He was just frustrated, in the heat of the moment...that's all. In the cold light of day, if you were to ask him about Petrov today, he would probably agree that Petrov did nothing wrong.
F1 Testing week 2 @ Jerez
- Thread starter Duke
- Start date
He was just frustrated, in the heat of the moment...that's all. In the cold light of day, if you were to ask him about Petrov today, he would probably agree that Petrov did nothing wrong.
Man of Honour
The reintroduction of ground effects is pretty radical.
Man of Honour
It's about as radical as you can get without doing something like banning all wings or chopping a wheel off the car.
But given your lack of knowledge with regards to all things F1 prior to approximately 1991 I wouldn't expect you to realise that.
Well, I like to think that Mansell had bundles of natural talent. But I am an uber Mansell fan so I can't speak objectively about him.
Very true (though possibly not quite as much as Senna), although Mansell was a little unlucky with car reliability
Didnt Nige lose two or three champs at the last race due to reliability?
Agreed again - I just dont like the Alonso charachter one bit
It could be a language thing of course, but Alonso has always appeared a lot more arrogant than Hamilton to me
Yeah it was Arrows - what a dog of a car that was (apart from around Hungary, where he dominated until the last two laps)
Thanks for that link really interesting. Yeah I had forgotten about Frenzen coming in for '97 , Williams really ****** that one up but hey ho. Still think DH was probably one of the best car developers on the pitlane at the time (remember he developed for Williams from '92 onwards - so 5 years worth of Willams titles / cars have a lot to do with DH's work)
I actually remember thinking back in 1992/93 that Williams really did have the dream team.
They had an uber fast driver who was at the peak of his powers (in Mansell).
They had one of the best No.2 drivers in F1 (in Patrese).
They had one of the best car designers in F1 (in Newey).
They had one of the best test drivers in F1 (in Hill).
Is it any wonder that at times in 1992, the Williams car was as much 3s/lap faster than the next non-Williams car? (Silverstone qualifying, 1992) In 1992/3 Williams really were untouchable and had everything going for them.
In hindsight, perhaps they should've worked on building an global brand, much like what McLaren did (with a little help from Mercedes). This could well have helped them attain more lucrative sponsorship deals, even when they didnt necessarily have the fastest car on the track...
Totally agree
Admittedly the teams and drivers nowadays are talking much larger sums than in the early 90's (ie late 90's - mid naughties were the boom years for driver/car advertising)
Never really thought that much of Patrese - wasnt he like the Heidfeld of his day (just in a better car)?
The sums probably werent that far behind the EPL sponsorship deals (this week there are reports that Man Utd are getting close to earning £100m per season just from marketing deals)
Obscene money (not unlike the huge sums Ferrari were getting during the Schumi years - some of which went to pay his enourmous salary)
With the budget cuts the marketing deals probably have come down since also (at a guess - although there seems to be less written these days than in the past about how much space on cars goes for)
Admittedly the teams and drivers nowadays are talking much larger sums than in the early 90's (ie late 90's - mid naughties were the boom years for driver/car advertising)
Never really thought that much of Patrese - wasnt he like the Heidfeld of his day (just in a better car)?
The sums probably werent that far behind the EPL sponsorship deals (this week there are reports that Man Utd are getting close to earning £100m per season just from marketing deals)
Obscene money (not unlike the huge sums Ferrari were getting during the Schumi years - some of which went to pay his enourmous salary)
With the budget cuts the marketing deals probably have come down since also (at a guess - although there seems to be less written these days than in the past about how much space on cars goes for)
Plus one!
The banning of it was one the major factors for why F1 cars had a problem following the car in front's turbulent air for the last 20 years.
Soldato
wasn't that because of the active suspension which was subsequently banned?
Incidentally I saw Mansell win at Silverstone in that car (I think) and it was extremely dull, DH started at the back in a Brabam.
Williams liked his independence and racing too much to become all corporate.
Soldato
DH only got near winning in Hungary because the Bridgestone tyre suited the track best.
DH was fast but also a bit rash at a couple of key moments.
He also had Dick Dasterdly against him.
I remember Mansell once losing a wheel nut while leading and once coming out of the pit box on three wheels.
Of course we all remember that puncture.
He once effectively lost the championship in Japan after doing his back in by landing on a kerb.
Actually, while I'm on, I was at silverstone one year when he drove that Ferrari screamer and retired in a huff when his gear box kept going wrong. Now those cars really were loud and fast around stowe with no vale. (I think)
Soldato
yes I know, but I've watched F1 avidly since about 1978 and I can't remember overtaking ever being that common place.
At the end of the day, if you have drivers and cars that are evenly matched they will find it difficult to overtake, if they are not evenly matched, one will drive of into the distance.
I was always facinated by the different ways F1 engineers found to make their cars go faster, and that is still the case today as demonstrated at Jerez.
Associate
Yeah, your probably right. I may just be looking for reasons not to like him. He can drive, but as posted above I'm not keen on his attitude. More his perceived attitude. Unless you hang around them you'll never know what they are like.
Being in a location that doesn't care much for F1 makes this double tough. At least now the internet makes it better. Back in the mid 80s I was lucky to catch brief glimpses of F1 on Wide World of Sports. They'd show like 3 laps and then move to something better...like water skiing or such.
Associate
- Joined
- 10 Sep 2008
- Posts
- 1,646
Isn't this just about the only thing a team can do to improve performance, I remember in years gone by the engine manufacturers improving the engine as the season went on, tire makers making better compounds etc... But now engines are locked down and its a single tire supplier, aero is all you can do and If you can't make yours better the next best think is to make the car followings worse.
Soldato
basically yes, and anything that is new and good like Fducts, double defusers etc are banned.
mechanically they cant really do anything. They are limited to 7 gears, limited to 2.4litre V8s, they are limited on kers power, they are fixed on EVERYTHING basically. Aero is the only area they seem to be able to tweak.
The old days of V8s, vs V10s, vs V12s are long gone
Soldato
With my engineering head on, and something I keep bringing up, but I can't see why they don't just bring in a simple rule that states a profile for the maximum downforce at any given speed with the amount of 'spoilt' air also specified a certain distance behind..
Just sticking an F1 car on scales in a wind tunnel would be the easy measure of downforce, and measuring wind speed in a square so many metres behind used for the 'spoilt' air test..
I know it's not that simple, but I can't see any issues that can't be worked around.. you could have a portable wind tunnel (lorry sized) at each track to profile the cars whilst in park ferme etc, or any number of feasible methods for checking..
They then just relax the regulations elsewhere. To me, the fundamental issue is that the main area of performance gain is in the Aero department, the very thing that also ruins overtaking..
Just sticking an F1 car on scales in a wind tunnel would be the easy measure of downforce, and measuring wind speed in a square so many metres behind used for the 'spoilt' air test..
I know it's not that simple, but I can't see any issues that can't be worked around.. you could have a portable wind tunnel (lorry sized) at each track to profile the cars whilst in park ferme etc, or any number of feasible methods for checking..
They then just relax the regulations elsewhere. To me, the fundamental issue is that the main area of performance gain is in the Aero department, the very thing that also ruins overtaking..
Last edited:
Associate
To test the full scale car without significant blockage and tunnel wall effects, you would need a tunnel similar in size to a passenger jet, and it would cost a fortune to operate and transport.
AFAIK most of the F1 wind tunnel testing (and CFD, for correlation) is done on half and quarter scale models depending on what is being studied.
Measuring the car's wake to a standard would be a pointless exercise.
If a tunnel large enough was available, and you measured a velocity profile across the wake of the car (various methods to do this but none are particularly quick or easy to conduct given the complexity of the flow), it would have to assume a steady state scenario, and you would have to average this as the turbulent flow in the wake will be chaotic.
Once you consider the real world effects of the wake varying with varying speed; movable control surfaces; cornering; weather; landscape; track geometry; track surfaces; the track side items (trees, adverts, barriers, grandstands etc); atmospheric turbulence and other cars etc just makes it impossible for any useful quantity to be measured. Each team's cars would almost certainly have a different wake to every other once in racing conditions.
Nice idea, but impossible to do with any real effect.
I think you've nailed it in one sentence. Basically unless prohibited, designers will want to come up with ways to not only make their car quicker, but also to disrupt the air flow of the car behind, as much as possible.
What Ron Denis said is that Alonso is an introvert and is an extremely private person. He keeps himself to himself and doesn't like to let people into his private life.