What should Formula One do to go green? Express your thought

[dumrick]

It's a two-bladed sword, essentially. Go "too green" and you lose the fans who are there for the noise, the excitement, and the technical sides of it (assuming you restrict development in effort to go greener). Stay "brown", and the rest of the world will hate you.

There is no correlation I can think about between restricting development and going "green".

In my opinion, motorsport is actually (or, at least, should be) one of the best fields to develop new technologies for road vehicles. Is one of the few environments where you can expend a considerable sum of money into R&D without having the top management detailing all your costs and questioning all your expenses. On the other hand, in competition you can assess the efficiency of a technology, leaving aside all marketing and commercial stunts. If some technology represents a real asset, it will make the difference on track.

That's why I hold the 80's Group C close to my heart. Some very loose chassis and engine regulations combined with a performance-leveling formula based solely on energy limitation. Was this bad for competition? Hell, no. You had 3,6L 6-cylinder turbocharged engines battling with 6L V12's and it worked. You had also permanent fuel injection system evolution - in a couple of years, the Bosch Motronic system that was tried on a Porsche and that helped that car to win Le Mans was under the hood of your car. If the same philosophy was mantained, instead of the ridiculous F1-engine formula that killed Group C and failed to feed F1 with new engines (except the "better forget about it" Peugeot), we could have had direct injection, variable geometry turbos and who knows what else tried in competition earlier. And the technology that now is arriving at road cars could be in our garage for longer.

Does this make motorsport green? If you implement the right set of rules, at least it can be the test bench for all technologies that make your everyday car greener. Let's look at KERS: I have no idea about real life performance and comparative merits of, for example, "Flywheel kinetic energy conservation" vs. "Prius-like chemical-electrical conservation" vs. "Pressurised fluid energy conservation". Depending on which technology each maker will be able to develop or buy at reasonable price, you will get the marketeers around you praising their own technology like the second coming. If they were raced head-to-head in a context of an energy-limited formula, it would be easier to tell the efficient technologies from those presenting more problems and from the pure marketing stunts. Eventually, car makers would have the pressure of the market to adopt the most efficient solutions.

Nowadays, the spirit of the rules is going farther and farther away from such a logic: you have spec carshapes, spec engines, spec COG's, fixed numbers of cylinders and weight penalties for the best cars. The kind of new technologies that can be applied must also be explicitly regulated. We know that this is meant to provide better racing. I just want to ask one thing: is there better racing now than when the logic was a different one?

[bar555]

There is only one way - Honda's way . PAINT EVERY car GREEN so then we may have a 'greener' F1 championship
(Just joking)

but.....hmmm think it better , maybe this is really the only way

[Metar]

I meant restricting aero- and engine-development in an effort to cut costs and improve the "green" image of the sport by cutting energy "wasted" on wind-tunnels and test-engines - something that already happened, with the statement that less windtunnel-time and engine-testing will save costs, but also energy. I agree with you that yes - development is the way to go if we want new, and green, technologies. I think you just misunderstood the part about restrictions on development.


We should also consider that even if a team has 30 engines running 24Hrs in an effort to squeeze out more power, if the technology they're using helps 10 models of roadcars achieve an extra 4-5MPG, or the the extra performance required while keeping the same fuel-consumption, then it helps far more than not-running those 30 test-engines and having perhaps half a million other engines wasting extra fuel.

At the same time, KERS, variable gadgets and whatnots are all things that a racing environment speeds up: A Prius-esque car with technologies derived from, say, the level of KERS systems available in 2015 will be so much more effective. And yes - you spend hours of test-driving, in theory wasting fuel, to develop the system - but in the long run, it pays off.
Considering a potential move to Tesla-esque EV cars in the future, or hydrogen-powered cars: those cars, at their current state, need a major boost in mileage. And yes - KERS will help them increase that mileage. A KERS system will be effective in 50 years, or a 100, assuming the earth still exists and cars are still wheel-powered by then.
At the same time, Variable Trumpets or whatever those are will help us with the now. More efficient engines mean more performance for sportscars, or smaller engines with the same level of performance for your average daily commuter-car. Volkswagen and Fiat proved that small, turbocharged engines are more powerful, and more efficient, than larger regular engines. And those things would get a huge boost in development if they were allowed in a racing-environment.


In a way, if we want F1 engines to become "greener", there should be one single rule: This and that amount of fuel per race, and lets party.

[dumrick]

Sorry Metar, I misunderstood your statement.

In the end, we really agree on this subject.
In my opinion, to consider F1's impact in the environment not taking into consideration the potential technological advances that it can bring to vehicle production is, at least, myopic (like me ).

And, since I'm on this subject, I would also like to join Belatti on what's he's drinking (and smoking).

[Metar]

Sorry Metar, I misunderstood your statement.

In the end, we really agree on this subject.
In my opinion, to consider F1's impact in the environment not taking into consideration the potential technological advances that it can bring to vehicle production is, at least, myopic (like me ).

Yep, the long-term, or the larger-scale, advancements that F1 brings seem more beneficial...

And, since I'm on this subject, I would also like to join Belatti on what's he's drinking (and smoking).

Screw methanol-powered cars. I wanna see methanol-fueled drivers

[checkered]

Screw methanol-powered cars. I wanna see methanol-fueled drivers

Drivers with impaired

central nervous systems? Blind drivers? Methanol is highly toxic. You don't want anyone to drink it - ever. Just to make it clear, just in case. It's great stuff for small 2stroke ICEs in RC planes and cars, though, mixed with some oil - that I can say of personal experience. But ethanol is the stuff that is supposedly drinkable (to an extent), but I'm tighta**ed enough to say that one shouldn't even joke about drinking and driving either.

[megz]

Nitro Methane for my F1 cars please. Watch as the pit crews eyes MELT!

[Carlos]

F1 will only be as green as it has to be to prevent itself from becoming totally irrelevant. Just like fashion, no one who wants to be taken seriously wears tie dye T shirts and bell bottom pants. It will incorporate some green features. F1 evolves on many levels. It's business model can't be identified with what it was 3 decades ago. It once highlighted engineering but now it highlights brand identification. Did it ever bring any kind of new technology to road cars? Some think fuel injection, monocoque chassis, use of advanced materials like aluminum, fiberglass, carbon fiber, overhead camshafts, 4 valve engines, turbo and a lot of other tech was pioneered by F1 then trickled down to road cars - but it didn't. All that tech came from airplanes. Maybe the purpose of road cars and race cars have diverged so much that they are different species. Remember the stir the Nano caused when it arrived on the forum. Perhaps future road cars will more closely follow the Nano's 'design for the real world' instead of the design of LeMans prototypes, which very closely resemble F1 cars with full bodywork. Yes F1 does without traction control, active suspension and ABS computer assist, but who needs that stuff more, an F1 driver or the average citizen driving to work while talking on the phone, eating a sandwich, in every kind of adverse weather surrounded by hundreds of other cars that are being driven just as badly. Should 22 F1 cars aspire to the miles-per-gallon fleet figures of family sedans. Why not airbags in F1 cars. Why doesn't everyone wear helmets when driving to the mall. Preserving human lives seems like a really green idea to me. Maybe thats what F1 should be about. Why shouldn't it also be more responsible in every arena of life, perhaps eliminating government waste, fraud and nepotism. Maybe it should be responsible for spreading fair-free trade and democracy. I can't recall F1's stand on AIDS or a vaccine for malaria. One of my friends sent me some photos, one was shot from up a hill off track, the track had a had dozen F1 cars but in the foreground was an abysmal slum, with half a dozen poverty ridden children playing. That was commentary on the real world. What is F1's position and action on that. I've got some things to think about.

[jaho101]

I think KERS is a step in the right direction, and I think its what F1 should be doing to begin to stay relevant. I'd rather see 10 million dollars go into KERS than into valve trumpets. I predict that in 10 years time, if F1 is still around, that they'll probably be running on electricity. And during pitstops, instead of fuel we'll be watching the cars recharge.

Carlos brought up a good point though, about how F1 is more similar to aircraft than road cars. The one thing they really have that is similar is energy usage, so that's where I think that the future of F1 lies, in making the most of energy. F1's rapid pace of development could finally be put to use, as its been quite irrelevant to road car technology for a while now.

Propellers to gather exhaust thrust, KERS, that's the future of F1. Everyone worried about their speed should also calm down, F1 is always getting faster. As the regulations for new technologies to be introduced into F1 start trickling in they'll still be able to maintain their pace.

I also just came to an idea, what if the fuel of the cars was limited, however electrical (or an alternative source) wasn't? You could start the race on fuel, but have to rely on the electronics and recovery systems (and recharging stops) to keep the car going. While every year the amount of fuel you can use is reduced slowly. Who knows, either way F1 needs to start using some new tech sooner or later.

[Belatti]

Preserving human lives seems like a really green idea to me.

[-X

Carlos, didn´t you read Manchild´s signature? Humans are killing all the animals in this planet.

[dumrick]

Preserving human lives seems like a really green idea to me.

[-X

Carlos, didn´t you read Manchild´s signature? Humans are killing all the animals in this planet.

That's true and that's not all. Carlos, au contraire, there is no greener thinking than trying to exterminate the human race, the virus that is corrupting our planet.

[modbaraban]

Finally you people got the point [-(

Remember Clarkson's idea to put some miniguns on F1 cars?

[dumrick]

On related news, Luca Marmorini, from Toyota, plays down F1's KERS system and Mauro Forghieri says that F1 has become technically irrelevant.

It's all here:
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/65226

Maybe Tomba will start wondering if putting "F1" and "Technical" in the site title isn't a contradiction in terms?

[Ciro Pabón]

Thanks, Dumrick, great link. It makes me feel better about my (in the beginning) lonely rant. I can resume it in a phrase:

"It's the amount of fuel for the race, stupid!"

I think this is becoming a chorus directed towards the less than sensitive ears of FIA.

About the title of this site, well, it's not called "F1Technical - And We Mean Techniques Relevant for Cars", isn't it? That is up to regulations, not to Tomba. Anyway, some degree of engineering techniques will have F1, no matter when or what for.

[dumrick]

About the title of this site, well, it's not called "F1Technical - And We Mean Techniques Relevant for Cars", isn't it? That is up to regulations, not to Tomba. Anyway, some degree of engineering techniques will have F1, no matter when or what for.

Of course it will, but is I feel it's losing it's appeal for technicians. For discussions on the shape of the brackets where the "off-the-shelf" and "not that efficient" flywheels for KERS are being mounted, don't count me in... I mean, that's the kind of issues i face at work. I'm already nerdy enough to enjoy spending my free time in technical discussions , not in trivial ones!!!

Nevermind anyway, with the interesting people gathered here, it could be called "Door Hinge Technical" that it would be a good place to be...