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So, fun racing/physics lessons learned here: the reason fan cars and (in general) primarily ground effect cars are banned are because of unpredictability leadin

So, fun racing/physics lessons learned here: the reason fan cars and (in general) primarily ground effect cars are banned are because of unpredictability leading to unsafe situations. In a car that uses underbody suction to create downforce, any loss of a seal suddenly reduces grip that could leave cars unable to steer, brake, etc and cause much more severe accidents than a car with over-body downforce that still has that benefit of downforce even in an accident to slow down as much as possible before impact.

ben7799 4y ago
This is mostly a bad argument. F1 rules cause all kinds of similar problems due to their arbitrary rules. It's very easy for the aerodynamic rules to result in unpredictability. The last 10 years many of the F1 cars due to the rules had catastrophic loss of downforce if they got too near other cars. The drivers had to work around this by not following too closely. F1 rules changes recently have tried to reduce these kinds of issues. But even this last season was somewhat ruined by one team figuring out to work within the current rules and not have the porpoising problems that wrecked the other teams cars because they'd lose their downforce. That made the racing less exciting. And the whole problem never had to exist if it wasn't for the rules.
- Someone 4y ago
  > The last 10 years many of the F1 cars due to the rules had catastrophic loss of downforce if they got too near other cars. But I don’t remember catastrophic loss of downforce as bad as this: https://youtu.be/e21ZjwZGjiQ https://youtu.be/e21ZjwZGjiQ
- fnimick 4y ago
  > catastrophic loss of downforce if they got too near other cars. The drivers had to work around this by not following too closely While the downforce loss was significant, it was predictable and could be easily avoided. The equivalent for ground effect, e.g. hitting a bump or curb mid-corner and lifting the skirt just far enough for the pressure seal to fail and your downforce to go from 100% to near 0% in an instant, is far more likely to lead to a catastrophic accident.

ben7799 4y ago

This is mostly a bad argument. F1 rules cause all kinds of similar problems due to their arbitrary rules. It's very easy for the aerodynamic rules to result in unpredictability. The last 10 years many of the F1 cars due to the rules had catastrophic loss of downforce if they got too near other cars. The drivers had to work around this by not following too closely. F1 rules changes recently have tried to reduce these kinds of issues. But even this last season was somewhat ruined by one team figuring out to work within the current rules and not have the porpoising problems that wrecked the other teams cars because they'd lose their downforce. That made the racing less exciting. And the whole problem never had to exist if it wasn't for the rules.

Someone 4y ago
> The last 10 years many of the F1 cars due to the rules had catastrophic loss of downforce if they got too near other cars. But I don’t remember catastrophic loss of downforce as bad as this: https://youtu.be/e21ZjwZGjiQ https://youtu.be/e21ZjwZGjiQ
fnimick 4y ago
> catastrophic loss of downforce if they got too near other cars. The drivers had to work around this by not following too closely While the downforce loss was significant, it was predictable and could be easily avoided. The equivalent for ground effect, e.g. hitting a bump or curb mid-corner and lifting the skirt just far enough for the pressure seal to fail and your downforce to go from 100% to near 0% in an instant, is far more likely to lead to a catastrophic accident.