F1 Testing 2016: Week 2 Barcelona (1st - 4th)

this_is_gav · 3 Mar 2016 at 11:46

Skeeter said:
Surtees was struck directly on the top of his head by a wheel traveling downwards. That halo has a large enough area open above the drivers head to easily allow a wheel to stil impact the drivers head from above.

I can't say I've seen it for a while, but while the wheel may have been travelling downwards the was moving forwards at speed - it's not like he was just stationary waiting on this thing to land on his head.

DRZ · 3 Mar 2016 at 11:49

Skeeter said:
Surtees was struck directly on the top of his head by a wheel traveling downwards. That halo has a large enough area open above the drivers head to easily allow a wheel to stil impact the drivers head from above.

The halo seems designed solely to stop frontal impacts from large objects (tyres), which is a situation that we haven't see. Once again the FIA seem to be trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist, while not solving the ones that do.

Absolutely everything that has ever happened had never happened before it actually happened.

The Halo does look awful, but the point isn't necessarily to completely remove the entire spectrum of possible injury but to remove some/most of the energy from quite a lot of definitely fatal situations. An absolutely vertical impact is extremely unlikely given that the cars are generally moving forward at all times - think back to resultant vectors in GCSE maths. Even at quite a steep angle of descent it would most likely hit either the leading edge of the halo or hit the airbox. All it would need to do would be to absorb some of the energy and deflect even a little bit of the remainder to make a fatal accident survivable.

Earlier in the thread someone calculated the kinetic energy of various projectiles and said that the halo would be useless. Well, if you imagine a projectile having had 50% of the energy removed and the direction of it changed (think parrying) then you can see how while the structure itself might not stand up to the impact the design goal has been satisfied if the occupants injuries are non-fatal. Massa's injury was very bad but not fatal. It would absolutely definitely have been fatal had he not been wearing a helmet. This doesn't make helmets useless!

smr · 3 Mar 2016 at 11:59

Skeeter said:
Surtees was struck directly on the top of his head by a wheel traveling downwards. That halo has a large enough area open above the drivers head to easily allow a wheel to stil impact the drivers head from above.

The halo seems designed solely to stop frontal impacts from large objects (tyres), which is a situation that we haven't see. Once again the FIA seem to be trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist, while not solving the ones that do.

To be fair I think the Halo was actually developed by Mercedes in co-operation with the FIA, so I don't think it was solely the FIA's design, if anything it's most likely Merc's "solution".

Syla5 · 3 Mar 2016 at 12:02

I personally don't like the look of the halo at all, it looks out of place, and takes aware from the fact that this is open wheel racing.

However the halo's specific design is to prevent/mitigate as much of the damage that accidents such as Bianchi and Surtees and Wilson. Dissipation of energy can have a huge impact on the severity of the final impact with the driver. They say the Halo is 10kg and would have been sufficient to significantly reduce the loads suffered in Bianchi's accident.

All of the people in here saying it would do nothing, would probably have doubted carbon fibre monoques until they were proven.

gord · 3 Mar 2016 at 12:07

Skeeter said:
Surtees was struck directly on the top of his head by a wheel traveling downwards. That halo has a large enough area open above the drivers head to easily allow a wheel to stil impact the drivers head from above.

Surtees' car was moving at 160kph when the wheel struck. That's 44 m/s. With the halo installed the uncovered area above the driver appears to be about 1m, giving a window of 0.02s for the wheel to drop behind the halo at that speed.

The wheel had only just come off the apex of a bounce when it struck him so let's generously say half a second of downward motion. Assuming it is timed perfectly that gives the wheel a rough total of 5cm downward movement before it reaches the drivers helmet. That's just enough to skim the top. It certainly still could injure the driver but look at the probabilities for it to miss the initial structure and drop in..

Lopéz · 3 Mar 2016 at 12:36

deuse said:
I doubt that halo could withstand a small sledge hammer swung by a person.

Why do you think that?

El_Watcher · 3 Mar 2016 at 12:36

Although not an FIA series, a halo could have saved Justin Wilson when he was struck last year.

One question I would have is how does the halo deform on impact?
If say a tyre were to hit the halo straight on, would it shatter in to a million pieces like everything else on the car?
Or would it bend inwards, therefore causing a possible impact hazard with the helmet if a subsequent sudden deceleration occurred (car gets hit, driver loses control, car hits barrier)?

Blackvault · 3 Mar 2016 at 12:44

Racecar Engineering article on the topic of Halos

Kris_90 · 3 Mar 2016 at 13:00

I don't like the look of the halo. It doesn't look too bad from the side but the front-on picture I've seen makes the car look horrible.

Skeeter · 3 Mar 2016 at 13:21

El_Watcher said:
Although not an FIA series, a halo could have saved Justin Wilson when he was struck last year.

One question I would have is how does the halo deform on impact?
If say a tyre were to hit the halo straight on, would it shatter in to a million pieces like everything else on the car?
Or would it bend inwards, therefore causing a possible impact hazard with the helmet if a subsequent sudden deceleration occurred (car gets hit, driver loses control, car hits barrier)?

Thats a good point. What is the halo made from?

Blackvault · 3 Mar 2016 at 13:24

Skeeter said:
Thats a good point. What is the halo made from?

I assume Titanium

Nismo · 3 Mar 2016 at 14:08

If that is the Halo solution realised, then pass.

What bothers me more is that Ferrari bothered to put a sponsor on it

Here;s the view of Nico Rosberg on the new halo concept with the Mercedes driver saying "it’s a massive step in safety because most of the fatalities we’ve had in motor-racing this would have saved the vast majority"

Would it?

Senna? No
Ratzenburger? No
Surtees? Probably not
Bianchi? No
Di Vilotta's initial testing accident which eventually led to death? Maybe
Dan Wheldon? Maybe
Justin Wilson? Probably yes

Syla5 · 3 Mar 2016 at 14:17

Nismo said:
If that is the Halo solution realised, then pass.

What bothers me more is that Ferrari bothered to put a sponsor on it

Would it?

Senna? Yes
Ratzenburger? Yes
Surtees? Yes
Bianchi? Probably
Di Vilotta's initial testing accident which eventually led to death? Yes
Dan Wheldon? Maybe
Justin Wilson? Yes

Fixed

Glaucus · 3 Mar 2016 at 14:29

Looks terrible and far less safe than fighter style cockpits.

If we want protection, fighter style cockpits all day long.

Greboth · 3 Mar 2016 at 14:35

I don't understand this idea that it wouldn't be strong enough to survive impacts. Firstly, it would pointless to consider such a design if it isn't strong enough to deflect large objects such a wheels. Secondly, look how strong other parts of an F1 car are and the impacts that they take. Yes the crash structure of the car is a lot bigger than the halo but then the crash structure decellerates a whole car which weights a lot more than a stray wheel that the halo would have to cope with.

Edit: I do agree it is fugly though but if it looks like it would protect drivers from some impacts so as fugly as it is then I am for it.

deuse · 3 Mar 2016 at 14:52

Lopéz said:
Why do you think that?

2,046 joules = 1,509052157421 pound-force foot. That's a BIG foot it's go to withstand

Flibster · 3 Mar 2016 at 14:54

You can't say a HALO would have helped with Senna and Ratzenberger. The cars themselves are too different.

Would Senna and Ratzenberger have survived identical accidents in a 2015 car and safety systems? Most likely.

Wheel tethers for Senna and the HANS system for Ratzenberger.

Flibster · 3 Mar 2016 at 15:05

Oh, and it appears that the F in F1 now stands for FlipFlop.

It's truly hideous. One of the worst things to ever appear on an F1 car, and I'm including the rabbit ears on the Honda Ra108, the 2012 low noses, the Eifelland type 21 mirror and intake, Arrows A22 nose wing, the Tyrrell 025 x-wing, the March 751's rear wing, Williams FW26 walrus nose, AND Katie Price in that list.

Syla5 · 3 Mar 2016 at 15:16

Flibster said:
You can't say a HALO would have helped with Senna and Ratzenberger. The cars themselves are too different.

Would Senna and Ratzenberger have survived identical accidents in a 2015 car and safety systems? Most likely.

Wheel tethers for Senna and the HANS system for Ratzenberger.

I agree that Ratzenberger would have benefitted more from HANS, but a halo would have deflected the tire that struck Senna on the head.

Greboth · 3 Mar 2016 at 15:29

deuse said:
2,046 joules = 1,509052157421 pound-force foot. That's a BIG foot it's go to withstand

Thanks for just giving a number and in no way explaining how or why you think the halo would not be able to withstand such an impact :rolleyes:

To put that in comparision though, quick google suggestions the nose cone crash test is done at 54km/h (15m/s) which equals 78,750 joules.

The nose cone disintegrates on impact which disapates energry and the nose cone is larger than the halo etc. which all is going to change the outcome of an accident but simply quoting figures is pointless. The whole point of the halo is to protect the driver in impacts so it is going to be subject to tests to ensure it can survive, or at least disapate energy, in expected impacts.