6 ms·
2014 F1 explained: What is brake by wire?
- jokoon 13y agoI really wonder how this works. Is this some generator held by the rear brakes ? How do they enable/disable this generating system when braking to go back to normal braking ? And why the hell did they set a maximum amount of recoverable energy ? Seems like a additional, unnecessary puzzle that seems to make things harder for pilots...
- k-mcgrady 13y ago>> "And why the hell did they set a maximum amount of recoverable energy" One reason is that the energy is used for KERS, a boost system (press a button for increased speed). Each driver is limited to a certain amount of this boost per lap. It's also possibly for safety reasons. Before a car pits or anyone can safely touch it all recovered energy must be discharged. If the car is in an accident and this isn't possible the less energy stored in the car the better.
- DVassallo 13y agoNote that the "boost button" disappeared in 2014 [1]. (K)ERS usage is not controlled by the driver anymore [2]: [1] http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/formula1/25158104 http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/formula1/25158104 [2] http://www.formula1.com/inside_f1/understanding_the_sport/8763.html http://www.formula1.com/inside_f1/understanding_the_sport/87...
- 7431 13y agoThere is no button this year. Also, batteries are heavy , where should they store all that energy if they recover all the time ?
- baddox 13y agoYeah, the Energy Recover System is essentially an electric generator hooked to a battery. It also functions as the electric motor to put the energy from the battery back into the rear wheels, for a small burst of speed allowed every lap. I can't find a source for how it is physically hooked up to the rear wheels, but I would guess that it's simply a clutch.
- philjohn 13y agoLast year it was a feed off the gearbox IIRC.
- leoc 13y agoI tentatively assume that allowing the cars to recover an unlimited amount of energy from rear braking would make turning too easy and/or speeds too high. The rules of F1 are mainly designed to prevent those two things.
- baq 13y agoi'd wager it's 100% a cost issue, the same reason that engines are 1.6 l, ECU is standard, etc.
- mwg66 13y agoIt is categorically not a cost issue. The new 1.6l V6 are more expensive than the previous generation of 2.4l V8's (which were homologated for 10 years). Formula 1 is a sport as well as a technology industry and the regulations are constructed for many different reasons - competitiveness, safety, cost, feasability etc.
- mwg66 13y agoFYI, the 1.6l (turbo) engine was introduced to increase relevance to road cars, not to reduce costs.
- robryan 13y agoI think it has a lot to do with the battery size. Last year there was I think 6 seconds of boost per lap allowed. Now it is something like 30-40 but they did need a bigger battery to support that.
- splitbrain 13y agoHmm, why not simply always use the recovery system but just not store the energy in the battery if it's full already (or capacity reached or whatever)?
- baq 13y agowhere do you suggest this energy should go? it's not like there's room for a bird burner on an f1 car.
- robmcm 13y agoWhy not power up some tesla coil on the rear of the car that produces cool electric arcs all over the track. Lets face it, some of the coolest parts of high power cars are dispersed excess energy, glowing brake discs or flaming exhausts and of course screaming engines.
- baq 13y agoyeah, that's the point. the brakes are smoking hot, so if you suddenly start to collect that energy it needs to go somewhere.
- masklinn 13y agoI think you missed the question/point: traditional brakes work by converting kinetic energy to thermal energy and dissipating it. The ERS base is to convert it to electric and store that. ERS obviously can't store things when the battery is full, but if the issue here is the transition between ERS and traditional why not have ERS bypass the battery when it's full and dump energy in a radiator, ending up with the same result as traditional brakes (kinetic -> thermal) without having to switch braking system in the midst of braking?
- rplnt 13y agoI think you missed the first answer. There is no place for it. It's big, heavy and needs to be exposed.
- 7schlaefer 13y agoRougly speaking, an electric motor acts as a generator when you turn it.
- furyg3 13y agoI'm envisioning a lightning rod at various stages along the track to discharge the extra energy... :)
- Theodores 13y agoI think it is shocking that after a century of motoring this idea of energy recovery from the brakes is 'new fangled'. It should have been made mandatory back in '73. Even if lithium batteries weren't available then every car has a battery, usually of the lead acid variety, plus there are things like flywheels that can store potential energy.
- DVassallo 13y agoFormula 1 is a sport. The game is about building the most performant machine within the constraints of the rules. There is a ton of technology that is prohibited in F1 (traction control, automatic gear shifting, ABS, etc) that has been part of road cars for decades. Rule changes tend to relax the constraints from time to time for some specific reason: such as better safety, better spectacle, or cost reduction. KERS (with its driver-controlled boost button) was introduced in 2009 mostly as an attempt to facilitate overtaking, since car aerodynamics had become so sophisticated that a car following another one would get a significant drop in downforce due to the turbulence of the car in front. On the other hand, the 2014 rules appear to have been enacted mostly to help teams lower their running costs.
- makmanalp 13y agoI think it's time we have an F1 alternative with only unmanned cars where we aren't concerned by passenger safety and can focus on pure speed.
- DVassallo 13y agoThe competition between drivers is what makes me wake up at 4:45AM every two Sundays to watch the events live. If I were interested in experiments about mechanical speed, I would just read research papers.
- ableal 13y agoThat's an intriguing thought, but I fear it would soon devolve into guided missiles ...
- yason 13y agoWith the endless and quite arbitrary rules and limitations they impose on the F1 cars each year I sometimes wonder what would happen if they hadn't done that. What would the teams have built if it weren't for the weigh, power, and technology limitations shaping the development? I see an analogy to evolution versus controlled genetic reproduction: what would the F1 cars look like and how would they behave if the only thing that mattered was being the fastest and winning races?
- fatrachet 13y agoRed Bull made a very interesting concept car a few years ago along that line of thought. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Bull_X2010 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Bull_X2010
- mwg66 13y agoIt would be difficult to ensure the safety of participants and spectators if there was entirely free regulations. Don't underestimate quite how fast a Formula 1 car is now, even within the current regulations. Formula 1 has made significant contributions to the safety of motorsports over the last two decades and much of this is due to the continual improvement and unequivocal dedication to preventing accidents. If you've never seen Kubica's accident from 2007 in Canada, it's amongst the best demonstrations of how safety has advanced in F1 (note Kubica was released from hospital the next day, unhurt). (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eP1_POQPJVw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eP1_POQPJVw)
- DVassallo 13y agoAgreed. Kubica hit that concrete barrier at 300KM/h at a 75 degree angle, and was subject to a peak g-force of 75G. He emerged with just a light concussion and a sprained ankle. [1] At the time, I wasn't even aware that humans could survive peak G's that high. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kubica#2007 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kubica#2007
- DVassallo 13y agoOne team would very likey dominate, and then all the other teams would quit. After all, these teams are backed by shareholders which continuously question the ROI of participating in the sport.
- ggreer 13y agoI'm amused that F1 cars now have a computer mimic manual brakes. It seems schizophrenic to allow advanced technology such as kinetic energy recovery, but ban traction control, active aerodynamics, anti-lock brakes, and dozens of other technologies that are in consumer vehicles. The excuse I typically hear is that these restrictions make races depend more on driver skill instead of team budgets. Do people not realize that the teams with the biggest budgets are the ones who can afford the most talented drivers? And it shows: The teams with the most money are the ones that consistently win. I think F1 would be much more exciting if they tweaked the aerodynamics and vehicle size to allow more passing. If race excitement can be boiled down to one metric, it's passing. If you've seen a MotoGP race, you'll probably concur.
- mwg66 13y agoLife is often not quite as simple as that! There are various other reasons for why it is easier to overtake on a motorbike in MotoGP compared to F1. There has been many introductions to ease overtaking in F1 recently - DRS, KERs (now ERS), tyre compounds etc. There is even a working group within the FIA dedicated to exactly this, one of it's most famous studies is the CDG wing (see http://www.f1technical.net/articles/4577 http://www.f1technical.net/articles/4577) - which ultimately was not adopted.
- Theodores 13y agoThanks for the link on the CDG wing - I did not know that. Any ideas why it was not given a go? It seems vastly more in the spirit of racing than the 'push to pass' DRS that has not been exactly popular with the dedicated fan. I don't think the Pirelli tyres have been that popular with fans either. The CDG wing appears a lot more true to the spirit of what racing is about.
- mwg66 13y agoI think it was ultimately concluded that it wouldn't work in practice as well as the preliminary CFD results suggested. It was an interesting study none the less.
- deleted 13y ago