Suspended
fruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm ... that sound 
2005/2006 F1 News and Testing.
- Thread starter Flibster
- Start date
Zip said:How did u get a job like that!?!?!
I would kill to be able to have had your job.
Whats wrong with having the GP at Monaco? Have you already posted why but im just going to need to read it and find it my self?
Left uni and Went to an agency to try and get some temp work - only did 2 years on a 6/7 year course in Aerospace systems engineering.
2 days later got a phonecall.
Can you read technical drawings?
Yup.
Can you use micrometers and vernier and things like that?
Yup.
Interested in motorsport?
Yup.
Can you travel 30 miles to this job?
Yup.
Fancy an interview?
Yup
Had an interview on a monday - started the next monday.
Started in quality control until we went to the local track and were given the keys to a Lotus Elise...and after around 5 laps clocked a time only half a second slower than the in house test drivers.
Was then moved into 'special projects' which dealt with the more specalised areas of motorsport *F1 and GT cars mainly* and the internal vehicle dynamics team. In other words - test driving.
Spent 2 years driving and travelling around with the race teams.
Monaco is a crap place for a Grand Prix becuase...it's too bloody small! Track doesn't allow overtaking - facilities are terrible compare to other circuits *ie...Silverstone and Spa...*
1 car one side of the pit lane - the 2nd car the other side of the pit lane and the spare car is a couple of hundred meters away...
It's cramped, generally unplesent and we had to drive there as it was a European race.
18 hour drive...Worst bit - wasn't allowed to chat up any of the totty.
Shame - there was some fantastic legs there.Simon/~Flibster
Soldato
Zip said:I dont quite know why that would be a bad sound. It might be horrible to some but i like it
??
Who said it was horrible??
Flibster said:Left uni and Went to an agency to try and get some temp work - only did 2 years on a 6/7 year course in Aerospace systems engineering.
2 days later got a phonecall.
Can you read technical drawings?
Yup.
Can you use micrometers and vernier and things like that?
Yup.
Interested in motorsport?
Yup.
Can you travel 30 miles to this job?
Yup.
Fancy an interview?
Yup
Had an interview on a monday - started the next monday.
Started in quality control until we went to the local track and were given the keys to a Lotus Elise...and after around 5 laps clocked a time only half a second slower than the in house test drivers.
Was then moved into 'special projects' which dealt with the more specalised areas of motorsport *F1 and GT cars mainly* and the internal vehicle dynamics team. In other words - test driving.
Spent 2 years driving and travelling around with the race teams.
Monaco is a crap place for a Grand Prix becuase...it's too bloody small! Track doesn't allow overtaking - facilities are terrible compare to other circuits *ie...Silverstone and Spa...*
1 car one side of the pit lane - the 2nd car the other side of the pit lane and the spare car is a couple of hundred meters away...
It's cramped, generally unplesent and we had to drive there as it was a European race.
Worst bit - wasn't allowed to chat up any of the totty. Shame - there was some fantastic legs there.
Simon/~Flibster
You lucky git
Thanks for clearing up the monoco thing
One more question. How do u become an in house test driver for car componys?
Soldato
Zip said:You lucky git
yep! that an all!
Zip said:You lucky git
Thanks for clearing up the monoco thing
One more question. How do u become an in house test driver for car componys?
Wasn't a car company - we built very few full cars *Mainly race cars like the Lola B2K/40 LMP675 car - which won it's class at Le Mans on it's first time out.
*We specalised in taking other companies cars and getting them to drive properly by setting the suspension up properly. We dealt with some serious sports car companies - We did a lot of work with Lotus in particular developing the Lotus Motorsport Elise and Exige as well as other companies.
As for becoming a test driver - the easiest way is to be very good at driving fast, driving consistantly and at driving on the limit *and frequently beyond* and to have no fear of personal injury or death.
Hitting concrete at 160mph is not a nice experience - can't remember the impact myself - I remember the surgery afterwards.
Simon/~Flibster
Flibster.. got a thread for you to participate in..
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=6464775&posted=1#post6464775
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=6464775&posted=1#post6464775
Soldato
Flibster said:Wasn't a car company - we built very few full cars *Mainly race cars like the Lola B2K/40 LMP675 car - which won it's class at Le Mans on it's first time out.
We specalised in taking other companies cars and getting them to drive properly by setting the suspension up properly. We dealt with some serious sports car companies - We did a lot of work with Lotus in particular developing the Lotus Motorsport Elise and Exige as well as other companies.
As for becoming a test driver - the easiest way is to be very good at driving fast, driving consistantly and at driving on the limit *and frequently beyond* and to have no fear of personal injury or death.
Hitting concrete at 160mph is not a nice experience - can't remember the impact myself - I remember the surgery afterwards.
Simon/~Flibster
Simon, You might have to do a photo thread about all this........ please
did I say please?
Flibster said:
Ok i lied, maybe there were more questions to be asked
How would you go about showing a compony that you as u put it very good at driving fast, driving consistantly and at driving on the limit *and frequently beyond* and to have no fear of personal injury or death.(Saves me of rewording it all
) Would they discover you at track days and at things like that?ashtray_head said:Simon, You might have to do a photo thread about all this........ please
did I say please?
Would do - but as I was driving and most of the stuff we were working was pre-release or confidential camera's were pretty much banned from everywhere.
However.... http://www.flibster.com/F1/damper/ contains a few images of some of the kit I managed to 'borrow' Thats a 2002 spec rear F1 damper from the Arrows team. It wasn't the most advanced stuff we used either.
Will get one labelled up with the materials used soon
Zip said:Ok i lied, maybe there were more questions to be asked
How would you go about showing a compony that you as u put it very good at driving fast, driving consistantly and at driving on the limit *and frequently beyond* and to have no fear of personal injury or death.(Saves me of rewording it all
I got lucky - we went for a day at our local track as a party as it was the companies birthday. 10 Lotus Elises, 2 pre-release Exige's, couple of Ferrari's *both the bosses* and a TVR *which broke down - shock horror...* and the keys were freely distributed.
Times were only taken as the kit was available and it seemd like a bit of friendly rivalry at the time.
How other drivers got the job - pass. Apart from Franchesco - he worked with Franco for years in various companies and was a nutter. Akiko was the same - except he was a bike nutter.
Simon/~Flibster
Zip said:You did get very lucky. Im jelous
When u said "How other drivers got the job - pass." Does that mean you dont really know or did they pass a test.
that was the last question, sorry for hyjacking the thread
Honestly don't know how they got the job tbh.
Generally there was 2 of us at a track with 1 or 2 cars though. In exceptional circumstances there could be all 6 of us in the same place though - that was leading up to Le Mans though where we did 48 hours of straight testing on the car.
We'd generally work on 1 car each - unless one got damaged *read - totalled* then we'd share the workload if we could. usually they'd be cars that could put in similar laptimes so we wouldn't get in the way of each other.
Some of the stuff we couldn't - Single seaters primarially as there would be too many adjustments to share the car - so then the one who was free would go back to the truck or the factory - get a massage and spend some time in the gym - then go do some other work - generally read reports, writing reports, visiting the teams, building dampers for events - that kind of stuff.
Simon/~Flibster
Soldato
Hey peeps, enough off-topic chatter, this is a F1 news thread
25 days to go
25 days to go
Soldato
Flibster said:
its the wabbit!
Soldato
Dutch Guy said:Hey peeps, enough off-topic chatter, this is a F1 news thread
25 days to go
Is that all there is now!!
dont wanna wish me life away but woohoo!!!