20 replies to this topic

[Cociani]

If a major goal of racing series is to remain relevant to road car manufacturers then are pneumatic valve return systems a worthwhile technology to further develop? Will they ever be used in road cars? Could they ever be used in road cars? I personally do not see a day where people will be charging their reservoir tanks with nitrogen at the filling station along with buying a bag of Doritos.

Perhaps a ban on such a pointless development (as far as technical transference goes), should now be brought to a halt and bannedin f1. A ban on pneumatic valve return rather than or perhaps in concert with a reduction in displacement would be a better way to reduce cost and speeds longterm. If we really want to make f1 development more relevant we could even make them run the engines on 87 octane fuel.

I know that many will jump all over these suggestions it just strikes me that if it is true that the cars are getting dangerously to fast and on a separate note too expensive that any limitation on performance ought to reflect technical parameters closer to road cars. This approach would hopefully encourage road car manufacturers to develop F1 engines.

At the end of the day engines running at more sane RPM levels would produce less power, use less fuel and would last longer then the 19,000 rpm machines of today. Who knows perhaps you would be able to buy a Ferrari with a slightly detuned f1 engine in it! Maybe even a Porche.

[desmo]

Most of the irrelevancy of modern F1 powertrains stems from the fact that they are displacement limited, and thus the need for the crazy rpms and tricks like pneumatic valve return and 2:1 bore-stroke ratios to get the requisite specific outputs. Limiting them by fuel type and quantity- as in the real world displacement and specific outputs are decidedly secondary considerations to fuel efficiency- would present a much nearer approximation of real world design priorities IMO.

[JwS]

Why do you feel that development of new technology is pointless, if that were the case we would still be walkin everywhere! (You'll never be able to ride that damn horse, and what good would it do anyway!!!)
JwS

[Greg Locock]

"If a major goal of racing series is to remain relevant to road car manufacturers "

and what leads you to think that might be the case?

F1 is a branch of the entertainment industry. It is not quite WWF. yet.

[Cociani]

Originally posted by Greg Locock
"If a major goal of racing series is to remain relevant to road car manufacturers "

and what leads you to think that might be the case?

F1 is a branch of the entertainment industry. It is not quite WWF. yet.

The SAE is having a confrence with Max Mosely, Tony George et al who agree it is the case.

[McGuire]

Originally posted by desmo
Most of the irrelevancy of modern F1 powertrains stems from the fact that they are displacement limited, and thus the need for the crazy rpms and tricks like pneumatic valve return and 2:1 bore-stroke ratios to get the requisite specific outputs. Limiting them by fuel type and quantity- as in the real world displacement and specific outputs are decidedly secondary considerations to fuel efficiency- would present a much nearer approximation of real world design priorities IMO.

I really like blank-sheet ideas such as these...the obstacle to them: the huge global corporations like DaimlerChrysler, BMW, Honda and Toyota are not going to commit their hundreds of millions to them until there is an experience base out there and they can figure out what to make of it and how they can best chisel things to their advantage.

This points to an interesting paradox in manufacturer participation in motorsports: when you ask them, they say they are there for open and unfettered technological competition, their engineers against the world, mano a mano. That's bullshit, really. Global corporations are the ulitmate control freaks. They don't make a move until both the potential upside and downside as well as all the secondary consequences are carefully defined. That's their culture, and their responsibility to their shareholders when it comes right down to it. Imagine a formula with no rules at all. Would any of these giant corporations sign up for that? Hell no. They'd have to be out of their minds.

[McGuire]

Originally posted by Cociani
If a major goal of racing series is to remain relevant to road car manufacturers then are pneumatic valve return systems a worthwhile technology to further develop? Will they ever be used in road cars? Could they ever be used in road cars? I personally do not see a day where people will be charging their reservoir tanks with nitrogen at the filling station along with buying a bag of Doritos.

Perhaps a ban on such a pointless development (as far as technical transference goes), should now be brought to a halt and bannedin f1. A ban on pneumatic valve return rather than or perhaps in concert with a reduction in displacement would be a better way to reduce cost and speeds longterm. If we really want to make f1 development more relevant we could even make them run the engines on 87 octane fuel.

An interesting thing about technology -- costs tend to follow a time/maturity curve. At this stage in the game, pneumatic valve return is actually pretty cheap, relatively speaking....cheaper than 32 valve springs capable of 15,000+ rpm, which are very fussy with high rejection and failure rates and short service life. So if you want to keep costs down while still allowing high rpm, let them keep their air springs. They're cheaper.

To get right to the root of the cost problem with high rpm, you really need a "closed rule." That is, you set a rev limit and be done with it. However, "closed rules" are considered bad form in rules ethics as they "stifle development." (Of course: that's the idea) However, the problem with an "open rule" (not prohibiting high rpm, just trying to discourage it by prohibiting certain materials and processes) is that it just shifts development around, usually into newer and thus more expensive technologies. It's like playing whack-a-mole but with hundreds of millions instead of quarters. Racing becomes a silly technical game played by totally arbitrary rules, a money-spending contest that has little to do with real technical advances at all.

[Cociani]

I am open to being proven dead wrong on this one, the thread has been posted to create discussion.

[Powersteer]

Pneaumatic valves are yet to be relevent to road cars but would be a good addition technically speaking and I don't mean for high performance. It can work like having coil valve spring with variable tension, at low rpm the friction on the cams would be much lower with low tension and goes up as rpm increases.

A lot of low performance production engines have valve springs that are set hard enough to hold the valve steady at 7,500 to 8,000 rpm. This is less practical when the engine, being a non high performance car, is always going to spin from 1,000 to 3,000 rpm and only sometimes hit red line let alone the rev limiter.

So until they come up with a reliable or long mileage service pneaumatic system, it is going to stay where it is at the moment. There is always desmo though.

[Greg Locock]

I don't think the car manufacturers want to get involved in the expectation of technological spin-offs. That may be the PR story. The truth is it is just a relevant billboard, and its effectiveness as form of advertising will be measured in the same way as any other advertisement.

[McGuire]

Originally posted by Cociani
I am open to being proven dead wrong on this one, the thread has been posted to create discussion.

Thanks, it's a great question. There are many very expensive technologies in racing cars with no relevance to road car development. Errr, all of them at the moment. With one exception, I think: safety.

[Melbourne Park]

The electro-changing mechanical gearbox started in F1. Lots of things did. Using them proved their effectiveness. We are now starting to get active suspensions, computer controlled manual gearboxes, composite materials etc. I agree with Desmo, fuel econ would make F1 more interesting from a development point of view. And while F1 is marketing marketing, that's a result of the need to get lots of dollars in. As are the rules to facilitation competition (often not so effective lately).

[Greg Locock]

Active suspension is the only technology I can think of which was developed by an F1 team and bled across to road cars.

Except that it hasn't, of course.

[Melbourne Park]

Originally posted by Greg Locock
Active suspension is the only technology I can think of which was developed by an F1 team and bled across to road cars.

Except that it hasn't, of course.

But it sort of is happening. Springs effectively tighten themselves now. Cars lower themselves at speed. The technology is happening, but its not common or fully implemented.

[sblick]

Pneumatic Valves are in development for road cars and have been for a while. The problem is they don't "land" really well on the seat and tend to snap. So it is a durability question right now. Lotus and a few other companies have been trying to use computer control to "land" the valve softer thus increasing its durability. Auto companies would get a huge gain in fuel efficency and pollution control if they have "infinitely variable" valves. The consensus is a 10% gain on horsepower and a similar reduction in pollution.

[desmo]

Sblick- please note that pneumatic valve actuation and pneumatic valve return are two entirely different things. There's no rational reason to fit an F1-type pneumatic return system to a road car.

[ZoRG]

Composites(carbon fibre) aren't really used in road cars, maybe in supercars, plastic is used quite alot these days, how many plastic panels on a F1 car?

As for pneumatic valve returns, except for cost/complexity, they should have the reliability to make it into road cars, maybe nothing in it performance wise, however, it might be a great PR move, also, won't a pneumatic system at 150psi yield the same performance as a coil spring of say around 250-300 compressed psi(80-100 on the seat)?

As for tech spin-off, not sure, are there any really? Active suspensions were implemented in the early 90's already weren't they? 15 years later nothing really close to what can be(was) done is done.

[Greg Locock]

Lotus F1 did lead the development of the Active suspension at Group Lotus, who are probably the only road car manufacturer to get almost serious about chucking a high bandwidth system into a production car.

Variable height suspensions were developed for road cars, long before F1 thought about them seriously.

The first reasonably fully composite car I can think of was also a road car, not a race car.

Sorry, I'm going to stick to my guns, new technology does not generally bleed across from F1 to road cars, in the last thirty years anyway.

[Melbourne Park]

Originally posted by Greg Locock
... Sorry, I'm going to stick to my guns, new technology does not generally bleed across from F1 to road cars, in the last thirty years anyway.

Simulation maybe an old goal, but F1 sets the standards there. Look at the way Ferrari can have a car hit the track without fiddling with setups and straight away be right on it. Using that technology at such a level of perfection is still progressing in F1, its use in road cars will provide better, safer, cheaper cars and help develop AI auto systems.

Telemetry has come from racing. Now a modern car is becoming a computer network. F1 has I imagine lead that concept.

If F1 tyres had to last 6 races I bet we'd learn something about getting better road tyres!

Its worth while standing back, and remembering that the auto industry is quite mature. Obviously any auto racing let alone a constrained formula will over time offer less and less to an industry that has transformed itself from a machine based product to one that IMO is now marketing based appliances.

But there's much that can be learned from F1 that is much broader than those that pertain to wheeled appliances. We live in a fast moving world, where getting to market quickly and meeting objectives and budgets is vital. Business can learn many vital lessons from F1. From a management perspective, F1 is fascinating. Large resources, lots of people, with the same ultimate goal. The drama of key individuals inside a political organisation. The constraints of budgets and laws. Even from a marketing perspective its interesting. We've seen the world get smaller as telecommunications grow, and F1 has been a core product for that progress. F1 viewers have even get to see various cities around the world when looking at race. And despite all the experience, individual people still seem pretty important. We ourselfves might also learn something from that.

[Greg Locock]

"
Simulation maybe an old goal, but F1 sets the standards there. Look at the way Ferrari can have a car hit the track without fiddling with setups and straight away be right on it. Using that technology at such a level of perfection is still progressing in F1, its use in road cars will provide better, safer, cheaper cars and help develop AI auto systems.

Telemetry has come from racing. Now a modern car is becoming a computer network. F1 has I imagine lead that concept.

If F1 tyres had to last 6 races I bet we'd learn something about getting better road tyres!

Its worth while standing back, and remembering that the auto industry is quite mature. Obviously any auto racing let alone a constrained formula will over time offer less and less to an industry that has transformed itself from a machine based product to one that IMO is now marketing based appliances.

But there's much that can be learned from F1 that is much broader than those that pertain to wheeled appliances. We live in a fast moving world, where getting to market quickly and meeting objectives and budgets is vital. Business can learn many vital lessons from F1. From a management perspective, F1 is fascinating. Large resources, lots of people, with the same ultimate goal. The drama of key individuals inside a political organisation. The constraints of budgets and laws. Even from a marketing perspective its interesting. We've seen the world get smaller as telecommunications grow, and F1 has been a core product for that progress. F1 viewers have even get to see various cities around the world when looking at race. And despite all the experience, individual people still seem pretty important. We ourselfves might also learn something from that"

I'm sorry, you really are giving the impression that you don't know what you are talking about.

1) Telemetry

The passenger car industry was taking dynamic data off cars long before F1 even thought about it. I was lucky, I skipped the bit where they had to use a harness between the car being tested and the data acquistion vehicle, but I have done plenty of laps of circuits with a 24 track tape recorder (25 kg) in my lap. This just was never feasible in an F1 car until we went digital. The signal amps would have been about the same size again.

2) Simulation

in 1989 if not before Lotus Engineering was using ADAMS. Team Lotus didn't even have a K&C rig.

[Melbourne Park]

I said F1 sets the standards despite telemetry being an old idea. Its one thing to have telemetry, or for that matter simulation. But competition pushes the envelope with increased resources and urgency.

Take another example, how many carbon fibre gear boxes are there in road cars? F1 pushes the limits.

Cars also do have composites in them. Car plastics are composite in nature, but cars aren't made like an F1 car. Why? Because of economic reasons.