127 replies to this topic

[PayasYouRace]

They couldn’t use the halo because the middle upright created a blind spot in corners on ovals. As they looked up and to the right, as you would in a banked oval corner, the depth of vertical member was too great. The compromise was to use the screen as vertical support as well.

That’s not right because the aero screen is the same framework sections as the halo. A central column and the halo round the top.

[Risil]

IMHO Indycar has a higher natural need for head protection than F1 owing to the high speeds and propensity for contact at Indy. I think an average Indycar driver incurs a greater risk of head strikes than an F1 driver. So there's an argument that if you're going down the route of "drivers need extra head protection" it's logical for Indycar to need a more comprehensive solution than F1. The halo will work fine to prevent a tyre or a whole car intruding but at the Indy 500 there's a wider variety of shapes and sizes of debris that could do serious damage.

[PayasYouRace]

The point of my view, which I would not classify as nihilistic, is to understand our objective more precisely. The objective cannot just be safety, since when you take it to its logical conclusion, it would preclude having racing in the first place. If the objective is not purely safety, then do have to ask ourselves what else is there? If the objective is more than just safety, then only discussing safety may lead us to a solution that isn't as satisfying as it could be.

I personally want Indycar to be distinctive, and being open-wheel open-cockpit formula made it distinct from sportscars for about a hundred years. I personally don't enjoy watching sportscar racing, and one of the reasons is that you can't even see any part of the driver. Sure, in F1 with halos, you only see a helmet these days, but even seeing a helmet is much better than seeing nothing; you see yellow helmet, you know it's Lewis Hamilton, and you know why he races with the yellow helmet. With aeroscreen, Indycars have closed up to the point that you don't really see the driver at all.

Well perhaps the objectives are along the lines of having a car that can race equally well at Indianapolis, Iowa, Long Beach and Road America, etc. A car that will protect its driver in the worst of accidents; A car that also stirs the soul by looking and sounding great, they the general public will look at and want to watch 33 of them being raced.

Trivial details such as whether the wheels are covered or not, how high the windscreen is, etc, aren’t going to be the major considerations.

But if you want a distinctive combination, then a closed cockpit open wheel, single seater is pretty unique. You won’t find many racing series in history that have done that.

[Peat]

I dearly miss seeing the drivers helmet and agree that the Halo is less obstrusive aesthetically. 
But there is no question that the screen is a far more complete soltion to protecting drivers from debris, which at oval speeds is now a necessity given you can't uninvent things. 

The area that still gives me the heebie-jeeblies with the aeroscreen is the inability to exit an inverted car without external assistance. I know we have the AMR saftey team that, even at road courses, are very quickly on the scene. But one of these days, a car will be upside down on fire and the driver will have no option but to sit and wait....

[juicy sushi]

There will always be blind spots or weaknesses in particular safety solutions, but so long as these series want to use different cars because they feel that matters (and for most fans it does), then we're going to have that issue.  I think the aeroscreen is more traditional and logical than the halo, as it was a part that has always been on the cars since the very early periods of the sport, just in varying sizes, and serves to prevent small debris from striking the driver, which is a demonstrated risk both Indycar and in F1 (Massa would have been protected by the aeroscreen when the halo would have done little).  

 

Does it make it hard to see the driver?  I suppose, but the raised cockpit sides since the early 1990s had already done that, so making it harder to see a sliver of helmet bobbing around isn't much of a loss, personally.

 

Single-seat enclosed bodywork would be neat, I think only the Gen2 Formula E car and the old WR LM94 have done it since the 1954 Mercedes W196 effort.  But it'd be heresy for most traditional fans, so I think we can be pretty confident it's never gonna happen.

 

[Risil]

(Annual reminder that it's technically not an aeroscreen as it serves no aerodynamic purpose.)

[juicy sushi]

(Annual reminder that it's technically not an aeroscreen as it serves no aerodynamic purpose.)

It functions as an excellent air fryer for cooking drivers in their cockpits though.  We just need to be more creating with the seasonings thrown in with them.

[PayasYouRace]

(Annual reminder that it's technically not an aeroscreen as it serves no aerodynamic purpose.)

Arguable. Most windscreens are there to protect you from debris/rail than as a primary method of shaping airflow.

[midgrid]

Single-piece bodywork was also banned at Le Mans after Sébastien Enjolras's fatal crash in 1997 in a later model of the above WR.

[Risil]

Arguable. Most windscreens are there to protect you from debris/rail than as a primary method of shaping airflow.

 

They should call them insect guards

[BRG]

I think the aeroscreen is more traditional and logical than the halo, as it was a part that has always been on the cars since the very early periods of the sport, just in varying sizes, and serves to prevent small debris from striking the driver, which is a demonstrated risk both Indycar and in F1 (Massa would have been protected by the aeroscreen when the halo would have done little).

 

I think equating the little bit of perspex used on many singe seaters over the years with the current Indycar aeroscreen is stretching the point some way beyond breaking point.  Older screens were merely there to deflect the wind (and sometimes rain) from the driver's face and had little intrinsic strength.  I once broke one on a Lotus 49 struggling to get out.

 

As for Massa, it is likely that the spring would have struck the central column of the halo and been deflected upwards.  Although we will never know for sure.

[Beri]

They should call them insect guards

But but but.. they are not guarding nor protecting insects..

[Risil]

But but but.. they are not guarding nor protecting insects..

 

Cars have mudguards over their wheels and they do very little to protect the mud from harm

[loki]

That’s not right because the aero screen is the same framework sections as the halo. A central column and the halo round the top.

It was covered quite a bit at the time.  Specifically the triangular area where the upright joins the halo as well as the width of the upright.

 

ETA. because some in the forum would ask for proof of gravity in a link should it be mentioned here’s a first page result.

 

 

 

IndyCar rejected the halo on the grounds that it would have a dangerous effect on driver sightlines on oval tracks, where cars often run wheel-to-wheel or in very close proximity.

https://www.motorspo...ses-first-test/

Edited by loki, 31 March 2025 - 16:10.

[loki]

(Annual reminder that it's technically not an aeroscreen as it serves no aerodynamic purpose.)

That’s why it's the Deflector Shield ™…

[Beri]

That’s why it's the Deflector Shield ™…

Deflector is one of many power-enhancing Mini-Cons scattered across Earth. A member of the elite Gold Mini-Con Team, when Powerlinxed to a larger Transformer, Deflector projects a force field that blocks enemy energy blasts for a limited time. His shield is ineffective against physical blows, however.

https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Deflector

Edited by Beri, 31 March 2025 - 16:42.

[red stick]

They should call them insect guards

Well, great, now I've got a vision of a company of army ants . . .

[red stick]

It was covered quite a bit at the time.  Specifically the triangular area where the upright joins the halo as well as the width of the upright.
 
ETA. because some in the forum would ask for proof of gravity in a link should it be mentioned here’s a first page result.
 

https://www.motorspo...ses-first-test/

That recalls the sign one of the law review editors placed on his office door at Vanderbilt nearly 40 years ago--"There is no gravity; the Earth sucks!"

[PayasYouRace]

It was covered quite a bit at the time.  Specifically the triangular area where the upright joins the halo as well as the width of the upright.

 

ETA. because some in the forum would ask for proof of gravity in a link should it be mentioned here’s a first page result.

 

https://www.motorspo...ses-first-test/

Note that is a frameless test item, two years before its eventual implementation.

 

The production model has a halo forming the structural strength of the device, as demonstrated in various replies to yourself, specifically Peat’s. So obviously the sight line issue was solved. You’re showing us Newton when the rest of us are on Einstein.

[Radoye]

Does it make it hard to see the driver?  I suppose, but the raised cockpit sides since the early 1990s had already done that, so making it harder to see a sliver of helmet bobbing around isn't much of a loss, personally.

 

Well there were complaints already when the move was made from open-face to fully enclosed helmets that people can't see the driver anymore so how can they know the driver is working hard if they can't tell by theri facial expression, i think that ship has sailed long time ago and unless one advocates a return to the 1950s safety standards which were the last time one could actually see the drivers the whole argument is a moot one.

 

But people generally don't like when things change, and also people will argue because that's what people do even when it makes little sense or the chances to actually change something are close to 0.

[loki]

https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Deflector

They’ve broken the laws of physics with this one…  

[loki]

Note that is a frameless test item, two years before its eventual implementation.

 

The production model has a halo forming the structural strength of the device, as demonstrated in various replies to yourself, specifically Peat’s. So obviously the sight line issue was solved. You’re showing us Newton when the rest of us are on Einstein.

 

I’m explaining why the F1 halo wasn’t used as a whole.  It happened.  Just because you didn’t know about it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. 

[pacificquay]

I’m explaining why the F1 halo wasn’t used as a whole.  It happened.  Just because you didn’t know about it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. 

Those concerns about visibility were before it was tested.

 

Here are some actual real quotes from when it was tested - no visibility concerns - and as Will Power points out in the article “you’ve got a halo and a screen”

 

https://motorsport.t...dixon-and-power

Edited by pacificquay, 31 March 2025 - 20:00.

[PayasYouRace]

I’m explaining why the F1 halo wasn’t used as a whole.  It happened.  Just because you didn’t know about it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. 

 

I did know about it.

 

As per Peat’s post, there is a halo in the aeroscreen.

 

 

Aeroscreen has the same central upright. 

 

*not the 'same'. The whole thing has a different geometrey to the F1 halo, slightly taller for the reasons you mentioned. I don't know how load bearing the screen itself in, I assumed not much. 

[loki]

[Seppi_0_917PA]

IndyCar planning to introduce new car in 2027, Roger Penske says
Nathan Brown, Indianapolis Star

"Right now, we have a car in design. It's in the wind tunnel, and our plan is to bring in that car in 2027," Penske said. "It'll look like an Indy car, and it'll be safer — that's one of the things we've tried to do. We're looking at speed and also the ability to take some weight out of the car, which all the teams want, and then of course we'll have hybrid technology."

When asked to clarify that the full car was set to roll out in less than two years, Penske told IndyStar, "That's the plan. Yeah."

"We're talking to Honda, obviously, and talking to Chevy, and our goal is to have them with us in 2027," Penske continued.

[maximilian]

(Annual reminder that it's technically not an aeroscreen as it serves no aerodynamic purpose.)

 

DEFLECTOR SHIELD!!    

Edited by maximilian, 04 April 2025 - 01:40.

[maximilian]

IndyCar planning to introduce new car in 2027, Roger Penske says
Nathan Brown, Indianapolis Star

"Right now, we have a car in design. It's in the wind tunnel, and our plan is to bring in that car in 2027," Penske said. "It'll look like an Indy car, and it'll be safer — that's one of the things we've tried to do. We're looking at speed and also the ability to take some weight out of the car, which all the teams want, and then of course we'll have hybrid technology."

When asked to clarify that the full car was set to roll out in less than two years, Penske told IndyStar, "That's the plan. Yeah."

"We're talking to Honda, obviously, and talking to Chevy, and our goal is to have them with us in 2027," Penske continued.

 

 

WOW, the excitement is palatable, isn't it?       "We'll have a car, and it'll look like an IndyCar" - I'd say that's the minimum requirement.

 

Safer yet?  Oooooook.  Not that we needed it much safer, did we?

 

Hybrid tech?  Whoopti dooooo 

Edited by maximilian, 04 April 2025 - 01:42.