4 replies to this topic

[PeaQ]

What is the definition on cockpit and the definition on monocoque?
What's the difference?
can a monococque be a cockpit?

[david_martin]

Not even remotely similar. The cockpit is where the driver sits (or pilot flies in an aircraft, or helmsmen steers on a racing yacht).

Monocoque is an engineering term referring to a construction method whereby the skin of the vehicle (car, or aircraft, or whatever) is stressed. In cars, this is compared to space frame construction, where an internal frame provides the structural integrity of the vehicle, and the skin is simply affixed to the frame, and does not bear service loads.

[Ursus]

from http://www.dictionary.com

mon·o·coque (mn-kk, -kk)
n.

A metal structure, such as an aircraft, in which the skin absorbs all or most of the stresses to which the body is subjected.

Obviously it isn't limited to metal.

The cockpit is simply the space where the driver sits.

cock·pit (kkpt)
n.


The space in the fuselage of a small airplane containing seats for the pilot, copilot, and sometimes passengers.
The space set apart for the pilot and crew, as in a helicopter, large airliner, or transport aircraft.
The driver's compartment in a racing car.
A pit or enclosed area for cockfights.
A place where many battles have been fought.
Nautical.
A compartment in an old warship below the water line, used as quarters for junior officers and as a station for the wounded during a battle.
An area in a small decked vessel toward the stern, lower than the rest of the deck, from which the vessel is steered

[mono-posto]

From the somewhat-decent-but-could-be-better book by Forbes Aird:

"The word "monocoque" was probably coined within the French aviation industry sometime around World War I, by adding the greek prefix mono meaning "alone" or "single", to the French word coque, which means "shell", as of an egg. Thus monocoque translates more or less literally as "single shell", but is perhaps best interpreted as " a structure formed as a single skin".

Some structures, both man-made (such as a storage tank) and naturally occuring (an egg shell), are truly monocoque. In these examples, the visible external skin does indeed carry structural loads, and there is no seperate frame of any sort."

He goes on to comment that such structures which carry reinforcing bulk heads or frames are actually more accurately "stressed skin" and sometimes referred to as "semi-monocouque".

The "cockpit" is just the space in which a driver sits and has no reference what so ever to the design of the chassis.

[Dimo]

I always thought that monocoque was used because, at some time in history, some F1 driver must have had two.;)

Or perhaps Eddie Irvine coined it in frustration...think of the ground he could cover if he had more than one.