Ross Brawn has said that last years aero reduction package did not go far enough in an attempt to reduce the downforce effect to increase the overtaking and hence spice up the spectacle.

I agree with him and said so when the proposals came out and said again when the chance to ban the double diffuser on grounds of not following the spirit of those reductions was missed earlier in the year.

Ross Brawn knows exactly what he is talking about, because he has been at the forefront of the developments in downforce generation and instrumental in the philosophy behind some of the features we still see on the cars.

It is no secret that he was the first and probably the only voice during early FOTA discussions on the 2009 rule changes and he warned that the way the rules were written was open to interpretation, when he was rebuffed he marched straight ahead and produced this years best initial aero package. So I guess some may question his motive to now be saying that aero reduction must go further. However that question misses the fact he was saying so when he highlighted the loophole.

The last decades development in downforce generation expertise began to come about when the teams started to build their own wind tunnel facilities to save the huge cost of using commercial ones.  This gave the testing engineers the opportunity to observe and tweek rather than just pour over a set of data received. This also meant that they were able to experiment with the concepts of fluid dynamics and increase understanding, rather than simply testing to see if a designed part achieved the required improvements.

One of the subsequent discoveries became the opportunity for a major re-thinking along tactical and strategic lines that brought the new found knowledge into Ross Brawn's own field of expertise. How to win races.

Having spent many millions eeking out 1.100ths of seconds gain it dawned on a few that the aero advantages could be best used to gain even more time more readily, by developing not only for aero gain on your own car but to exploit the aero disruption of the car behind. So rather than simply designing for an aero gain it became tactically advantageous to design for an aero net loss on your own car if the aero disadvange to the following car gave you a greater overall gain. 

The diffuser is the end result. yes it does give a gain on cleaning up the airflow exit from the car but with all the fins and vanes and vortex generators each adding to the net drag loss the gains are not as significant as the huge time over chasing opponent gains from leaving a very disturbed air mass behind.

In Ferraris golden years this was a massive tactical advantage to be the first team to exploit this, and made even more advantageous if it was known with an exceptional driver such as Schumacher, who could fill up with a reasonable first stint of fuel have his coop-driver run light Shuey would pick up the places during pit stops and the only hazardous hard driving that needed to be done was a few Q quick laps at the end of the first stint.

Ross Brawn knows that to increase the overtaking opportunities then the disturbed air wake of the cars that is generated part as downforce generation and part as disturbed air generation needs to be removed from the equation. Accepting that there will be a higher drag by not ram forcing the exiting up upwards from the rear of the car will create increased drafting effects and smoother air being presented for better chasing car downforce efficiency will improve the cornering speeds for the following cars.

Ross has also suggested any aero losses in speed can be regained by improved mechanical grip, as has been shown this year with the reintroduction of slicks. It is not too far a development step to then make the more important developments areas be in the mechanics of suspension, steering, torsion bars and dampers.

With increased following cornering speeds, increased dafting and reliance on mechanical yet driver imput critical cornering grip, the spectacle should be vastly improved over what may result from just chucking full fuel tanks on.

After all Ross was the one to exploit the possibilities that refueling allowed so that as long as he had a compliant coop driver and aero packages that kept cars behind, the longer first stint pitstop overtake became a Michael/Ross trade mark tactic.

 

very true but i suspect he is looking for the advantages which will come with rule changes just like he enjoyed at the start of he season. he is a very smart and competitive man and will not seek rule changes to enhance the competition because he wants to win.

r macaw:

Ross Brawn has said that last years aero reduction package did not go far enough in an attempt to reduce the downforce effect to increase the overtaking and hence spice up the spectacle.

I agree with him and said so when the proposals came out and said again when the chance to ban the double diffuser on grounds of not following the spirit of those reductions was missed earlier in the year.

Ross Brawn knows exactly what he is talking about, because he has been at the forefront of the developments in downforce generation and instrumental in the philosophy behind some of the features we still see on the cars.

It is no secret that he was the first and probably the only voice during early FOTA discussions on the 2009 rule changes and he warned that the way the rules were written was open to interpretation, when he was rebuffed he marched straight ahead and produced this years best initial aero package. So I guess some may question his motive to now be saying that aero reduction must go further. However that question misses the fact he was saying so when he highlighted the loophole.

The last decades development in downforce generation expertise began to come about when the teams started to build their own wind tunnel facilities to save the huge cost of using commercial ones.  This gave the testing engineers the opportunity to observe and tweek rather than just pour over a set of data received. This also meant that they were able to experiment with the concepts of fluid dynamics and increase understanding, rather than simply testing to see if a designed part achieved the required improvements.

One of the subsequent discoveries became the opportunity for a major re-thinking along tactical and strategic lines that brought the new found knowledge into Ross Brawn's own field of expertise. How to win races.

Having spent many millions eeking out 1.100ths of seconds gain it dawned on a few that the aero advantages could be best used to gain even more time more readily, by developing not only for aero gain on your own car but to exploit the aero disruption of the car behind. So rather than simply designing for an aero gain it became tactically advantageous to design for an aero net loss on your own car if the aero disadvange to the following car gave you a greater overall gain. 

The diffuser is the end result. yes it does give a gain on cleaning up the airflow exit from the car but with all the fins and vanes and vortex generators each adding to the net drag loss the gains are not as significant as the huge time over chasing opponent gains from leaving a very disturbed air mass behind.

In Ferraris golden years this was a massive tactical advantage to be the first team to exploit this, and made even more advantageous if it was known with an exceptional driver such as Schumacher, who could fill up with a reasonable first stint of fuel have his coop-driver run light Shuey would pick up the places during pit stops and the only hazardous hard driving that needed to be done was a few Q quick laps at the end of the first stint.

Ross Brawn knows that to increase the overtaking opportunities then the disturbed air wake of the cars that is generated part as downforce generation and part as disturbed air generation needs to be removed from the equation. Accepting that there will be a higher drag by not ram forcing the exiting up upwards from the rear of the car will create increased drafting effects and smoother air being presented for better chasing car downforce efficiency will improve the cornering speeds for the following cars.

Ross has also suggested any aero losses in speed can be regained by improved mechanical grip, as has been shown this year with the reintroduction of slicks. It is not too far a development step to then make the more important developments areas be in the mechanics of suspension, steering, torsion bars and dampers.

With increased following cornering speeds, increased dafting and reliance on mechanical yet driver imput critical cornering grip, the spectacle should be vastly improved over what may result from just chucking full fuel tanks on.

After all Ross was the one to exploit the possibilities that refueling allowed so that as long as he had a compliant coop driver and aero packages that kept cars behind, the longer first stint pitstop overtake became a Michael/Ross trade mark tactic.

 

Excellent post, Very interesting read and I agree.

murray walker said overtaking has always been few and far between in f1 before and after aero developments.

 your questions answered - week 12.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/murraywalker/ 

secondly hamilton has overtaking many times with all the aerodynamics. 

jack 67:

r macaw:

Ross Brawn has said that last years aero reduction package did not go far enough in an attempt to reduce the downforce effect to increase the overtaking and hence spice up the spectacle.

I agree with him and said so when the proposals came out and said again when the chance to ban the double diffuser on grounds of not following the spirit of those reductions was missed earlier in the year.

Ross Brawn knows exactly what he is talking about, because he has been at the forefront of the developments in downforce generation and instrumental in the philosophy behind some of the features we still see on the cars.

It is no secret that he was the first and probably the only voice during early FOTA discussions on the 2009 rule changes and he warned that the way the rules were written was open to interpretation, when he was rebuffed he marched straight ahead and produced this years best initial aero package. So I guess some may question his motive to now be saying that aero reduction must go further. However that question misses the fact he was saying so when he highlighted the loophole.

The last decades development in downforce generation expertise began to come about when the teams started to build their own wind tunnel facilities to save the huge cost of using commercial ones.  This gave the testing engineers the opportunity to observe and tweek rather than just pour over a set of data received. This also meant that they were able to experiment with the concepts of fluid dynamics and increase understanding, rather than simply testing to see if a designed part achieved the required improvements.

One of the subsequent discoveries became the opportunity for a major re-thinking along tactical and strategic lines that brought the new found knowledge into Ross Brawn's own field of expertise. How to win races.

Having spent many millions eeking out 1.100ths of seconds gain it dawned on a few that the aero advantages could be best used to gain even more time more readily, by developing not only for aero gain on your own car but to exploit the aero disruption of the car behind. So rather than simply designing for an aero gain it became tactically advantageous to design for an aero net loss on your own car if the aero disadvange to the following car gave you a greater overall gain. 

The diffuser is the end result. yes it does give a gain on cleaning up the airflow exit from the car but with all the fins and vanes and vortex generators each adding to the net drag loss the gains are not as significant as the huge time over chasing opponent gains from leaving a very disturbed air mass behind.

In Ferraris golden years this was a massive tactical advantage to be the first team to exploit this, and made even more advantageous if it was known with an exceptional driver such as Schumacher, who could fill up with a reasonable first stint of fuel have his coop-driver run light Shuey would pick up the places during pit stops and the only hazardous hard driving that needed to be done was a few Q quick laps at the end of the first stint.

Ross Brawn knows that to increase the overtaking opportunities then the disturbed air wake of the cars that is generated part as downforce generation and part as disturbed air generation needs to be removed from the equation. Accepting that there will be a higher drag by not ram forcing the exiting up upwards from the rear of the car will create increased drafting effects and smoother air being presented for better chasing car downforce efficiency will improve the cornering speeds for the following cars.

Ross has also suggested any aero losses in speed can be regained by improved mechanical grip, as has been shown this year with the reintroduction of slicks. It is not too far a development step to then make the more important developments areas be in the mechanics of suspension, steering, torsion bars and dampers.

With increased following cornering speeds, increased dafting and reliance on mechanical yet driver imput critical cornering grip, the spectacle should be vastly improved over what may result from just chucking full fuel tanks on.

After all Ross was the one to exploit the possibilities that refueling allowed so that as long as he had a compliant coop driver and aero packages that kept cars behind, the longer first stint pitstop overtake became a Michael/Ross trade mark tactic.

 

Excellent post, Very interesting read and I agree.

This has been said before and will be again, good post

What utter nonsense.  How can anyone question the motives of a man that has only ever demonstrated a desire for clarity in the regs and better racing.  Having given the FIA both the opportunity and the material needed to make the rear diffuser issue go away before the season started, how did you expect him to react to having the offer thrown back in his face?  And as for aveli666's suggestion that Brawn is only interested in reg changes that will only benefit his team, well that's pure fantasy.  Do you think Ross went to all the other teams and said,'Hey guys I've found a nice glitch in the rear difusser regs."?  Of course not.  And yet Brawn weren't the only team to start the season with a questionable diffuser.  It's just not possible to come up with a regulation that favours any one team.  Oh unless it's that unwritten one that the conspiracy theorists bring up from time to time.  This isn't something new that Ross has come up with.  Ross has been talking about this issue for some time so I really don't think his motives can be questioned at all.

All very true and yet next season we are going for narrower front tyres which will reduce mechanical grip.

bingolingo:

What utter nonsense.  How can anyone question the motives of a man that has only ever demonstrated a desire for clarity in the regs and better racing.  Having given the FIA both the opportunity and the material needed to make the rear diffuser issue go away before the season started, how did you expect him to react to having the offer thrown back in his face?  And as for aveli666's suggestion that Brawn is only interested in reg changes that will only benefit his team, well that's pure fantasy.  Do you think Ross went to all the other teams and said,'Hey guys I've found a nice glitch in the rear difusser regs."?  Of course not.  And yet Brawn weren't the only team to start the season with a questionable diffuser.  It's just not possible to come up with a regulation that favours any one team.  Oh unless it's that unwritten one that the conspiracy theorists bring up from time to time.  This isn't something new that Ross has come up with.  Ross has been talking about this issue for some time so I really don't think his motives can be questioned at all.

I don't think r_macaw was questioning Ross' motives in the OP and I agree with you both completely, I assume that you are reffering to another one of aveli's nonsense posts!

aveli666:

murray walker said overtaking has always been few and far between in f1 before and after aero developments.

 your questions answered - week 12.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/murraywalker/ 

secondly hamilton has overtaking many times with all the aerodynamics. 

Overtaking in F1 has always been difficult. Some drivers are up for it more than others and when refuelling was introduced in ’94 it was less risky to overtake in the pit lane instead of on the track.

Next year we will see who the real racers are, and not a moment too soon.

 

r1_racing:

aveli666:

murray walker said overtaking has always been few and far between in f1 before and after aero developments.

 your questions answered - week 12.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/murraywalker/ 

secondly hamilton has overtaking many times with all the aerodynamics. 

Overtaking in F1 has always been difficult. Some drivers are up for it more than others and when refuelling was introduced in ’94 it was less risky to overtake in the pit lane instead of on the track.

Next year we will see who the real racers are, and not a moment too soon.

 

True it has always been difficult, but it has been getting increasingly so. Reducing Aero can only be a good thing.

As for the re fueling comment. I couldn't agree more. Hated the idea from the start. Cant wait to get away from these sprint races, and find out who can really handle the cars under the different weights etc.

It is ironic though that the refueling was brought in to improve the racing.

I thought refuelling was brought in after the wake of cars catching fire in the cockpits because the fuel tank needed to be big enough to last and the only place it could go was in the drivers cockpit.  In fact the drivers seats used to sit on top of the fuel tank and it came down either side of the driver too.  I just hope the advances in safety protect the fuel tanks/drivers a LOT more than they used to because unstable cars and full fuel tanks is a recipe for disaster.

r macaw:

Ross Brawn has said that last years aero reduction package did not go far enough in an attempt to reduce the downforce effect to increase the overtaking and hence spice up the spectacle.

I agree with him and said so when the proposals came out and said again when the chance to ban the double diffuser on grounds of not following the spirit of those reductions was missed earlier in the year.

Ross Brawn knows exactly what he is talking about, because he has been at the forefront of the developments in downforce generation and instrumental in the philosophy behind some of the features we still see on the cars.

It is no secret that he was the first and probably the only voice during early FOTA discussions on the 2009 rule changes and he warned that the way the rules were written was open to interpretation, when he was rebuffed he marched straight ahead and produced this years best initial aero package. So I guess some may question his motive to now be saying that aero reduction must go further. However that question misses the fact he was saying so when he highlighted the loophole.

The last decades development in downforce generation expertise began to come about when the teams started to build their own wind tunnel facilities to save the huge cost of using commercial ones.  This gave the testing engineers the opportunity to observe and tweek rather than just pour over a set of data received. This also meant that they were able to experiment with the concepts of fluid dynamics and increase understanding, rather than simply testing to see if a designed part achieved the required improvements.

One of the subsequent discoveries became the opportunity for a major re-thinking along tactical and strategic lines that brought the new found knowledge into Ross Brawn's own field of expertise. How to win races.

Having spent many millions eeking out 1.100ths of seconds gain it dawned on a few that the aero advantages could be best used to gain even more time more readily, by developing not only for aero gain on your own car but to exploit the aero disruption of the car behind. So rather than simply designing for an aero gain it became tactically advantageous to design for an aero net loss on your own car if the aero disadvange to the following car gave you a greater overall gain. 

The diffuser is the end result. yes it does give a gain on cleaning up the airflow exit from the car but with all the fins and vanes and vortex generators each adding to the net drag loss the gains are not as significant as the huge time over chasing opponent gains from leaving a very disturbed air mass behind.

In Ferraris golden years this was a massive tactical advantage to be the first team to exploit this, and made even more advantageous if it was known with an exceptional driver such as Schumacher, who could fill up with a reasonable first stint of fuel have his coop-driver run light Shuey would pick up the places during pit stops and the only hazardous hard driving that needed to be done was a few Q quick laps at the end of the first stint.

Ross Brawn knows that to increase the overtaking opportunities then the disturbed air wake of the cars that is generated part as downforce generation and part as disturbed air generation needs to be removed from the equation. Accepting that there will be a higher drag by not ram forcing the exiting up upwards from the rear of the car will create increased drafting effects and smoother air being presented for better chasing car downforce efficiency will improve the cornering speeds for the following cars.

Ross has also suggested any aero losses in speed can be regained by improved mechanical grip, as has been shown this year with the reintroduction of slicks. It is not too far a development step to then make the more important developments areas be in the mechanics of suspension, steering, torsion bars and dampers.

With increased following cornering speeds, increased dafting and reliance on mechanical yet driver imput critical cornering grip, the spectacle should be vastly improved over what may result from just chucking full fuel tanks on.

After all Ross was the one to exploit the possibilities that refueling allowed so that as long as he had a compliant coop driver and aero packages that kept cars behind, the longer first stint pitstop overtake became a Michael/Ross trade mark tactic.

 

Great post!

 I believe overtaking is down to the driver and much to do with the determination, pace of car and driver ablity. As someone said, Murray claims F1 has seen little overtaking over the years anyway. It isnt to the rain pours down we get a truly good race anyway.

For me I would like to see most of the tracks redesigned for clear cut overtaking on the whole. There should be two sections on every track where an overtaking move is more than possible and the skill fails on the drivers to defend his places, rather than the other way around.

By the way, what came first the chicken or the egg? Did Ross turn up to the rule change FOTA meeting, because we have been led to believe Ross designed this season car from 2007? And Toyota and Brawn had different meetings with the FIA on the rule changes than the rest of the bunch from FOTA, which is more than apparent and clear.

An interesting point which springs from this is the much talked-about improvement in road-car technology supposedly deriving from F1.

Developments in transmission and suspension, increasing mechanical grip and smooth ride, are much more directly transferrable to the road-car industry than the fiendishly elaborate and minutely finely-tuned aerodynamics which now adorn F1 cars.

Underfloor diffusers are liable to be crunched by speed-bumps, and the ride heights are too high to be very effective anyway.

Commercially useful R&D could, maybe, be an incentive for cash-strapped Manufacturers to stay in F1.

bingolingo:

What utter nonsense.  How can anyone question the motives of a man that has only ever demonstrated a desire for clarity in the regs and better racing.  Having given the FIA both the opportunity and the material needed to make the rear diffuser issue go away before the season started, how did you expect him to react to having the offer thrown back in his face?  And as for aveli666's suggestion that Brawn is only interested in reg changes that will only benefit his team, well that's pure fantasy.  Do you think Ross went to all the other teams and said,'Hey guys I've found a nice glitch in the rear difusser regs."?  Of course not.  And yet Brawn weren't the only team to start the season with a questionable diffuser.  It's just not possible to come up with a regulation that favours any one team.  Oh unless it's that unwritten one that the conspiracy theorists bring up from time to time.  This isn't something new that Ross has come up with.  Ross has been talking about this issue for some time so I really don't think his motives can be questioned at all.

that same man was involved in this

PRESS RELEASE FROM THE FEDERATIONINTERNATIONALE DE L'AUTOMOBILE (FIA)

According to LDRA Ltd., the company appointed bythe FIA to investigate Formula One electronic systems, the best evidence isthat Benetton Formula Ltd. was not using "launch control" (anautomatic start system) at the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix. Had the evidenceproved they were, the World Motor Sport Council would have been invited toexclude them from the World Championship. Given the evidence available, such acourse of action would obviously have been wrong.

To avoid speculation, the report of the FIAFormula One Technical Delegate submitted to the World Motor Sport Council on 26July is attached

Hockenheim, 29 July 1994

Report by the FIA Formula One Technical Delegateon the investigations carried out on the electrical systems on Car Number 5 inthe 1994 San Marino Grand Prix.

An investigation into the software used in thecomputer systems of the cars finishing in the first three places at the 1994San Marino Grand Prix was undertaken by Liverpool Data Research Associates Ltd.(LDRA).

LDRA is a company which specializes in theanalysis, validation and verification of highly complex computer software suchas that used in modern civilian and military aircraft and a wide range of safetycritical applications.

On race day (1st May 1994), each of the teams wasrequested to supply the source code* for the software on board the car andschematic circuit diagrams of the electrical system. (Appendix 1 )

One team complied in full with this request and ademonstration of the complete electrical system was set up with entirelysatisfactory results.

Having received nothing from the other two teams,a fax was sent on 9th May (Appendix 2) asking for urgent action.

An alternative suggestion was received fromBenetton Formula Ltd. In this letter dated 10th May (Appendix 3), they statedthe source codes could not be made available for commercial reasons.

In a fax to Benetton Formula dated 15th May(Appendix 4), we accepted this proposal, on the condition that Article 2.6 ofthe Technical Regulations was satisfied.

On 27th May we received a detailed program for thedemonstration at Cosworth Engineering. (Appendix 5)

The tests which were scheduled to take place on28th June were canceled, by Benetton, after some discussion between Ford andthemselves concerning non-disclosure agreements

By a fax dated 28th June, we again requested thetests take place as a matter of urgency. (Appendix 6)

The demonstration and tests took place on 6thJuly. We received a report from LDRA on 11th July (Appendix 7) which left anumber of unanswered questions which we were advised could only be addressed byclose examination of the source code.

In a letter to Benetton dated 13th July (Appendix   we made it clear the demonstration had beenunsatisfactory and we required the source code for the software.

Following another exchange of letters on the 13thand 14th July (Appendices 9 and 10) a meeting was set up at the Benettonfactory on 19th July, an agenda for which was received on 18th July (Appendix11) which gave our advisors full access to all the source code, but only onBenetton's premises and subject to the instructions set out in Appendix 11.

Analysis of this software, which had been used atthe San Marino Grand Prix, revealed that it included a facility called"launch control". This is a system which, when armed, allows thedriver to initiate a start with a single action. The system will control theclutch, gear shift and engine speed fully automatically to a predeterminedpattern.

Benetton stated that this system is used onlyduring testing. Benetton further stated that "it (the system) can only beswitched on by recompilation of the code". This means recompilation of thesource code. Detailed analysis by the LDRA experts of this complex coderevealed that this statement was untrue. "Launch control" could infact be switched on using a lap-top personal computer (PC) connected to thegearbox control unit (GCU).

When confronted with this information, theBenetton representatives conceded that it was possible to switch on the"launch control" using a lap-top PC but indicated that theavailability of this feature of the software came as a surprise to them.

In order to enable "launch control", aparticular menu with ten options, has to be selected on the PC screen."Launch control" is not visibly listed as an option. The menu was soarranged that, after ten items, nothing further appeared. If however, theoperator scrolled down the menu beyond the tenth listed option, to option 13,launch control can be enabled, even though this is not visible on the screen.No satisfactory explanation was offered for this apparent attempt to concealthe feature.

Two conditions had to be satisfied before thecomputer would apply "launch control": First, the software had to beenabled either by recompiling the code, which would take some minutes, or byconnecting the lap-top PC as outlined above, which could be done in a matter ofseconds.

Secondly, the driver had to work through aparticular sequence of up-down gear shift paddle positions, a specific gearposition had to be selected and the clutch and throttle pedals had also to bein certain positions. Only if all these actions were carried out would the"launch control" become available.

Having thus initiated "launch control",the driver would be able to make a fully automatic start. Such a start isclearly a driver aid as it operates the clutch, changes gear and uses tractioncontrol by modulating engine power (by changing ignition or fuel settings), inresponse to wheel speed.

When asked why, if this system was only used intesting, such an elaborate procedure was necessary in order to switch it on, wewere told it was to prevent it being switched on accidentally.

A full copy of the LDRA report of the 9 Julymeeting can be seen in Appendix 12.

In the circumstances, I am not satisfied inaccordance with Article 2.6 of the Formula One Technical Regulations that carnumber 5 (M.Schumacher) complied with the Regulations at all times during theSan Marino Grand Prix and I therefore submit this matter to the World Councilfor their consideration.

Charlie Whiting FIA Formula One Technical Delegate

*Source code

Computer instructions are usually called machinecode and are represented internally as a series of noughts and ones known asbinary numbers. This form of instruction is very difficult for humans tounderstand, so computer languages have been devised that enable us to expressinstructions in a form that is more natural to us. Programs written in theselanguages are known as "source code". A computer can not use themdirectly but they can be translated to machine code that it can understand byusing another program called a compiler. When the machine code is loaded intothe computer's memory the processor can then execute the instructions that aredescribed in the source code.