WIRED: Insanely Complex F1 Steering Wheel

Interesting that the brake balance is now on the steering wheel.

 

I can see why kimi complains.

 

Where does the airbag come out?

 

I think it's been on the wheel for a few years now. I wonder what that one that says pedal does?

 

This is the first year. Schumacher one handed through swimming pool, adjusting the balance whilst setting pole in 2012 is something that will stay with me forever.

Pedal will adjust the sensitivity of the accelerator pedal. Different settings for stages of tire wear and track conditions...

 

It's a lot to take in. Frankly, probably too much for a driver to concentrate on the drive and monitor and alter inputs at the same time. But, when the teams are monitoring everything happening on the car, they're likely making the recommended changes to settings.

I'd bet that most drivers are making changes on their own to just a few inputs. They get to know those well enough, and the rest of it is for the engineers to instruct from the pitlane.

Amazing stuff, though. Now we know why these wheels cost what they do. Probably north of $50K each?

CW

 

They all have their own preferred layouts, look at the difference between Lewis' and Rosberg's from last year for instance:

http://s11.postimg.org/4jimnakoz/lewis_nico_steering_wheels.png

I think it becomes second nature relatively quick, especially for the younger guys. For sims I use key combos as well to change certain settings (albeit not to the incredible detail for F1, the sims just don't allow it) and it's something you do blind quite quickly.

They indeed only adjust a few things during quali/race. There is trouble shooting which is a bit more complex but it's also quite straight forward (for instance, when an engineer says ''Swith to fail Gain + 10'' it could fix a glitch/fault of whatever that combo is assigned to). The drivers mostly have to remember where the buttons are and they're placed such a way the driver is most comfortable with. The combinations they are told by their engineer.

30-40K GBP is around the going rate, so 50K USD is almost cheap .

 

It's nice to see and all. But i would prefer to see the boys racing, not tell them how fast they should go.