Lotus reactive ride height system legal.....

Hey,

From Autosport, edited for brevity;

So much for them being "conservative" this season..... Kimi may disappear into the distance

Cheers,
Ian

 

Good stuff. Flexing wings is so 2011....

 

Like totally !!

 

You really think he'll be that far back????


Mark

 

Leave it to Lotus engineers to take it to the next level! This is awesome!

 

Wow, very interesting. Can't wait to see how this plays out. I'd love to see Kimi get a competitive car...

 

It was a French fellow with Renault who designed this and I cannot remember his name.....


Honda CBR's of the '80s used a similar system, and Mercedes has a similar system. The system is interesting on both as it is sort of a ride height control while bracking, only Mercedes at the moment appears to be a function mainly used on the rear end which I believe they only implemented at Spa moving forward.

 

What a load of BS! So mass dampers were not legal but this is.

If this device was invented by Red Bull, it would be banned inmediately. But oh, well, Renault (or Lotus-Renault or whatever) needs some help.

 

Was that really necessary?

 

They would, wouldn't they?!..... [Source?]

Seriously, it's pretty easy to do an anti-dive and/or anti-squat system - Tweak the relative angles between the wishbones. IIRC, Colin used it extensively, and particularly noted on the Lotus 72.

However, this system apparently uses hydraulics directly on the lower front wishbones. [I can't find the reference now, but read it somewhere earlier.]

If true, how it can be considered "non-moveable" is left as an exercise for the reader.....

Charlie says they're good, so they're good.

Cheers,
Ian

 

I'm gonna guess you didn't understand what the mass damper was doing?..... Just because it wasn't in the airstream didn't mean it's purpose was improving aero stability, and you can't do that with anything that "moves"......

With respect, nonsense IMO. Seems they asked Charlie over a year back - He looked at it and gave 'em the green light. I'm sure it would have been the same had it been Adrian doing the asking. [Having said that, see my previous comment about hydraulic activation ]

Cheers,
Ian

 

What's odd is I believe Lotus tested this at the end of 2010 yet it still didn't help their 2011 season. And their very clever fluid inerter didn't work so well either in '11. Growing pains until perfection perhaps? Very possible
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

I think it´s OK that they deemed this legal. But if (Lotus)-Renault´s new ride height system is legal because it´s not an movable aero device, then why Renault´s mass damper was illegal? Of course, it had an impact on aero, because everything in a modern F1 car has an impact on aerodynamics, just like this new system. So what´s the difference if it´s "linked to the suspension" or not? They banned the exhausts of the blown diffuser despite "being linked to the engine".

Ironically, everybody has been using flexible wings for ages and FIA doesn´t care if that´s a movable aero device or not. But then a mass suspended INSIDE the car is a movable aero device!

Sure? His blown diffuser was legal in 2010... and illegal in 2011 when they were blowing the competition apart.

But who cares, we all know how this show works, and we´re still watching.

 

Lotus? I remember how Eric was saying that the car would challenge for wins with its unique exhaust layout.

 

Last season they certainly went with something very different and radical which I believe was smart. I wish the best of luck to Lotus in getting this technology to work in their favor as it is clearly the wave of the future.

 

I think it is nice to see these sort of innovations returning to F1.

 

It did pretty damn well in the first two races.

 

Indeed. I reckon they had too much on their plate with the forward exhaust - They went down a blind alley on that one and everything else got back-burnered maybe? Good to see 'em trying to innovate though.

Not true. They were all blowing the devil out of the diffuser all season! Charlie tried to ban "exotic" engine mappings, but other than the Silvertsone incident even that failed to get unanimous approval and hence didn't change. [As an aside, it always amuses me when folk claim they've "got to stop messing with the rules" - It's very rare for rule changes to occur during the season in F1 - This ain't taxicab racing after all ]

Cheers,
Ian

 

And what´s the difference? Those engine mappings were legal at the beginning of the season and then suddenly illegal at Silverstone. Only after the teams agreement FIA allowed them to use it for the rest of the season, but FIA really wanted to change (errr... "change the interpretation of") the rules during the season.

 

That was probably before Robert's injury.

 

Yes, but the season is not 2 races mate

The thing about Lotus is, they seem to blame the drivers for everything. Robert, Nick, Vitaly, and Bruno. It's as if the drivers were the one that designed the car.

I hope Kimi ditch them after this season and link up with Red Bull. Or Force India.