Motorsport Off Topic Thread

JHeaton said:
When it comes to ground effects, I'd have thought that with a much, much better understanding of it these days there wouldn't be so many problems with using it. I'm no aerodynamicist though! :p
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Even with all the tech we have now, it won't save you when you've just pulled a massive amount of Gs groing round a corner and black out due to blood distribution, such is the power of ground effects :p
 
TehBluebear said:
Even with all the tech we have now, it won't save you when you've just pulled a massive amount of Gs groing round a corner and black out due to blood distribution, such is the power of ground effects :p
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:p

Surely the biggest risk with ground effect is when the effect breaks...

Even with modern understanding, it's never going to be easy to replace downforce if ground effect is lost, so how do you ensure the driver can still control the car?
 
I hear this ground effect but have no idea what it is vs. say, normal downforce.

Wikipedia started banging on with aircraft, wingspans and I nearly fell asleep. Anyone fancy giving me a simple explanation on how it works with a car?
 
Tenzo said:
I hear this ground effect but have no idea what it is vs. say, normal downforce.

Wikipedia started banging on with aircraft, wingspans and I nearly fell asleep. Anyone fancy giving me a simple explanation on how it works with a car?
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Air is fed under a car and squashed to make it move faster creating low pressure sucking the car to the ground.

Wings push the car down, ground effects sucks it down.

The diffusers and floors of modern F1 cars are designed to use ground effect principles to create down force. Its why most teams strive to get the nose as high as possible to allow as much air as they can to get under the car. However its nothing compared to the amount of ground effects being used in the (I think) 80's where cars had skirts that sealed the edge of the cars to the track.

Ground effects are affected far less by turbulence than the wing style aerodynamics we have now. But the effects of ground effect down force can be quite dramatic, hence why it was banned from F1 as cornering speeds started to get extremely high (for the time).
 
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Skeeter said:
Air is fed under a car and squashed to make it move faster creating low pressure sucking the car to the ground.

Wings push the car down, ground effects sucks it down.

The diffusers and floors of modern F1 cars are designed to use ground effect principles to create down force. Its why most teams strive to get the nose as high as possible to allow as much air as they can to get under the car. However its nothing compared to the amount of ground effects being used in the (I think) 80's where cars had skirts that sealed the edge of the cars to the track.

Ground effects are affected far less by turbulence than the wing style aerodynamics we have now. But the effects of ground effect down force can be quite dramatic, hence why it was banned from F1 as cornering speeds started to get extremely high (for the time).
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Thanks Skeeter :)
 
Panzerbjorn said:
That video you(?) posted the other day looked pretty nasty when it rode up the side of the Porsche and went flying. :p
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It was, but it was no different to Rosberg climbing over the HRT at Abu Dhabi or Hamilton going up and over Alonso at Spa. And now I think about it the Toyota crash at Le Mans this year or any one of the Audi crashes last year. If you clip any race car in the rear quarter when travelling at speed its likely to cause a big crash.

Its still a fantastic demonstration of what modern ground effects can achieve. I'm actually quite shocked (and disappointed) that it had to go to America to be allowed to race :(.
 
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JB needs to start shopping in sainsburys...

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