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I don't see how you could convince manufacturers to spend way more money on it, especially in the early days when it's not that popular.

MonkeyMalarky 4y ago
Wouldn't the year over year advancement and chaotic competition make it a little more exciting and thus popular?
- bagels 4y ago
  Would it make it popular enough that the manufacturers would want to participate in an escalating war of money?
  - KennyBlanken 4y ago
    > escalating war of money You mean like literally any other form of automotive racing? The advantage here is that all that R&D would push for more powerful, lightweight, efficient EV powertrains instead of going into a dead, and largely "solved", problem of ICEs.
  - MonkeyMalarky 4y ago
    Then don't participate? I don't understand the crab-bucket mentality of setting limits in that context.
ggm 4y ago
Its a dichotomy: if you were allowed free-reign, you'd get innovation and arguably both sides (price and performance) as people went off-piste for parts. You'd also get loss of safety margins, and therefore increased risk and insurance costs on the organisers and teams. And in the end, it would come back to price of tech wins, once driver effects are discounted. Some cheap parts are surprisingly good. The assumption you only increase cost by mandating but automatically get "the best" might be undermined. What if there was a sudden surge of surplus high-Q magnets, and your home-made motor had significantly higher torque, for less weight, and a novel wheel mounting? Getting that kind of thing rated would be a 5+ year exercise in some cases. (I don't follow F1 in any form, but I remember a lot of nonsense around the time ground effect skirts first came on the scene, and again with winglets, and complaints about driver safety effects on speed...)
etempleton 4y ago
Yeah, the problem would be the cost. If F1 ever goes all electric you would see this. I suspect Formula E is the test bed to see how close we are getting to viability with electric cars while preserving the F1 format.
nradov 4y ago
Institute a team spending cap.
rozap 4y ago
I think there has been a lot of value in FE as a technological driver and from a PR perspective. VW/Audi/Porsche committed to it pretty early on, even after repeating forever that they weren't interested in Formula 1 (which of course changed this year...). Motorsport is a great way to attract talent and drive innovation, but has always been super risky in terms of straight money in/money out. That's why they say, "You know how to make a small fortune in motorsport? Start out with a large one".

MonkeyMalarky 4y ago

Wouldn't the year over year advancement and chaotic competition make it a little more exciting and thus popular?

bagels 4y ago
Would it make it popular enough that the manufacturers would want to participate in an escalating war of money?
- KennyBlanken 4y ago
  > escalating war of money You mean like literally any other form of automotive racing? The advantage here is that all that R&D would push for more powerful, lightweight, efficient EV powertrains instead of going into a dead, and largely "solved", problem of ICEs.
- MonkeyMalarky 4y ago
  Then don't participate? I don't understand the crab-bucket mentality of setting limits in that context.

ggm 4y ago

Its a dichotomy: if you were allowed free-reign, you'd get innovation and arguably both sides (price and performance) as people went off-piste for parts. You'd also get loss of safety margins, and therefore increased risk and insurance costs on the organisers and teams. And in the end, it would come back to price of tech wins, once driver effects are discounted. Some cheap parts are surprisingly good. The assumption you only increase cost by mandating but automatically get "the best" might be undermined. What if there was a sudden surge of surplus high-Q magnets, and your home-made motor had significantly higher torque, for less weight, and a novel wheel mounting? Getting that kind of thing rated would be a 5+ year exercise in some cases. (I don't follow F1 in any form, but I remember a lot of nonsense around the time ground effect skirts first came on the scene, and again with winglets, and complaints about driver safety effects on speed...)

etempleton 4y ago

Yeah, the problem would be the cost. If F1 ever goes all electric you would see this. I suspect Formula E is the test bed to see how close we are getting to viability with electric cars while preserving the F1 format.

nradov 4y ago

Institute a team spending cap.

rozap 4y ago

I think there has been a lot of value in FE as a technological driver and from a PR perspective. VW/Audi/Porsche committed to it pretty early on, even after repeating forever that they weren't interested in Formula 1 (which of course changed this year...). Motorsport is a great way to attract talent and drive innovation, but has always been super risky in terms of straight money in/money out. That's why they say, "You know how to make a small fortune in motorsport? Start out with a large one".