Night race lighting?

[lesz42]

hello all! first post, great site!


right done a search, but could not find anything, does anybody know, what sort of lighting they will using for the night race/s?

read somewhere , that there will be no glare for the drivers/cameras?

[Steven]

He lesz42,
welcome to this forum!

Previously there has been a test at Australia for lightning the Australian GP, and it has been discussed here: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=4994

I am however not sure how they will arrange that in Singapore later this year.

[lesz42]

hi!


thanks!

[Ciro Pabón]

Well, some photos were released to "catch the imagination":



I've read that:

- The cars will run in "succesively darker conditions"
- Friday practice will start a 4 pm, still with sun light. Second practice will be in the dark, at 8 pm.
- Saturday practice will start at 5 pm. Qualifying will be at 8 pm (wow!). The atmosphere will be "charged, even for F1 conditions".
- I don't know at what time the race will be, I imagine that at 8 pm also.

On October 16th, last year, the track site announced a contract with Valerio Maioli S.p.a., an italian firm. Two tests were made at Paul Ricard in July and September at Paul Ricard. There were no driver complains (or so they say, when they presented the system to FIA on October 10th).

The system uses 1.500 lights and 12 twin generators. The light level will be 3.000 lux, enough for HDTV and four times the light level of a stadium. The setup of the system takes 3 months.

[Spencifer_Murphy]

I read in F1 Racing magazine a couple issues ago that the lighting will be achived by having the lights in the ground pointing upwards, this is then reflected using mirrors which will (somehow) reduce glare for the drivers.

The reflectors will be suspended on a temporary gantry, and will incorporate multiple redundancies in case of a power cut.

But that's about all I can remember. I shall search for my copy of the magazine and post back with more if I can find any.

[Steven]

Here's quite a bit of information on the Singapore lightning system:
http://www.f1technical.net/news/8034

[Ciro Pabón]

I'm not sure, Spencifer. This is the image I saw at Maioli site http://www.maioli.com, taken from an interview conceded to Today at http://www.maioli.com/f1singapore/art/TODAY.jpg:



They also mention they will use "6 km of aluminium trusses". This is also said in the link Tomba provides. That was last year, I concede happily. Also, the image that I post has a caption that says: "artist impression"...

Musco used a similar system at Indy last year.

[mx_tifoso]

I was actually watching a really good video about the Singapore GP the other day. It basically covered the lighting system that will be used and the circuit IIRC. Probably a search on youtube for the 2008 Singapore GP would do you some good.

And then there was an article in some motorsport magazine as well.

IIRC, the lighting system is similar to what Spencifer_Murphy mentioned, except I didn't hear/read anything about using mirrors to reduce glare. But basically overhead trackside gantries with the actual lighting units (hanging) on trusses.

Glare might not be that big of a problem, since the MotoGP riders didn't have any issues with that, instead they "complained" about the shadows caused by the overhead lighting. I saw the Qatar race a few weeks ago and it was actually pretty cool, and I imagine that it must be even more "cool" for the drivers since there isn't glaring sunlight beaming directly on them.

Night Light: Illuminating the Singapore GP night race
The system devised for the event will consist of some 1600 lighting projectors, hanging in clusters 10 meters above the surface on 240 steel pilings placed 32 meters apart from each other around the circuit and connected by over 100,000 meters of cable. The system will draw 3.18 Megawatts of electricity from 12 pairs of generators encased in sound-proof containers, each with its own engineer on standby in case anything should go wrong. Although the run-off areas will be illuminated as well, the lighting will be dimmer than the track surface to avoid confusion for the drivers
Autoblog

[Spencifer_Murphy]

I'm not sure, Spencifer. This is the image I saw at Maioli site http://www.maioli.com, taken from an interview conceded to Today at http://www.maioli.com/f1singapore/art/TODAY.jpg:



They also mention they will use "6 km of aluminium trusses". This is also said in the link Tomba provides. That was last year, I concede happily. Also, the image that I post has a caption that says: "artist impression"...

Musco used a similar system at Indy last year.

Yup those are the gantries I was talki9ng about, altho you're right it does look like the lights are suspended from them. Who knows, maybe they are the reflectors? Although I imagine they've probably chosen to go with a conventional "use-lights-to-light-the-track" system lol. (Either that or I just was mistaken earlier!)

[joseff]

A bit offtopic: Luxim argon plasma lights.
http://www.news.com/Luxims-plasma-light ... l?part=rss

These argon plasma lamps have a spectrum "very similar" to sunlight, and are 10x more efficient than typical sodium street lights. Interesting, no? Imagine the savings: This light might take 50-60% off the 3MW needed for a track. On the other hand, 1.5MW is "only" the power output of 3 F1 cars.

But then if they "look like" sunlight, the night races won't look different, no? Sort of defeats the purpose of having night races. The only difference would be the absence of shadows.

[Spencifer_Murphy]

But then if they "look like" sunlight, the night races won't look different, no? Sort of defeats the purpose of having night races. The only difference would be the absence of shadows.

Not at all, the purpose of night races in F1 is so that races in the east can be shown at a more friendly time for Bernie's european customers lol.

Night races in F1 have nothing to do about challenge, and everything to do with money lol!

[joseff]

@Spencifer: Funny you should mention. The European afternoon races are sunday evening primetime in Asia. Seriously. I normally get home, have dinner at 7 while watching the race. Perfectly timed with minimal disruption to paternal and marital duties.

[checkered]

There could be

some issues with tyres, with getting in heat and such. I don't think the teams have run night time tests and there are some surprises in store for everybody. Ferrari is struggling a bit to get the tyres in operating temps over a single lap as it is. I'm sure endurance racers have knowhow to share about running on cool(ing) surfaces. Perhaps not such a big issue, but something to consider.

[Ray]

Jesus H. Christ. I hold everyone here in good esteem, but for the life of me I can't understand why in the hell the so called 'problems/difficulties' are being discussed. They aren't the first cars to race at night, and all of these 'concerns' are flat out stupid and ridiculous. But then again, F1 cars are not like any other race car ever built and raced. Every other series' experience with night racing has no relevance and it can't be a remote possibility that the night racing effects are in any way similar to what an F1 car will experience. Jesus shut up about heat in the tires, visibility and such. It hasn't affected cars in any other series so why the hell would it in F1? Night racing has gone on for DECADES!

[tarzoon]

Imagine the difference between a football match at day and night, but four times brighter. There won't be much difference between day and night when it comes to light.

On the other hand, there may be a difference in track conditions.