Tilke is an artist...

[Carlos]

More to read about the Golden Ratio. What I noticed - it's everywhere.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio

[ISLAMATRON]

Nice technical exercise that is but...
As a simracer I must admit I hate that spiral T1 in Shanghai. Race cars don't like to turn and brake at the same time. It's like.... well, you know how some turns put a smile on driver's face? This one like many other 'tilked' corners gives the direct opposite of that feeling.
And as a spectator I have no reason ooowhatsoeva to like that turn. It looks slow, there's no overtaking *yawn*... zzzzzzzzzzzzz

I love the side by side racing through there, especially in the rain.... outstanding!

Hey Ciro is that Indy turn 1?

[Ciro Pabón]

Yes, it is, Islam. You have a good eye for tracks! I have a terrible one, to the extent that I've not been able to participate in the "Guess the circuit" thread...

Yes, Carlos, it is everywhere, specially in curves at modern roads. Ehem.

On a side note, as I've must already said, "old" roads have the kind of curves Modbaraban seem to like: purely circular. I guess the sim does not allow you to feel how the sideslope varies in the straights!

This forces drivers to move the steering wheel in the opposite sense of the curve at its entrance. However, few people notices that, but everybody "corrects" that effect in the entrance without knowing what they're doing. Next time you drive in an old road with circular curves, notice what you do. It can teach you something. Double ehem...

[ISLAMATRON]

CAnt say I gave that great an eye for tracks... but I think I stood nearly exactly the same place as that photograper did when he took that pic.

[modbaraban]

I prefer 3-Dimensional corners

T1 of Brands Hatch is just right for me

[Ciro Pabón]

All road curves are three-dimensional. I haven't seen a curve without sideslope in my life (maybe at kart tracks inside a factory or something like that, but...).

This is the source of the "problem" of circular curves (I must have posted it already, but again I cannot find it):

Straight


Curve


Transition from straight to curve: notice how in the straight you already have sideslope. The road pushes you to the left while you're still in a straight (way before you start to turn).


If you use spirals, you make the transition during the spiral at the entrance: the more you move your steering wheel, the more sideslope the track has. Is the only way I know to make "continous" 3-D corners.

Thus, those are not "technical exercises", those are the kind of curves you find in the real world with current highway-building technology, but few drivers notice it. I guess the absence or presence of spiral transitions causes around 10-15% of change in grip, way beyond what you get with set up. I don't know if simulators include this effect in its design.

As I said, the only way to understand this is to drive in an old road with circular curves and watch the driver (or better yet, watch yourself) moving the steering wheel in the opposite direction of the curve at its entrance. Then you get it. There are plenty of relatively new roads of this kind: it's harder to calculate the layout with spirals, so many roads are built with circular curves, because it's easier for the designer to calculate the design.

Sorry for going so technical (and for the horrible drawings), but maybe a couple of racers around the forum will have a new kind of "critical eye" next time they walk the track.

[modbaraban]

Thanks for the insights, Ciro.

I'll clarify though. Of course I do understand that pretty much every curve is 3D. What I meant was that many drivers including myself find noticeable altitude (and camber) variations in mid-corner, where you'd need precision and lots of courage to be fast, way more thrilling than any spiral turn, where you'd need precision and lost of patience

I bet any driver would choose Schwedenkreuz over Shanghai T1. Yes it's way more dangerous, but humans don't go racing to feel safer, do they?

[ESPImperium]

Nice technical exercise that is but...
As a simracer I must admit I hate that spiral T1 in Shanghai. Race cars don't like to turn and brake at the same time. It's like.... well, you know how some turns put a smile on driver's face? This one like many other 'tilked' corners gives the direct opposite of that feeling.
And as a spectator I have no reason ooowhatsoeva to like that turn. It looks slow, there's no overtaking *yawn*... zzzzzzzzzzzzz

I have to aggree with you on this one, as a fellow sim racer, T1 at Shanghai is just hell to me in F1: CE on my PS3. That with T7 and T13 together make my tyre selection and setup hell. I get T7 and T13 set up right, i just cant get the rear end to stick on T1, get T1 right, i compromise T7 and T13 to the extent that i need to modify my line and change where i put the power down.

However, i do like many Tilke circits, they are wide and have a few good enough overtaking points on the track. However, i would like a few changes to a few Tilke tracks tho;

* Sepang needs more overtaking opertunities, modify T7/8 and T12/13/14 for more overtaking in my eyes.
* Bahrain needs to have the first corner squeesed a little more, made less wide, less room for error, same with T4 and T15 at Bahrain.
* Shanghai needs a more challanging T16, more of a 90 degree corner needed for me.
* Valencia Street and Singapore Street are existing road layouts, so not much can be changed.
* Abu Dhabi im not shure about yet, looks very pointy and squirty, very angular, ill reserve judgement for when F1 goes there this year.
* Hockenhiem, is a damnd good track for what he has done, id like to see T12 made a little less 90 degree, but tight enough to still be challance to get the rear end stable.
* Istanbul Park is pretty much leave as be as its a awsome track, T9 is the maximum challenge.
* Fuji is peretty much leave as as well.
* Barcelona should return to the old T13/14 layout as its a challenge, not the Mickey Mouse ending to the lap that it has now.
* Monza is leave as, maybes a run off area at Lesmo 2.
* Nürburgring is pretty much leave as.
* Silverstone just needs new pit facilities, that pretty much it for that track.
* Donnington, he has done a good job from what he had, altho he ruined Coppice tho, also no Dunlop bridge. But for the music side of things for me, im not shure where the Download Festival stages and things are going to go. Just dont mention the Downloas Festival to Valentino Rossi tho.

Thats my thoughts, as a sim racer.

[Belatti]

So, if you contemplate the idea of an extra 6.5 km of sweeping curves, for the excitement of fans, you have to think of the need of 100-meter-wide paved areas around the track.

So, spa has got 100 meter wide paved areas?

I cannot imagine how to figure out the fact that the access road are longer because of those safety areas, because you're increasing the size of the perimeter of the track.

Dont figure out, you dont need to

A track should be as flat as possible, this increases exponentially your maintenance costs.

Thats why in SA drivers have always complained about track flatness
Its not we like to save costs

Meanwhile, I think drivers are not happy with "our" proposal for a 7 mile long "chain" of fast curves.

A fast sweeping curve at 200 km/h means a load on the neck that is truly the proverbial "pain in the neck". Keep that load on your head for 300 km and we're talking about the risk of serious accidents caused by G forces around 3-4 Gs. That's something hard to balance against that lonely benefit. Not even jet pilots have to resist 3 Gs for 2.5 hours...

G-G diagram: it shows you the acceleration capabilities of a car, and it is used to estimate the envolvent of trajectories I mentioned before. In an F1 car, the lateral axis has a scale that goes up to 3.5 Gs and all of them are used by the driver.

If I may ask a favor, tie a 10 kg weight to your head, incline your head to the side and keep the weight lifted for the next two hours while you play R-factor, then answer me: how do you feel about the architect that designed such a "working" place? And how did your lap times improve?

Sum the time the drivers spend at 3Gs or more in the whole race and that will give you maybe 10 minutes (thats not 2 hours) and in different directions. So your "heavy earing" theory doesnt apply

Finally, I don't know if the extra-excitement for spectators that a track double the length would bring is diminished somehow by the fact that you'll have half the laps: you'll see the cars less times; actually, you'll see them half the number of times, because the length of the race is more or less constant (as Miguel explains).

Its not about quantity, its about quality!
I would rather see a Ferrari than 500 FIATs, I would rather see 44 laps at spa than 80 in Valencia

Additional comment: I seem to know a little bit about the golden mean in the nature and the constructions that men made with it. The same with fractals, Fibonacci series and other similar stuff. I love math!
However Shangai curve 1 makes not Tilke a genious, he still sucks. Oh! and before I forget, the drivers who doesnt like "spiral" curves also sucks: they should improve trailbraking

[Ciro Pabón]

Last attempt, I throw the towel. Happiness is when you win the race against yourself...

Mod, in any design, the sideslope is proportional to the horizontal curvature. When the horizontal curvature is constant, like in circular curves, the sideslope is constant.

Ergo, there are no curves with sideslope changes in the middle of the curve except in full-spiral curves, like the ones in Shanghai and in the Repsol curve at Catalunya.

In modern tracks and roads, all the transition happens in the spirals that there are before and after the circular curve, which is in the middle.

Once you're in a circular curve, the sideslope is constant in any design.

Belatti, few tracks have fast curves (250-400 m or radius). Why?

Spa paved areas at a medium speed curve (radius: 120 m). That's not a fast curve in my book, and that's gravel.

[modbaraban]

I would rather see 44 laps at spa than 80 in Valencia

Im affraid 80 laps in Valencia is not technically possible due to falling asleep

Oh! and before I forget, the drivers who doesnt like "spiral" curves also sucks: they should improve trailbraking

I do trailbraking a lot in various types of corners. I didn't say that drivers or cars generally can't brake and turn. I only said it doesn't feel that good.

[Miguel]

Belatti, few tracks have fast curves (250-400 m or radius). Why?

Spa paved areas at a medium speed curve (radius: 120 m). That's not a fast curve in my book, and that's gravel.

Because 250m is the "magic radius" of Formula 1 cars? I mean, corners of radius bigger than 250m are full throttle in any recent F1 car with medium downforce settings.

Ciro, I don't know the two radii of Pouhon, or Blanchimont, but I know that Blanchimont is taken at 300 km/h full throttle and Pouhon is taken in 5th gear at around 250. Yes, these cars are that fast. 120m you say? No problem, Suzuka's 130R only required slight braking, before the Alan McNish reform that changed it's exit to 340R. And 130R means indeed that its radius was 130m.

I know you have the full data of Montmelo. I've seen the cars (2002, 2003 and 2004) negotiate Campsa live. V10's were taking it I think in 4th gear, just a bit over 200 km/h. Watching Porsche GT3 cars after that makes you want to laugh at them.

[Scotracer]

Tid-bit: Blaunchimont has a radius about 120m (thank you Photoshop and Google maps). That's one of the fastest corners in the world...

[WhiteBlue]

...Belatti, few tracks have fast curves (250-400 m or radius). Why?

Spa paved areas at a medium speed curve (radius: 120 m). That's not a fast curve in my book, and that's gravel.

this picture looks like Pouhon. they put down tarmac there last year. Kimi went very wide over the new tarmac, illegaly actually in my view.

I allways think about Nordschleiffe and wish we could have that back as a special endurance event with pehaps 500 km as an F1 GP. I know the cost would be astronomical but how astronomical actually?

Asuming that the FIA FOM and FOTA would make anexception for the race could you give an estimate what it would cost additionally to bing the tack to F1 safety standads and what the additional cost per race would be?

[Ciro Pabón]

Miguel, curves of that radius are taken at full throttle and full speed in most categories, not only in F1. You are entitled to think that protos are not that fast, but to my taste they are.

McNish accident (no gross images in this video but his comments) is a good example.

It was his last F1 race and for many of his fans, me included, it was a bitter way to end the career of this much liked driver

Frankly, I did not want to go into this: I mentioned that number (250 m) as "magic" because F1 is not the only thing that runs a circuit, but here I go.

You all know that when 130R was modified, following McNish accident, changing it into a double curve with 85 and 340 m radii, Daijiro Kato was killed there, a proof, if needed, of how irresponsible is to build curves that fast with less safety area than the one mentioned.

130R had after its exit, maybe, an 8 meter safety area and an unsafe barrier. I don't like a bit this kind of videos (mercily, it's brief), but this is the kind of risks you take in this kind of curves. There has not been any Moto GP races at Suzuka following that accident, but I don't feel well if this is what it takes for fans to reflect on their tastes.

Scot is right, and WB identified correctly the curve I posted: both Pouhon and Blanchimont have similar radii. Pouhon, even if its a "thread-the-eye-of-the-needle" kind of curve, at least, has a large safety area, unlike Blanchimont, which is not a piece of cake: it's not only fast but has a drop in its external edge, so the safety area is also less than optimal (30 m perhaps?).

What do you get with this difference in design? At Pouhon you can complain about illegalities, as WB does, while at Blanchimont Luciano Burti lost a wing and the crash was truly violent. Tom Kristensen, in F3000, was almost killed there after he crashed and went again into the track, being hit by several cars after coming to a stop. When Erik Comas crashed there, I remember Senna stopping and crossing the track to help, while several cars zoomed by. If that's the kind of excitement fans wish, I don't want to be a part of it. I prefer the (apparently) much fan-rejected large, paved, safety areas, exemplified by Pouhon, just to be able to sleep in peace after delivering the blueprints.