FRIC Could Be Banned As Soon As Germany

[astracrazy]

because now the fia are questioning if it is illegal or not, if one of those teams protests after the race and the fia decide its illegal then they will lose the result?

[mikeerfol]

because now the fia are questioning if it is illegal or not, if one of those teams protests after the race and the fia decide its illegal then they will lose the result?

I guess so. By the way when is FIA going to announce if it's going to be banned at Germany or next year?

[Thunder]

Well if it's true that 3 Teams vote it illegal then it will be banned from from Germany onwards.

[gary123]

No More FRIC: Mercedes and Williams will be the losers

There will be no unanimous agreement to extend the life of the FRIC until the end of the season 2014: the interconnected suspensions have been banned by the FIA with a regulatory clarification sent this week by Charlie Whiting, must be removed from the car before the Grand Prix of Germany which will be held in Hockenhein.

The International Federation had left a door open to teams: sign a document unanimously to extend the use of the FRIC until the conclusion of the 2014 season to prevent one of the team without the plant could claim the other teams. But, as always happens in the Circus, is almost impossible to find a shared synthesis of a proposal, so that the cars are different in the two days of testing at Silverstone turned without suspension interconnected.

Adrian Newey said that teams may be more damaged Mercedes and Williams. According to the technical director of Red Bull Racing there will be no disruptions in values, because the solution can be worth two or three tenths of a second per lap, but put in some crisis-seater rather than others.

According to the assessments of the English genius, in fact, the W05 hybrid that dominates the world, and in particular on the FW36, as well as controlling the ride height and roll have been developed effective systems that make the front suspension contractive, so on there are no curbs the usual bumps and loss of adhesion that occur on normalemnte disconnections.

In short, the FRIC would not be used only to interconnect with a hydraulic system, the front axle with the rear one, but there would be the possibility to operate the left side of the car in a different way from the right one, varying in function of the curves that the car must deal with.

It will be interesting to see what happens at Hockenheim, because there are machines that are born with the hydraulic suspension of the FRIC very integrated into the design of the car. Some teams, in fact, may replace the weight saved by removing the ballast mounting system, while the cars more complicated will simply disarm the system operation.

Source: http://www.omnicorse.it/magazine/39875/ ... e-williams

[dans79]

Source: http://www.omnicorse.it/magazine/39875/ ... e-williams

That's just Newey day dreaming because he is still pissed that aero isn't king right now.

[gary123]

Source: http://www.omnicorse.it/magazine/39875/ ... e-williams

That's just Newey day dreaming because he is still pissed that aero isn't king right now.

I think he is pissed because he hasent got a powerful engine. They are still the number 1 in that area. But this is OT

[Phillyred]

Why run without it? Surely if they haven't had a rule clarification then they can run with it, seeing as they have been doing so for quite some time now?

I'd run with it until they ban if, if they don't then you don't have to worry, and if they do, then you plan for that.

But yes I'd like to see Red Bull and Merc destroy the field at this race just to make a point about this silly ban from the FIA.

I think we both know that even if Mercedes continues to win without FRIC, everyone else will still question the split-turbo advantages.

[Waywardism]

I think some of ya'll are giving the FIA too much technical benefit of the doubt. There's a theme in a lot of posts that the FIA must have found something improper or at least potentially dubious in their review of technical drawings, so they are specifically banning those forms of FRIC, or perhaps banning all FRIC due to the difficulty of policing the different forms.

Reality is simpler. The FIA has decided that it's a technical violation to have "a system which appears to allow the response of the suspension at either or both of the rear corners to drive the response of the suspension at either or both of the front corners (or vice versa)." This means a simple anti-roll bar is legal because it couples the left and right corners together, but the same device turned longitudinally would be illegal because it couples the front and rear corners together. The FIA is not saying they have to ban all FRIC because of the difficulties of policing complicated systems, rather they are explicitly saying front-rear coupling itself is illegal. Full stop.

It's been open knowledge for several years that the purpose of FRIC is to couple front and rear corners together. On Tuesday the FIA decided this coupling was illegal. Perhaps that was the first day Charlie Whiting read the excellent F1T thread "What the FRIC is it?"

The quote above is from the FIA's letter to the teams this week, as reported by the reputable Adam Cooper at this link--
http://adamcooperf1.com/2014/07/08/fia- ... n-systems/

This post seemed to have been ignored while people just continued their pointless discussion about why the FIA deem FRIC systems illegal, hypothesising over movable aero parts and fluids and whatnot.

That is why.

[monsi]

I agree. The ruling clearly talks about the rear of the car driving the front. No problem necessarily about side to side coupling or even front driving the response of the back. I would imagine that this is because the rear driving the front has no obvious 'suspension' purpose - front driving back, or sides affecting each other could both be ways to keep tyre contact as effective as possible. If the rear is driving the front then can there be any reactive element to the road surface profile in it ? I can't envisage it, but perhaps I am not imaginative enough

[CBeck113]

MAybe we're crucifying the wrong person/people here. In the letter on Adam Cooper's site Charlie W. writes:

“Having now seen and studied nearly every current design of front-to-rear linked suspension system, as well as reviewing future developments some teams have shared with us, we are firmly of the view that the legality of all such systems could be called into question, particularly with respect to compliance with Article 3.15 of the F1 Technical Regulations."

Maybe it's not just the current usage, which they more or less know, but where it was going, based on the next-gen system plans. And, if whoever was trying to get his system for 2015 accepted basically stated that others' can already do what they want to do, then he may have begun to scratch his head. Let's be honest: the technical director should be the most brilliant engineer/designer alive to keep up with what the teams are developing. I can understand that a few things slip through, but I'd like to see a bit more concequence in handling these situations.

The flip side: we don't know everything about this, and may never do so. Maybe the F1 Strategy Group is behind it - trying everything to make the season less obvious (I avoided to use the word "boring" because we've seen much worse than this year).

[dans79]

Maybe it's not just the current usage, which they more or less know, but where it was going, based on the next-gen system plans. And, if whoever was trying to get his system for 2015 accepted basically stated that others' can already do what they want to do, then he may have begun to scratch his head. Let's be honest: the technical director should be the most brilliant engineer/designer alive to keep up with what the teams are developing. I can understand that a few things slip through, but I'd like to see a bit more concequence in handling these situations.

The entire issue is retarded as far as I'm concerned, as the systems have been around for several years. As far as I'm concerned this is someone trying to knock Merc down because they are making other teams look foolish.

[sennaf1god.94]

pathetic heightempt by FIA to decrease merc domination

We can agree that the system is now 2 yo and that a clarification should had been made by then and not by now.

As far as the system does not comply with the rules, and the rules had not been changed since that time.. One should ask if the last 2 championships were won or not by illegal cars...

Any way of changing the ride height on motion is illegal no matter it electronically or mechanically actuated. So in that sense the system is illegal since day one.

Then we can agree in the pathetic way the FIA is dealing with the issue.

[Edax]

I was just thinking. Do we know the date on the letter?

The first time that I looked at the footage from Silverstone I thought that the reaction of Raikkonens cars was odd. I've seen plenty cars hit gutters, grass bumbs, escape roads etc, But I never ever have seen the rear of the car take-off like that. Always the front. And even then 9 out of 10 times the drivers are able to control the car pretty well.

Could that be perhaps be a result of their FRIC system?

In that case the ban could be safety motivated and this is the FIA's akward way of getting the systems of the car without exposing Ferrari or giving Ferrari a disadvantage.

[MOWOG]

the technical director should be the most brilliant engineer/designer alive to keep up with what the teams are developing.

There are those who suggest that Charlie Whiting has NO formal engineering training. NONE!!!! And that he is nothing more than Bernie's appointed lap dog and butt sniffer. I have no idea if any of that is true.

But if Whiting DOES have any qualifications for his job, I for one would be very glad to hear of them.

[Cam]

the technical director should be the most brilliant engineer/designer alive to keep up with what the teams are developing.

There are those who suggest that Charlie Whiting has NO formal engineering training. NONE!!!! And that he is nothing more than Bernie's appointed lap dog and butt sniffer. I have no idea if any of that is true.

But if Whiting DOES have any qualifications for his job, I for one would be very glad to hear of them.

Seeing as he states himself he started in F1 at age 14, that would suggest no formal education. But, on the job for 40 odd years has some merit. I personally don't think he's dumb, blindly guided however....