Comments on: F1 in the future – The Cars

By: Le Mans-Sportwagen: Going Green

Le Mans-Sportwagen: Going Green — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 01:40:24 +0000

[...] im Blog von James Allen (Ex-ITV-Formel 1-Kommentator) gab es in einem Artikel zur Zukunft der Formel 1-Autos vor Kurzem ein interessantes Statement zu lesen, das in diese Richtung geht: It is not possible to [...]

By: Howard Hughes

Howard Hughes — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 15:01:35 +0000

Nonsense. Automatic chute deployment. I’m not talking about 2012, but in 15-20 years time? Damn right it could be utterly feasible.

By: James Allen

James Allen — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 17:50:13 +0000

F1 is hoping Bridgestone may stay on in some capacity, otherwise Michelin may look at it. I spoke to Pirelli and they said that technically it would be hard to get up to speed on that kind of tyre in one year. It could turn out to be a problem.

By: Spencer

Spencer — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 15:39:52 +0000

Agreed money, but what I’m saying is getting the most from the least resorce, both fuel and sticking to the budget restrictions. Then let the best engineers and the best drivers do battle!

By: Stu

Stu — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 13:07:58 +0000

With fuel efficiency being key now refuelling is banned diesel power should be an obvious alternative with the aim of being able to run F1 cars on bio-diesel.

Safer, greener and of some benefit to the engine manufacturers.

By: Martin

Martin — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 10:46:19 +0000

I suspect there will be an expectation that F1 will remain the fastest cars around an normal circuit. This is probably going to keep the downforce levels up. 1978 showed the way to make this work while allowing the cars to overtake – car generated suction. The fan could have a fixed set of operational parameters so that the car generated, for example 3.5 g in all instances (tyres depending), rather than huge gs at 300 km/h and 1.5 g at 80 km/h around a Monaco hairpin.

If we want the noise to be part of the spectacle (so to speak) then a hydrogen-burning combustion engine would be the way to go. Turbos would be good too – more variety in tone and not quite so hard on the ears.

Active suspension could be used to make the ride more comfortable, so the drivers could spend more time drinking beer and chasing groupies rather than training and saving energy on a weekend. (I recently re-read the Keith Botsford assisted Alan Jones autobiography from 1981. There is a classic chapter on Jones describing hooking up with the girls at the races, and some thoughts on their intellectual abilities too. It would have gone down well with his wife too see it in print…).

With regenerative braking, the carbon brakes could go, in part on OH&S grounds. Without wings and covered wheels, there’d be a balance between weight, angular momentum and having a long car to reduce drag – think long-tail 917.

There would probably be a rule change in sports cars so that they must have roofs so that they are clearly different from F1 cars.

The sponsorship will still be English spelling, but it will all be for Asian countries and international banks as everything else will be too poor to take part. With no oil the Middle East will have less of a role too.

By: Andrew Hill

Andrew Hill — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 10:30:37 +0000

Great idea….

Perhaps we could also throw random hazards at the drivers. Sprinklers have been mentioned before but what about blinding lights, smoke, big jumps or a kilt wearing lunatic.
That would really sort the men from the boys.

By: Martin

Martin — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 10:24:20 +0000

If you look at average speeds on a circuit-to-circuit basis, 2004 was the peak. Last year of the V10 engines and the tyre war are the key factors. The 1985 British GP pole lap at Silverstone stood as the record for a long time until 2002 at Monza – Barrichello is officially the fastest ever driver with pole at Monza in 2004. The difference is circuit design. Silverstone was modified in 1987 and that brought the speed down before a major re-work in the early 90s. The turbo era cars didn’t have the downforce, so they ran huge wings and these kept the top speeds down to 350 km/h mark on the straights. In 2004 the speeds were more like 372 km/h at Monza for the fastest cars. Button got a BAR-Honda without its wing on up to something like 410 km/h in 2005

By: Andrew Hill

Andrew Hill — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 10:21:26 +0000

I think it will be difficult to move away from the internal combustion engine. For many of the sports core fans and petrol heads in general, we have grown to love the speed and the sound associated with petrol driven rear-wheel drive.
Despite the clear environmental benefits I’m not sure that the public will embrace fuel cell technology.
For sure, cut costs, look at standardizing component parts but please don’t move away from fire spitting, high revving V8s.
There are many who have had posters of classic muscle or sports cars on their bedroom walls. Fewer people, I suspect, idolize with Sinclair’s C5 in the same way.
Whatever rule changes are implemented in the future please don’t spoil the F1 show.

By: Martin

Martin — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 10:12:48 +0000

You’ve been flying in too many fighter jets Howard – and sniffing the avgas. Instead of having energy-absorbing bit of car around the driver, the driver gets added energy – the same forward speed and the ejected velocity and no time to deploy the chute or anything else to slow the drive down before hitting something solid. The cars would weigh more, so the cornering speeds would be lower.

It would also remove the medical helicopter to outside the circuit…