic is not what it seems.

[zeph]

Looks like we're gonna have some more back-n-forth:

http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/formula1/32857685

Refuelling was proposed during the strategy group meeting as a way of making the cars lighter and therefore faster for more of the race duration.
But none of the teams are in favour of refuelling, which was banned on grounds of cost, safety and because it reduced the amount of on-track overtaking.
A meeting of sporting directors in Monaco on Friday concluded that refuelling would add about a million euros to each team's annual budget. Several smaller teams are struggling to make ends meet at the moment.
The teams are to do further analysis on the effects re-introducing refuelling would have on the racing. The findings will be presented at a meeting at the next race in Canada on 5-7 June.
Statistics show that the years during the refuelling era of 1994-2009 produced consistently the lowest number of overtaking manoeuvres on track per race of any year since 1980.
Regardless of whether refuelling returns, F1 cars will be made five to six seconds a lap faster than current speeds.