Innholdsfortegnelse for November 2018 i Racecar Engineering

There is a quote, incorrectly attributed to Winston Churchill, that appeared on the internal staircase of the Williams F1 motor home recently. It reads: ‘Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.’ It’s a sentiment that sums up the 2018 season for Williams. With nine world championships and 114 race wins under its belt this team certainly understands success, but considering that it has only won a single race in the last 14 seasons, and that 2018 looks likely to be its worst ever world championship campaign, this is also a team that now also understands failure. Yet at the start of 2018 it was clear that Williams believed it was about to turn around its slump. The team had achieved a…

‘For the fans of the series the 45-minute plus one lap regulation is a good idea, but for the engineers in the teams it will be a nightmare’ Private testing days, of which just 15 are afforded to the nine confirmed manufacturers in the FIA Formula E Championship, are intense affairs. This is especially so when a brand new car is involved and every kilometre of running counts. Which is why it was a big deal when Racecar was invited to the Calafat circuit in Spain where the DS Automobiles Formula E squad was working on a variety of programmes in preparation for Season 5 of Formula E, which is set to spark into life in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in December. This was also the first ever test in which…

Chassis Aluminium and carbon fibre hybrid. Body Carbon composite external panels. Aerodynamics Manually adjustable rear wing. Engine 10-cylinder; 90deg V angle; naturally aspirated; gasoline direct injection IDS; dry sump lubrication. Displacement: 5.2-litre. Bore and stroke 84.5mm x 92.9mm. Compression ratio 17.7:1. ECU and TCU management: Bosch Motorsport MS6.4. Transmission Rear-wheel drive with mechanical differential lock; traction control by Bosch Motorsport, adjustable in 10 positions through the steering wheel. Gearbox: Hor 6-speed sequential, pneumatically controlled. Suspension Front and rear: double wishbones with uniball. Dampers: 4-way Ohlin TTX 36. Anti-roll bar: front and rear, 3-way adjustable. Safety equipment FIA spec roll cage; carbon fibre racing seat FIA 8862 spec; roof hatch system. Wheels Front: 12x18in ET45.65. Rear: 13x18in ET37.85. Tyres Pirelli P Zero. Front: 325/680-18. Rear: 325/705-18 Brakes Front: Brembo steel brakes;…

The combination of circuit racing, rallying and drag racing that is World Rallycross (RX) is fantastically entertaining. Add to that the technical challenges of setting up a car for both asphalt and dirt surfaces, while coping with the impact of jumps, and faster-than-F1 acceleration times, and it is, for many, the perfect balance between engineering and entertainment. World RX is also arguably the fastest growing category of motorsport in the world, and with growth comes expansion. Last year, the World RX Championship concluded in South Africa for the first time, while this year saw the introduction of two new venues; Silverstone in the UK, and COTA in the USA. ‘There are two or three other territories that we are talking to seriously as well as a few additional European ones,…

Being able to process the data is all well and good, but sharing it quickly and securely is equally critical. In the past McLaren relied on an MPLS connection to send real-time video back to Woking. However, the system was expensive and didn’t have the bandwidth for the 11.8 billion data points being sent per year. This caused video lag and image quality issues, hindering the team’s ability to monitor each race and accurately assess each situation. NTT Communications suggested that the team used software-defined wide-area network, (SD-WAN), which is quick and reliable data and is more affordable. Such is the change in volume and the reliance on data to power essential team communications and machine learning that the NTT SD-WAN service is now considered a key race tool. Operating…

The rise and rise of Formula E and its relevance in the development of electric vehicle technology is having a profound effect on the use of new engineering tools and practices in motorsport – in particular when it comes to driving simulators. Season 5 of the all-electric FIA series represents the biggest leap forward for FE with completely new second-generation cars, the addition of brand new tracks and the arrival of official manufacturer teams including BMW, Audi, Nissan, Porsche and Mercedes. New era This is not without its unique challenges, though, as Dennis Marcus, commercial manager automotive and motorsport at simulator manufacturer Cruden, explains. ‘With FE races taking place on street circuits there is virtually no time for teams to test the exact track and circuit outside of a race…

‘When you are instructing your race drivers or mechanics there has to be absolutely no doubt in your voice’ In professional motorsport every racecar requires a team of full-time engineers who dedicate their lives to maximising its performance. But how many engineers make up a team? What does each of them do? How does this improve the performance? Not many know the answer to all these questions and, unfortunately, this lack of insight into the inner workings of race teams, particularly in the trackside environment, is the reason why motorsport is facing a huge shortage of quality engineering talent. It’s by no means a new problem, either. ‘I had no exposure to motorsport growing up,’ says Bernadette Collins, who is senior strategist at Racing Point Force India. ‘The TV coverage…

One of the most important, yet often overlooked, set-up items in engineering a racecar is the differential. The reason the diff is so important is that it plays a critical role in both the power delivery and the car handling. The goal of this article is to outline the problem the differential poses, and then to show you how to use simulation tools to solve this. An open diff has this nasty habit of transferring all the power to the wheel that spins the most The principal problem we have with the differential is that we have two wheels moving at two different speeds. This problem is illustrated in Figure 1. The reason why tuning the diff is such a problem is that for a given forward speed, V, and…

The quartet of manufacturer WRC teams have it all to play for as the World Rally Championship heads to the forests of Wales Rally GB in October. With three rallies to go at time of writing, both the drivers’ and manufacturers’ championships could well go down to the wire on November’s final round in Rally Australia. And it’s not all about the drivers; it is also a battle of constantly evolving technology, as our annual appraisal of the top four cars will show. Ford Fiesta WRC Sebastien Ogier’s M-Sport Ford Fiesta WRC arrived at Rally Finland in July with a substantially revised rear end. Aimed at improving the car’s aerodynamic performance, it had been developed in Ford Racing’s Dearborn wind tunnel by M-Sport chief rally engineer Chris Williams, together with…

It is not only Williams that has struggled with the floor of its car in 2018. At the Italian Grand Prix one of the Haas VF-18s was disqualified for running with an illegal floor. Ahead of the summer break it had become clear that a number of teams had interpreted a regulation relating to the shape of the leading edge of the front splitter differently to the FIA. The rules state that the outer corners must have a 50mm radius, but some teams, including Haas, exploited what they felt was a loophole allowing them to claim that outer parts of the splitter were in fact parts of the barge board and did not have to comply with the 50mm rule. A technical directive was issued outlawing this practice which gave…

GT3 cars today have to be versatile and meet more criteria than ever before Visually, the Lamborghini Huracan GTE Evo features a small upgrade to the existing model, which was first introduced to GT3 racing in 2015. The current Huracan has already scored multiple race wins and won the Blancpain Series teams’ title in 2017. Yet under the skin, the Evo is almost a new racecar. The Evo kit features a new roll cage, a new engine, a new rear suspension, as well as a revised driveshaft quick-change mechanism, a new power steering system and a new aero package that is designed to increase downforce, with only a slight drag penalty. GT3 cars today have to be versatile and meet more criteria than ever before. With a global market, they…

It quickly became clear that something had to be done to curb the growth of aerodynamic testing in F1, and its associated costs In January 2018, the FIA introduced the latest evolution of aerodynamic testing restrictions for Formula 1, and with them came the biggest change in CFD restrictions since they were first introduced back in 2009. Racecar went behind the scenes with HPC specialist, Boston Ltd, to discover the impact of these changes and how Formula 1 teams have not only benchmarked new solutions, but also upgraded their CFD supercomputers. But to put these latest changes into context we need to understand the history of the restrictions, both for CFD and the wind tunnel. In 2008, aerodynamic testing was at its peak. BMW Sauber, Honda, Williams and Toyota had…

‘We can share valuable content such as video footage in real-time, which enables us to make better strategy calls’ With ever increasing technical restrictions, gains in F1 are usually marginal. Hundredths of seconds shaved off a pit stop or thousandths of a second with a new wing all add up. So, given that race strategy can play a critical role in the outcome of a race, it’s unsurprising that innovation in this area is booming. What is surprising is that some of the gains possible are up to 25 per cent. The need to make quick decisions is well understood by race engineers. It’s not unusual to make a call in less than five seconds; responding to a rival’s strategy, a safety car or change in the weather. At McLaren,…