Double Decker Diffuser Banned For 2011

Yeeey the DDD is banned for 2011 !


http://www.autosport...rt.php/id/80766

Will it improve overtaking though?

According to Gascgoyn no


Bye Bye

Edited by Hypnotise, 07 January 2010 - 18:47.

Yeeey the DDD is banned for 2011 !


http://www.autosport...rt.php/id/80766

Will it improve overtaking though?

According to Gascoin no


Bye Bye

Depends. Brawn's car was designed around the diffuser, others just had their bolted on.

I think we will have to wait and see.

Its formula 1 . Couldnt they ban diffuser at the end of this season? Now teams are spending **** load of money to develop the double decker just to find it banned next year.

saving costs my ass

What a joke

Its formula 1 . Couldnt they ban diffuser at the end of this season? Now teams are spending **** load of money to develop the double decker just to find it banned next year.

saving costs my ass

They are banning it at the end of this season

Isn't this just a big waste of money?

The teams have already spent all this cash developing the DDD.

Why not just let them stay?

And when it comes to overtaking, isn't it better having a car that develops downforce using the underbody rather than upper surfaces?

Trouble is, cutting costs AND reducing overtaking, after the work from 2009, is almost impossible...

As many of you already said shame that teams spent so much money on developing a better diffusor...

Isn't this just a big waste of money?

The teams have already spent all this cash developing the DDD.

Why not just let them stay?

And when it comes to overtaking, isn't it better having a car that develops downforce using the underbody rather than upper surfaces?

How would most here have reacted if they issued a rule clarification after last years hearing effectively banning them thereby costing only 3 teams the expense of only removing the device?
Funny how now cost is the reason that some dont want the DDD banned.

They are banning it at the end of this season

I meant that teams are spending huge amount of money for developing DD for 2010. While in 2011 its banned. So much about Costs saving!

How would most here have reacted if they issued a rule clarification after last years hearing effectively banning them thereby costing only 3 teams the expense of only removing the device?
Funny how now cost is the reason that some dont want the DDD banned.

Sure, but this loophole was exploited and other teams have followed.

They've all spent a year refining the technology and will to now un-learn it.

Just seems another waste of time.

Still, at least they haven't demanded it be done immediately.

Good decision, imo. But why weren't the DDDs banned half a year ago for 2010!?!

I meant that teams are spending huge amount of money for developing DD for 2010. While in 2011 its banned. So much about Costs saving!

They would develope the aero with certain summ regardless if the rules stay constant or not. The more constant they stay, the more it will cost to find improvements.

It is one of the performance differentiators taken away, and I don't like all cars being within half a second from each other, so please... no....

Good decision, imo. But why weren't the DDDs banned half a year ago for 2010!?!

That's what anyone sensible in the rules dept would have done, but "sensible" is not what the FIA did whilst under MM.

Banning certain type of diffuser (or alternatively not banning it) does not reduce costs, teams spend as much they can raise via sponsorship. If it is not diffusers, it is something else. Of course, now they are all supposed to work with limited budgets (and rest assured no books will be cooked).

I cannot see this ban making following cars through faster corners any easier either (...), something more drastic would be required.

Banning certain type of diffuser (or alternatively not banning it) does not reduce costs, teams spend as much they can raise via sponsorship. If it is not diffusers, it is something else. Of course, now they are all supposed to work with limited budgets (and rest assured no books will be cooked).

I cannot see this ban making following cars through faster corners any easier either (...), something more drastic would be required.

It may not make it any easier, but it won't make it harder.

I still think they should be more drastic and ban the diffuser compeletly. Everyone should also stop with the cost saving nonsense. Where the aerodynamics are concerned, unless they mandate standard parts (god forbid) then there will never be cost savings. The teams will continue to spend to find every millisecond of improvement.

Good decision, imo. But why weren't the DDDs banned half a year ago for 2010!?!

Because the rules clearly said that holes in the floor are not allowed and the FIA agreed with Brawn that they had slots, (not holes) in the floor.

The only cost saving here will be at the FIA, who doesn't actually have to re-write the rules, Just interpret them correctly.

Edited by metz, 07 January 2010 - 17:39.

This whole issue just sums up F1 in a nutshell. The moment it was allowed it opened a can of worms. It was allowed fair enough, but since that point to the end of the 2011 season, all that money spent on developing and refining the idea is money down the drain (for the long term). It was one of the biggest focussed parts of the car for development last season. And it might be again in 2010.

But then in 2011, it will be back to square one. Which FIA and Bernie like, because it keeps the rules fresh and keeps things from being predictable. Every year or two there are rules that go against cost cutting but it refreshes the pecking order on the grid, and gives the engineers a chance to have an impact. It's a boring preseason if we know what the pecking order will be for the following season. New rules bring excitement, unpredictability and a chance for the slower teams to catch up.

It's hard to prove on a forum if it helps overtaking or not. Without simulations and comparisons and numbers to back it up. I think most of us can agree it doesn't help overtaking, but by how much is hard to say. The DDD also gives less grip in the wet, compared to a car to gets more of it's downforce from it's wings. Downforce in the wet should be improved, which is good because it's a huge dissappointment when they can't race because of the rain, or have to delay the qualifying or race by doing SC laps. The tracks are one of the biggest factors for overtaking, but with the DDD I have to believe that the ability to follow another car is at least slightly comprimised.

If the FIA really cares about it, it's an easy thing to test. Take 4 cars to Barcelona. 2 Renaults (1 with DDD and 1 without) and 2 Brawns (1 with DDD and 1 without). Maybe the Brawn is a bad example because they don't have a non DDD version. So it could be another team like BMW or Ferrari. Give the car infront x more fuel so that it's comprimised in speed and get the cars to follow each other keeping all other variables the same. The Renault infront to start with using the DDD, and the Brawn without. For 5 laps see the closest it is able to stay (.5 for example). Then give the chasing Brawn the DDD and get it to follow again, seeing if it can stay any closer. Then get the Renault to lead without the DDD etc. Then get the Brawn to lead and the Renault to follow, giving the Brawn x fuel to be slower. It'd be interesting to find which combination allows the car to follow the closest. The driver feedback would probably be more useful then the numbers, but if they tested it throughly they should get some kind of idea about it. This would never happen of course but it'd be interesting if it did. You could ask the drivers what they noticed from early in the season when only a few cars had it. I remember the Renault in Sepang was overtaken a few times in the dry which is rare. But there are some many variables in the races it's hard to isolate if it's the DDD or a high fuel load or a bad setup making following the cars more possible. What is certain is when the RB5 had no DDD, it was easily the fastest car in the wet and that later in the season with the DDD, it had no big wet advantage (Vettel missing Q2 in Brazil for example) but was quicker in the dry winning that Brazil race.

Good move. It has to help overtaking, the wake is a function of speed, anything that reduces cornering speed has to make it easier to follow closely onto the straight.

Better late than never .

Isn't this just a big waste of money?

The teams have already spent all this cash developing the DDD.

Why not just let them stay?

And when it comes to overtaking, isn't it better having a car that develops downforce using the underbody rather than upper surfaces?

The problem is that the diffuser and rear wing(together) are a large part of how 'disturbed' the car's wake is, which most certainly will affect the ability of another car to follow closely(even if it doesn't necessarily allow any noticeable improvement in overtaking).

As for being a waste of money, well yea, it kinda is. But pretty much any rule change in F1 is going to be a waste of money as teams have to design new aero work and components to suit the new regulations, replacing the old.

At the least, unless the new diffuser regs are radically different than they were expected(key word) to be in 2009, then most teams will at least have a good starting point to work off of.

I just hope that they've written these regulations well so that no one can turn up in mid-March 2011 so that we don't keep going round in circles.

It may not make it any easier, but it won't make it harder.

I still think they should be more drastic and ban the diffuser compeletly. Everyone should also stop with the cost saving nonsense. Where the aerodynamics are concerned, unless they mandate standard parts (god forbid) then there will never be cost savings. The teams will continue to spend to find every millisecond of improvement.

I agree to an extent, but don't you see that it's a dead end?

Goal of cost cutting - to help the smaller teams remain competitive and prevent "spending races" so that the strength of the idea is more important then how much money is behind it. In other words, an engineering race instead of a spending race. No wonder Toyota have bolted from F1. Money was the only thing they ever had going for them.

If a small team knows it needs to catch up, if it spends a great percentage of it's budget on something that will be banned from 2011, it will be a waste because even if it's successful in gaining some ground, it will lose it once the DDD is banned. And they will be at the back again.

Meanwhile the large teams can spend more money on this dead end route, because they are desperate for whatever it takes to win. But then still have enough resources to be more capable of bouncing back from that and exploring the new areas once it's banned.

So in other words, the teams in 2010 at the front will continue to develop the DDD and it's harder for the small teams to do that. The other problem with the DDD is that it's an area of the car that has a large scope for finding improvements. There is alot of potential to find time there. ESPECIALLY if the car is designed to contain this diffuser from the core concept when it's launched. So the core concept of the cars will be DDD based in 2010, only to be ditched for the 2009 concept (a variation of it) once they are banned. Which means 2 seasons of dead end aero development. It'll keep things interesting and unpredictable for 2011, but these dead ends should be tried to be avoided. It's like when the teams had to develop the V10s to last 2 races for one season, only to switch to V8s the next year. Or when they had to develop the whole car and setup around making one tyre last for the qualifying and race, only to switch to super soft tyres that could be changed again the next year.

I just hope that they've written these regulations well so that no one can turn up in mid-March 2011 so that we don't keep going round in circles.

I believe the article mentioned that they were going to look very carefully at the regulations to make sure there were no loopholes.

I agree to an extent, but don't you see that it's a dead end?

Goal of cost cutting - to help the smaller teams remain competitive and prevent "spending races" so that the strength of the idea is more important then how much money is behind it. In other words, an engineering race instead of a spending race. No wonder Toyota have bolted from F1. Money was the only thing they ever had going for them.

If a small team knows it needs to catch up, if it spends a great percentage of it's budget on something that will be banned from 2011, it will be a waste because even if it's successful in gaining some ground, it will lose it once the DDD is banned. And they will be at the back again.

Meanwhile the large teams can spend more money on this dead end route, because they are desperate for whatever it takes to win. But then still have enough resources to be more capable of bouncing back from that and exploring the new areas once it's banned.

So in other words, the teams in 2010 at the front will continue to develop the DDD and it's harder for the small teams to do that. The other problem with the DDD is that it's an area of the car that has a large scope for finding improvements. There is alot of potential to find time there. ESPECIALLY if the car is designed to contain this diffuser from the core concept when it's launched. So the core concept of the cars will be DDD based in 2010, only to be ditched for the 2009 concept (a variation of it) once they are banned. Which means 2 seasons of dead end aero development. It'll keep things interesting and unpredictable for 2011, but these dead ends should be tried to be avoided. It's like when the teams had to develop the V10s to last 2 races for one season, only to switch to V8s the next year. Or when they had to develop the whole car and setup around making one tyre last for the qualifying and race, only to switch to super soft tyres that could be changed again the next year.

F1 developement is always a series of deadends and the spending race will always continue. The only way you can ever stop it is to make F1 a spec series. Teams are on the lookout for the next advantage, and as soon as someone has it you can be sure everyone else will try and copy it, and following past trends the FIA will eventually ban it.

Why are people fussing over costs?

It should make the racing a little better, so i'm all for it.

Why are people fussing over costs?

It should make the racing a little better, so i'm all for it.

Indeed, if it improves the show then i'm all for it

It should make the racing a little better, so i'm all for it.

How?
Find me one aerodynamicist that says it will improve racing.
It's a myth.

Edited by Timstr11, 07 January 2010 - 16:45.

How?
Find me one aerodynamicist that says it will improve racing.
It's a myth.

The aerodynamicists are never going to say "take some aero off the cars it's bad for racing". It's turkeys voting for Christmas, that was the trouble with the OWG.

The simple fact of less downforce means less corner speed -> less wake -> closer following -> more overtaking. Plus a larger % is mechanical grip.

2 years too late

DDD is an abomination that ruined F1 and racing

well...it spiced up the show. ...for 1 year.

It would have been wrong to ban then when the FIA made its ruling in the early part of 2009 as the rules did not prohibit DDD's. They should have been banned at the end of 2009 though. If The FIA and FOTA had not spent so much time hitting each other with handbags something productive for F1 may have emerged by now. The FIA should have the wording sorted out for the ban by now.

I believe the article mentioned that they were going to look very carefully at the regulations to make sure there were no loopholes.

Or slots...

I'm good with that.

Or slots...

Very good!

That would be loop slots!

Its formula 1 . Couldnt they ban diffuser at the end of this season? Now teams are spending **** load of money to develop the double decker just to find it banned next year.

saving costs my ass

Cost savings? What I wouldn't give for just 10% of the money that was spent on KERS.

This really depends on which side of the fence you fall on, either spec racing with spec cars (Drivers Championship) or a series that allows technological innovation and rules interpretation. Enough has been said about the DD but the point is several teams figured out how to build a superior diffuser that was still within the letter of the law, in other words they did their jobs.

I don't mind that they tighten up the rules in that area but still think they need to leave enough of the rules open to allow for designers to put their "stamp" on the cars.

Otherwise be done with it and use a spec chassis and spec engine. Paint the car anyway you want and then put what ever name you want on the valve cover to make the engine manufacturers happy. That should take care of cost savings forever.

Nice decision, but i´m sure in the next few years another suspicious piece will be the next element of technical disagreement.

Something tells me this is Ferrari's idea. Maybe they STILL cant work out with their new car and how to beat Merc GP or the new improved McLaren in 2010..so the best thing is to eliminate their advantage

Edited by Raincoat, 07 January 2010 - 18:32.

maybe i should poll this




good or bad decision?

maybe i should poll this




good or bad decision?

Good decision but call it what it is. Either the sport involves technical innovation that can lead to a distinct car advantage or no innovation and strictly a drivers series.

2 years late stupid *****

Good news, I thought they had forgotten about this. I hear Mike Gascoyne doesn't think it'll do anything to overtaking, and I'm not sure it will neither, but hey it's a step in the right direction.

What I don't understand, at all, is why it wasn't banned for this year already. When the FIA deemed it legal at the start of the season, that was a massive ****-up, they should've either deemed it illegal on the basis that it was against the spirit of the regulations (I do understand that would've killed Brawn, though), or started pushing immediately for a 2010 ban. This way they have the teams bolting in half-assed DDDs in their non-DDDs cars in 2009, designing DDD cars in 2010, and then going back to early 2009 in 2011. It's ********.

Great, so the teams that didn't have DDD this year are designing brand new cars ( Mclaren and Ferrari ) and then and the end of the year, they need to design an other brand new car again because DDD is not allowed.

That is alot of research and development cost

Edited by Simon Says, 07 January 2010 - 19:56.

Cost savings? What I wouldn't give for just 10% of the money that was spent on KERS.

This really depends on which side of the fence you fall on, either spec racing with spec cars (Drivers Championship) or a series that allows technological innovation and rules interpretation. Enough has been said about the DD but the point is several teams figured out how to build a superior diffuser that was still within the letter of the law, in other words they did their jobs.

I don't mind that they tighten up the rules in that area but still think they need to leave enough of the rules open to allow for designers to put their "stamp" on the cars.

Otherwise be done with it and use a spec chassis and spec engine. Paint the car anyway you want and then put what ever name you want on the valve cover to make the engine manufacturers happy. That should take care of cost savings forever.

KERS was a faillure because the FIA limited it that much. If KERS cars were allowed 100 hp for 5 seconds a lap, or perhaps unlimited boost, then everybody would be using it.

It's going to be interesting for road cars.

Good news, I thought they had forgotten about this. I hear Mike Gascoyne doesn't think it'll do anything to overtaking, and I'm not sure it will neither, but hey it's a step in the right direction.

What I don't understand, at all, is why it wasn't banned for this year already. When the FIA deemed it legal at the start of the season, that was a massive ****-up, they should've either deemed it illegal on the basis that it was against the spirit of the regulations (I do understand that would've killed Brawn, though), or started pushing immediately for a 2010 ban. This way they have the teams bolting in half-assed DDDs in their non-DDDs cars in 2009, designing DDD cars in 2010, and then going back to early 2009 in 2011. It's ********.

It is fundamently wrong to ban something based on the spirit of the rules. They certainly screwed up, but it was in the writing of the rules that the mistake happened, trouble is they are just not forward thinking enough to rewrite the rule for 2010 when the decision was taken.

Great, so the teams that didn't have DDD this year are designing brand new cars ( Mclaren and Ferrari ) and then and the end of the year, they need to design an other brand new car again because DDD is not allowed.

That is alot of research and development cost

They all design brand new cars anyway.

Great, so all teams are going to have to design brand new cars ( Mclaren and Ferrari ) because of DDD for 2010 and then and the end of the year, they need to design an other brand new car again because DDD is not allowed.

That is alot of research and development cost

Don't they design brand new cars every year?
I don't see the big deal.

I'm sure it's the likes of cash strapped teams like USF1 who have complained about the move as teams like that are likely to use the same gearbox used in 2010.
That's formula cheap. Me no likey.

Why would anyone vote that this is a bad decision? I think it is GREAT. Remember GP Australia? Barely any DDs there, and epic action ;)

Edited by Alx09, 07 January 2010 - 20:05.

do people realise this is not a rule as everyone is going on like this is already writen in stone
Some people should read this article.
http://www.autosport...rt.php/id/80766

Once the wording of the rules has been sorted, it will then be put to the FIA's official Technical Working Group for ratification prior to going through the channels required for it to get put into the 2011 regulations.

At best this is the teams TWG's recommendations and clearly is not a rule yet just their thoughts on the matter.

If it becomes law i am not certain if it is a good thing or a bad one.
one thing is clear the DDD has less effect on both drag and following cars per pound of down force generated (due to the air exiting in the centre of the low pressure area behind the car rather than being sent skywards). IF it is banned one thing is clear the designers will still grab back all the downforce within a year and this time it will be once again regained through the use of wings etc and therefore will effect the cars behind more than the DDD does.

Edited by Demo., 07 January 2010 - 20:37.