2017 F1 Constructor technical info/developmentFormula 1

[[Nor]MclarenF1]

I find it a bit strange that it made him dizzy. Look at say, an F-16 canopy, which has a very similar shape. The pilots manage just find without feeling disoriented or dizzy. It's either Ferrari and Vettel being pouty and trying to discourage FIA from implementing this, or it might be a manufacturing defect. Considering it's a prototype, it could happen.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Look at say, an F-16 canopy, which has a very similar shape. The pilots manage just find without feeling disoriented or dizzy.

The major major difference is that they're not concentrating on points a few metres away, the way you use your eyes in a plane is nothing like the way you use them in car when navigating obstacles or courses.

I agree that there may well be an element of Ferrari/Vettel deliberately naysaying but from the onboard video there is a lot of distortion in parts of the screen.

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

I find it a bit strange that it made him dizzy. Look at say, an F-16 canopy, which has a very similar shape. The pilots manage just find without feeling disoriented or dizzy. It's either Ferrari and Vettel being pouty and trying to discourage FIA from implementing this, or it might be a manufacturing defect. Considering it's a prototype, it could happen.

Well that's a fixed canopy jet, that has the canopy designed to fit it and has a different purpose too. This by all means was designed quickly to start testing future head protection that will at some point soon be implemented. We don't know if the curvature distorted the view for Vettel making it dizzying. We don't know if the vibration of the car at speed made any oscillations that caused distortions in the glass either. We just don't know what it was that played into Vettel not liking the set up, and more troublesome is that no one really seems to have pressed for a detailed answer.

What I've read is that curvature was already a concern for the design and the thickness that curvature would have to be.

 

[prisonermonkeys]

Post-2020 aero regulations to be discussed alongside new engine regulations:

http://www.speedcafe.com/2017/07/18/strategy-group-discuss-post-2020-aero-changes/

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

Post-2020 aero regulations to be discussed alongside new engine regulations:

http://www.speedcafe.com/2017/07/18/strategy-group-discuss-post-2020-aero-changes/

I don't like the calls for a return to early 90s and 80s front wing. Just to create some supposed thought of closer racing.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

I don't like the calls for a return to early 90s and 80s front wing. Just to create some supposed thought of closer racing.

Yep and it's not as though the teams can just un-learn everything that they've learned in the last 30 years.

 

[SVX]

It makes no sense to lack innovation in the highest tier of motorsports.

 

[prisonermonkeys]

It makes no sense to lack innovation in the highest tier of motorsports.

It depends on what kind of innovation you're talking about. I would call the development of the engines innovative; I would be less generous with the term if all you're doing is adding a few square inches of cardboard to a front wing so elaborate that it coyld

 

[TheElbows]

Let's be fair, it also makes no sense to have some of the lamest/worst racing in the highest tier of motorsports (a title it barely deserves). This was always going to happen though.

 

[catamount39]

Let's be fair, it also makes no sense to have some of the lamest/worst racing in the highest tier of motorsports (a title it barely deserves). This was always going to happen though.

Highest tier my ****, that belongs to LMP1 at the moment. This is just the most expensive tier of racing.

 

[Touring Mars]

These debates about which form of motorsport is the best always ends in tiers.

 

[Dennisch]

LMP1

How can a class with only 6 5 cars and 3 teams be the top tier?

 

[mustafur]

The Series with the better drivers is the highest tier, the fact is LMP1 drivers are either failed F1 drivers or drivers that failed the stepping stone to get to F1.

I'm not trying to bash LMPs but this is the hard truth.

 

[AudiMan2011]

Mclaren claiming Ferrari and Merc won't help with a 2018 engine because they enjoy seeing them at the back.
http://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12...nd-ferrari-dont-want-to-help-with-2018-engine

 

[Touring Mars]

Mclaren claiming Ferrari and Merc won't help with a 2018 engine because they enjoy seeing them at the back.
http://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12...nd-ferrari-dont-want-to-help-with-2018-engine

It's hardly a shock while Ferrari and Mercedes both have works teams in F1... and McLaren are arguably between a rock and a hard place while that remains the case. May be Mercedes will get bored and quit F1, or at least sell the team, and make their engines more attractive to other teams as a result - but I wouldn't hold my breath waiting on that happening.

Unfortunately, McLaren's laudable and brave decision to go with Honda has (thus far anyway) backfired horribly... it is such a shame to see McLaren struggle so badly, but reverting to a Merc (or Ferrari) customer engine would not only be a humiliating climb down, but would also be more than a mere statement of intent - it would be a virtual guarantee that McLaren would become a permanent second tier team.. a bit like what is happening/has happened to Williams in recent years. McLaren can either double down and go for broke with Honda (possibly literally) or consign themselves to playing second fiddle to one of the 'big boys' for the foreseeable future... frankly, I can't see them going for the latter option and in many ways I hope they don't... and I sincerely hope these lean years of poor performance and (let's face it) downright embarrassment may yet pay off in the long term if they can eventually get back to the top without having to go cap in hand (or at least hand in pocket) to a rival manufacturer.

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

How can a class with only 6 5 cars and 3 teams be the top tier?

With most of those teams having just as much trouble at times finishing races as a McHonda

 

[Liquid]

McLaren seem to be turning into a Lotus/Brabham/Cooper team sliding permanently towards the rear of the grid with weaker and feebler engines from a former period as a front-running innovator.

 

[Dotini]

McLaren seem to be turning into a Lotus/Brabham/Cooper team sliding permanently towards the rear of the grid with weaker and feebler engines from a former period as a front-running innovator.

Whenever Mercedes becomes involved, they tend to dominate. Whether pre-WWI, pre-WWII, early fifties or now, Mercedes-Benz achieves the success against all others. Lotus/Brabham/Cooper/McLaren were/are "garagistas" with limited financial, engineering and manufacturing resources compared to the great factory teams of history. Of the factories, history has shown who's best.

That said, they have never been my favorite team, as I prefer the entrepreneurs, underdogs and fanatic mad engineers and mechanics who are the living heart of racing. By far my favorite era were the Cosworth/Hewland kit-cars of '68-'82 or so.

 

[Tired Tyres]

How can a class with only 6 5 cars and 3 teams be the top tier?

What you mean like Mercedes and Ferrari? That's 4 cars. No one else is going to win unless they both screw up.

 

[mustafur]

What you mean like Mercedes and Ferrari? That's 4 cars. No one else is going to win unless they both screw up.

Screwing up is racing though.

 

[catamount39]

Unfortunately, guess we knew this would happen.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/strategy-group-halo-shield-decision-932802/

Only 1 team voted in favor of the Halo, but the FIA overruled them. The most cumbersome and least protective to oncoming debris between the two solutions is a terrible safety device. Can't believe they want it.

 

[L8 Apex]

The worst solution has been chosen by our resident idiots the FIA.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/strategy-group-halo-shield-decision-932802/

Only 1 team voted in favor of the Halo, but the FIA overruled them.

👎👎👎👎👎

Sounds like the North Korean version of "democracy."

 

[DesertPenguin09]

Any precedent for them doing whatever they want even with the teams voting against it?

 

[catamount39]

Any precedent for them doing whatever they want even with the teams voting against it?

I believe it was a "For Safety" reason, but that's complete garbage when neither are perfect solutions but the Halo is by far the least helpful of the two.

 

[DesertPenguin09]

They were saying they needed to have something by 2018 or bust. That's not how you go about it. They're forcing something just to say they have something. F1 with the few major incidents it has had in the last 20 years (relative to the 70s and earlier) has been going on without a thing there. Give it another year, let them properly test these things.

 

[Liquid]

Any precedent for them doing whatever they want even with the teams voting against it?

Running the 2005 United States Grand Prix once the weakness in the Michelin tyre became known; in that event, much like this one, only one team voted to continue the Grand Prix.

Possibly switching from slicks to grooved tyres in 1998. Not sure about that one for definite though.

 

[[Nor]MclarenF1]

Unfortunately, McLaren's laudable and brave decision to go with Honda has (thus far anyway) backfired horribly... it is such a shame to see McLaren struggle so badly, but reverting to a Merc (or Ferrari) customer engine would not only be a humiliating climb down, but would also be more than a mere statement of intent - it would be a virtual guarantee that McLaren would become a permanent second tier team.. a bit like what is happening/has happened to Williams in recent years. McLaren can either double down and go for broke with Honda (possibly literally) or consign themselves to playing second fiddle to one of the 'big boys' for the foreseeable future... frankly, I can't see them going for the latter option and in many ways I hope they don't... and I sincerely hope these lean years of poor performance and (let's face it) downright embarrassment may yet pay off in the long term if they can eventually get back to the top without having to go cap in hand (or at least hand in pocket) to a rival manufacturer.

At the moment they don't have any option other than Honda. Both Mercedes and Ferrari have apparently shown no interest in supplying them with engines (according to Mr. Brown at least). Maybe Renault would be willing to supply, but considering they've been here for the entirety of the new turbo era and still struggles to get competitive performance out their PU they probably never where, and never will be a viable option.

The dangling carrot for McHonda would be that - as the pundits and boffins in the know predict - if they can get the PU running reliable, it can match Ferrari and Mercedes on power.

 

[Kingofweasles]

Surprise, surprise... And to think Ferrari were the only team interested in using the Halo... #conspiracytheory

 

[TheElbows]

Definitely a step in the wrong direction.

 

[PzR Slim]

The halo is so bad that after over 35 years of watching F1 I might stop. I've seen some pretty horrific things stuck on an F1 car but the halo is comfortably the most hideous.