Safety of car recovery (and trucks on circuits)

[Lycoming]

I can give you a good solution to aquaplaning.

Slow down.

[SweetApex]

It's simple, it doesn't matter when yellow flags are out or if a safety car is present, marshals and tractors should not be present when cars on the track at pit-lane speed or obviously racing speed.

If a brake failure occurs during a safety car period and there is no response from driver input of the brake pedal. They will go straight off into a section containing marshals and tractors. Even at 50km/h that is still a significant crash.

Under double waved yellow situations (wet/dry) if a wheel falls off or a car spins off the track it doesn't matter how safe you are, things happen.

Now I have just outlined the simple problem here. It's up to a team of investigators allocated by the FIA to come up with a solution to this problem. It's not easy, but as long as it's safe that's all that matters. One life lost is one too many.

[Lycoming]

By that logic, any time a car needs to be removed from the track you would have to red flag the race.

[Moose]

By that logic, any time a car needs to be removed from the track you would have to red flag the race.

To be fair, in lower racing series (I'm thinking karting), the response to marshals on track is to have all cars immediately stop in their current place. That doesn't work for F1 because of the cooling requirements, but I wonder if it could work given enough notice for the engineers.

[Richard]

The main reasons to avoid porous asphalt use are, as mentioned:

• Statu quo
• Economic factors.

Economic factors will be a major factor for existing pavement, but a lot of circuits have laid new paving over run off areas recently. New circuits have also been built as well in Austin and Sochi. So people do put down new paving when the need/have to. I think the dominant issue in F1 is "doh, that never occurred to us".

The irony is that the most recent green field circuit when anything was possible was built in the country that uses porous asphalt for its tracks. Admittedly there's not much rain in Texas so the odds of aquaplaning aren't too high on the list.

[autogyro]

By that logic, any time a car needs to be removed from the track you would have to red flag the race.

To be fair, in lower racing series (I'm thinking karting), the response to marshals on track is to have all cars immediately stop in their current place. That doesn't work for F1 because of the cooling requirements, but I wonder if it could work given enough notice for the engineers.

It definitely would work if the power train was designed to include that requirement.
The power train I have available would include a full engine stop with no problem for a re-start.

http://www.f1technical.net/forum/viewto ... ansmission

[Andres125sx]

Andres - I give up.

[...]

So you two basically say that Alex Wurz and Pedro De la Rosa statements about bumps increasing year by year on braking zones are just a product of their imagination

And that is because you don´t know any technical explanation for that to happen... so it must be imposible even if two experienced F1 drivers have stated, one on spanish tv and the second on english tv, that braking bumps are a reality on racing tracks


Ok, this is my last contribution to this discussion

It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong.

Probably my fail as I can´t explain it properly, even when my example of a gravel road resisting a truck but not a hard braking from a bike or a car was very enlightening I think, but it´s been enough for me

Have a good day

[Richard]

So you two basically say that Alex Wurz and Pedro De la Rosa statements about bumps increasing year by year on braking zones are just a product of their imagination.

I'm sure Alex and Pedro are correct in saying that the asphalt design/construction/maintenance at that point needs to be improved.

[Miguel]

It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong.

Probably my fail as I can´t explain it properly, even when my example of a gravel road resisting a truck but not a hard braking from a bike or a car was very enlightening I think, but it´s been enough for me

Have a good day

As if experiments never got it wrong... I've got papers discussing that sort of thing. Eventually, when samples and techniques are pushed to the extreme, the risk of contamination, or misinterpretation or misunderstanding increases. And to put an example:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/319/5869/1506

That paper is wrong. And yet, their measurements are probably right.

[langwadt]

It's simple, it doesn't matter when yellow flags are out or if a safety car is present, marshals and tractors should not be present when cars on the track at pit-lane speed or obviously racing speed.

If a brake failure occurs during a safety car period and there is no response from driver input of the brake pedal. They will go straight off into a section containing marshals and tractors. Even at 50km/h that is still a significant crash.

Under double waved yellow situations (wet/dry) if a wheel falls off or a car spins off the track it doesn't matter how safe you are, things happen.

Now I have just outlined the simple problem here. It's up to a team of investigators allocated by the FIA to come up with a solution to this problem. It's not easy, but as long as it's safe that's all that matters. One life lost is one too many.

you can't be serious, of course the worlds best drivers in some of the most extremely cars can drive at pitlane speed when there is people or equipment on the track. If they couldn't how could they ever pit where there is hundreds of people?

Everyday trafic is worse than that

[Richard]

Great minds think alike:

One of the most important things to learn here is that it is probably better to take the decision to slow down away from the drivers, to have a system where it is clearer to everyone how much we think drivers should slow down.

We have a meeting with the teams on Saturday to discuss a way of imposing a speed limit. It would have the same effect as a safety car because if you slowed everyone down to the same pace they would hold position.

Whiting said the FIA would also consider putting 'skirts' around recovery vehicles to ensure it was impossible for cars to go beneath them.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/29573232

[Ciro Pabón]

So you two basically say that Alex Wurz and Pedro De la Rosa statements about bumps increasing year by year on braking zones are just a product of their imagination

And that is because you don´t know any technical explanation for that to happen...

The fact that De La Rosa and Wurz complain about bumps in braking zones doesn't mean they are caused by braking, even if they say so. They're drivers, not pavement builders.

I remember TC2000 pilots complaining HARD about bumps in ONE curve in Autodrómo de Rosario. Although the work lasted six months, back in 2003, ALL meetings with pilots were about those darn 200 meters of pavement.

What happened there is simple: bump problems are exacerbated in the entrance to a curve.

The solution we found at Rosario was better drainage (and it took a lot of time to understand what was happening, the infiltration of water was not evident).

I hate viscerally the entrance to this curve, towards the bottom right.
It is horrible to have great drivers, people you admire, complaining about how stupid YOU are because you cannot provide a decent asphalt surface...


Bumps usually become worse because of poor drainage, but there is the possibility of poor construction, that is, poor binding between asphalt and base.

That's a construction defect, not a problem inherent to porous asphalt.

Actually, porous asphalt, with a reduced amount of asphalt and a larger amount of rocks is better to support loads, that's why it's used in base courses.

The top layer is usually less porous because of durability issues. The less water that enters the top layer, the longer the layer will last.

However, having a larger amount of asphalt makes the layer more susceptible to plastic flow.

... Ok, this is my last contribution to this discussion

It's not my intention to discourage contributions to threads, I apologize if the facepalm picture I posted is interpreted as mockery of your posts, Andrés. Won't happen again, it's not what I meant.

[autogyro]

Massa contacted by radio saying that track conditions were worsening.
Anyone who has driven a high down force car knows full well that if you reduce speed for 'safety' you strait away lose the knife edge balance of grip you had when driving at racing speed.
Many times cars have spun and crashed on wet warm up laps because they were going too slow to generate high down force.
In extremely wet conditions under yellows, the only safe speed is a crawl.
IMO hitting a recovery vehicle was only a matter of time.
Having said that and with respect to all injured drivers, you could say this for any potential accident unless you make motor sport totally safe.
Already the driver to driver respect that was an un-written thing in times gone by has all but disappeared.
Is this a result of the greedy times we live in or just because the drivers no longer fear crashes?
I for one already watch far more motor cycle racing than F1.

[SectorOne]

Many times cars have spun and crashed on wet warm up laps because they were going too slow to generate high down force.

But the good thing is people won´t be hitting tow trucks at 100km/h if they go off at 60km/h or less.
It´s quite an easy concept to understand that if you go off at such low speeds the level of danger is massively decreased.

Did Ericsson total his car during the safety car period? No he just had a spin, completely harmless.
Had he gone off at 203km/h things would have looked much more different.

[marcush.]

astonishingly the problem of High Voltage strikes with these Hybrid cars has not been looked for properly as well.
Only now FIA implemented a requirement for orange cablingcover with all high Voltage leads and says this is the only thing they could do for now..
No it is not .
First of all it should be mandatory that each and every person touching a car should wear a simple Voltage gauge .So before actually touching the car with your body the gauge would be measuring the actual potential difference (voltage step) from the person to the car .If there is a danger a warning would be released .Sure you´d have the warning for electrostatic pheneomens as well but those would not persist as the probe touches the car ..
I think it is just pure blasphemia to run those cars without provision to actually switch them Voltagefree in case of a serious accident automatically .So a big deceleration should actually severe all relevant high volage connections so dangers are minimised as much as possible .
I´d think most cornerworkers /Marshalls and Medical people are not really aware of the dangers for their life when touching such a wreckage and you don´t know what actually is safe and what not.
In Automotive industry you need special training to be even allowed to work on Hybrid cars that are connected to the High Voltage Battery -only few are allowed to switch the car Voltage free because of the risks involved (Just think about generator voltage terminals you could toch when the generator is turning .....no Battery connected necessary to induce a life threatening electric shock)