Senna Imola 1994

[ThommyH]

I've have made an interesting observation, but I'm not quite sure, if it is know already.
Here you can see a picture of Ayrton Senna at Imola 1994 just before his accident:


Something at the suspension is wrong (marked with red circle). For comparison, here a picture from the start. There you can't see it.



You can also see it on the onboard footage of the last lap (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RByKFxeb ... ture=feedf).
At second 5, everything is ok.



But then, at second 39 you can see the same thing at the suspension as on the pic above.



In the onboard footage you can see that it appears the first time in the corner at second 20.
So my question: Is is an interesting observation?

[Isak]

First of all, that's not the suspension, that's the steering rod.

Second, all you are seeing in the video is the shiny metal part of the joint going in and out of sunlight.

And for the two above photos, i don't see anything that differs between them.


This is a model that shows what i mean, didn't find any photos of the actual car:

[Richard]

This is already being discussed in another thread ...

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=10054&start=30

[Thunder]

wow, joined only for necroing a Thread 3,5 Years old..... quite the Achievement.

[Manoah2u]

holy ancient thread browsing revival, batman!



guess it should've been locked - well, i'm sure nobody expected a reply 3 years later

[coaster]

I remember the 92 car had self leveling suspension and was banned at the last minute for 93 (factcheck please?).
Basically, Williams had to learn car setup from scratch again and the cars were very twitchy, maybe they were still lost in 94.
That combined with Ayrtons 'god given' right to win and a peaky v10, an inferior tig weld and a large bump in the track at corner entry.
It was only a matter of time before a broken steel wishbone got somebody.

[Sebp]

Active suspension was used throughout the 93' season and banned ahead of 94'.

FW15C front suspension:


FW16 front suspension:


Which looks more flimsy to you? Tough call...

Btw. the official version for Senna losing control doesn't mention a broken wishbone but rather the steering column which was modified before the race.

Check out the sources below the this wikipedia article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Ayrton_Senna

What is it with folks' inability to use search engines lately?

[Manoah2u]

actually this is a rather old thread.

besides, the Senna report is full of incorrect data. I personally don't believe for a single second the broken steering colum was the cause of Senna's death rather the aftermath of the violent impact.

Neither do I belive the car 'skidding' on the plate was the actual cause of careering into the wall. I feel like it's something different that has happened, and that Williams took important data to save themselves, as the missing data is very suspicious. Whatever happened though I feel like is a matter of collective incidents that lead to a certain point where it's effectively being at the wrong place at the wrong time in the wrong situation.

It doesn't really change one bit though because the guy's gone and nothing can change that.

The Legend will live on though.