FIA scrap 2014 bodywork changes [split]

I'm not sure I'm that comfortable with slower laptimes, if it's a second or two fine no big deal, if it's several seconds they'd better phone Dallara and tell them to make a shittier GP2, and don't forget telling the IRL too.

I do know meeting and improving on the record 2004 times is lunacy, because of cost G-forces safety overtaking etc etc, but there's a sweet spot somewhere.

Cars won't be 7 sec slower unless they get rid of diffuser. These changes will decrease lap times by 3-4 sec at most, which will be regained in the next 2-3 years of development.

Edited by BetaVersion, 08 December 2012 - 01:18.

Is it possible that a small national series could have the fastest racing cars in the world?

With such short track, I can see why times will drop as it will lose quite some performance in corners. But I guess this is good as it will balance the reduction in engine power

Cars won't be 7 sec slower unless they get rid of diffuser. These changes will decrease lap times by 3-4 sec at most, which will be regained in the next 2-3 years of development.

By Brenson's article, the drag will increase a bit because the FW won't cover the last 7cm of the tires to deviate airflow from it.

People complain about how one car is dominating and the little teams have no chance to catch up, but then when they introduce Regs. to re-stimulate the competition everyone freaks out because the cars are slower. Well no crap.

Edited by DrProzac, 08 December 2012 - 10:44.

I can't believe this. Another horrible decision from the FIA.

Exactly. It's just a shame that the whole cost savings and greenness thing clashes with that.

I don't see how 1000bhp clashes with cost savings.

Edited by BetaVersion, 08 December 2012 - 19:37.

This green stuff in F1, and in motorsport in general, is a big BS, too.

Motorsport energy comsuption is nothing on the whole scheme of humanity.

Andrew Benson's done a bit of digging: http://www.bbc.co.uk...rmula1/20640255

Equally, the overall efficiency targets will remain the same - whereas now use of fuel is free, it will be metered from 2014. Currently, cars use about 150kg of fuel (about 195 litres) in a Grand Prix; in 2014, they will be allowed to consume no more than 100kg (130l).

Edited by Eff One 2002, 09 December 2012 - 01:22.

Edited by mtknot, 09 December 2012 - 01:55.

You're missing the point. It's not about the actual energy usage, it's about Formula One's image in the world. Using modern efficient, more greener engines gives a better image than the current frozen, old ones.

I don't see why an arbitrary amount of horsepower is necessary either. The engines need to be powerful enough to give us good racing at a high enough speed. No more, no less.

The diffuser hasnt even been removed so it just seems even more stupid.

Edited by DrProzac, 09 December 2012 - 10:48.

Edited by Snic, 09 December 2012 - 11:17.

Edited by DrProzac, 09 December 2012 - 13:23.

I might be completely wrong here but in 2010 didn't Renault threaten to drop out of F1 unless V6 engines were introduced which would be more relevant in terms of their own road cars.

It is about entertainment.

Heck, with the aero/power improvements of GP2/WSR, doesn't this make F1 slower than GP2 or WSR?

Not at the moment, but that might change soon if those series continue to make faster cars and F1 continues to slow down.

I must say that it concerns me a bit. I'm not one to say that F1 cars need to be going round at a thousand miles per hour for me to be happy because I frankly cant tell the difference visually between a lap of 1:25 and 1:30 in most instances, nor a car going 190mph and a car going 210mph. But F1 will inevitably lose a fair bit of its prestige if its not THE fastest road racing sport on the planet anymore.

Not at the moment, but that might change soon if those series continue to make faster cars and F1 continues to slow down.

I must say that it concerns me a bit. I'm not one to say that F1 cars need to be going round at a thousand miles per hour for me to be happy because I frankly cant tell the difference visually between a lap of 1:25 and 1:30 in most instances, nor a car going 190mph and a car going 210mph. But F1 will inevitably lose a fair bit of its prestige if its not THE fastest road racing sport on the planet anymore.

Edited by Kucki, 09 December 2012 - 15:38.

Agree with that, but where I can see the difference is in the cornering. Corners that were once a challenge are now becoming an easy full-throttle blast. Better tyres and aero account for some of that, but IMHO the biggest problem is the limits put upon the engine.

Agree with that, but where I can see the difference is in the cornering. Corners that were once a challenge are now becoming an easy full-throttle blast. Better tyres and aero account for some of that, but IMHO the biggest problem is the limits put upon the engine.

Its not only about prestige. The cars have become looking very boring visually, that has got to make at least unconciously bored. Look at old generations of cars flying through the corner rockets on the straight, a single car by itself looked impressive. They used to run 370km/h not too long ago, nowadays they reach 300km/h early on the straight and then hit a wall were they just crawling up to 310 km/h the whole rest of the straight. Add to that the extremely wide tracks with asphalt run off and an F1 cars top speed looks like 100km/h on TV.

I agree. F1 engines at 750bhp do not overwhelm the mechanical and aero grip of the car; theres too much grip. We need to see cars at 1000bhp, like in the early 00's, but without traction control. I begin to wonder if those 1000 horsepower monsters of the early 00's were even driveable without traction control.

I do get the feeling despite the FIA's attempts to curb downforce levels, of the 2014 regs, a certain Adrian Newey will easy reclaim the lost downforce.... full throttle all the way through every corner! Although at that point, power levels could easily be adjusted. I wouldn't be surprised if the engines could easily produce 1000hp (with KERS) if they needed it to.

An overpowered car with low grip will be slow because:
-You don't need 1000 HP to go fast around a corner. In fact it's useless. For that you need grip (aerodynamic, mechanical, chemical (tyres) grip).
-Low grip means less traction and thus slower acceleration.
-Someone also said smaller brakes. Well, less braking capacity means longer brake distances, lower top speeds, thus slower cars.
If you increase power, you need to increase grip so that you can make use of the power.

I think you have missed the point.

An overpowered car requires more skill and control to get the best out of it. You don't need to increase grip, there should be an excess of power, but that is sadly lacking these days.

Increasing the braking distance might give a slightly slower laptime, but visually you wouldn't be able tell, and has the benefit of improving the chances for an overtake into the braking zone.

You should look at overtaking moves this year...

Having an overpowered is imho as stupid as an underpowered. You have to have a good power/grip ratio to force braking and make re(acceleration a difficulty, but an overpowered one will just require more braking and allows for more mistakes in racing lines.

This is a well known problem in kart where shifter karts corner slower than non shifter karts yet have faster lap times because they can reaccelerate faster out of corners even if you do a mistake.

Whoa! This is for 2014 but very significant:

So the lower front bulkhead and nose, removal of the beam wing, changes to the front and rear wing have been binned.

Sounds good to me. The better drivers will make less of those mistakes.

You missed my point:
An overpowered car lets you make mistakes in racing lines and still not lose time because you have a spare power to re-accelerate.

All cars being equally overpowered, the one that does a mistake on the racing line will lose time, because even if it will be able to accelerate fast, the car that did negotiate the turn properly will also accelerate fast and still have the in corner advantage.

Your comparing of two different machines over the same track makes no sense at all.

In karts, The shifter karts enjoy much more available power than non shifter karts due to the gear box. Their max power is much more than what they can apply at the exit of a turn thus you have spare power available, so if you do a small mistake you can cover it up by re-aligning a putting on more power than when you exit the turn properly.

This is one of the reasons why in shifter karts heavier pilots can still make it in contrary to other series.

This is very akin to two cars with one having more power available.

Shifter karts are faster because, like you said, they have much more available power. The engine works on a higher power speed range, delivers more energy to the kart. It will be faster because it reaches higher average speeds from accelerating faster. Period.

You can't extrapolate that to a field of equally powered or overpowered f1 cars. Because if one is overpowered all of them will be, and the one that makes a mistake will always lose time.

You can't make for the lost time, that's the point. Every mistake he does costs time, the driver who runs a clean lap will be always faster, because he didn't lose time and has the same power available.

And then there is the whole lot of new mistake opportunities with an overpowered car, breaking traction and power sliding out of turns.

It's a commonly accepted fact in motorcycle racing that smaller-displacement bikes with less power will punish bad lines and errors more, because the rider can't use the torque available at their right hand to accelerate hard out of a corner. Where there's a lot more power than available traction, the emphasis tends to shift from carrying corner speed to getting your vehicle stood up/straightened out to apply the power as quickly as possible.

Aside from aerodynamic grip screwing up the mechanical side of the handling, there's no reason why this shouldn't be true in cars as well. So I'm with Ogami-san on this one.

...because it has more power than needed to reaccelerate it can re align to make a straighter reacceleration, making for the lost time.

... Their max power is much more than what they can apply at the exit of a turn thus you have spare power available, so if you do a small mistake you can cover it up by re-aligning a putting on more power than when you exit the turn properly.

Edited by saudoso, 11 December 2012 - 21:25.