scarbs wrote:Strangely there is no FIA specification for that either!
Although Jabroc, a laminated Beech wood product is\was common. One of the contemporary planks I saw was nothing like wood, more like a vinyl wood product. Yyou know the type used to make fake wooden chunky garden furniture, like picnic benches. There's some wood in there, probably as filler, but it feels for all the world like plastic. Very slippery and not likely to wear quickly from abrasion.
If your theory is correct then the ideal plank material will have low stiffness so it can flex easily. Your see-saw theory would require the plank to bend in two different directions within a fairly short length.
The plank could easily be non-isotropic. In fact the material properties along the length of the plank could vary in terms of abrasion resistance vs flexibility. The front half of this 1 meter plank would need good abrasion resistance and the back half would need good flexibility.
A slightly pivoty mount at the rear of this front plank would also help achieve the necessary flexibility.
A calculation would be interesting, but I don't see anything that intuitively strikes me as a show-stopper for this theory. Let me put it this way-- Regardless of whether or not RB and others are doing this now, is there any reason not to do it going forward?