About the Ros/Kar crash and Tarmac runoff areas

Better to remove the source of the accident than the consequences. Karthikeyan is not good enough, never has been, never will be, his presence is an embarrassment to a supposedly elite racing series where the rupees you can bring count more than the talent.

Better to remove the source of the accident than the consequences. Karthikeyan is not good enough, never has been, never will be, his presence is an embarrassment to a supposedly elite racing series where the rupees you can bring count more than the talent.

Actually gravel would have slowed him down better. Might have rolled, who knows, but the impact would have been way less severe.

Slowed down, yes - but like you said he would very likely rolled around with the angle he shot into the air.

Why are you even posting if you don't have anything to say about the topic ... and are you really so ignorant that you don't want to know why this accident happened? His hydraulic failed which resulted in a broken steering rod. Would you like him to not think about himself and actually acculearate into the wall?

Actually gravel would have slowed him down better. Might have rolled, who knows, but the impact would have been way less severe.

Like most racing fans I really am not a fan of those so called "Carpark" circuits, but let's get honest here - do you think both Rosberg and Karthikeyan would have walked away just like they did today, if there had been a gravelpit and concrete walls?

I don't. Maybe the FIA needs to have a different approach and simply be more strict at giving out penalties for driving flat out over the Tarmac area if you have missed the corner.

Actually gravel would have slowed him down better. Might have rolled, who knows, but the impact would have been way less severe.

Edited by dau, 04 November 2012 - 17:42.

Since when has anyone asked to get rid of safer barriers in favour of concrete walls? most people want grass or gravel and i think the result of the crash would have been the same. The way his car landed he wouldn't have rolled.

Better to remove the source of the accident than the consequences. Karthikeyan is not good enough, never has been, never will be, his presence is an embarrassment to a supposedly elite racing series where the rupees you can bring count more than the talent.

Edited by Disgrace, 04 November 2012 - 19:42.

You appreciate karthikeyan's car was suffering from hydraulic failure at the time of the shunt. He was a bystander.

To change the subject entirely, Brundle's team said that this was not an engine failure.

Karthikeyan was able to drive around the corner. He was steering the HRT around the racing line.

As far as tarmac runoffs and so on, the penalties for drivers using them are insufficient. Makes the racing unsafe. Paradoxically. Put glue or something on them. The human species has gone to the moon, there must be a way of slowing errant cars down to a degree that's both safe and penalizes them for being off.

Grass would have sufficed, plus would penalise anybody running wide there. Honestly, I can't see the issue with grass - I can understand the argument for gravel traps, but grass doesn't have anywhere near the same rolling hazard.

Karthikeyan has been the target of a lot of unfounded vitriol. When an HRT was left standing on the grid today, someone immediately said "LOL Karthikeyan", when it was actually de la Rosa and not even his fault at that.

Clearly he isn't fast enough for F1 and is there for his money, however, he is not dangerous. He has only crashed out of a single race, Singapore, at which meeting Senna hit the wall three times. Glock and Webber also hit the same wall he did during that weekend. It's not a standout move of incompetence.

Likewise today signified the third 2012 race winner to drive into him after Vettel and Button. This time, he had a technical failure which meant he was a passenger. It was an unfortunate accident out of both drivers' hands.

I do not advocate that he remains in F1 in the long term, but I advocate people taking the blinkers off when supposedly objectively commenting about his performances. Webber and Perez made more idiotic moves today, and both will find themselves in top cars next year.

Let me illustrate the problem with grass:

Why not a car width's worth of grass, then a car width's worth of gravel, then all the runoff you need? You tick the safety box but you can't straightline corners without losing speed.

Edited by Kucki, 04 November 2012 - 22:10.

Grass would have sufficed, plus would penalise anybody running wide there. Honestly, I can't see the issue with grass - I can understand the argument for gravel traps, but grass doesn't have anywhere near the same rolling hazard.

Worst. Post. Ever.

Let me illustrate the problem with grass:

I was expecting Greg Moore's fatal accident...

I´d like to say something about NK´s driving. People defends him because he had a failure. But if you have a failure in that little straight with a car right behind, you have two options:

1) If it´s after you start steering for the corer, turn left, go wide, and get out of the way on the outside and don´t bother the guy behind, you´re going to retire anyway.
2) If you notice in the straight, just stick to the right hand side and lift the throttle so you don´t bother the guy behind.

Trying to go through the corner using the racing line at reduced speed is really bad decission.

Am I missing something or didn't Karthikeyan lose steering which would ... stop him from steering the car out of Rosberg's way

Wait a sec. Didn´t he lose power steering? That´s what I thought I heard. If that´s the case, it´s not as if you couldn´t turn anymore, what I said it´s perfectly doable.

If he lose steering altogether - wheel not connected to front wheels movement-, he could have accelerated off the track and stopped it like 50 meters away from the closest barrier. Anyway if it´s the last case, I understand why he missed this quickthinking while he was trying to understand what on Earth was happening.

"At Turn 16, I lost the hydraulics. It [the hydraulic pressure] just dropped completely to zero and the steering wheel locked solid."
http://www.autosport...t.php/id/104043

Could you elaborate? I'm honestly curious as to what exactly makes this the worst post ever.

I´d like to say something about NK´s driving. People defends him because he had a failure. But if you have a failure in that little straight with a car right behind, you have two options:

1) If it´s after you start steering for the corer, turn left, go wide, and get out of the way on the outside and don´t bother the guy behind, you´re going to retire anyway.
2) If you notice in the straight, just stick to the right hand side and lift the throttle so you don´t bother the guy behind.

Trying to go through the corner using the racing line at reduced speed is really bad decission.

Real grass, for cars out of control and heading towards a wall. I need to explain it?You're not one of my employees are you?

This incident made no difference whether there would have been asphalt run off or grass or sand. Rosbergs car was sliding on its stomach.

What made a difference was the High Tech Tecpro barriers, for which this crash / that speed of impact wasnt even anything special. It can catch cars above 200km/h with little problem for the driver. They are designed to give way and slow down the impact softly.

You could have the Tecpro barriers on normal / classic designed tracks and they would work just as good.

Edited by bmardini, 05 November 2012 - 07:29.

+1000

Finally someone who actually realizes that whats more important is what happens at the point of impact.

The car could be going 40kph straight into a concrete wall or 160kph into a high tech barrier. I'll take the latter any day.

Which is of course complete bollocks; otherwise the modern circuits would have no run-off and just fancy barriers!

If we want to play "whats more important" it is to gradually slow the car to a stop BEFORE it hits any form of barrier. Many things have been tried, and nothing is perfect, but tarmac doesn't dangerously entangle a driver like the old catch fencing, doesn't require constant maintenance like gravel to stop it compacting, doesn't have any tendency to flip a sideways car like gravel, and doesn't beach cars metres from the racing line necessitating a SC , but does have the downsides of increased draining problems and being a get out of jail free card for drivers taking the piss or marginally overcooking a corner.

Which is of course complete bollocks; otherwise the modern circuits would have no run-off and just fancy barriers!

If we want to play "whats more important" it is to gradually slow the car to a stop BEFORE it hits any form of barrier. Many things have been tried, and nothing is perfect, but tarmac doesn't dangerously entangle a driver like the old catch fencing, doesn't require constant maintenance like gravel to stop it compacting, doesn't have any tendency to flip a sideways car like gravel, and doesn't beach cars metres from the racing line necessitating a SC , but does have the downsides of increased draining problems and being a get out of jail free card for drivers taking the piss or marginally overcooking a corner.

Why not a car width's worth of grass, then a car width's worth of gravel, then all the runoff you need? You tick the safety box but you can't straightline corners without losing speed.

We've been through this the other day in the "sanitation of the sport" thread, the issue with multiple surfaces is that an out-of-control car can roll as soon as it hits a different surface. See Di Grassi's F3 accident at Hockenheim, as soon he hits the gravel the car rolled. I don't think reducing the gravel to a car's width would've solved anything in that case.

Which is a shame as I'd quite like that solution.

What about the tungsten-asphalt thing that's installed in Paul Ricard? It slows the car down, penalises the driver by ruining his tyres and gives the driver an opportunity to maneuvre. It does look rather ugly in Paul Ricard but the colour can probably be changed if necessary.

We've been through this the other day in the "sanitation of the sport" thread, the issue with multiple surfaces is that an out-of-control car can roll as soon as it hits a different surface. See Di Grassi's F3 accident at Hockenheim, as soon he hits the gravel the car rolled. I don't think reducing the gravel to a car's width would've solved anything in that case.

Which is a shame as I'd quite like that solution.

Edited by MrMontecarlo, 05 November 2012 - 13:07.

Edited by Alx09, 05 November 2012 - 13:21.

The more important thing here is - we have again seen a near miss on an open cockpit.

If everything is going to be paved, we'd better hope to god that it never rains.....