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Planet-f1 has a copy of charlie whitings letter to the teams. It outline the 3 proposals for the rules changes since the teams could not come to an arrangement.
These caught my eye:
"2) All turning vanes and barge boards will be forbidden."
"Note :
To be accompanied by a sporting rule that no team may use an engine which is not available free of charge and on a fully competitive basis to a number of other teams equal to or greater than the number of teams entered in the Championship divided by the number of different makes of engine in use, rounded up to the nearest whole number."
This could be bad for BMW, Mercedes and Renault. Surprisingly not so bad for ferrari...
"1) The car reference plane will be required to extend as far forward as the front wheel centre line."
Does this mean the plank under the car has to extend all the way between the frontwheels? That would be something
one more thing has got me thinking...
"(ii) a reduction in the weight limit sufficient to eliminate ballast (at least on most of the cars) in order to reduce the energy to be dissipated if control of a car is lost. This would be combined, if necessary, with a change in relative wheel widths front to rear.
This would mean a reduction of 120-130 kg. That's a lot. The goal of this reduction is to make crashes safer, but at the same time it balances out the attempts to slow cornering speeds... reduction of diffuser size is propably not sufficient to slow the car more than a reduction of 120 kg in weight makes it faster. Therefore the cars will go the corners just as fast as they do now, the only change is that straight speeds will have gone up dramatically due to loss of weight and downforce because of the smaller diffuser and the wing changes.
So the reason that got the whole rulechanges going, slowing the cars down, is lost in the masses of new rulechanges that balance each other out.
So we are going to be doing something like a 450kg car with a 700kW engine. Err.....I dont think its gonna be all that safe someehow, the reduction in downforce doesnt matter, they'll still have the same cornering speed, but higher acceleration and more top speed. Max you idiot!
BTW: well spotted bernard, the shared engine thing does look to be a bit fo a ferrari benefit. The only good that can come of this is if Jordan and Minardi get a decent engine from BMW/Merc/Toyota/Honda/Renault.
Just had a thought to add to that post. Is it possible that the rule change about eliminating the sharp debris could mean a return to fibreglass/aluminium/titanium bodies. I think this might be a good thing, as much as we all love carbon fibre, I would love to see some of the cars be able to have a minor tangle when fighting for position and not have to go to the pits for a new nose/tail and make it boring again.
What do you think?
About the supplying an engine rule... It says the enginemanufacturer has at the current number of teams, supply a free competitive engine to two teams. The only teams that need an engine are Jordan and minardi. Rather unsurprisingly they will take Mercedes and BMW. BMW has even at the current state of affairs hinted a retriet from F1. Not to meantion if ford sees best to stop making engines for Jaguar(since Jordan already has moved to a bigger manufacturer) and save the money they would spend on the engines and get free, better engines instead. That means another top team with free engines shipping to a crap team with feeble results.
But I'm not sure I've got this all correct. The FIA is trying to cut costs in the fright that big car manufacturers will flee from F1 due to risen costs... so where in this does forcing them to supply an extra team with free engines fit?
All we've been hearing is rulechanges that actually rule eachother out. I don't even think the FIA itself knows what they want. Their spirit seems to be a mixture of cutting costs, favoring ferrari, some safety and a healthy splash of suicide.
- lack of racing battles is a big problem.
- safety is not an issue.
- engines power doesn't matter, cost does
- all aero bits that get affected by turbulent air should be changed to reduce performance. This should include front & rear wing & all bodywork winglets. The diffusser and under car ground effects should be left alone as they do not detract from racing.
- slick tyres not grooved. Whoever put grooved tyres in F1 should be executed. ALL racing cars have slicks and I mean ALL.
Bad racing tracks are an issue. F1 cars are high perfomance cars that need high speed circuits. San Marino, Barcelona, Monaco, and Hungary should be given a lifetime ban. Personal favourites of mine are Mugello and Bathurst (an Australian version of Spa)
Fact: Slicks make cornering speeds faster. So unless there's a significant restriction in the softness and/or structure, grooved tires are here to stay. It's a safety issue. The ratio of aero grip to mechanical grip can be solved just as easily by a massive reduction in aerodyanmic efficiency. This means that engine power will have to be drastically reduced to balance the loss of drag. This means a car with 600hp, and half the aero that they currently have.
Personally, I'm all for changing the regs to suit. The 'purists' who complain about changing the spirit of the sport will have to get over themselves. People were screaming when turbo was banned, saying normally aspirated engines are against the spirit of racing since they're no the pinnacle of technology. Same with ABS and AS. F1 is a buisiness. It's goal is to make money. The manufacturers are in the sport for only one reason, money. The concept of cutting costs is useless. The only way to ajust the playing field is to restrict the pace of development and to drastically reduce the amount of speed gained per dollar spent.
That was me above. Also, tracks are not the problem. No other racing series has trouble at every single track like F1 does. Motogp puts on a great show at every track. CART, for all it's faults has no where near the same problems.
"I'll bring us through this. As always. I'll carry you - kicking and screaming - and in the end you'll thank me. "
Anonymous wrote:Fact: Slicks make cornering speeds faster. So unless there's a significant restriction in the softness and/or structure, grooved tires are here to stay. It's a safety issue. The ratio of aero grip to mechanical grip can be solved just as easily by a massive reduction in aerodyanmic efficiency. This means that engine power will have to be drastically reduced to balance the loss of drag. This means a car with 600hp, and half the aero that they currently have.
Personally, I'm all for changing the regs to suit. The 'purists' who complain about changing the spirit of the sport will have to get over themselves. People were screaming when turbo was banned, saying normally aspirated engines are against the spirit of racing since they're no the pinnacle of technology. Same with ABS and AS. F1 is a buisiness. It's goal is to make money. The manufacturers are in the sport for only one reason, money. The concept of cutting costs is useless. The only way to ajust the playing field is to restrict the pace of development and to drastically reduce the amount of speed gained per dollar spent.
On ITV's F1 site Martin Brundle said "slicks will give the drivers much more feel and confidence in the car, particularly in low speed corner situations where much of the overtaking is done." If u reduce aero, cars will have less speed in high speed corners where aero is most important. Mechanical grip is more important for slow speed corners, so slicks are the only way. So if u put it all together, safety is NOT an issue. Aerodynamics SUCK, slicks RULE
Your right about that "speed gain per dollar spent". Shouldn't the FIA have a technical director to sort out these problems?
if the grip cf generated from the tires gets higher, then the cornering speed will grow at all levels. Grooved tires became a neccesity when attempt to properly regulate aerodyanmics became difficult due to the concorde agreement. Want to really shake things up on the aero side? Implement a hanford device to seriously disrupt the aero cf. Also, ban 3d curvature for front and rear wings, or only allow a single change in orientation, symmetrically on both sides. Also by eliminating the diffuser all together, this would have the effect of cutting DF by 50% or more.
Changing the tires won't fix the series, only a comptent rules package will do that. I personally would like to see one or two engines used per season per car per team. It's entirely do-able. You'd have to allow for changing certain elements of the engine in between races. Pistons, rings, camshafts, etc. But the block and other major elements stay. Also, teams only get one set of rotors per car per event, with one set of pads on each day. Steel brakes discs and associated pads can handle this, all at a fraction of the cost.
Costing more than 50 million with all expenses to run a team is ludicrous. It provides no additional benefit, showcases no real skill or ingenuity and ultimately removes competitive nature of the sport.
"I'll bring us through this. As always. I'll carry you - kicking and screaming - and in the end you'll thank me. "
As I said uzael, u can balance the speed by reducing aero (high speed: the actual dangerous corners) and giving more mechanical grip (slicks), you know give and take. As for only changing tyres, I said u can do that and cut aero bits that get effected by turbulant air.
Currently F1 cars a designed to run in clean air for maxium performance. So unless your significantly faster than the guy in front, there is no chance of passing in F1. Thus by changing all of that u can improve the chances of REAL racing not the current pit-stop races we see today.
Also everyone has the same grip with tyres not aero, so by balancing the grip towards the tyres, you can even up performance. You see currently in F1 all teams spend and spend in between GP's to comp up with new aero bits, a significant waste of money in my view.
As for banning the diffuser, not before the front/rear wing & winglets. I reckon you u start with the bits that detract from racing, not just to eliminate performance, this is F1 afterall.
I forgot to add, ban traction control. Throttle application is a skill. I think it's hard to police but there must be a way.
I don't think these rules will work. Big teams will spend more money on compensating the "dissability" next year, then the gap between smaller teams will widen, that's not the F1 I am hoping for.
The rules will create like clash between the FIA's cost cutting policy and slowing down cars policy. Why not instead of limiting the team personnel and the budget of teams...saves cash and hinders development, isn't that more effective?
