14 ms·

Formula 1 2020: The secret aerodynamicist – are capes the key?

162 points by ColinWright 6y ago

arooaroo 6y ago
People who are not normally interested in F1 are finding the Netflix series Drive to Survive a more accessible version to spectate. It's not just highlights in chronological order, but a distillation of the main themes of the season, e.g., certain inter-team battles, intra-team rivalries, fallouts between teams and suppliers, regulations, etc. The behind-the-scenes glimpses are fascinating. I remember (pre-family when I could easily give-up a large chunk of my weekend) tuning in to the beginning of TV coverage on Saturdays (qualifying) and Sundays (race day) primarily to watch all the build-up about the developments since the previous race, particularly all the new technical changes; the relentless engineering efforts are immense and we only get a tiny glimpse of it. These cars could in theory be even faster. They stopped in season testing years ago; there are limits to the amount of high performance computing they can do; many parts are standardised. There's a tension in the way the sport is regulated to constrain the vast budgets of the larger teams so that smaller teams can try and compete, and ideally new teams enter the sport too. In addition, the aerodymics evolved to such a degree that the wake each car leaves behind makes it almost impossible for cars to follow closely and overtake, leading to uninspiring processions on race days. So regulations are constantly being added to try and ensure a spectacle (DRS, degrading tyres, forcing sub-optimal front and rear wings). But they continue to innovate at a staggering pace. When DRS (Drag Reduction System -- used in set portions of the straights, a car that's within 1 sec of a car can deploy DRS, that causes the rear wing to have less drag and can potentially allow an overtake). But absolutely amazing lateral thinking from the teams saw innovations like the "F-duct" that was eventually banned and then the so-called "Double DRS". They are channeling relatively small amounts of air-flow through little vents and holes to create small but improvements to their aero performance. And when in-season testing was removed, all teams rolled out state-of-the-art digital car simulators that have become incredible sophisticated; they design new aerodynamic parts, such as a tiny adjustments to their front-wing, then they test the part on the simulator before actually building and taking to the next race.
- LandR 6y ago
  Justst be aware the Netflix series sometimes show things out of context, or just straight up wrong, chronologically wrong etc to make it more entertaining.
- WalterBright 6y ago
  I've sometimes thought that computers and radios should be banned from F1 cars, unless they are part of the safety equipment.
- dom96 6y ago
  So I watched Drive to Survive and loved it, so much so that I would like to get into watching F1 proper, but when I tried it just doesn't hold my interest (although admittedly I mostly attempted to watch random races on YouTube). Do you (or anyone else) have any tips on what and where to watch to get into it? Perhaps it's time I get a proper subscription for the TV coverage and watch it like you say over the weekend.
  - beavisel 6y ago
    I think the more you understand about the race, strategy, technology, rivalries, and race-craft will definitely help you enjoy a GP much more. It's combination of all these things that make it that much more than just cars going around a track quickly. The Austrian GP just gone was very exciting, especially the end! Try watch a few more races and even check out the F1 subreddit /r/formula1 - its a good community that share plenty of news, clips from new and old races etc - and if you have any questions, they're all very helpful
  - selykg 6y ago
    The first season I watched was a little tough to follow. There's a lot of new information being thrown at you and teams and all that fun stuff to wrap your head around. I typically just watch qualifying and the race. But it's a time thing. Qualifying if I fast forward through things still takes about 40 minutes. The race is typically a solid 2 hours or so. That's nearly 3 hours each weekend it's on and we haven't even dove into the pre-race and post-race bits or the practice sessions. Things get interesting, like in yesterday's race, when penalties start playing into things (which resulted in different podium finishes yesterday) and some of the technical issues that happen (of which there were several during the Austrian GP, as only 11 finished the race). I'd say yesterday's race had a fair bit happening in it, but not super duper exciting stuff. The big part of the problem is, at least so far this year, Ferrari is once again behind the eight ball, Mercedes is (once again) running the pack, and Red Bull are sort of somewhere in the mix there. The more exciting parts of the race are the team placing 4th, 5th and 6th. Those are typically much more exciting, but they rarely air much of those parts of the race. r/formula1 is a good place to keep up to speed as well.
beaker52 6y ago
There are a couple of aspects of Formula 1 that make it very compelling to watch (my opinion of course, take as you will): - Accessible aerodynamics (it's on the road in front of you, not up in the air) - Technological developments (e.g. this year, one of the teams has a steering wheel they pull toward/push away themselves to change the geometry of the front wheels) - Watching high-performing athletes demonstrating the ability to operate a machine at speeds over 200mph and still having the capacity to understand the strategic situations unfolding around them, even gathering information from the crowd in the grandstands, or the tv screens that flash past them as they navigate the track - Seeing an inter-disciplinary team design and operate a machine that fuses aerodynamics, mechanics and hybrid propulsion systems, driven by a human operator, monitored in realtime by a team of engineers distributed around the world - On-the-fly risk/reward decision making in race strategy from observing current data whilst incorporating gut feeling based on past experience to great effect
- 11235813213455 6y ago
  - The fact our planet has enough pollution to deal with already, I'm not saying Formula1 is extremely polluting, but whatever it adds is quite unnecessary for just an entertainment purpose (my opinion of course)
  - olyjohn 6y ago
    There's always Formula E...
    - 11235813213455 6y ago
      I didn't think about the gas consumption really. I'd have said the same about a cycling race (and I love bike, but practising, not watching). The pollution comes from all the surroundings, transports, materials, organizations, services, broadcasting, littering, ..
  - LandR 6y ago
    I believe Formula 1 has been carbon neutral for quite a while.
jstanley 6y ago
I read Adrian Newey's autobiography, "How to build a car", last year, and thoroughly enjoyed it. I'd recommend it to anyone with an interest in the engineering side of motorsport.
Andrew_nenakhov 6y ago
Watched a lot of F1 in 90s/00s, stopped after 2017 season. Current regulations make it very predictable. Most offending rules are: - limit on testing means that whoever makes the best car after regulations change will win until next regulations change (2010..2013 Red Bull, 2014.. today Mercedes), others have very limited means to catch up - scoring system introduced in late 00s rewards reliability over racing, and gives miniscule reward for 1st place: now you get 25 for P1, 18 for P2, and in 80s it was 9 or 10 for P1, 6 for P2, and in 1980s only 11 of 17 results counted towards championship, so drivers would often take more risks to get for results. Now they just drive home safely.
- kohtatsu 6y ago
  25 vs 18 = 1.39x 9 vs 6 = 1.50x 10 vs 6 = 1.67x For anyone curious.
  - Andrew_nenakhov 6y ago
    For p2 it's even worse: 18 vs 15 = 1.20x 6 vs 4 = 1.5x
- ColinWright 6y ago
  > Now they just drive home safely. Some of the on-track incidents yesterday (July 5th) suggest that this is not the whole story, and may not be accurate.
- rurban 6y ago
  Limiting on testing is just taking away the unique Ferrari advantage. Previously they just took their design out on their private racetrack next to the lab. Now they have to test as all the others: virtually in computer simulations. And for a short time on the track. It's much more interesting to do the simulations virtually. Some even do the windtunnel testing now virtually. But only the richest.
  - Andrew_nenakhov 6y ago
    So how do you explain that now after each regulation change and until the next, one team wins every constructor and driver title? Previously, dominance was never that total, not even during Schumacher/Ferrari era (and Schumacher was way better driver than Hamilton). But since 2010, no competing team is able to catch up.
gripfx 6y ago
If anyone is interested, the software team I work for is hiring! F1 is definitely an interesting challenge and a unique work environment. Find out more here: https://jobs.redbull.com/at-de/bicester-scuderia-alphatauri-software-development-team-leader-128988-047824?lang=en https://jobs.redbull.com/at-de/bicester-scuderia-alphatauri-...
- logicx24 6y ago
  I'm probably not up for a move to the UK, but if you don't mind, could you tell us a bit more about your job? What sort of projects have you been able to work on? What's the work culture like? Do you find the actual technical problems you work on exciting, or is it more the domain that excites you (i.e. building and operating a racecar)?
  - gripfx 6y ago
    Sure. The role (and myself) are in the aerodynamics department, developing and maintaining software for the aerodynamicists. The role of the aerodynamicist is to develop the bodywork of the car (wings, ducts, chassis shape etc) to improve aerodynamic efficiency. This is done primarily in computational fluid dynamics simulations [1] (virtual) and scale model testing in a wind tunnel [2] (physical) before being tested on the actual race car. My group works on the software to analyse the data output. Think data science dashboards with lots of real time and historical data. Due to our requirements, the tools are designed in house with input from users. In my time here I have worked on interfacing with the HPC cluster, improving visualisations and improving our backend stack amongst other things. For your last question, it is a bit of both. I went to university with the goal of working in F1 and the competitive aspect is definitely there but as I was not a comp sci student the technical problems are still interesting. Developing aero is very visual heavy as ideas are implemented as 3D CAD designs and often reviewed as such. So it's not just a more complicated stock ticker that needs to be shown. [1]: https://static.carthrottle.com/workspace/uploads/posts/2016/03/0b59df596795aa48e1ed670478d2b06a.jpg https://static.carthrottle.com/workspace/uploads/posts/2016/... [2]: https://images.cdn.circlesix.co/image/2/1000/425/5/uploads/posts/2019/08/462980c00e8a3c285d85b9931da87a73.png https://images.cdn.circlesix.co/image/2/1000/425/5/uploads/p...
KuiN 6y ago
Always tricky to see detail in this area of an F1 car, but the BBC really haven't picked the clearest photos ... Hopefully a bit clearer here: * Mercedes W11 cape: https://i.imgur.com/LoDuge8.jpg https://i.imgur.com/LoDuge8.jpg * Red Bull RB16: https://i.imgur.com/lJ4SrYv.jpg https://i.imgur.com/lJ4SrYv.jpg * Renault RS20: https://i.imgur.com/XJVeFwN.png https://i.imgur.com/XJVeFwN.png
- KuiN 6y ago
  Even harder to see the J-vanes on the Ferrari (not helped by there being only 10 photographers round the tracks at the moment, so many fewer pictures than usual) but I've found a couple photos of the SF1000's vanes: https://i.redd.it/4awyalvl1al41.jpg https://i.redd.it/4awyalvl1al41.jpg https://i.redd.it/xrhjfzmj0ql41.jpg https://i.redd.it/xrhjfzmj0ql41.jpg It'll be interesting to see if they change cape/J-vane philosophy with their much vaunted aero upgrade for Hungary in a couple of weeks. There certainly seem to be some pretty fundamental issues with their 2020 car at the moment. I'm sure their newly legal engine isn't helping them but watching some of Vettel's onboards from yesterday[0] there's clearly something aerodynamically wrong too, the car just isn't planted in any phase of cornering. [0] - https://twitter.com/deadlinex/status/1279825624719392768 https://twitter.com/deadlinex/status/1279825624719392768
obilgic 6y ago
It's only gonna get interesting when Tesla puts a fully autonomous F1 car racing against the drivers.
- meditative 6y ago
  automated cars would obviously eventually become faster than F1 drivers, it's just there's no interest in it (unfortunately). The biggest interest to most people are the drivers and they strongly dislike driver aids. I'd prefer every driver aid under the sun and have a real engineering battle. I'm obviously in the minority here. Formula E is under very tight budget constraints in order to lower the barrier to entry. I look forward to the day when the series is established and they can start to compete on things like motor construction and battery tech to drive the field forwards.
  - BadOakOx 6y ago
    There is already an autonomous car race which they tested at Formula E events: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roborace https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roborace
  - doikor 6y ago
    > drivers and they strongly dislike driver aids The racers like whatever makes them go faster. When ABS and traction control was allowed everyone was using it. It just made you faster. But the current rules ban them with the goal of trying to make the driver matter more. One of the sports all time great (Micheal Schumacher) won all of his championships with traction control most likely. The teams used their own computers in the cars then so it was basically impossible to police and thus the ban was lifted in 2002. The ban was put back in place when the onboard computer in the cars was homologated (everyone uses the same computer by McLaren)
    - obilgic 6y ago
      I think OP meant "viewers dislike"
  - speedgoose 6y ago
deltron3030 6y ago
The true beauty of motorsports for me is the symbiosis of man/machine/environment interaction, the best drivers are are able to adapt their driving style to the limits of their car/setup in respect to changing weather.
rurban 6y ago
Bold move by this technician helping out their worst competitors. You normally don't do this, even if Ferrari looks really poor this year and would need some help. They are just redesigning their front, because their J-Vane is not good enough.
Ptrulli 6y ago
I see the formula one body always trying to change rules that effect car performance. The goal, more overtaking and competitive racing. My question is if they were to have more technology limitations meaning less area of improvement would that balance of 90% car 10% driver change for the better. Say 60% car and 40% driver. Wouldn't that make it more competitive?
- arooaroo 6y ago
  The problem is that a lot of the investment comes from the large automotive manufacturers. Despite the fans and media interest in the drivers' championship, what really counts within the sport is the constructors' championship (the two are strongly correlated, of course). What makes the sport more interesting to the fans is not necessarily what motivates teams to participate. One could argue that there are many other formula and racing formats that get that balance between the car and driver, but it's not necessarily something that gets people tuning in. People watch F1 because it's supposed to be pinnacle of automotive engineering and racing. So if I'm a team boss of one of the top 3 teams, I'm not going to be interested in artificially handicapping the sport so that the smaller teams can get in the mix. However, they've seen repeatedly that fans get bored when it's the same couple of teams who are wrangling for the podium and there's not much excitement per race. So teams at the top will begrudgingly let the regulations be altered to try and spice things up, but nothing too significant. Unfortunately it'll take a downturn in F1 rights income & viewership to make the teams think twice about how to fight this tension between the competitiveness vs status quo. But then the big teams will think, why am I investing hundreds of millions in F1 when I'm not winning when I can spend a fraction in DTM or Le Mans and start building up prestige from other events. Take the Monaco race, the quintessential F1 race. Watch the pole position lap from the driver's viewpoint and it's the up there with the most amazing 70secs you've seen in sport. However, watch the full race and it's typically a dull procession. As a fan I'd be glad to see the back of it, but sport itself love it.
  - Ptrulli 6y ago
    I think you captured this perfectly with your explanation. I did not take into account the teams. I was solely concentrating from a fans perspective in error or from being a fan myself. So this delicate balance won't really change much due to the reason you outlined. I'm curious in your opinion what do you think could change that will affect the sport in a positive manner (from a fan and business perspective)?
tentboy 6y ago
Judging by yesterday’s race, the real key is just having your car finish the race (said in jest but there were nine DNFs in yesterday’s Austria Grand Prix and close to having a few more with Mercedes gearbox issues). There is a ton of cool engineering in F1. If you are bored poke around https://www.f1technical.net/ https://www.f1technical.net/
kavinskyy 6y ago
As someone who wishes to work in the field of motorsport specially Formula 1, what opportunities are present for software engineers at a junior role?
- squidofbits 6y ago
  Most teams have career opportunities on their websites. I suggest starting there.
ajoy 6y ago
I used to like watching it, until it became boring. The cars got wider and more sensitive to the car in front, that overtakes became rare, even with DRS (*Drag Reduction System - that allows the back wing of the car in the back to fold to reduce drag at certain points in the track, if the car is close enough to the car in front). Also, Mercedes started dominating it, to a point that the only battle in the race was in the mid-field. The winners were almost always, already decided at qualifying (unless some reliability issues happened during the race).
- ksk 6y ago
  TBH, I think its better now that they're trying to level the playing field. Before (circa 2006 when I used to watch every single race) it was basically whoever had more money to spend. >The winners were almost always, already decided at qualifying (unless some reliability issues happened during the race). I don't think that's fair. FWIW, in the 2019 F1 season only 8/21 races were won by the driver in pole position.
  - ajoy 6y ago
    I agree. 2019 was better. But still not enough, I feel. I got tired of Mercedes winning :). Because of the COVID, they have pushed some of the needed reforms further out, which is unfortunate (like max $ spend per team, engine specs, reduced sensitivity to the car in front etc.).

162 points by ColinWright 6y ago

People who are not normally interested in F1 are finding the Netflix series Drive to Survive a more accessible version to spectate. It's not just highlights in chronological order, but a distillation of the main themes of the season, e.g., certain inter-team battles, intra-team rivalries, fallouts between teams and suppliers, regulations, etc. The behind-the-scenes glimpses are fascinating. I remember (pre-family when I could easily give-up a large chunk of my weekend) tuning in to the beginning of TV coverage on Saturdays (qualifying) and Sundays (race day) primarily to watch all the build-up about the developments since the previous race, particularly all the new technical changes; the relentless engineering efforts are immense and we only get a tiny glimpse of it. These cars could in theory be even faster. They stopped in season testing years ago; there are limits to the amount of high performance computing they can do; many parts are standardised. There's a tension in the way the sport is regulated to constrain the vast budgets of the larger teams so that smaller teams can try and compete, and ideally new teams enter the sport too. In addition, the aerodymics evolved to such a degree that the wake each car leaves behind makes it almost impossible for cars to follow closely and overtake, leading to uninspiring processions on race days. So regulations are constantly being added to try and ensure a spectacle (DRS, degrading tyres, forcing sub-optimal front and rear wings). But they continue to innovate at a staggering pace. When DRS (Drag Reduction System -- used in set portions of the straights, a car that's within 1 sec of a car can deploy DRS, that causes the rear wing to have less drag and can potentially allow an overtake). But absolutely amazing lateral thinking from the teams saw innovations like the "F-duct" that was eventually banned and then the so-called "Double DRS". They are channeling relatively small amounts of air-flow through little vents and holes to create small but improvements to their aero performance. And when in-season testing was removed, all teams rolled out state-of-the-art digital car simulators that have become incredible sophisticated; they design new aerodynamic parts, such as a tiny adjustments to their front-wing, then they test the part on the simulator before actually building and taking to the next race.

LandR 6y ago
Justst be aware the Netflix series sometimes show things out of context, or just straight up wrong, chronologically wrong etc to make it more entertaining.
WalterBright 6y ago
I've sometimes thought that computers and radios should be banned from F1 cars, unless they are part of the safety equipment.
dom96 6y ago
So I watched Drive to Survive and loved it, so much so that I would like to get into watching F1 proper, but when I tried it just doesn't hold my interest (although admittedly I mostly attempted to watch random races on YouTube). Do you (or anyone else) have any tips on what and where to watch to get into it? Perhaps it's time I get a proper subscription for the TV coverage and watch it like you say over the weekend.
- beavisel 6y ago
  I think the more you understand about the race, strategy, technology, rivalries, and race-craft will definitely help you enjoy a GP much more. It's combination of all these things that make it that much more than just cars going around a track quickly. The Austrian GP just gone was very exciting, especially the end! Try watch a few more races and even check out the F1 subreddit /r/formula1 - its a good community that share plenty of news, clips from new and old races etc - and if you have any questions, they're all very helpful
- selykg 6y ago
  The first season I watched was a little tough to follow. There's a lot of new information being thrown at you and teams and all that fun stuff to wrap your head around. I typically just watch qualifying and the race. But it's a time thing. Qualifying if I fast forward through things still takes about 40 minutes. The race is typically a solid 2 hours or so. That's nearly 3 hours each weekend it's on and we haven't even dove into the pre-race and post-race bits or the practice sessions. Things get interesting, like in yesterday's race, when penalties start playing into things (which resulted in different podium finishes yesterday) and some of the technical issues that happen (of which there were several during the Austrian GP, as only 11 finished the race). I'd say yesterday's race had a fair bit happening in it, but not super duper exciting stuff. The big part of the problem is, at least so far this year, Ferrari is once again behind the eight ball, Mercedes is (once again) running the pack, and Red Bull are sort of somewhere in the mix there. The more exciting parts of the race are the team placing 4th, 5th and 6th. Those are typically much more exciting, but they rarely air much of those parts of the race. r/formula1 is a good place to keep up to speed as well.

beaker52 6y ago

There are a couple of aspects of Formula 1 that make it very compelling to watch (my opinion of course, take as you will): - Accessible aerodynamics (it's on the road in front of you, not up in the air) - Technological developments (e.g. this year, one of the teams has a steering wheel they pull toward/push away themselves to change the geometry of the front wheels) - Watching high-performing athletes demonstrating the ability to operate a machine at speeds over 200mph and still having the capacity to understand the strategic situations unfolding around them, even gathering information from the crowd in the grandstands, or the tv screens that flash past them as they navigate the track - Seeing an inter-disciplinary team design and operate a machine that fuses aerodynamics, mechanics and hybrid propulsion systems, driven by a human operator, monitored in realtime by a team of engineers distributed around the world - On-the-fly risk/reward decision making in race strategy from observing current data whilst incorporating gut feeling based on past experience to great effect

11235813213455 6y ago
- The fact our planet has enough pollution to deal with already, I'm not saying Formula1 is extremely polluting, but whatever it adds is quite unnecessary for just an entertainment purpose (my opinion of course)
- olyjohn 6y ago
  There's always Formula E...
  - 11235813213455 6y ago
    I didn't think about the gas consumption really. I'd have said the same about a cycling race (and I love bike, but practising, not watching). The pollution comes from all the surroundings, transports, materials, organizations, services, broadcasting, littering, ..
- LandR 6y ago
  I believe Formula 1 has been carbon neutral for quite a while.

jstanley 6y ago

I read Adrian Newey's autobiography, "How to build a car", last year, and thoroughly enjoyed it. I'd recommend it to anyone with an interest in the engineering side of motorsport.

Andrew_nenakhov 6y ago

Watched a lot of F1 in 90s/00s, stopped after 2017 season. Current regulations make it very predictable. Most offending rules are: - limit on testing means that whoever makes the best car after regulations change will win until next regulations change (2010..2013 Red Bull, 2014.. today Mercedes), others have very limited means to catch up - scoring system introduced in late 00s rewards reliability over racing, and gives miniscule reward for 1st place: now you get 25 for P1, 18 for P2, and in 80s it was 9 or 10 for P1, 6 for P2, and in 1980s only 11 of 17 results counted towards championship, so drivers would often take more risks to get for results. Now they just drive home safely.

kohtatsu 6y ago
25 vs 18 = 1.39x 9 vs 6 = 1.50x 10 vs 6 = 1.67x For anyone curious.
- Andrew_nenakhov 6y ago
  For p2 it's even worse: 18 vs 15 = 1.20x 6 vs 4 = 1.5x
ColinWright 6y ago
> Now they just drive home safely. Some of the on-track incidents yesterday (July 5th) suggest that this is not the whole story, and may not be accurate.
rurban 6y ago
Limiting on testing is just taking away the unique Ferrari advantage. Previously they just took their design out on their private racetrack next to the lab. Now they have to test as all the others: virtually in computer simulations. And for a short time on the track. It's much more interesting to do the simulations virtually. Some even do the windtunnel testing now virtually. But only the richest.
- Andrew_nenakhov 6y ago
  So how do you explain that now after each regulation change and until the next, one team wins every constructor and driver title? Previously, dominance was never that total, not even during Schumacher/Ferrari era (and Schumacher was way better driver than Hamilton). But since 2010, no competing team is able to catch up.

gripfx 6y ago

If anyone is interested, the software team I work for is hiring! F1 is definitely an interesting challenge and a unique work environment. Find out more here: https://jobs.redbull.com/at-de/bicester-scuderia-alphatauri-software-development-team-leader-128988-047824?lang=en https://jobs.redbull.com/at-de/bicester-scuderia-alphatauri-...

logicx24 6y ago
I'm probably not up for a move to the UK, but if you don't mind, could you tell us a bit more about your job? What sort of projects have you been able to work on? What's the work culture like? Do you find the actual technical problems you work on exciting, or is it more the domain that excites you (i.e. building and operating a racecar)?
- gripfx 6y ago
  Sure. The role (and myself) are in the aerodynamics department, developing and maintaining software for the aerodynamicists. The role of the aerodynamicist is to develop the bodywork of the car (wings, ducts, chassis shape etc) to improve aerodynamic efficiency. This is done primarily in computational fluid dynamics simulations [1] (virtual) and scale model testing in a wind tunnel [2] (physical) before being tested on the actual race car. My group works on the software to analyse the data output. Think data science dashboards with lots of real time and historical data. Due to our requirements, the tools are designed in house with input from users. In my time here I have worked on interfacing with the HPC cluster, improving visualisations and improving our backend stack amongst other things. For your last question, it is a bit of both. I went to university with the goal of working in F1 and the competitive aspect is definitely there but as I was not a comp sci student the technical problems are still interesting. Developing aero is very visual heavy as ideas are implemented as 3D CAD designs and often reviewed as such. So it's not just a more complicated stock ticker that needs to be shown. [1]: https://static.carthrottle.com/workspace/uploads/posts/2016/03/0b59df596795aa48e1ed670478d2b06a.jpg https://static.carthrottle.com/workspace/uploads/posts/2016/... [2]: https://images.cdn.circlesix.co/image/2/1000/425/5/uploads/posts/2019/08/462980c00e8a3c285d85b9931da87a73.png https://images.cdn.circlesix.co/image/2/1000/425/5/uploads/p...

KuiN 6y ago

Always tricky to see detail in this area of an F1 car, but the BBC really haven't picked the clearest photos ... Hopefully a bit clearer here: * Mercedes W11 cape: https://i.imgur.com/LoDuge8.jpg https://i.imgur.com/LoDuge8.jpg * Red Bull RB16: https://i.imgur.com/lJ4SrYv.jpg https://i.imgur.com/lJ4SrYv.jpg * Renault RS20: https://i.imgur.com/XJVeFwN.png https://i.imgur.com/XJVeFwN.png

KuiN 6y ago
Even harder to see the J-vanes on the Ferrari (not helped by there being only 10 photographers round the tracks at the moment, so many fewer pictures than usual) but I've found a couple photos of the SF1000's vanes: https://i.redd.it/4awyalvl1al41.jpg https://i.redd.it/4awyalvl1al41.jpg https://i.redd.it/xrhjfzmj0ql41.jpg https://i.redd.it/xrhjfzmj0ql41.jpg It'll be interesting to see if they change cape/J-vane philosophy with their much vaunted aero upgrade for Hungary in a couple of weeks. There certainly seem to be some pretty fundamental issues with their 2020 car at the moment. I'm sure their newly legal engine isn't helping them but watching some of Vettel's onboards from yesterday[0] there's clearly something aerodynamically wrong too, the car just isn't planted in any phase of cornering. [0] - https://twitter.com/deadlinex/status/1279825624719392768 https://twitter.com/deadlinex/status/1279825624719392768

obilgic 6y ago

It's only gonna get interesting when Tesla puts a fully autonomous F1 car racing against the drivers.

meditative 6y ago
automated cars would obviously eventually become faster than F1 drivers, it's just there's no interest in it (unfortunately). The biggest interest to most people are the drivers and they strongly dislike driver aids. I'd prefer every driver aid under the sun and have a real engineering battle. I'm obviously in the minority here. Formula E is under very tight budget constraints in order to lower the barrier to entry. I look forward to the day when the series is established and they can start to compete on things like motor construction and battery tech to drive the field forwards.
- BadOakOx 6y ago
  There is already an autonomous car race which they tested at Formula E events: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roborace https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roborace
- doikor 6y ago
  > drivers and they strongly dislike driver aids The racers like whatever makes them go faster. When ABS and traction control was allowed everyone was using it. It just made you faster. But the current rules ban them with the goal of trying to make the driver matter more. One of the sports all time great (Micheal Schumacher) won all of his championships with traction control most likely. The teams used their own computers in the cars then so it was basically impossible to police and thus the ban was lifted in 2002. The ban was put back in place when the onboard computer in the cars was homologated (everyone uses the same computer by McLaren)
  - obilgic 6y ago
    I think OP meant "viewers dislike"
- speedgoose 6y ago

deltron3030 6y ago

The true beauty of motorsports for me is the symbiosis of man/machine/environment interaction, the best drivers are are able to adapt their driving style to the limits of their car/setup in respect to changing weather.

rurban 6y ago

Bold move by this technician helping out their worst competitors. You normally don't do this, even if Ferrari looks really poor this year and would need some help. They are just redesigning their front, because their J-Vane is not good enough.

Ptrulli 6y ago

I see the formula one body always trying to change rules that effect car performance. The goal, more overtaking and competitive racing. My question is if they were to have more technology limitations meaning less area of improvement would that balance of 90% car 10% driver change for the better. Say 60% car and 40% driver. Wouldn't that make it more competitive?

arooaroo 6y ago
The problem is that a lot of the investment comes from the large automotive manufacturers. Despite the fans and media interest in the drivers' championship, what really counts within the sport is the constructors' championship (the two are strongly correlated, of course). What makes the sport more interesting to the fans is not necessarily what motivates teams to participate. One could argue that there are many other formula and racing formats that get that balance between the car and driver, but it's not necessarily something that gets people tuning in. People watch F1 because it's supposed to be pinnacle of automotive engineering and racing. So if I'm a team boss of one of the top 3 teams, I'm not going to be interested in artificially handicapping the sport so that the smaller teams can get in the mix. However, they've seen repeatedly that fans get bored when it's the same couple of teams who are wrangling for the podium and there's not much excitement per race. So teams at the top will begrudgingly let the regulations be altered to try and spice things up, but nothing too significant. Unfortunately it'll take a downturn in F1 rights income & viewership to make the teams think twice about how to fight this tension between the competitiveness vs status quo. But then the big teams will think, why am I investing hundreds of millions in F1 when I'm not winning when I can spend a fraction in DTM or Le Mans and start building up prestige from other events. Take the Monaco race, the quintessential F1 race. Watch the pole position lap from the driver's viewpoint and it's the up there with the most amazing 70secs you've seen in sport. However, watch the full race and it's typically a dull procession. As a fan I'd be glad to see the back of it, but sport itself love it.
- Ptrulli 6y ago
  I think you captured this perfectly with your explanation. I did not take into account the teams. I was solely concentrating from a fans perspective in error or from being a fan myself. So this delicate balance won't really change much due to the reason you outlined. I'm curious in your opinion what do you think could change that will affect the sport in a positive manner (from a fan and business perspective)?

tentboy 6y ago

Judging by yesterday’s race, the real key is just having your car finish the race (said in jest but there were nine DNFs in yesterday’s Austria Grand Prix and close to having a few more with Mercedes gearbox issues). There is a ton of cool engineering in F1. If you are bored poke around https://www.f1technical.net/ https://www.f1technical.net/

kavinskyy 6y ago

As someone who wishes to work in the field of motorsport specially Formula 1, what opportunities are present for software engineers at a junior role?

squidofbits 6y ago
Most teams have career opportunities on their websites. I suggest starting there.

ajoy 6y ago

I used to like watching it, until it became boring. The cars got wider and more sensitive to the car in front, that overtakes became rare, even with DRS (*Drag Reduction System - that allows the back wing of the car in the back to fold to reduce drag at certain points in the track, if the car is close enough to the car in front). Also, Mercedes started dominating it, to a point that the only battle in the race was in the mid-field. The winners were almost always, already decided at qualifying (unless some reliability issues happened during the race).

ksk 6y ago
TBH, I think its better now that they're trying to level the playing field. Before (circa 2006 when I used to watch every single race) it was basically whoever had more money to spend. >The winners were almost always, already decided at qualifying (unless some reliability issues happened during the race). I don't think that's fair. FWIW, in the 2019 F1 season only 8/21 races were won by the driver in pole position.
- ajoy 6y ago
  I agree. 2019 was better. But still not enough, I feel. I got tired of Mercedes winning :). Because of the COVID, they have pushed some of the needed reforms further out, which is unfortunate (like max $ spend per team, engine specs, reduced sensitivity to the car in front etc.).