Mark Webber and Flipping

[callmekart]

Just wondering the number of times Webber has flipped a car.. Paranormal?

- 1999 24 Hours of Le Mans(Twice)
- European Grand Prix 2010

[The FOZ]

Nah, not paranormal. He's an Aussie, they're upside down to the rest of us. It's just his true nature asserting itself.

[bhallg2k]

Classic.

[richard_leeds]

There's no footage of Webber going airbourne in quali, but here's footage immediately afterwards.



Here is Webber in the warm up for the race, go to 2:30 ...



And his team mate Peter Dumbrek in the race ...






Details http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_24_Hours_of_Le_Mans

[andrew]

From memory, I don't think his Le Mans flip was his fault, but the flipperoo in Valencia was due to him comming down with a case of plonkeritus.

[richard_leeds]

Plonkeritis in action ...

[Pandamasque]

Nah, not paranormal. He's an Aussie, they're upside down to the rest of us. It's just his true nature asserting itself.

My thoughts exactly. He's just trying to feel more at home.

[Giblet]

Coincidentally, I was taught how to flip on a snowboard by an Australian.

[beelsebob]

From memory, I don't think his Le Mans flip was his fault, but the flipperoo in Valencia was due to him comming down with a case of plonkeritus.

I'm really not convinced that this was down to plonkeritis. I'm pretty sure that both this, and Vettel's crash with Button at Spa were caused by the same thing – red bull's flexi wing.

The logic behind it:

• The car starts running in thin air in the {lotus | McLaren}'s slip stream.
• The driver steers to the right to make the pass
• The right hand end of the front wing comes into the higher preasure zone and immediately starts to work much harder.
• The right hand end flexes as it generates more downforce, causing the whole wing to tilt slightly down on the right.
• The wing being tilted generates a component of it's downforce to the left.
• This extra force on the front of the car pushes the nose back in behind the car being overtaken
• We know the rest.

As an aside – if this genuinely is the case (big if), it also means that the flexiwing has a further advantage in high speed corners than just the downforce advantage. Suppose you're in a left hand turn – the linear velocity of the air on the right hand side of the wing is slightly faster than on the left; this causes the right hand side of the wing to generate slightly more downforce, and to tilt the wing slightly over. This causes a component of the downforce to be generated pushing the car into the turn.

[Mandrake]

Respect for your creativity here, but Vettel's case was too aggressive steering on a slightly damp track and Webber's was unawareness of the Lotus' slowness leading to the crash.

My sister lost control over her car on the autobahn when trying to avoid something, she steered too agressively and the car overreacted. And she doesn't have flexiwings :p

[Giblet]

The wings were flapping back and forth when he tried to pass Button that time, but also, the downforce is all applied to the nose in the center, so the it wasn't unevenly loaded, just varying in amount.

[alelanza]

Nah, not paranormal. He's an Aussie, they're upside down to the rest of us. It's just his true nature asserting itself.

LOL, best explanation so far

[*]The car starts running in thin air in the {lotus | McLaren}'s slip stream.
[*]The driver steers to the right to make the pass
[*]The right hand end of the front wing comes into the higher preasure zone and immediately starts to work much harder.
[*]The right hand end flexes as it generates more downforce, causing the whole wing to tilt slightly down on the right.
[*]The wing being tilted generates a component of it's downforce to the left.
[*]This extra force on the front of the car pushes the nose back in behind the car being overtaken
[*]We know the rest

That's some wind tunnel you got there, expect teams to be knocking at your door any minute
I'll admit that watching Seb's wing in Spa was very interesting and it "seems" as if his wing is more affected than others by the car in front, i'm sure there were forces at work in that crash that maybe not even his team fully understands, but on the other hand we're talking about the two guys that crashed into each other before even getting to the braking zone in Turkey. And one of them crashed into LH in Aus that same season for no good reason, and then in Canada pulled the same move on another car (can't remember if it was a macca or ferrari) and the only reason they didn't crash was that the car in front pulled into the pits, ie Webber outbraked himself going into the inside of a car that wasn't even there. Plus none of the two ever claimed the car having a mind of its own, one admitted his mistake and the other one said the guy in front braked too early for his taste.

the downforce is all applied to the nose in the center, so the it wasn't unevenly loaded, just varying in amount.
The wings were flapping back and forth when he tried to pass Button that time, but also, the downforce is all applied to the nose in the center, so the it wasn't unevenly loaded, just varying in amount.

Yes it's applied in the center, but you have to consider where that force is being exerted, remember there's a distance from where the force is applied to the nose, so torque comes into play. Downforce that's laterally uneven will also cause grip that's laterally uneven. Not that this would help make sense of Beelsebob's explanation, but I thought it should be mentioned.