2014 Design

[Tim.Wright]

what i find 'positive' about this accident is the fact that the nose itself is still intact. in the past, the high noses would make contact and get damaged, even so to the point that they can almost snap off (even though obviously there is a significant force needed) - but in this case, it seems the actual nose rather then the vanity panel is able to withsand the 'impact' and weight of scooping up another car, and remain intact.

The nose is a crash zone. Its supposed to be destroyed because thats how it disspates crash enery. The fact that it stayed intact is a massive fail.

[stefan_]

Or the impact wasn't as strong as it looked from the outside.

[Manoah2u]

what i find 'positive' about this accident is the fact that the nose itself is still intact. in the past, the high noses would make contact and get damaged, even so to the point that they can almost snap off (even though obviously there is a significant force needed) - but in this case, it seems the actual nose rather then the vanity panel is able to withsand the 'impact' and weight of scooping up another car, and remain intact.

The nose is a crash zone. Its supposed to be destroyed because thats how it disspates crash enery. The fact that it stayed intact is a massive fail.

the official crash test surely will have proven it actually gets destroyed when hit in the right manner.

Or the impact wasn't as strong as it looked from the outside.

seems logical. there obviously are differences with full contact and levitational contact.

for example:





three examples of cars getting 'scooped up' by a collection from the rear. did the crash structure fail? certainly not.
does that make the car crash structure a massive failure? definately not. Does this make the cars unacceptably dangerous? no. It just shows under the right circumstances, a car can dive under the car in front.

in a full contact situation you get this:



in this case, the crash structure does its work the way it was intended to do. Is it safer then another car scooping up the other? well, one might argue the 'violence' of the impact probably is a whole lot less becuase energy is not transferred the same way. i would say, a car scooping up another one is safer because it lowers the risks of physical damage to the occupants because of the abrupt stop. On the other side, there is a potential danger of a top being crushed due to the other cars weight (should it become lodged underneath far enough).



the simple truth is, this is what the FIA is genuinly trying to avoid:





interestingly enough, though - andretti was not hurt in this accident.

[beelsebob]

According the rules i believe they cannot put it any higher

Not true at all. According to the rules the centroid can not be any higher. That doesn't mean that the top of it can't be (this is in fact the trick that Merc are exploiting to get their nose so high in the first place). Here for example are a bunch of shapes with the same centroid (roughly):



The crazy but possible may not even be so crazy – you could use the little winglets underneath as a mini snow plough, or as vortex generators for parts further down the car.

[turbof1]

The crazy but possible is illegal due the cross section. I'm not going to take the rules with this because that'll lead only to more confusion, but simply put: you could draw a vertical line at any point throughout the first 3 shapes and it'll cut the shape only once. The last one is illegal due a line nearer the edges would cut it 2 times. The rules made this illegal.

[beelsebob]

The crazy but possible is illegal due the cross section.

Is it? Which rule bans it?

[turbof1]

The crazy but possible is illegal due the cross section.

Is it? Which rule bans it?

I'll look for the correct ruling, but we did have this discussion before on this forum and it was established this is iilegal.

[beelsebob]

The crazy but possible is illegal due the cross section.

Is it? Which rule bans it?

I'll look for the correct ruling, but we did have this discussion before on this forum and it was established this is iilegal.

I feel like you're referring to 3.7.3 which specifies that you get only a single section by looking at it from the front. But this is why the two winglets don't join up underneath. Maybe I'm missing something though. Also, perhaps we should move this to another thread, as this isn't actually on the Merc.

[turbof1]

I feel like you're referring to 3.7.3 which specifies that you get only a single section by looking at it from the front. But this is why the two winglets don't join up underneath. Maybe I'm missing something though. Also, perhaps we should move this to another thread, as this isn't actually on the Merc.

While I'm looking, take a look at this:

I'll move this discussion to the 2014 design topic as soon as it's rounded up.

EDIT: I copied this from scarb's blogpost. I'm not into looking for 2014 tech pdf, and that's atleast readable and understandable:

One aspect of the nose shape is carried over from the 2009 rules is the demand it’s a single open section; this was to prevent the slotted noses Ferrari introduced in 2008. It also usefully serves to keep the nose shape relatively free. This rule works by enforcing a single continuous cross section, if the nose’s side face were sliced open. If any of these slices form two or more pieces then the nose is not a single section and thus illegal.

Mercedes however could still raise the centroid a little bit if they extended the sidebones more downwards, replacing even more wing pillar volume. Technically, they could reduced the height of the wing pillars to 1mm.

[beelsebob]

I feel like you're referring to 3.7.3 which specifies that you get only a single section by looking at it from the front. But this is why the two winglets don't join up underneath. Maybe I'm missing something though. Also, perhaps we should move this to another thread, as this isn't actually on the Merc.

While I'm looking, take a look at this:
http://scarbsf1.com/blog1/wp-content/up ... SLICES.jpg
I'll move this discussion to the 2014 design topic as soon as it's rounded up.

EDIT: I copied this from scarb's blogpost. I'm not into looking for 2014 tech pdf, and that's atleast readable and understandable:

One aspect of the nose shape is carried over from the 2009 rules is the demand it’s a single open section; this was to prevent the slotted noses Ferrari introduced in 2008. It also usefully serves to keep the nose shape relatively free. This rule works by enforcing a single continuous cross section, if the nose’s side face were sliced open. If any of these slices form two or more pieces then the nose is not a single section and thus illegal.

Ah yeh, I'm reading the plane that 3.7.3 is talking about wrongly. Indeed it's illegal.

So then the only way to get the nose higher that I can see is to make the pillars wider, and the bridge narrower. But you really can't get much higher by doing that.

[turbof1]

To be honest, in the past I checked the rules and didn't got any wiser out of it. The best thing you can do to check if it's legal is to slice it in your mind. if at any point you get more then 2 pieces, it's illegal.

[beelsebob]

Okay, so one thought is that you could use the trick that got used a few years back to make a 3 element rear wing:



At this point though, there's probably too much stuff under the nose, generating turbulence and poor quality air. It would probably defeat the point of getting the nose higher in the first place.

[ringo]

For all we know ferrari may come with a force India nose. It's the better design for maximising airflow.
Mercedes solution is sound, but there's no proof it's the best.

[beelsebob]

For all we know ferrari may come with a force India nose. It's the better design for maximising airflow.
Mercedes solution is sound, but there's no proof it's the best.

As you say, there's no proof it's the best... So why are you asserting that the Force India's is the best as a proven fact?

[turbof1]

Okay, so one thought is that you could use the trick that got used a few years back to make a 3 element rear wing:

http://scarbsf1.files.wordpress.com/201 ... r_wing.jpg

At this point though, there's probably too much stuff under the nose, generating turbulence and poor quality air. It would probably defeat the point of getting the nose higher in the first place.

Interesting. Which year was that? I never picked up on that, so I'll need some more research on this.