It is my understanding that as long as you're using an epoxy matrix the best you can do is "down cycle", i.e. you shred your part, literally burn off the resin and reuse the scraps with new binder into e.g. airplane trays.
It sounds like maybe switching to a thermoplastic ("remeltable") matrix might be better but it will probably take decade(s) to research how to optimally produce and use those new parts.
> line with Formula E’s achievement as the first net-zero sport
I don't understand how can they claim such things, what is the definition for "net-zero".
Doesn't matter how optimized, say, the production of a car is, say it produces 10 metric tons of CO2, how are they gonna offset it? And all the rubber, travelling, batteries, etc?
Carbon offsets are super complicated, potentially shady, and I don’t fully understand them, but the gist of it is that they pay money to companies to either not produce carbon that they otherwise would have, or use the money to install and operate equipment in factories and powerplants that captures carbon before it goes out into the world. You can also do things that pull carbon out of regular air but I think the first two options are so much more efficient that they dominate the market. It seems like the system could be gamed, but as far as I know it broadly works.
> These unavoidable emissions from the past six seasons have now been certified as offset through investment in Gold Standard and Verified Carbon Standard UN projects in-line with the UNFCCC’s Clean Development Mechanism.
> From biogas energy generation in China to landfill gas energy generation in Mexico and wind power energy generation in Morocco, the offsetting projects Formula E has partnered with are carefully selected based on their social or ecological benefits, and on their location, all of which are situated in regions that we’ve raced in, from Season 1 to-date.
most emission from ICE racing (at least in the high level series where they do a lot of traveling) is from the planes and ships that transport the team members and equipment, and I imagine that's the same for Formula E
> Although, relative to ICE racing, the bar is low.
You do realize the actual ICE emissions dwarf in comparison to the whole picture right? If you take Formula 1 for example, they run 20 cars that will each burn through about 200-300kg of fossil fuel per race weekend. Even so, the actual emissions from the cars only accounts for 0.7% of the total CO2 emissions of a whole season of F1. Almost half the emissions are just from transporting equipment from race to race (via air, sea and land). About a quarter is transporting the personnel. Almost all of these still apply to Formula E.
In this kind of series the tyre’s overheating and degradation characteristics are carefully designed in to them. The factory has taken in to account covered/uncovered airflow on the wheel.
You control overheating by tuning camber and caster.
According to Wikipedia, all "Highest average" speed records (for race, lap, and qualifying) happened in Monza, and they're all around 250km/h, or 155mph.
> Inside, an electric motor can deliver 350kW of power (470BHP) to reach top speeds of 200MPH (320 km/h). For reference, Formula 1 cars average speeds between 220 and 230MPH during a Grand Prix.
There's either some typos here, or just bad writing.
The speed record for Formula 1 looks to be 231.4 mph, so the E top speed looks to be pretty close. That's cool! I wonder if we'll see the top races turn into electric at some point.
As with all engineering there's a tradeoffs dance. The F1 one cars pull insane G's in the bends, and all that downforce requires a lot of power. I'd like to know what kind of g-forces those FE cars reach. I think the best way to compare the overall performance is to compare the average speed on the same track.
I think Formula E is kind of useless. Racing competitions can be a good engine for innovation, but last I heard Formula E has all cars using a standard battery. Isn't the battery the biggest thing we want to improve on EVs?
They hold the races in cities instead of "real" race tracks, which I guess is cool if that's your home town but as a (lukewarm) racing fan I would rather see tracks I know. I wonder if they also want to avoid comparisons with ICE race cars. The Gen 2 Formula E did 0-60 in 2.8s... which is achievable in some ICE street cars. Hopefully the Gen 3 is more impressive.
I'm not really sure Formula E is big enough yet to put a lot of resources into battery tech like Formula 1 can engine tech.
I believe the biggest reason they are in cities now is that the battery capacity/tech just isn't there yet for something like Spa or COTA for the distance and speeds required for an interesting race. City courses allow for a design that offers a lot of regenerative braking.
Another reason to host them in cities is that cities are great for fans. Lots of hotels, restaurants, people buy tickets, etc. Cities are likely more open to Formula E due to the quieter cars and lower pollution too.
So, not useless, just maybe not interesting to you.
For publicity reasons F1 and Indycar/CART virtually never race on the same tracks. Otherwise people would point fingers and say that US series are slower overall, or top speeds in F1 are not as jaw-dropping as in US.
I'd bet FE has similar arrangement - no one wants obvious comparison with an obvious loser by some metric.
Yeah, the current gen cars are (very) roughly equivalent to F3 cars in terms of overall performance. Hopefully the Gen3 cars can push closer to F2 (they're still going to be miles off F1)
F2 is about as performant as IndyCar, except on high speed ovals where IndyCar is better than anything else (F1 is not designed for that.) I believe that's possible to build low cost cars as performant as a F1 but it's not in the interest of FIA to sanction that kind of series because F1 must be the fastest one by definition. The "pinnacle of motorsport."
To back my statement: if you look at the race times for the last 20-25 years F1 cars didn't get any faster at completing a race. They got faster at completing a qualifying lap so we could say that current cars are built to run hot laps and have to enter into a slow mode to run a race. BTW that cost billions of cumulative engineering efforts. If somebody tells Dallara to build 20 copies of a Ferrari F1 car from 2004 (Ferrari won 15 out of 18 races that year) you'll have a v10 series much faster than any IndyCar or F2, only slightly slower than current F1 and it will cost a fraction because of the reasons for IndyCar costs a fraction of F1.
Monaco is special in a way that power does not matter there that much and even downforce is not so important, so comparing different cars over that track does not make much sense.
Just because it's not a typical circuit doesn't mean the comparison is useless. To your point though, Monaco is the best case scenario for Formula E when being compared to Formula 1.
Long term the goal probably includes custom batteries, but Im assuming now they arent included because they want to keep costs lower. Teams do get to design powertrain stuff though, which is why you see car manufacturers in it. Good way to get some advanced R&D, and brand awareness obviously.
In battery design, there's always an energy - safety trade-off. The proper role of racing regulations is to prevent a race to the bottom in safety. So I'm in favor of standardizing the battery.
If I've gathered anything from "innovation" in F1/FE, it's because of heavy-handed regulations forcing the teams to innovate. Just enrol bankrupting fines/disqualification for battery fires/injuries/death (if they don't already) and we'll see innovation there that can trickle into mainstream.
Formula E hasn't existed for decades. I would be interested in knowing more about this contract which prevents organizations unaffiliated with FIA (there aren't many, though) from having single seat electric racing.
I didn't say they have held it for decades, I'm saying they own the exclusive rights for the next couple decades (I think it was a 25 year exclusivity period, which they are now ~7 years into).
There's nothing stopping an unaffiliated race series from starting up, but good luck attracting any top tier drivers.
> I didn't say they have held it for decades, I'm saying they own the exclusive rights for the next couple decades (I think it was a 25 year exclusivity period, which they are now ~7 years into).
I appear to have misunderstood. Sorry about that.
> There's nothing stopping an unaffiliated race series from starting up, but good luck attracting any top tier drivers.
Organizations unaffiliated with FIA can do whatever they want. There are not many of them though. Even American motorsport is affiliated with FIA [1] even if I think that the link has been very weak for most of its history.
One problem surfaced as many times as Formula 1 teams threatened to break away from FIA and do their own league is that FIA could ban all FIA seriest to race on circuits that organize races for the break away series. That's bad for circuits because they lose many weekends of income so nobody wants non FIA series.
If I were to launch a single seater electric car tournament tomorrow and provide cars for a bunch of racers, surely I have myself an event? Is being FIA-backed just nice to have, or a prerequisite, or?
It is the internationally recognized body responsible for motor racing, so you would have a very very hard time convincing anyone to take you seriously.
There's obviously nothing stopping you from setting up your own series, but there's a _lot_ that would go into it, and the FIA handles a lot of that stuff for other series.
The problem with this comparison is that F1 cars have a lot more downforce (and therefore drag) than FE cars, which means that F1 cars have a relatively low top speed.
Add to this the fact that race distance is a lot shorter in FE and that they race in street circuits where time with full throttle is low and brake regen is high and suddenly Formula e is not very impressive.
My take is that what makes a sport exciting for spectators is different from what makes a sport exciting for the participants, which is also different from an exciting sports spec sheet.
I miss the old days when we had 1000+ HP monsters driven with one hand on the wheel the other on the shifter through the crazy tight turns at Monaco. Yes it was insane and dangerous but it was incredible.
Nah. I race on iRacing, and whenever we go to a street circuit, you just ignore the on-pavement markings, and run the optimal line. Once you’ve gotten used to the general layout, you watch for the racing-specific markings (the red/white “piano” curbing mostly) and ignore the rest.
> Those lines must be very confusing since our brains have been trained to stay in them
It isn't many of us ran canyons as a lead up to track days to dial in our suspension or engine maps ahead of time attacks, and just as another poster mentioned: you ignore it entirely when you're in the zone.
You're looking at your own lines, and making your own braking points which often require you go wide (on to oncoming traffic) to make an apex in a high gear and have a higher exit speed etc...
In short, normal day-driving has almost no bearing on how you drive in anger in the canyons or the track. I drive like an old man on the street and seldom speed, but once the helmet goes on I'm a full contact driver and I will block pass and push you wide off the track to make an apex on the track without a second thought.
I was getting too aggressive at the K1 racetrack on my bday one year, I had just assumed people had done track days before and the marshals eventually let me run alone on the track to set a best flying lap because I was forcing people into dangerous situations, which to me is a part of racing: forcing people into mistakes is a critical part of race-craft. And if you go over your limit and you crash those are just racing incidents at the end of the day.
I think I held a Top 10 lap record for most of that year at that location.
As for reminiscing about F1 I think the hybrid era has yielded the most monotonous era on F1 history; which is saying a lot where 5 on track overtakes was considered an exciting race before that. Mercedes/HAM domination is about as compelling as the Redbull/Vettel era but with way more boring engines (they had V8s back then).
I was in Maranello the last season right before the v6 hybrid era and I could hear them testing the V6s F1 engines in the factory and then heard it on the track Fiorano. They sounded pathetic to even the street version V8s and I knew it was an end of an era.
Luckily, I got to see the LaFerrari prototype with its crazy hybrid-V8 get tested out on the canyons up Torre Maina which was a remarkable experience. They always say that when Ferrari sucks in F1 is when their Strada division makes it's best cars.
Either way, I think the Senna/Prost days in manual Turbo V6s was cool but way over valued, to me the pinnacle will always be the V10 era. Seeing that BMW V10 in the Williams screaming at near 20K RPM was insanity [0]! I know the V8s and even the V10s are faster around a track, but these engines were over a 1000HP in qualy trim, and the sound alone was what made the racing back then.
Ok, so someone who never spent much time on a track and is quoting the SCCA rule book to make it sound otherwise hasn't realized that a blockpass is a common tactic in all categories of racing, both on 2 and 4 wheels be it at the GT or GP level.
So let me show you what it is and how common a tactic it is to ensure an overtake sticks [0]. Here is a breakdown of the anatomy of what a blockpass is and how it's used to hold the racing line:
Racer Training Technique #1. Block Pass
A. get close to rider in front
B. brake same time or after rider in front
C. remove some brake pressure to get side by side
D. hold position side by side while continuing to brake evenly with other ride. (don't pass in-front.. as it opens up a possible re-pass if you run wide)
E. enter corner holding the inside line ftw!
It is a legitimate overtaking technique.
This video on the 'art of passing' is also worth watching to see what I had described earlier [1], at 0.55 you see what a blockpass looks like on track and that is what forces a driver wide off the racing line and makes him loss time by going wide, which is an entirely legitimate racing technique.
Kelvin describes it rather well and shows how you can execute it best and still drive cleanly.
PS: I used to drive when I was younger but I also marshaled and did scrutineering at Time Attacks, and Open lap track days be it with SCCA sanctioned events or otherwise when I got older and sustained too many injuries and got slower.
There is a saying amongst the experienced veterans: Racing is a full contact sport, and rubbing is racing.
Speaking of the old days: I miss the old days when yellow flags were for a section of the track, and there were no safety cars. Last year's F1 season finale was an embarrassment. I'm very happy that Max won, I'm just not happy about how it happened...
I realize safety is important, however I think just as much safety can be achieved if drivers respect yellow flags and are heavily penalized for violations. There is just no reason to effectively stop racing on a multi-mile circuit just because a car went off in one corner. We should go back to the old rules of yellow flags and/or a stop and restart if the track is fully blocked.
Formula E is pretty interesting. All the races are on YouTube. It’s enjoyable, and the races have some interesting gimmicks that electric cars can give you.
First, the race is n minutes + 2 laps instead of a set distance. Functionally, it’s not really any different from a regular distance race, since you have to be on the lead lap to win. The other gimmick is that video game speed boosts are a thing. You can drive through areas to have your motor run at a higher output for a limited time.
I do like the aesthetics for the new cars, and the battery technology has improved from the earliest version where the drivers had to change cars in the middle of the race because the batteries were too weak.
I've never heard of such races until a few days ago when I was in Monaco. The city was getting ready for the race and they were heavily promoting the electric part (especially in a large meeting center that was expected to hist all things electric).
I will gladly have a look at the YouTube recordings of the races as I am wondering whether they are basically silent compared to their fuel-based counterparts.
The silence factor of a car is really something. I recently got a hybrid car (self-recharging version) and I love the sound of the first meters, solely electric. My next car will be a 100% electric one for sure.
I do agree about liking my electric cars silent. I recently saw some electric cars advertising “performance sounds”, which I thought was dumb as hell. There’s even a startup to add these sounds to your electric car [0].
I find this even dumber than the Jaguar roadster I test drove that had what as effectively a “louder” button. It shot fuel directly into the exhaust to make the engine louder while simultaneously increasing your emissions and decreasing your fuel economy. Somehow this was a selling point, I guess for people with severe self esteem issues.
The only reason I can imagine a EV being more noisy is for very slow sppeds which are usually in areas with pedestrians. It may be a good idea to gently warn them that a car is nearby (though I do not have a strong opinion on that one - a bike is silent after all)
Monaco is good for a one day visit, at best. Of course this depends on your preferences, I like middle-sized, rather open cities such as Versailles.
Monaco is very cramped with lots of buildings and roads that are not easy to cross. There are nice parks, though - but everything seems really cramped.
The prices are outrageous, but this is the case in many places in the south of France. You do not live in Monaco comfortably with a middle-class income.
France is a marvelous country, with beautiful places and climates - there are really better places to choose from.
BEVs are great for hill climb (Pikes Peak record held by incredible VW BEV https://youtu.be/2K2paIN20mU) and for low end drag racing (NEDRA in the US http://www.nedra.com/record_holders.html), but for circuit racing they are years away from being able to run more than a few laps at a time with sub formula III performance.
I'd be interested to see more hybrid racing, which would help with hybrid street R&D, but the BEV world is imo currently limited to sprint performance, not multiple lap competitive racing
> Gen3 won’t rely solely on batteries for power. Around 40 percent of the energy cars will use during an E-Prix will be produced by regenerative braking.
Definitely bad writing. Where do they think the energy that got the car up to speed originally (which is then partially recouped via regenerative braking) came from?
I watched some of season 7 of Formula E on youtube and just couldn't get into it. I really would love to get into it. Attack mode is weird to me. 10% power boost, twice? No DRS? Everyone is sort of the same power same car? Driver skill doesnt seem to change much? It doesn't feel like a competition.
No pitting or tire strategy? Wtf? No pit charging to dump several kwh in quickly? There's no refueling in F1 because stuff catches on fire, Formula E doesn't have that problem. Perhaps more indy car style where only 1 person can swap tires to delay pits to get good value out of charging?
I also had thought, instead of attack mode, why not kind of mario kart rules lol? Red shell that fires forward and harms people in front? Drop banana to harm people behind you. Could make the race funnier.
> Then there’s the motor efficiency. Formula E says the electric power units can convert over 90 percent of their energy to mechanical power, compared to around 40 percent for an ICE motor.
They're measuring efficiency in miles per joule, but really the output of a race car is entertainment. You want the most entertainment per joule.
If you make the cars smaller (call the scale s), they have a smaller frontal area by s^2. They can also go slower and look the same on camera, again by a factor of s. Since energy consumption scales as speed^3 * frontal area, you get a remarkable
power ∝ s^5
So if you make half-sized cars you can use 1/32 of the energy. And you can have an identical visual spectacle as long as you scale the camera positions, reduce the tire grip by s^2, and find some 3' tall drivers.
Absolutely none of the appeal is anticipating a crash. If someone claims to be a race fan and likes the crashes, they are by definition not a race fan as there is no racing in a crash.
I remember watching when Jules Bianchi had his fatal accident and I remember where I was when I read of Antoine Hubert had his fatal crash and I remember watching Romain Grosjean somehow walk away from an incredibly violent crash. Each one made me seriously consider giving up on the sport, but the racers racing and each crash has led to massive safety improvements.
I hope there is never another fatal or injury accident in motor racing. In F1 there was a long gap between Senna and Bianchi, let's hope the next gap never ends.
To be honest, when I was very young, there was always the thrill something unexpected might happen on TV, and crashes were part of that. But this has quickly faded. I only dimly remember the Bianchi incident, at the time watching I didn't think too much of it. The Grosjean incident though was really something, and I got similar vibes a few weeks ago with the Schumacher (Mick) incident where he wasn't shown for a short time
The Bianchi incident was so odd and I've only (accidentally) saw one video of it since as far as I know, no broadcast camera captured the incident. But F1 learned and red flags seem more common now and they don't race with reduced visibility.
Agreed about Mick as well, its always terrible when they don't show replays for a while. But I also think that fact alone contradicts the OP, they won't broadcast a serious crash.
> If someone claims to be a race fan and likes the crashes, they are by definition not a race fan as there is no racing in a crash.
That's true in open wheel racing like F1, but in stock car racing like NASCAR, contact and wrecks are an accepted part of the sport and are definitely a component of the race and strategy.
That is fair, I admit I'm mainly an open-wheel fan. But as far as I understand, closed-wheel racing cars are more robust to side-swipe/rubbing incidents, which in open-wheel often forces a spin at best and breaks suspension at worst.
Yeah, they're intrinsically safer vehicles but obviously much slower and less maneuverable. A lot of the r&d over the last 20 years has been to make these wrecks relatively safe, and they've done a good job with it.
Typical crashes are bad for the body without being very bloody. It's all concussions and subdural hematomas. For max entertainment, robot drivers should splatter blood all over the place when they crash.
I never followed Formula, so forgive my ignorance, but if the car is that great compared to ICE cars as the article suggests, why not try to put them together in the same race with the same parameters/limitations on the outside? I would love to watch that.
Because besides being significantly slower and inferior in almost every conceivable way Formula E cars would run out of power after 1/3 of an F1 race (Formula E races are under 90 km while the minimum required distance for an F1 race is 305km).
95 comments
[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 161 ms ] threadIt is my understanding that as long as you're using an epoxy matrix the best you can do is "down cycle", i.e. you shred your part, literally burn off the resin and reuse the scraps with new binder into e.g. airplane trays.
It sounds like maybe switching to a thermoplastic ("remeltable") matrix might be better but it will probably take decade(s) to research how to optimally produce and use those new parts.
I don't understand how can they claim such things, what is the definition for "net-zero".
Doesn't matter how optimized, say, the production of a car is, say it produces 10 metric tons of CO2, how are they gonna offset it? And all the rubber, travelling, batteries, etc?
How can you judge them while openly admitting you don’t understand them?
> From biogas energy generation in China to landfill gas energy generation in Mexico and wind power energy generation in Morocco, the offsetting projects Formula E has partnered with are carefully selected based on their social or ecological benefits, and on their location, all of which are situated in regions that we’ve raced in, from Season 1 to-date.
[1] https://www.fiaformulae.com/en/news/2020/september/three-ste...
https://www.goldstandard.org/our-story/gold-standard-feature...
- https://www.fiaformulae.com/en/discover/sustainability/net-z...
- https://f.fiaformulae.com/r/sustainability/FE-Sustainability...
Not clear which emissions are being offset. Although, relative to ICE racing, the bar is low.
You do realize the actual ICE emissions dwarf in comparison to the whole picture right? If you take Formula 1 for example, they run 20 cars that will each burn through about 200-300kg of fossil fuel per race weekend. Even so, the actual emissions from the cars only accounts for 0.7% of the total CO2 emissions of a whole season of F1. Almost half the emissions are just from transporting equipment from race to race (via air, sea and land). About a quarter is transporting the personnel. Almost all of these still apply to Formula E.
You control overheating by tuning camber and caster.
This must be a typo. Maybe kph? 220mph is maybe like a theoretical max speed, but certainly not an average over a race.
According to Wikipedia, all "Highest average" speed records (for race, lap, and qualifying) happened in Monza, and they're all around 250km/h, or 155mph.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Formula_One_race_recor...
There's either some typos here, or just bad writing.
The speed record for Formula 1 looks to be 231.4 mph, so the E top speed looks to be pretty close. That's cool! I wonder if we'll see the top races turn into electric at some point.
They hold the races in cities instead of "real" race tracks, which I guess is cool if that's your home town but as a (lukewarm) racing fan I would rather see tracks I know. I wonder if they also want to avoid comparisons with ICE race cars. The Gen 2 Formula E did 0-60 in 2.8s... which is achievable in some ICE street cars. Hopefully the Gen 3 is more impressive.
I believe the biggest reason they are in cities now is that the battery capacity/tech just isn't there yet for something like Spa or COTA for the distance and speeds required for an interesting race. City courses allow for a design that offers a lot of regenerative braking.
Another reason to host them in cities is that cities are great for fans. Lots of hotels, restaurants, people buy tickets, etc. Cities are likely more open to Formula E due to the quieter cars and lower pollution too.
So, not useless, just maybe not interesting to you.
I'd bet FE has similar arrangement - no one wants obvious comparison with an obvious loser by some metric.
As a comparison, the FE pole time was 1:29.839. Last year the F1 pole lap was 1:10.346.
https://formularegionaleubyalpine.com/corsa/monaco-2021/
(This is really Formula 3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Formula_Regional_European... )
To back my statement: if you look at the race times for the last 20-25 years F1 cars didn't get any faster at completing a race. They got faster at completing a qualifying lap so we could say that current cars are built to run hot laps and have to enter into a slow mode to run a race. BTW that cost billions of cumulative engineering efforts. If somebody tells Dallara to build 20 copies of a Ferrari F1 car from 2004 (Ferrari won 15 out of 18 races that year) you'll have a v10 series much faster than any IndyCar or F2, only slightly slower than current F1 and it will cost a fraction because of the reasons for IndyCar costs a fraction of F1.
Formula 1 2019 and 2021: 1:32.029, 1:32.910.
Moto GP 2021: 2:02.781.
There's nothing stopping an unaffiliated race series from starting up, but good luck attracting any top tier drivers.
I appear to have misunderstood. Sorry about that.
> There's nothing stopping an unaffiliated race series from starting up, but good luck attracting any top tier drivers.
I pretty much agree with that.
One problem surfaced as many times as Formula 1 teams threatened to break away from FIA and do their own league is that FIA could ban all FIA seriest to race on circuits that organize races for the break away series. That's bad for circuits because they lose many weekends of income so nobody wants non FIA series.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automobile_Competition_Committ...
If I were to launch a single seater electric car tournament tomorrow and provide cars for a bunch of racers, surely I have myself an event? Is being FIA-backed just nice to have, or a prerequisite, or?
There's obviously nothing stopping you from setting up your own series, but there's a _lot_ that would go into it, and the FIA handles a lot of that stuff for other series.
Add to this the fact that race distance is a lot shorter in FE and that they race in street circuits where time with full throttle is low and brake regen is high and suddenly Formula e is not very impressive.
https://youtu.be/auXfAHHNSFo
It’s incredibly fun in VR.
It isn't many of us ran canyons as a lead up to track days to dial in our suspension or engine maps ahead of time attacks, and just as another poster mentioned: you ignore it entirely when you're in the zone.
You're looking at your own lines, and making your own braking points which often require you go wide (on to oncoming traffic) to make an apex in a high gear and have a higher exit speed etc...
In short, normal day-driving has almost no bearing on how you drive in anger in the canyons or the track. I drive like an old man on the street and seldom speed, but once the helmet goes on I'm a full contact driver and I will block pass and push you wide off the track to make an apex on the track without a second thought.
I was getting too aggressive at the K1 racetrack on my bday one year, I had just assumed people had done track days before and the marshals eventually let me run alone on the track to set a best flying lap because I was forcing people into dangerous situations, which to me is a part of racing: forcing people into mistakes is a critical part of race-craft. And if you go over your limit and you crash those are just racing incidents at the end of the day.
I think I held a Top 10 lap record for most of that year at that location.
As for reminiscing about F1 I think the hybrid era has yielded the most monotonous era on F1 history; which is saying a lot where 5 on track overtakes was considered an exciting race before that. Mercedes/HAM domination is about as compelling as the Redbull/Vettel era but with way more boring engines (they had V8s back then).
I was in Maranello the last season right before the v6 hybrid era and I could hear them testing the V6s F1 engines in the factory and then heard it on the track Fiorano. They sounded pathetic to even the street version V8s and I knew it was an end of an era.
Luckily, I got to see the LaFerrari prototype with its crazy hybrid-V8 get tested out on the canyons up Torre Maina which was a remarkable experience. They always say that when Ferrari sucks in F1 is when their Strada division makes it's best cars.
Either way, I think the Senna/Prost days in manual Turbo V6s was cool but way over valued, to me the pinnacle will always be the V10 era. Seeing that BMW V10 in the Williams screaming at near 20K RPM was insanity [0]! I know the V8s and even the V10s are faster around a track, but these engines were over a 1000HP in qualy trim, and the sound alone was what made the racing back then.
0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gT36kC2pwAc
So let me show you what it is and how common a tactic it is to ensure an overtake sticks [0]. Here is a breakdown of the anatomy of what a blockpass is and how it's used to hold the racing line:
Racer Training Technique #1. Block Pass
A. get close to rider in front
B. brake same time or after rider in front
C. remove some brake pressure to get side by side
D. hold position side by side while continuing to brake evenly with other ride. (don't pass in-front.. as it opens up a possible re-pass if you run wide)
E. enter corner holding the inside line ftw!
It is a legitimate overtaking technique.
This video on the 'art of passing' is also worth watching to see what I had described earlier [1], at 0.55 you see what a blockpass looks like on track and that is what forces a driver wide off the racing line and makes him loss time by going wide, which is an entirely legitimate racing technique.
Kelvin describes it rather well and shows how you can execute it best and still drive cleanly.
PS: I used to drive when I was younger but I also marshaled and did scrutineering at Time Attacks, and Open lap track days be it with SCCA sanctioned events or otherwise when I got older and sustained too many injuries and got slower.
There is a saying amongst the experienced veterans: Racing is a full contact sport, and rubbing is racing.
0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4ZqBhEbaYo
1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVyKys3T9Rw
I realize safety is important, however I think just as much safety can be achieved if drivers respect yellow flags and are heavily penalized for violations. There is just no reason to effectively stop racing on a multi-mile circuit just because a car went off in one corner. We should go back to the old rules of yellow flags and/or a stop and restart if the track is fully blocked.
https://youtu.be/VkckEO5ONPY
First, the race is n minutes + 2 laps instead of a set distance. Functionally, it’s not really any different from a regular distance race, since you have to be on the lead lap to win. The other gimmick is that video game speed boosts are a thing. You can drive through areas to have your motor run at a higher output for a limited time.
I do like the aesthetics for the new cars, and the battery technology has improved from the earliest version where the drivers had to change cars in the middle of the race because the batteries were too weak.
I will gladly have a look at the YouTube recordings of the races as I am wondering whether they are basically silent compared to their fuel-based counterparts.
The silence factor of a car is really something. I recently got a hybrid car (self-recharging version) and I love the sound of the first meters, solely electric. My next car will be a 100% electric one for sure.
I do agree about liking my electric cars silent. I recently saw some electric cars advertising “performance sounds”, which I thought was dumb as hell. There’s even a startup to add these sounds to your electric car [0].
I find this even dumber than the Jaguar roadster I test drove that had what as effectively a “louder” button. It shot fuel directly into the exhaust to make the engine louder while simultaneously increasing your emissions and decreasing your fuel economy. Somehow this was a selling point, I guess for people with severe self esteem issues.
[0] https://www.thedrive.com/news/42734/this-startup-will-give-y...
The only reason I can imagine a EV being more noisy is for very slow sppeds which are usually in areas with pedestrians. It may be a good idea to gently warn them that a car is nearby (though I do not have a strong opinion on that one - a bike is silent after all)
Monaco is very cramped with lots of buildings and roads that are not easy to cross. There are nice parks, though - but everything seems really cramped.
The prices are outrageous, but this is the case in many places in the south of France. You do not live in Monaco comfortably with a middle-class income.
France is a marvelous country, with beautiful places and climates - there are really better places to choose from.
I'd be interested to see more hybrid racing, which would help with hybrid street R&D, but the BEV world is imo currently limited to sprint performance, not multiple lap competitive racing
Definitely bad writing. Where do they think the energy that got the car up to speed originally (which is then partially recouped via regenerative braking) came from?
I mean by your argument, ICEs are solar powered, right? :-)
And yes fundamentally it comes from their batteries first and foremost.
I watched some of season 7 of Formula E on youtube and just couldn't get into it. I really would love to get into it. Attack mode is weird to me. 10% power boost, twice? No DRS? Everyone is sort of the same power same car? Driver skill doesnt seem to change much? It doesn't feel like a competition.
No pitting or tire strategy? Wtf? No pit charging to dump several kwh in quickly? There's no refueling in F1 because stuff catches on fire, Formula E doesn't have that problem. Perhaps more indy car style where only 1 person can swap tires to delay pits to get good value out of charging?
I also had thought, instead of attack mode, why not kind of mario kart rules lol? Red shell that fires forward and harms people in front? Drop banana to harm people behind you. Could make the race funnier.
In terms of quick charging, teams get to design their own bank of supercaps that dump as much power into the car as fast as possible.
I dont know, I really want to watch formula e over f1 but sure doesnt make it for me.
Formula 1 cars have over 50% thermal efficiency:
https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article.how-f1-technology...
F1 cars are running faster using less fuel than they were 9 years ago.
If you make the cars smaller (call the scale s), they have a smaller frontal area by s^2. They can also go slower and look the same on camera, again by a factor of s. Since energy consumption scales as speed^3 * frontal area, you get a remarkable
So if you make half-sized cars you can use 1/32 of the energy. And you can have an identical visual spectacle as long as you scale the camera positions, reduce the tire grip by s^2, and find some 3' tall drivers.I remember watching when Jules Bianchi had his fatal accident and I remember where I was when I read of Antoine Hubert had his fatal crash and I remember watching Romain Grosjean somehow walk away from an incredibly violent crash. Each one made me seriously consider giving up on the sport, but the racers racing and each crash has led to massive safety improvements.
I hope there is never another fatal or injury accident in motor racing. In F1 there was a long gap between Senna and Bianchi, let's hope the next gap never ends.
Agreed about Mick as well, its always terrible when they don't show replays for a while. But I also think that fact alone contradicts the OP, they won't broadcast a serious crash.
That's true in open wheel racing like F1, but in stock car racing like NASCAR, contact and wrecks are an accepted part of the sport and are definitely a component of the race and strategy.
https://roborace.com/
They don't use lifelike robots, yet, but they're doing some exciting stuff.