Safety car problem suggestions please

[ISLAMATRON]

My fix, just use the same in car system they use to alert the drivers to a SC deployment to tell them to engage the pit speed limiter. Everyone must engage by a certain amount of time(maybe 5 seconds) and from the time the system is deployed no passing is allowed, any passes must be given back and if not then penalized.

Having everyone at the pit speed limit will lower the speeds thru which they may drive thru an accident scene, they can always go slower if necesasry. Since they are all at the same speed all relative gaps will be somewhat maintained so we wont have a huge bunch of cars entering the pits at the same time like we do now when they bunch up behind the SC. Pits dont have to close and double stacking will be minimized.

Am I overlooking anything? Seems like such a simple fix to a huge problem. Only problem I can think of is overheating, but after seeing Massa stand still for so long this weekend they should be ok moving at 60kph in seventh gear.

[WhiteBlue]

hm, this is more a politicking problem by the small teams that are likely to loose opportunities.

[ISLAMATRON]

hmmmm, never even considered that, I guess I did miss something big

[donskar]

My fix, just use the same in car system they use to alert the drivers to a SC deployment to tell them to engage the pit speed limiter. Everyone must engage by a certain amount of time(maybe 5 seconds) and from the time the system is deployed no passing is allowed, any passes must be given back and if not then penalized.

Having everyone at the pit speed limit will lower the speeds thru which they may drive thru an accident scene, they can always go slower if necesasry. Since they are all at the same speed all relative gaps will be somewhat maintained so we wont have a huge bunch of cars entering the pits at the same time like we do now when they bunch up behind the SC. Pits dont have to close and double stacking will be minimized.

Am I overlooking anything? Seems like such a simple fix to a huge problem. Only problem I can think of is overheating, but after seeing Massa stand still for so long this weekend they should be ok moving at 60kph in seventh gear.

I like it - a lot. Simple solution, with the means already in place. I hope whiteblue isn't right - but he probably is. Why should driver A (the leader) suffer through the misfortune (or poor driving!) of driver B? And why should driver C be able to undo A's hard-earned lead?

Sorry, drifted off there into logic - totally out of place in a discussion of F1 rules and regs.

[modbaraban]

I thought about that too. My only correction would be to get another dedicated 'safety' speed limiter for that at about 120km/h to avoid engine overheating.

[ESPImperium]

I like it alot.

And at the higher speed of say arround 120kph, it would be all good, the saftey car should always be deployed to pick up the leader, slowly the guys behing are picked up, and just before the restart, everyone should be behing the saftey car in RACE ORDER.

Another thing that could could work is that the pits get closed for the first 2 laps of the SC being out, but anyone that pits then get the penalty of sitting at the end of the pits until the SC comes arround again with them going one whole lap down on the field.

Thus Kubica and Rossberg would have been one lap down on the restart at Singapore.

To me that is the safetst, probably not the farest penalty tho, but it is the safest i think.

Also could making making teams take in one driver at a time under SC conditions be a solution to overcrouding in the pits, as i think stackling is a little unsafe, and this contributed to Masas pits incident.

[MattF1]

I really don't get the lapped cars can overtake rule, the point in following the safety car is to keep all the cars together in a pack at low speed. Why are some cars allowed to go faster (admittedly not full racing speed), and having the potential to cause further disruption?

[flynfrog]

make this the new 2009 car. No need to stop for cars on the track

[flynfrog]

or you could have a field wide pit lane speed limiter than kicks in on all cars when the SC lights turn on. Monster trucks have used this for years. The engine can be killed remote controllably from an official or team member

then there would be no need to even deploy the safety car just slow the whole field down to pit road speed

[modbaraban]

or you could have a field wide pit lane speed limiter than kicks in on all cars when the SC lights turn on. Monster trucks have used this for years. The engine can be killed remote controllably from an official or team member

then there would be no need to even deploy the safety car just slow the whole field down to pit road speed

A. F1 is not a moster truck (yet ), so pit limiter kicking in by itself in the middle of a corner may cause accidents.

B. SC is needed to bunch the cars up to make a bigger 'window' for marshals to work on the track. Simply limiting speed (e.g. 'code 60' of 24h of Dubai) will result in cars passing the crash scene really randomly.

[andartop]

Safety car rules in general aim mostly at securing safety, fairness under unsafe conditions comes second. The penalties though are kind of ridiculous. I think someone else suggested this in the past: They can just make one simple rule which will immediately solve the problem. All cars should carry a minimum amount of fuel at all times, ie enough for two laps. They could carry out random checks at the end of a session and penalise anyone who does not conform with the rule, and during the race anyone who takes the risk to use that extra fuel, well he risks running out or being penalised if a safety car comes out and they have to pit. If that happens, I think it would then be fair to give them a drive-through, stop and go, or even to black flag them, as they will know it was their own choice to take the risk. Simple, fair, easy to implement, and cheap! What do you think?

[nae]

thats what they did in British touring cars a while back
iirc, made them always have 3 laps worth of 'saftey car fuel'
which in real terms is like 1.5 laps racing fuel

of course that would have to mean the pits would open after 3 laps

but yes simple and cheap

[Conceptual]

I always wondered why the FIA didnt simply inrease the minimum weight of the cars to slow them down, instead of all of the things like grooved tyres, and bodywork restrictions.

Maybe they should raise the minimum weight to 615Kg, with 10Kg min for fuel, so even if it is used during a SC, it can be replaced at the next pitstop.

[nae]

Mosley wants to reduce the minimum weight to reduce the inertia in an accident
iirc

[ISLAMATRON]

I always wondered why the FIA didnt simply inrease the minimum weight of the cars to slow them down, instead of all of the things like grooved tyres, and bodywork restrictions.

Maybe they should raise the minimum weight to 615Kg, with 10Kg min for fuel, so even if it is used during a SC, it can be replaced at the next pitstop.

BEcause as it is the cars are running with a very larga amount of ballast, and that much high density matter traveling at those speeds is inherently dangerous, so what the've done now is introduce KERS which will eat into that ballast weight but introduce a performance advantage. But requiring the teams to run a reserve/minimum amount of fuel is not a bad idea, but then you gotta make sure the teams aren't running underweight during the middle of the race Like Honda was a couple years ago