End of the safety car

[marmer]

Looking back at this weekends issues I fail to see reasoning behind the safety car.

Stealing an idea from indy car

Once an incident occurs cars enter vsc then go back to the pits
Red flag in effect lap under vsc counts towards total.
Lapped cars could providing they stick to vsc and track is safe enough to go round extra laps slowly. could unlap and join back of grid in pit lane

Cars could change tyres but would have to slot back in pit lane to the back of stack so if a gap was big enough a car might be able to keep his place like a real pit stop.

no changing of parts on the pit lane unless for safety and must drop to back of stack. Like a normal pit in effect.

Once track is clear cars would go out do a warm up lap or 2 depending on conditions dictated by race control and then go to the grid for a restart like at the start of the race.
Tracks could be cleared quickly and without spending multiple race laps behind the safety car going slowly and no actual racing. This method would only cost 1 race lap or 3 if you count the warm up laps. Many times safety car has been more than 3.
If it's safe enough to restart the race it can be done with a standing start races might take slightly longer but more actual racing laps would take place


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[Jolle]

Looking back at this weekends issues I fail to see reasoning behind the safety car.

Stealing an idea from indy car

Once an incident occurs cars enter vsc then go back to the pits
Red flag in effect lap under vsc counts towards total.
Lapped cars could providing they stick to vsc and track is safe enough to go round extra laps slowly. could unlap and join back of grid in pit lane

Cars could change tyres but would have to slot back in pit lane to the back of stack so if a gap was big enough a car might be able to keep his place like a real pit stop.

no changing of parts on the pit lane unless for safety and must drop to back of stack. Like a normal pit in effect.

Once track is clear cars would go out do a warm up lap or 2 depending on conditions dictated by race control and then go to the grid for a restart like at the start of the race.
Tracks could be cleared quickly and without spending multiple race laps behind the safety car going slowly and no actual racing. This method would only cost 1 race lap or 3 if you count the warm up laps. Many times safety car has been more than 3.
If it's safe enough to restart the race it can be done with a standing start races might take slightly longer but more actual racing laps would take place


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Because a 4x WC can’t keep his head cool? Maybe they should ban corners, or pit stops or other drivers on track.

There was just one problem, Vettel’s attitude.

[marvin78]

Perhabs because a 3 times WC complained about the SC all the time in the race (which perhaps was not totally wrong - in this special case).

[marmer]

Looking back at this weekends issues I fail to see reasoning behind the safety car.

Stealing an idea from indy car

Once an incident occurs cars enter vsc then go back to the pits
Red flag in effect lap under vsc counts towards total.
Lapped cars could providing they stick to vsc and track is safe enough to go round extra laps slowly. could unlap and join back of grid in pit lane

Cars could change tyres but would have to slot back in pit lane to the back of stack so if a gap was big enough a car might be able to keep his place like a real pit stop.

no changing of parts on the pit lane unless for safety and must drop to back of stack. Like a normal pit in effect.

Once track is clear cars would go out do a warm up lap or 2 depending on conditions dictated by race control and then go to the grid for a restart like at the start of the race.
Tracks could be cleared quickly and without spending multiple race laps behind the safety car going slowly and no actual racing. This method would only cost 1 race lap or 3 if you count the warm up laps. Many times safety car has been more than 3.
If it's safe enough to restart the race it can be done with a standing start races might take slightly longer but more actual racing laps would take place


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Because a 4x WC can’t keep his head cool? Maybe they should ban corners, or pit stops or other drivers on track.

There was just one problem, Vettel’s attitude.

no its nothing to do with that its purely a solution to offer the most amount of racing laps and being safe to recover cars or bits of cars.

baku has the added danger of the long straight where cars are going very fast into turn 1 from the grid they are alot closer and slower into turn 1 so it would be safer

at no point did i mention VET or HAM issues i made this topic out of that thread to avoid this tit for tat. this is purely an idea to work around problems the safety car creates (bunched up pack all trying to get an edge on the other)

vsc maintain positions and back to pits then out to grid start removes all need for pointless ducking and driving with other cars

[notsofast]

Cars could change tyres but would have to slot back in pit lane to the back of stack so if a gap was big enough a car might be able to keep his place like a real pit stop.

Good idea. However... The difference with Indy is that the F1 pit lanes are usually too short. There's not enough room at the end of the pit lane to stack up 20 cars without blocking some of the pit boxes.

[seventhsin]

Looking back at this weekends issues I fail to see reasoning behind the safety car.

...clipped to save scrolling...

If it's safe enough to restart the race it can be done with a standing start races might take slightly longer but more actual racing laps would take place


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Because a 4x WC can’t keep his head cool? Maybe they should ban corners, or pit stops or other drivers on track.

There was just one problem, Vettel’s attitude.

How on earth did you turn the OP's post into your comment which clearly has a dedicated thread?

Jolle raises some valid points, the nature of this circuit, combined with the actual safety car procedure had a lot to do with the multitude of incidents at the start of the race and subsequent SC restarts, pulling all cars into pit lane for every incident seems a little extreme but that's what discretion is for.

Given the amount of debris scattered on track in the first 20 odd laps, after 3 SC periods where the pack was lapping the circuit more or less in a tight group, Race Control should have worked with the Clerk of Course a little better and coordinated the cleaning and sweeping of affected sections of track in between passes of the pack. Marshalling and communication around the circuit looked very sub-par all weekend.

[zac510]

marmer, a thread for every idea you have are getting tiring. All of your ideas focus on a single problem and attempt to solve that problem, but neglect the myriad of known and unknown scenarios that might occur, let alone fit into the FIA's regulations for safety and FOM's requirements for commercial viability. F1 rules are both an evolution of many years of experience and a best-fit compromise of all of that experience.

[WaikeCU]

On a different note tho, Lewis complained that the safety car is too slow. It made me think about it:

F1 is the pinnacle of autosport and is innovation regarding road vehicle technology and safety. Innovation is the word that I'm looking for regarding the safety car.

My thoughts are:
- How fast is a drone?
- Can a drone be a 'Safety drone' instead of the conventional 'Safety car' we have for years/decades?

I could see benefits in this knowing that it isn't a land vehicle, it doesn't obstruct the road for the race cars. It could just simply deployed by a professional drone racer person. It doesn't need to be big, just a drone with some lighting / display that can be switched on/off and enough juice to fly around on rollbar height.

I think this could actually work tbh.

[notsofast]

F1 rules are both an evolution of many years of experience and a best-fit compromise of all of that experience.

Makes sense. Nevertheless, one good way for anyone to understand that best-fit compromise is by challenging individual elements of it. It's not like people are creating dozens of threads a day, like on some other forums.

[Andres125sx]

On a different note tho, Lewis complained that the safety car is too slow. It made me think about it:

F1 is the pinnacle of autosport and is innovation regarding road vehicle technology and safety. Innovation is the word that I'm looking for regarding the safety car.

My thoughts are:
- How fast is a drone?
- Can a drone be a 'Safety drone' instead of the conventional 'Safety car' we have for years/decades?

I could see benefits in this knowing that it isn't a land vehicle, it doesn't obstruct the road for the race cars. It could just simply deployed by a professional drone racer person. It doesn't need to be big, just a drone with some lighting / display that can be switched on/off and enough juice to fly around on rollbar height.

I think this could actually work tbh.

As a drone operator myself I´d love to see that, but sincerely, I can´t see any reason to use a drone instead of a car. It would add some unnecessary risk as a drone would have to dodge bridges, trees, lightings, wires... and more importantly, if it crashes with any of these, or if it simply suffer some technical problem, it would be a risk for the spectators if it goes out of control to the stands


I understand and even agree with Lewis complaints, but a much faster car could be used wich would solve the problem without adding any new risk.

From a Zonda or similar hypercar to any other race car like DTM, WTCC or even a GP2 or F3 car could be used to solve the problem. Well, a GP2 at least when Honda has a PU good enough to chase it

[marmer]

On a different note tho, Lewis complained that the safety car is too slow. It made me think about it:

F1 is the pinnacle of autosport and is innovation regarding road vehicle technology and safety. Innovation is the word that I'm looking for regarding the safety car.

My thoughts are:
- How fast is a drone?
- Can a drone be a 'Safety drone' instead of the conventional 'Safety car' we have for years/decades?

I could see benefits in this knowing that it isn't a land vehicle, it doesn't obstruct the road for the race cars. It could just simply deployed by a professional drone racer person. It doesn't need to be big, just a drone with some lighting / display that can be switched on/off and enough juice to fly around on rollbar height.

I think this could actually work tbh.

the car used is capable of nearly 200 mph i suspect the issue at Baku is the tight sections the car would struggle to go fast enough and still be safe on normal tracks you can often hear the car sliding around.

a drone would be a non starter at least for many years the issue of what if the drone fell on a drivers head for a start remember it was not a large heavy object that nearly killed massa. it would take some serious tech to have a drone that could fly for mulitple laps while still being light enough to do it quickly. (battery issue)

speed is a massive problem it seems anyway http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/drone ... VE1PGjyuUk
less than 90mph

a drone would be hard for the drivers to see they don't look up to the sky and if they get a halo they might not be able anyway.
on night tracks it would have to illuminate itself.

if the drone lost signal for even a 2nd at speed it could throw the race into chaos and what if it ever got hacked

[Just_a_fan]

Just do away with the safety car totally. Use the VSC for the track as a whole and add a simple rule that in the "accident zone" the cars must use their pit lane limiters. All checked by telemetry etc. Accident zone starts at the yellow board before the zone where marshals are working and ends where the green board is shown after that zone. Everywhere else is VSC.

Anyone speeding under VSC is given a simple stop/go, anyone speeding in the pit limiter zone is a 10 second stop/go. The penalty to be served on the next time they come to the pit entrance after the VSC ends. If they speed under both the VSC and in the pit limiter zone they serve a penalty for each on consecutive laps.

Example.
VSC becomes operational on lap 5 for a crash. VSC ends on lap 9.
Driver A speeds under VSC so comes in for a stop/go on lap 10.
Driver B speeds in the limiter zone so comes in for a 10 second stop / go on lap 10.
Driver C speeds for the whole lap so comes in for a stop / go on lap 10 and a 10 second stop / go on lap 11.

No need for drivers to set the pace behind the safety car etc., they just follow their dashboard delta time and maintain the gap accordingly.

All other safety car / yellow flag rules apply as normal e.g no overtaking.

[Edax]

The safety car has a couple of functions. They are there not only there to slow cars down but also to guide them around problems, such as debris or marshals on track. They dictate which side of the track to use, if need be they can take the field through the pit lane, slow them down even more, or stop them entirely.

VSC is great for a number of issues, but IMHO misses that flexibility. under VSC, the cars will for instance be rounding Fairmont Hairpin at the same speed as during the race. Working in the blind spot around that corner would not be fun under VSC.

Main issue is the current tires. In the past cars followed single file until the last yellow lap, when they had a clear track to heat up their tires and brakes. Now if the tire cools down they are gone, so they are waving like madman just to keep the temperature in. Especially when the track is humid when the tires loose temperature it is almost impossible to bring them back.

In don't want to jinx it but I think that having the drivers paying more attention to tire temperatures instead of surroundings is dangerous when you have an issue and personnel on track.

Solution would be to have less demanding tires, not so much in new safety car solutions.

[notsofast]

In addition, a function of the safety car is to bunch up the field, so that the track workers get roughly a minute of clear track until the cars come around again.

In cases where the safety car is deemed to be too slow, just red flag the race. There's nothing to be gained from driving behind the safety car in such situations, and we already have procedures for red flag conditions. No need to invent anything new.

[DarkSurferZA]

I don't know what the solution is, but I am tired of seeing so many races where Mercedes enter 3 cars into the race.

I don't think it is the fault of the safety car (it maybe needs to be a bit faster), but when the rules allow you to build cars that don't work when it's too hot, when it rains, when it's too cold, when there is mild precipitation, when the race is held on a non-dedicated racing circuit, when it's a racing circuit etc, then there is another problem.

The tyres must have a wider operating window. Tyre pressures must be allowed to be lower. Tyres need to be softer, yet more durable (less thermal degradation so teams can push harder). The cars must have sufficient ground clearance to avoid aqua planing over a mild dew etc etc etc.

There just has to be a better solution to millions of dollars in aero development to build a car that works in only one condition. if not, then only allow races to be run on circuits where this condition can be consistently met. Like an indoor slot car circuit or something.

Btw, this is not all Pirelli's fault. It's the stupid changes FOM (or FOM think we are asking of them) ask them to make every year. Think it must have been at the Canadian GP four years back when there were 4 pit stops and everyone demanded Pirelli make a "proper" tyre <- if you were one of them, yes, I blame you.

</Rant>

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