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Formula 1: Building the world’s fastest cars

155 points by deegles 10y ago

fizixer 10y ago
Clickbait title. (technical deep dive? really?).
- pdelbarba 10y ago
  I thought it was fairly enlightening. I was unaware of the computational limits that FIA imposes on CFD calculations.
- sctb 10y ago
  OK, we've taken that out of the title since interpretations may vary and the article is represented just fine without it.
  - deegles 10y ago
    Sorry, I didn't want to editorialize :)
  - VLM 10y ago
    The irony is there's still a rather obvious factual error left in the title, in that the slowest top fuel dragsters are well over 100 MPH faster than the fastest straightaway speeds of F1 cars. Eventually the title is going to be chopped down to not much more than "F1" LOL. Due to continuous modification of the rules, today F1 cars are faster than NASCAR but its an incredibly close race (LOL the pun) and it seems inevitable that given the constant turmoil of the rules there will eventually be a season where the top NASCAR speed is higher than the top F1 speed for that season. So if its not bad enough that the dragsters are faster than F1, its only via extensive rules manipulation that the fastest NASCAR cars are not occasionally faster than the fastest F1.
    - soundwave106 10y ago
      The absolute fastest "cars" in the world tend to be the jet-propelled vehicles solely built to break land speed records (I believe the current holder is this car: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThrustSSC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThrustSSC) A jet car isn't going to be able to be driven very easily on a closed race course, though. :) Many cars are designed to be fast in one way, but not as quick in other ways. Cars designed just to go straight (like dragsters) do not need loads of speed-robbing downforce for taking corners quickly. Formula 1 doesn't even hold the fastest lap ever recorded by a sanctioned racing series... as far as I know, that would be CART / Indycar, who achieved a 241mph (387kph) qualifying lap at Fontana (http://www.prnmag.com/columns/44-columns/66-who-holds-the-worlds-closed-course-record-aj-foyt.html http://www.prnmag.com/columns/44-columns/66-who-holds-the-wo...). But Formula 1 doesn't run on banked ovals like Indycar does. Circuit Gilles Villeneuve has hosted a lot of series, including both Formula 1 and the NASCAR Nationwide series. There's a comparison of record lap times at the end of the Wiki article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circuit_Gilles_Villeneuve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circuit_Gilles_Villeneuve). At least here, it seems that Formula 1 is a fair bit quicker than Indycar and loads quicker than the saloon / sport type cars. For this particular type of course, they probably are the fastest racing class.
      - rurban 10y ago
        F1 is about 10x better than other racing series or car tech. The top speed and power obviously not. But look at the max. rpm. Capped now at about 20k, but they can easily go to 26k. F1 is all about high freq and acceleration. Internal systems are running at 10khz cycles, normally a NASCAR or normal car Max is 500-1k. F1 dynos are small monsters compared to NASCAR. Dragsters have strong power, 3x more than F1 with stronger dynos but this is like a ship dyno. You could use cheap hydraulic dynos to test them. Transmitted data rates and sensors are insane, team budgets ditto. NASCAR and Indy could never use that much sensor tech as F1. They are highly motivated, but it's a different league. The F1 dyno tech would blow away any Tesla e-motor.
        PhantomGremlin 10y ago
        No, 20k rpm was "the good old days". Now they are limited to 15k.[1] I think the engine manufacturers were the ones pushing for all these rule changes. The reason is the manufacturers want to be able to utilize this technology in their road cars. Just look at turbos, not too long ago F1 went turbo (again). Not coincidentally many recent road cars are turbo. E.g. Honda has turbos in their econoboxes. [1] https://www.formula1.com/en/championship/inside-f1/rules-regs/Power_Unit_and_ERS.html https://www.formula1.com/en/championship/inside-f1/rules-reg...
- taude 10y ago
  I don't understand why on Hackernews we change the titles of the submissions, if the originating site (a repudable arstechnica in this case) has the original title of "Formula 1: A technical deep dive into building the world’s fastest cars". And with gems like this in the article, how someone couldn't say that it's technical? "For example, each Formula 1 team is only allowed to use 25 teraflops (trillions of floating point operations per second) of double precision (64-bit) computing power for simulating car aerodynamics. 25 teraflops isn't a lot of processing power, in the grand scheme of supercomputers: it's about comparable to 25 of the original Nvidia Titan graphics cards (the new Pascal-based cards are no good at double-precision maths)."
  - walshemj 10y ago
    Yes coming from a From an rnd background I was surprised that they are limited to half scale tunnels. IT would make more sense to limit the max power for you computing resource - it would encourage innovation.
    - ajholyoake 10y ago
      The tunnels themselves can be full size (which is good for reduction of boundary layer effects) but the models are typically 60%. There do exist some 50% models for cost reasons, but the correlation is worse and there are problems like the pirelli-supplied model tyres (amongst many other things) tend to be a bit crap.
- 6stringmerc 10y ago
  It's Ars Technica, they specialize in click-bait titles and acting technologically ignorant when convenient. It's unfortunate to see them linked consistently, because they are a low-merit publication.
  - StyloBill 10y ago
    I really don't think they are 'a low-merit publication' and I'm very curious as to what you consider a 'high-merit publication'.
    - 6stringmerc 10y ago
      In the sector I'd cite AnandTech and Evo as superior sources of tech and/or auto related content.
ethbro 10y ago
If you really want to geek out about F1 (which is incredibly fascinating from a rules and sheer technical wizardry perspective), I would highly recommend the F1 Technical forum. https://www.f1technical.net/forum/ https://www.f1technical.net/forum/
- TallGuyShort 10y ago
  I also enjoy Scarbs: http://scarbsf1.com/ http://scarbsf1.com/. He sometimes goes a long time with no updates there, but he'll do really good deep dives on a specific part and all the various trade-offs the teams make. He's really good on social media too: often notices tiny tweaks the teams have made on race weekend and does an analysis of what they're probably trying to do.
- barclay 10y ago
  Though, now dated, I'd also recommend [Steve Matchett's books](http://stevematchett.com/ http://stevematchett.com/). Previous mechanic, and now commentator (which, yeah, some people hate... but i love the guy). Interesting insider perspective.
  - mikey_p 10y ago
    I don't mind most of his commentary, except for the bit where he calls all the teams by their home city. People don't really care about Brackley vs. Maranello.
    - AlecSchueler 10y ago
      I've never seen Steve's commentary (although I do love his books), but those references could be useful in appreciating the lineage of the teams on track, e.g. the consideration the the team that once was Spyker finished 4th in the championship last year.
      - mikey_p 10y ago
        Yeah, I don't mind it occasionally, but he'll open up qualifying with something like, "Well today we're going to see if Maranello can take the fight to Brackley," and I wish he'd just use the team names. On the other hand, I really look forward to hearing Hobbs go "Whoeuueeuuueeeoaa!!" midsentence every time someone gets even slightly sideways.
hunterjrj 10y ago
So much emphasis on Microsoft technology in here. Veiled advertisement?
- LeonM 10y ago
  I thought the same thing while reading the article. The whole part about Power BI is definitely an advertisement, it has little to do with the rest of the story.
- manarth 10y ago
  Microsoft are listed as a "partner" on the Renault Sport site [1], which may be a synonym for sponsor (even if that's simply providing free/reduced-price services). So yes, I would expect them to mention + promote MS services in their posts. [1] https://www.renaultsport.com/-formule-1-partners-.html https://www.renaultsport.com/-formule-1-partners-.html
- rurban 10y ago
  For sure. I have worked in F1 at the forefront, and they are so good despite still being tied to Microsoft and Oracle. The real hard problems are not done on Windows of course. They are using e.g a soft real-time OS - inTime - beneath Windows. Wind tunnel, engine, transmission, vehicle simulations are sometimes cross compiled to special hardware. But SW development on the other hand if so much easier on Windows, esp now with .Net and c#. I just didn't see real-time c# yet.
elcapitan 10y ago
I wish the actual Formula 1 race shows would make more use of explanations and technical details. There's some mentions during the race by the reporters of some aspects of the technology, but they could do a lot better before and after with animations etc. I watched this Top Gear video a while ago, showing one of their guys trying to drive a F1 car (and one of a slower league) around a race track, which is pretty tough if you're not trained to do so, because of the massive G-force in the turns. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9773pisjCSw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9773pisjCSw Compared to that, the race reporting often looks kind of dull and slow.
- k-mcgrady 10y ago
  What country are yo watching F1 in? In the U.K. I find there's a fair bit of technical content (obviously they can't do too much as a lot of people won't care).
  - manarth 10y ago
    For context, which channel? I watch Sky F1, which provides a decent amount of technical context, but I don't know what content is delivered by Channel 4, or how it compares to Sky.
    - k-mcgrady 10y ago
      I was referring mostly to Sky. I'm sure BBC did a fair amount though, not really sure on C4. With Sky now including Pat Symonds I'm sure the amount of technical content will increase too.
    - AlecSchueler 10y ago
      Channel 4 coverage is brilliant, especially the technical side which is covered by Karun Chandhok. I actually watched the Sky stream live last weekend, and then tonight I watched the Channel 4 highlights as well purely for the coverage around the race. Having watched at least a few races from every season since 1979 onwards, I'd say Channel 4 is the best reporting team Formula 1 has had so far.
  - 10y ago
mr_justin 10y ago
For me, endurance racing (WEC) is quite a bit more fascinating and impressive than F1. Racing a car on the cutting edge of race technology for 2 hours is one thing, but 24 hours is a whole different ballgame.
- quanticle 10y ago
  The other thing that WEC has that Formula 1 doesn't is the chaos and excitement caused by multiple classes of car competing at the same time. It's not just a matter of negotiating your car around all the other cars that are pretty much identical to yours. You have to negotiate around cars that are both slower and faster. Dealing with traffic is a major aspect of WEC, and it's something that's entirely lacking from F1.
  - mr_justin 10y ago
    Absolutely. I mean, could you imagine F1 drivers having to negotiate the track with the 911s, Astons & Corvettes? They'd throw a damn hissy fit. Not only does it make the race exciting from logistics/entertainment perspective, but at any given time there are multiple first place battles occurring. It's hugely entertaining.
  - kirse 10y ago
    If you like the chaos and excitement of WEC you should come on over to WRC. $5/month for 3-hours of live streaming HD content per Rally, including full on-board cams for every major driver and stage: https://plus.wrc.com/ https://plus.wrc.com/ I mean c'mon, Kris Meeke with an accidental exit into a car park with just a few corners to go while leading Rally Mexico. You can't get much more exciting than that! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECS_GXIJ200 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECS_GXIJ200
    - quanticle 10y ago
      I already have :) WRC is fantastic. At this point, I think I'm supposed to whine about how "modern rallying doesn't hold a shadow to Group B" :)
patrickbolle 10y ago
I'm a diehard racing fan and F1 is the absolute pinnacle of car technology. I go to the Montreal Grand Prix every year (Singapore this year) and it's by far the most exciting point of my year. The only thing though... with this insane technology, we see less and less 'real racing' which is a shame. I read an article (will try to find it) that was saying last week at this year's first race, there was only 1 racing pass the whole race. It's become a challenge of who has the best first 3 seconds of the race to get into pole position. Once you are in first, besides a strategical error by your team, you can essentially stay in first for the rest of the race. I'm a Ferrari fan and am hoping this year they can shape up, but I want to see some more passes! My dad is a Formula 1600 driver here in Canada, and the 1600 races are ridiculously exciting. Open wheel madness, passes all over the track, so much fun.
- elcapitan 10y ago
  That's mostly only true for the 1-3 top teams, though - there's quite a bit of battles going on behind them, at least that's what I remember from last season to be the enjoyable part. I hope we'll see more even fights at the top as well.
- Yhippa 10y ago
  Sadly unless you normalize the cars we may never see true racing as you say. Someone in my F1 watch group pointed out the minimal passes in that race. It would be sad if it ends up being like the Peak Schumacher days where races were more or less won by pit strategy. Also worried that it's now Ferrari, Mercedes, and everyone else. By a long shot.
  - elcapitan 10y ago
    Agree on normalization. Or at least keep the core regulation (engines, aerodynamics, tires) untouched for a few years. Right now it's some kind of new regulation every year, and the big teams with their crazy development budgets can buy wins in the next year. If that stuff would at least stay the same for a while, the teams could become more even. For a few years Red Bull dominated completely because of aerodynamics regulation, now it was Mercedes because of engine regulation, and it just becomes more boring all the time.
DVassallo 10y ago
Here's one lap onboard from last weekend's qualifying, showing 6G+ forces many times over the course of a single lap: https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/features/2017/3/f1-video-2017-vs-2016-g-force-comparison.html https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/features/2017/3/f1-video-... And that track isn't even one of the most demanding ones.
myrandomcomment 10y ago
So both my wife and I watch every race. I have been to the Singapore race in the past. What an amazing party. The races themselves are getting to be quite dull. The lack of passing and things like DRS have made the racing all about the first few seconds. With the exception of Max V. amazing driving in some of the races last year it is not as fun as it used to be. I really wish they would mandate a single engine and a singe car type. Lets make it about the drivers and the strategy. The teams with the money win here.
- maxxxxx 10y ago
  I think part of F1's fascination is the technology so I don't think single engine is a good thing. In the 70s and 80s they introduced turbo engines, active suspension, 6 wheeler, automatic gearboxes, carbon fiber and other stuff. They did all this without being as expensive as it is now. I don't know where all the money goes but I think F1 should be about crazy technology. They have to find a way to let designers be creative while still keeping cost in check.
  - elcapitan 10y ago
    I think the middle ground there is not "one engine for everybody" but probably "one set of rules for a long time". The money game is really worst with this set of ever changing regulations, which favors large development budgets for rapid adoption. If regulations stay the same for 10-15 years, there can be learning and progress and technological competition even for the smaller teams.
    - maxxxxx 10y ago
      I think the cars are too reliable now. The cars used to blow up all the time but now this rarely happens anymore. I think there is a lot cost involved in making an engine super reliable.
      - deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
Errorcod3 10y ago
25 teraflops and not a drop more - I did not expect to see a limit for the hardware used for simulations!
WalterBright 10y ago
If I ruled the world, F1 cars would not be allowed to use any electronics other than in safety systems. Something about a computer taking the place of clever mechanics sucks the joy out of it.
- chadgeidel 10y ago
  And no aerodynamics active or otherwise. :-)
  - WalterBright 10y ago
    Yes. Tuning up a race car with a laptop just seems like cheating to me, they should be tuned by ear :-)
Balgair 10y ago
I grew up around racing and cars, not F1, but SCCA, NHRA, NSCAR and the like. F1 is just plain boring. Yes, the tech is ASTOUNDING and really got me into engineering to begin with. Taking into account the elasticity of titanium piston rods, the down force aerodynamics, the regen braking, all that jazz, it is all SO COOL. But, as other commenters point out, the race is won in 10 seconds, there is no passing anymore. Like the recent Pacquiao or Rousey fights, you can't even enjoy a single beer before the event is done. There is no drama, there is no excitement, just a ton of talking by boring people trying to fill time. In F1, it becomes a match of who does not screw up and make a mistake. Why watch that? How can I get my own kids into that kind of a 'sport', to them is it their father sitting on the edge of the seat for about a minute, then hours of nothing. Why would they want to watch it? They know that they will never be able to compete at that level, as they know it is all about the money that we don't have as a family. No amount of hard work will get a little boy into those seats if dad is not a Billionaire. Maybe they can study really hard and become a person that does CAD models for one of those teams. But there are no dreams of F1 cars for little boys anymore. So why bother? What does F1 have that could keep me watching? If you believe the stats, a lot of people are asking the same thing: http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2016/04/20/f1-has-lost-one-third-of-its-tv-audience-since-2008/ http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2016/04/20/f1-has-lost-one-third-...
- k-mcgrady 10y ago
  You say all that like it's fact. Personally I love F1 for the strategy. Watching a car slowly close on another car 0.25s a lap for 20 laps is thrilling. Trying to figure out where people are coming out after pit stops and whether they're lap times are good enough is fun. I feel like the argument that 'there is no overtaking in F1 so it's bad' is akin to people not liking Soccer because there are never more than a few goals a game. There's much more to it than that and their are other series that cater to people who just want lots of passing.
  - Balgair 10y ago
    Yes but in soccer, both teams start with 0 points and can tie. You can't do that in racing (a tie does happen but is so rare, it might as well never happen). Would you like to just watch cars draft each other for 3 hours and never actually overtake or try to win? Because that's what F1 is kinda is, a 15 second death scramble at the front of the poll followed by a non-competitive Sunday drive at extreme speeds. The damn time trials for poll in NASCAR are more worth watching, at least they are trying to go fast.
nonsequ 10y ago
I think PG once wrote an essay explaining that most press is agenda-driven and there's somebody with money behind the story. I wonder if that's the case here. F1 just passed out of Bernie Ecclestone's hands and has a new leadership team as well as shareholder base. They are aiming to revamp the sport and make it more exciting by addressing a lot of the issues brought up in other comments, like the rules stacking the deck in favor of rich teams and the fact that there is no streaming/digital option available to global fans.
hkjayakumar 10y ago
Richard Hammond's Engineering Connections on F1 [1] is a great watch for some of the technical details. It is however a bit dated; there have been changes to the rules and the cars themselves since the video was made. The Reddit guide [2] to F1 is more up to date. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QC_gpr2xAjk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QC_gpr2xAjk [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/wiki/newtof1 https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/wiki/newtof1
redtuesday 10y ago
I hope self driving cars take the crown in the future. The more the F1 is regulated the more boring it get's (at least for me). Since no driver is in danger they could make the cars faster and the race tracks more interesting. Maybe this will revive some of the race tracks that apparently are not on the F1 list anymore because they are to dangerous. Or in the far future even high speed racing with weapons like in the games Rollcage, Wipeout, F-Zero and Extreme-G (of course with technology that is available...)
- k-mcgrady 10y ago
  Self-driving car races sound like the most boring thing imaginable to me. Drivers don't have to be risking death (and they are, and they have died recently) to make the sport exciting. They have to be in immensely good physical condition to drive those cars and they have to have better race craft than ever as overtaking has become more difficult too. I'm not saying self-driving cars couldn't be it's own series but it would never reach the level of F1/WEC/WRC in terms of popularity. Nobody wants to cheer on a CPU.
  - joshu 10y ago
    I have started a competition for autonomous vehicles. I struggle to see much spectator interest as well. I see it has more of an engineering competition that happens to culminate in a race. That said, most of amateur racing has no spectatorship either. http://selfracingcars.com http://selfracingcars.com
yason 10y ago
Funny title. FIA has, for decades, been explicitly forcing the cars to not be the fastest racing cars with byzantine restrictions on the design of the cars and even how they can be designed. I gradually stopped watching F1 races through the late 90's because there was less and less racing and the winning cars were more and more determined by how the engineers found loopholes in the rules for one season until those got regulated or banned for the next season. If they just gave everyone the same car and let the teams augment the base construction instead of building a new car from scratch then the drivers' skills would be more emphasised and leave more room for race action. Also, the more activity there is during the race the more entertaining.
- fest 10y ago
  I have the opposite impression: it seems to me that FIA regulations are making the cars pretty much the same for all teams.
  - tradersam 10y ago
    That is the main goal, but take the turbo switch in 2014 as a counter example-Mercedes out their turbo-charger inline with the engine, and no other teams did this[0], so they dominated for years. So yes, if you have the most money for engineers and parts, you generally have the best chance of winning. [0]:https://www.wired.com/2014/04/mercedes-f1-turbo/ https://www.wired.com/2014/04/mercedes-f1-turbo/
- quiquex 10y ago
  I agree on your points. Although I believe giving everyone the same car (including engine) would kill F1. I mean the historical and most influential teams like Ferrari, Mercedes, Renault and McLaren are manufacturers and they are there for visibility, they would just ditch the series and with them 95% of the fans. There are many series with same car that are very entertaining to watch, but F1 for its own nature will never be one
- exDM69 10y ago
  > FIA has, for decades, been explicitly forcing the cars to not be the fastest racing cars with byzantine restrictions on the design of the cars and even how they can be designed. Of course they are doing that. The whole history of F1, starting from the late 1950's has been a cat and mouse game of teams pushing the rules and the regulators patching the loopholes to keep it competitive, safe and costs sane. By the early 1970s it became apparent that "anything goes" is a bad recipe for racing cars. By then, technology had advanced to a level where the cars could be made too fast to be safely driven by humans. A third of the racing drivers died in accidents. The fastest cars then were Can-Am cars, which had monstrous engines (1000hp+), huge levels of downforce (and a lot of drag, but enough power to counter that) and stiff chassis made from vacuum filled magnesium tubing. > I gradually stopped watching F1 races through the late 90's because there was less and less racing and the winning cars were more and more determined by how the engineers found loopholes in the rules for one season until those got regulated or banned for the next season. It's not like this begun in the 1990s (although there were record low number of overtakes then). The late 70s and early 80s were largely defined by a team making a vastly superior car and then just dominating. Like Mario Andretti winning with the Lotus 78/79 or the McLaren dominance of mid-80s. F1 is often misunderstood. It's not the most exciting driver-to-driver racing for 120 minutes and it doesn't strive to be. It's predominantly the competition of teams over a whole season. It's not friendly to the casual observer. But they are the fastest racing cars on the planet driven by some of the best drivers there are. And right now it seems that 2017 will be faster than ever and looks like we might be getting some competition at the top this year.

155 points by deegles 10y ago

fizixer 10y ago

Clickbait title. (technical deep dive? really?).

pdelbarba 10y ago
I thought it was fairly enlightening. I was unaware of the computational limits that FIA imposes on CFD calculations.
sctb 10y ago
OK, we've taken that out of the title since interpretations may vary and the article is represented just fine without it.
- deegles 10y ago
  Sorry, I didn't want to editorialize :)
- VLM 10y ago
  The irony is there's still a rather obvious factual error left in the title, in that the slowest top fuel dragsters are well over 100 MPH faster than the fastest straightaway speeds of F1 cars. Eventually the title is going to be chopped down to not much more than "F1" LOL. Due to continuous modification of the rules, today F1 cars are faster than NASCAR but its an incredibly close race (LOL the pun) and it seems inevitable that given the constant turmoil of the rules there will eventually be a season where the top NASCAR speed is higher than the top F1 speed for that season. So if its not bad enough that the dragsters are faster than F1, its only via extensive rules manipulation that the fastest NASCAR cars are not occasionally faster than the fastest F1.
  - soundwave106 10y ago
    The absolute fastest "cars" in the world tend to be the jet-propelled vehicles solely built to break land speed records (I believe the current holder is this car: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThrustSSC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThrustSSC) A jet car isn't going to be able to be driven very easily on a closed race course, though. :) Many cars are designed to be fast in one way, but not as quick in other ways. Cars designed just to go straight (like dragsters) do not need loads of speed-robbing downforce for taking corners quickly. Formula 1 doesn't even hold the fastest lap ever recorded by a sanctioned racing series... as far as I know, that would be CART / Indycar, who achieved a 241mph (387kph) qualifying lap at Fontana (http://www.prnmag.com/columns/44-columns/66-who-holds-the-worlds-closed-course-record-aj-foyt.html http://www.prnmag.com/columns/44-columns/66-who-holds-the-wo...). But Formula 1 doesn't run on banked ovals like Indycar does. Circuit Gilles Villeneuve has hosted a lot of series, including both Formula 1 and the NASCAR Nationwide series. There's a comparison of record lap times at the end of the Wiki article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circuit_Gilles_Villeneuve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circuit_Gilles_Villeneuve). At least here, it seems that Formula 1 is a fair bit quicker than Indycar and loads quicker than the saloon / sport type cars. For this particular type of course, they probably are the fastest racing class.
    - rurban 10y ago
      F1 is about 10x better than other racing series or car tech. The top speed and power obviously not. But look at the max. rpm. Capped now at about 20k, but they can easily go to 26k. F1 is all about high freq and acceleration. Internal systems are running at 10khz cycles, normally a NASCAR or normal car Max is 500-1k. F1 dynos are small monsters compared to NASCAR. Dragsters have strong power, 3x more than F1 with stronger dynos but this is like a ship dyno. You could use cheap hydraulic dynos to test them. Transmitted data rates and sensors are insane, team budgets ditto. NASCAR and Indy could never use that much sensor tech as F1. They are highly motivated, but it's a different league. The F1 dyno tech would blow away any Tesla e-motor.
      - PhantomGremlin 10y ago
        No, 20k rpm was "the good old days". Now they are limited to 15k.[1] I think the engine manufacturers were the ones pushing for all these rule changes. The reason is the manufacturers want to be able to utilize this technology in their road cars. Just look at turbos, not too long ago F1 went turbo (again). Not coincidentally many recent road cars are turbo. E.g. Honda has turbos in their econoboxes. [1] https://www.formula1.com/en/championship/inside-f1/rules-regs/Power_Unit_and_ERS.html https://www.formula1.com/en/championship/inside-f1/rules-reg...
taude 10y ago
I don't understand why on Hackernews we change the titles of the submissions, if the originating site (a repudable arstechnica in this case) has the original title of "Formula 1: A technical deep dive into building the world’s fastest cars". And with gems like this in the article, how someone couldn't say that it's technical? "For example, each Formula 1 team is only allowed to use 25 teraflops (trillions of floating point operations per second) of double precision (64-bit) computing power for simulating car aerodynamics. 25 teraflops isn't a lot of processing power, in the grand scheme of supercomputers: it's about comparable to 25 of the original Nvidia Titan graphics cards (the new Pascal-based cards are no good at double-precision maths)."
- walshemj 10y ago
  Yes coming from a From an rnd background I was surprised that they are limited to half scale tunnels. IT would make more sense to limit the max power for you computing resource - it would encourage innovation.
  - ajholyoake 10y ago
    The tunnels themselves can be full size (which is good for reduction of boundary layer effects) but the models are typically 60%. There do exist some 50% models for cost reasons, but the correlation is worse and there are problems like the pirelli-supplied model tyres (amongst many other things) tend to be a bit crap.
6stringmerc 10y ago
It's Ars Technica, they specialize in click-bait titles and acting technologically ignorant when convenient. It's unfortunate to see them linked consistently, because they are a low-merit publication.
- StyloBill 10y ago
  I really don't think they are 'a low-merit publication' and I'm very curious as to what you consider a 'high-merit publication'.
  - 6stringmerc 10y ago
    In the sector I'd cite AnandTech and Evo as superior sources of tech and/or auto related content.

ethbro 10y ago

If you really want to geek out about F1 (which is incredibly fascinating from a rules and sheer technical wizardry perspective), I would highly recommend the F1 Technical forum. https://www.f1technical.net/forum/ https://www.f1technical.net/forum/

TallGuyShort 10y ago
I also enjoy Scarbs: http://scarbsf1.com/ http://scarbsf1.com/. He sometimes goes a long time with no updates there, but he'll do really good deep dives on a specific part and all the various trade-offs the teams make. He's really good on social media too: often notices tiny tweaks the teams have made on race weekend and does an analysis of what they're probably trying to do.
barclay 10y ago
Though, now dated, I'd also recommend [Steve Matchett's books](http://stevematchett.com/ http://stevematchett.com/). Previous mechanic, and now commentator (which, yeah, some people hate... but i love the guy). Interesting insider perspective.
- mikey_p 10y ago
  I don't mind most of his commentary, except for the bit where he calls all the teams by their home city. People don't really care about Brackley vs. Maranello.
  - AlecSchueler 10y ago
    I've never seen Steve's commentary (although I do love his books), but those references could be useful in appreciating the lineage of the teams on track, e.g. the consideration the the team that once was Spyker finished 4th in the championship last year.
    - mikey_p 10y ago
      Yeah, I don't mind it occasionally, but he'll open up qualifying with something like, "Well today we're going to see if Maranello can take the fight to Brackley," and I wish he'd just use the team names. On the other hand, I really look forward to hearing Hobbs go "Whoeuueeuuueeeoaa!!" midsentence every time someone gets even slightly sideways.

hunterjrj 10y ago

So much emphasis on Microsoft technology in here. Veiled advertisement?

LeonM 10y ago
I thought the same thing while reading the article. The whole part about Power BI is definitely an advertisement, it has little to do with the rest of the story.
manarth 10y ago
Microsoft are listed as a "partner" on the Renault Sport site [1], which may be a synonym for sponsor (even if that's simply providing free/reduced-price services). So yes, I would expect them to mention + promote MS services in their posts. [1] https://www.renaultsport.com/-formule-1-partners-.html https://www.renaultsport.com/-formule-1-partners-.html
rurban 10y ago
For sure. I have worked in F1 at the forefront, and they are so good despite still being tied to Microsoft and Oracle. The real hard problems are not done on Windows of course. They are using e.g a soft real-time OS - inTime - beneath Windows. Wind tunnel, engine, transmission, vehicle simulations are sometimes cross compiled to special hardware. But SW development on the other hand if so much easier on Windows, esp now with .Net and c#. I just didn't see real-time c# yet.

elcapitan 10y ago

I wish the actual Formula 1 race shows would make more use of explanations and technical details. There's some mentions during the race by the reporters of some aspects of the technology, but they could do a lot better before and after with animations etc. I watched this Top Gear video a while ago, showing one of their guys trying to drive a F1 car (and one of a slower league) around a race track, which is pretty tough if you're not trained to do so, because of the massive G-force in the turns. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9773pisjCSw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9773pisjCSw Compared to that, the race reporting often looks kind of dull and slow.

k-mcgrady 10y ago
What country are yo watching F1 in? In the U.K. I find there's a fair bit of technical content (obviously they can't do too much as a lot of people won't care).
- manarth 10y ago
  For context, which channel? I watch Sky F1, which provides a decent amount of technical context, but I don't know what content is delivered by Channel 4, or how it compares to Sky.
  - k-mcgrady 10y ago
    I was referring mostly to Sky. I'm sure BBC did a fair amount though, not really sure on C4. With Sky now including Pat Symonds I'm sure the amount of technical content will increase too.
  - AlecSchueler 10y ago
    Channel 4 coverage is brilliant, especially the technical side which is covered by Karun Chandhok. I actually watched the Sky stream live last weekend, and then tonight I watched the Channel 4 highlights as well purely for the coverage around the race. Having watched at least a few races from every season since 1979 onwards, I'd say Channel 4 is the best reporting team Formula 1 has had so far.
- 10y ago

mr_justin 10y ago

For me, endurance racing (WEC) is quite a bit more fascinating and impressive than F1. Racing a car on the cutting edge of race technology for 2 hours is one thing, but 24 hours is a whole different ballgame.

quanticle 10y ago
The other thing that WEC has that Formula 1 doesn't is the chaos and excitement caused by multiple classes of car competing at the same time. It's not just a matter of negotiating your car around all the other cars that are pretty much identical to yours. You have to negotiate around cars that are both slower and faster. Dealing with traffic is a major aspect of WEC, and it's something that's entirely lacking from F1.
- mr_justin 10y ago
  Absolutely. I mean, could you imagine F1 drivers having to negotiate the track with the 911s, Astons & Corvettes? They'd throw a damn hissy fit. Not only does it make the race exciting from logistics/entertainment perspective, but at any given time there are multiple first place battles occurring. It's hugely entertaining.
- kirse 10y ago
  If you like the chaos and excitement of WEC you should come on over to WRC. $5/month for 3-hours of live streaming HD content per Rally, including full on-board cams for every major driver and stage: https://plus.wrc.com/ https://plus.wrc.com/ I mean c'mon, Kris Meeke with an accidental exit into a car park with just a few corners to go while leading Rally Mexico. You can't get much more exciting than that! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECS_GXIJ200 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECS_GXIJ200
  - quanticle 10y ago
    I already have :) WRC is fantastic. At this point, I think I'm supposed to whine about how "modern rallying doesn't hold a shadow to Group B" :)

patrickbolle 10y ago

I'm a diehard racing fan and F1 is the absolute pinnacle of car technology. I go to the Montreal Grand Prix every year (Singapore this year) and it's by far the most exciting point of my year. The only thing though... with this insane technology, we see less and less 'real racing' which is a shame. I read an article (will try to find it) that was saying last week at this year's first race, there was only 1 racing pass the whole race. It's become a challenge of who has the best first 3 seconds of the race to get into pole position. Once you are in first, besides a strategical error by your team, you can essentially stay in first for the rest of the race. I'm a Ferrari fan and am hoping this year they can shape up, but I want to see some more passes! My dad is a Formula 1600 driver here in Canada, and the 1600 races are ridiculously exciting. Open wheel madness, passes all over the track, so much fun.

elcapitan 10y ago
That's mostly only true for the 1-3 top teams, though - there's quite a bit of battles going on behind them, at least that's what I remember from last season to be the enjoyable part. I hope we'll see more even fights at the top as well.
Yhippa 10y ago
Sadly unless you normalize the cars we may never see true racing as you say. Someone in my F1 watch group pointed out the minimal passes in that race. It would be sad if it ends up being like the Peak Schumacher days where races were more or less won by pit strategy. Also worried that it's now Ferrari, Mercedes, and everyone else. By a long shot.
- elcapitan 10y ago
  Agree on normalization. Or at least keep the core regulation (engines, aerodynamics, tires) untouched for a few years. Right now it's some kind of new regulation every year, and the big teams with their crazy development budgets can buy wins in the next year. If that stuff would at least stay the same for a while, the teams could become more even. For a few years Red Bull dominated completely because of aerodynamics regulation, now it was Mercedes because of engine regulation, and it just becomes more boring all the time.

DVassallo 10y ago

Here's one lap onboard from last weekend's qualifying, showing 6G+ forces many times over the course of a single lap: https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/features/2017/3/f1-video-2017-vs-2016-g-force-comparison.html https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/features/2017/3/f1-video-... And that track isn't even one of the most demanding ones.

myrandomcomment 10y ago

So both my wife and I watch every race. I have been to the Singapore race in the past. What an amazing party. The races themselves are getting to be quite dull. The lack of passing and things like DRS have made the racing all about the first few seconds. With the exception of Max V. amazing driving in some of the races last year it is not as fun as it used to be. I really wish they would mandate a single engine and a singe car type. Lets make it about the drivers and the strategy. The teams with the money win here.

maxxxxx 10y ago
I think part of F1's fascination is the technology so I don't think single engine is a good thing. In the 70s and 80s they introduced turbo engines, active suspension, 6 wheeler, automatic gearboxes, carbon fiber and other stuff. They did all this without being as expensive as it is now. I don't know where all the money goes but I think F1 should be about crazy technology. They have to find a way to let designers be creative while still keeping cost in check.
- elcapitan 10y ago
  I think the middle ground there is not "one engine for everybody" but probably "one set of rules for a long time". The money game is really worst with this set of ever changing regulations, which favors large development budgets for rapid adoption. If regulations stay the same for 10-15 years, there can be learning and progress and technological competition even for the smaller teams.
  - maxxxxx 10y ago
    I think the cars are too reliable now. The cars used to blow up all the time but now this rarely happens anymore. I think there is a lot cost involved in making an engine super reliable.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]

Errorcod3 10y ago

25 teraflops and not a drop more - I did not expect to see a limit for the hardware used for simulations!

WalterBright 10y ago

If I ruled the world, F1 cars would not be allowed to use any electronics other than in safety systems. Something about a computer taking the place of clever mechanics sucks the joy out of it.

chadgeidel 10y ago
And no aerodynamics active or otherwise. :-)
- WalterBright 10y ago
  Yes. Tuning up a race car with a laptop just seems like cheating to me, they should be tuned by ear :-)

Balgair 10y ago

I grew up around racing and cars, not F1, but SCCA, NHRA, NSCAR and the like. F1 is just plain boring. Yes, the tech is ASTOUNDING and really got me into engineering to begin with. Taking into account the elasticity of titanium piston rods, the down force aerodynamics, the regen braking, all that jazz, it is all SO COOL. But, as other commenters point out, the race is won in 10 seconds, there is no passing anymore. Like the recent Pacquiao or Rousey fights, you can't even enjoy a single beer before the event is done. There is no drama, there is no excitement, just a ton of talking by boring people trying to fill time. In F1, it becomes a match of who does not screw up and make a mistake. Why watch that? How can I get my own kids into that kind of a 'sport', to them is it their father sitting on the edge of the seat for about a minute, then hours of nothing. Why would they want to watch it? They know that they will never be able to compete at that level, as they know it is all about the money that we don't have as a family. No amount of hard work will get a little boy into those seats if dad is not a Billionaire. Maybe they can study really hard and become a person that does CAD models for one of those teams. But there are no dreams of F1 cars for little boys anymore. So why bother? What does F1 have that could keep me watching? If you believe the stats, a lot of people are asking the same thing: http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2016/04/20/f1-has-lost-one-third-of-its-tv-audience-since-2008/ http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2016/04/20/f1-has-lost-one-third-...

k-mcgrady 10y ago
You say all that like it's fact. Personally I love F1 for the strategy. Watching a car slowly close on another car 0.25s a lap for 20 laps is thrilling. Trying to figure out where people are coming out after pit stops and whether they're lap times are good enough is fun. I feel like the argument that 'there is no overtaking in F1 so it's bad' is akin to people not liking Soccer because there are never more than a few goals a game. There's much more to it than that and their are other series that cater to people who just want lots of passing.
- Balgair 10y ago
  Yes but in soccer, both teams start with 0 points and can tie. You can't do that in racing (a tie does happen but is so rare, it might as well never happen). Would you like to just watch cars draft each other for 3 hours and never actually overtake or try to win? Because that's what F1 is kinda is, a 15 second death scramble at the front of the poll followed by a non-competitive Sunday drive at extreme speeds. The damn time trials for poll in NASCAR are more worth watching, at least they are trying to go fast.

nonsequ 10y ago

I think PG once wrote an essay explaining that most press is agenda-driven and there's somebody with money behind the story. I wonder if that's the case here. F1 just passed out of Bernie Ecclestone's hands and has a new leadership team as well as shareholder base. They are aiming to revamp the sport and make it more exciting by addressing a lot of the issues brought up in other comments, like the rules stacking the deck in favor of rich teams and the fact that there is no streaming/digital option available to global fans.

hkjayakumar 10y ago

Richard Hammond's Engineering Connections on F1 [1] is a great watch for some of the technical details. It is however a bit dated; there have been changes to the rules and the cars themselves since the video was made. The Reddit guide [2] to F1 is more up to date. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QC_gpr2xAjk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QC_gpr2xAjk [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/wiki/newtof1 https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/wiki/newtof1

redtuesday 10y ago

I hope self driving cars take the crown in the future. The more the F1 is regulated the more boring it get's (at least for me). Since no driver is in danger they could make the cars faster and the race tracks more interesting. Maybe this will revive some of the race tracks that apparently are not on the F1 list anymore because they are to dangerous. Or in the far future even high speed racing with weapons like in the games Rollcage, Wipeout, F-Zero and Extreme-G (of course with technology that is available...)

k-mcgrady 10y ago
Self-driving car races sound like the most boring thing imaginable to me. Drivers don't have to be risking death (and they are, and they have died recently) to make the sport exciting. They have to be in immensely good physical condition to drive those cars and they have to have better race craft than ever as overtaking has become more difficult too. I'm not saying self-driving cars couldn't be it's own series but it would never reach the level of F1/WEC/WRC in terms of popularity. Nobody wants to cheer on a CPU.
- joshu 10y ago
  I have started a competition for autonomous vehicles. I struggle to see much spectator interest as well. I see it has more of an engineering competition that happens to culminate in a race. That said, most of amateur racing has no spectatorship either. http://selfracingcars.com http://selfracingcars.com

yason 10y ago

Funny title. FIA has, for decades, been explicitly forcing the cars to not be the fastest racing cars with byzantine restrictions on the design of the cars and even how they can be designed. I gradually stopped watching F1 races through the late 90's because there was less and less racing and the winning cars were more and more determined by how the engineers found loopholes in the rules for one season until those got regulated or banned for the next season. If they just gave everyone the same car and let the teams augment the base construction instead of building a new car from scratch then the drivers' skills would be more emphasised and leave more room for race action. Also, the more activity there is during the race the more entertaining.

fest 10y ago
I have the opposite impression: it seems to me that FIA regulations are making the cars pretty much the same for all teams.
- tradersam 10y ago
  That is the main goal, but take the turbo switch in 2014 as a counter example-Mercedes out their turbo-charger inline with the engine, and no other teams did this[0], so they dominated for years. So yes, if you have the most money for engineers and parts, you generally have the best chance of winning. [0]:https://www.wired.com/2014/04/mercedes-f1-turbo/ https://www.wired.com/2014/04/mercedes-f1-turbo/
quiquex 10y ago
I agree on your points. Although I believe giving everyone the same car (including engine) would kill F1. I mean the historical and most influential teams like Ferrari, Mercedes, Renault and McLaren are manufacturers and they are there for visibility, they would just ditch the series and with them 95% of the fans. There are many series with same car that are very entertaining to watch, but F1 for its own nature will never be one
exDM69 10y ago
> FIA has, for decades, been explicitly forcing the cars to not be the fastest racing cars with byzantine restrictions on the design of the cars and even how they can be designed. Of course they are doing that. The whole history of F1, starting from the late 1950's has been a cat and mouse game of teams pushing the rules and the regulators patching the loopholes to keep it competitive, safe and costs sane. By the early 1970s it became apparent that "anything goes" is a bad recipe for racing cars. By then, technology had advanced to a level where the cars could be made too fast to be safely driven by humans. A third of the racing drivers died in accidents. The fastest cars then were Can-Am cars, which had monstrous engines (1000hp+), huge levels of downforce (and a lot of drag, but enough power to counter that) and stiff chassis made from vacuum filled magnesium tubing. > I gradually stopped watching F1 races through the late 90's because there was less and less racing and the winning cars were more and more determined by how the engineers found loopholes in the rules for one season until those got regulated or banned for the next season. It's not like this begun in the 1990s (although there were record low number of overtakes then). The late 70s and early 80s were largely defined by a team making a vastly superior car and then just dominating. Like Mario Andretti winning with the Lotus 78/79 or the McLaren dominance of mid-80s. F1 is often misunderstood. It's not the most exciting driver-to-driver racing for 120 minutes and it doesn't strive to be. It's predominantly the competition of teams over a whole season. It's not friendly to the casual observer. But they are the fastest racing cars on the planet driven by some of the best drivers there are. And right now it seems that 2017 will be faster than ever and looks like we might be getting some competition at the top this year.