McLaren Tells the Truth.....Finally

You wound up John? I don't believe it!

 

Hmmm, the thing I find interesting about this is how does the Ferrari system be declared legal under the above rule?. Only if there is a separate circuit front to rear ... which ofcourse we know there would be for front to rear balance, but ofcourse the spring alters the pressure and thus force on the rear brakes pads at differen times ... not legal to me.

While in some way I will always be impressed by the engineering of these cars, the fact that the rules are too restricted and politics now very strongly define who is going to be allowed to win ... my interest has gone.

For christmas last year my wife bought me a great book about a woman racing driver in the 30's. One of the most interesting things about that book is it highlighted very clearly that motorracing even back then was not really racing but politics and deals OFF track and thus while the racing on track might have been 50% real it really can never been said to be the fastest really won. This made me quite depressed because while I am aware, thanks to my own club stuff, that this **** does happen (rich kid in by far the best car with the inept driving ability of Sydney taxi driver) I guess I lived in hope that it was real enough. It isn't, and thus if you look at modern motorsport where it is even more contrived ... Kimi isn't really the best driver on the grid, but he is the best at wheeling and dealing his way into the "right" political team and keeping it on the tarmac. My point is that to win a WDC you need 75% BS PR skills and only 25% driving ability ... that is not how it should be, but ofcourse motorracing costs money ...

No wonder most of these guys love karts so much ... you can only apply so much bnllsh!t (+ extra $'s) to a kart and thus talent really does get displayed.
Pete

 

The one thing I really love about F1 is the engineering side how they come with ideas trying to get round the rules,but I have to agree with you there are far to many/restricted.

 

wound up but not outnumbered Mike

next year will be very relaxing now that peace and atonement have descended upon F1

I still wish the big manufacturers like Ford and GM would join the fray like BMW, Toyota, Honda, Renault, etc

are they afraid of the competition or just don't know how to build a competitive F1 car ?

 

They (American car companies) are broke. And no, they not only no know how to make a competitive F1 car, they don't know how to make a competitive road car. That's why they are broke.

 

Except for Saleen.

I was watching the Topgear DVD "The good, the bad, the ugly" which covers all the crappy US sports cars. Only the Ford GT gets high marks, which I would agree with. However I missed the fact, that they weren't even looking at the Saleen. It actually is a fantastic car.

 

Sigh.... I've eliminated the technical description of what the system does and why it does it and left what you seem to be saying corroborates your statement that McLaren used the Ferrari system on its car. Correct? If I've missed something in the post please single it out.

Having said that, it certainly doesn't in the very least corroborate your claims that McLaren used the Ferrari brake system in their car. It'd been observed by everyone who watches the F1 feed that the Ferrari drivers were adjusting a lever from the cockpit, and it turns out from the drawings that McLaren received that they were adjusting the rear brakes. That much is clear from the email discussed in the first paragraph. The second one state that it was widely observed by everyone it, but no one really could say what it was they were doing.

The final paragraph says McLaren found out that the lever controlled the brake system and McLaren had already had a similar device and decided to employ it in the same manor. It certainly shows they used a similar system to the Ferrari one, a system that they'd developed and abandoned back in 2002. Which by your logic Ferrari, it could be argued that as that date proceeds the 2007 Ferrari challenger Ferrari may very well have gotten the idea from McLaren, by what means we don't know. But, you stated and argued that McLaren had stolen the Ferrari brake system and were using it on their cars. This does not say that in any way shape or form. This says they use a similar system that they developed years before in a new application.

This I do not dispute. But, the transcripts in no way shape or form said that McLaren copied Ferrari's brake system. Similar system, yes. Copy? No. The FIA stated that without the Ferrari data McLaren probably would not have utilized the old brake valveing, developed in 2001 to 2002, for the new application. With that in mind the Ferrari data did lead McLaren to a performance benefit (as they probably would not have used the old valve in this way during the 2007 season), and that is what the FIA ruled was in violation of the rule.

I'm still waiting on Corroborating evidence. What you've shown me only proves my point.

 

Interesting that nobody has commented on the fact that I pointed out that the current Ferrari brake bias adjusting system is actually illegal ...

But as we know the purpose of this 'spring' is to limit the rear brake force and then slowly allow it to return to normal ...

.. another example how Ferrari are IN with the FIA and others are not ... oh dear, and simply disappointing
Pete

 

The keyword is "in each ciruit". You have two seperate circuits, one for front, one for rear brakes. Otherwise, there wouldn't be any brake balance at all.

 

Clever system !
I was under the impression that no "automatic" brake bias was allowed. This is why in MS's cockpit views he could be seen constantly fiddling with the bias.
Or are both teams "cheating" ?

 

Heaven forbid what you trying to say...

 

Not sure about that, but if it was illegal, Stepney&Co would have done the same thing as with the moving floor...


(And we'd know it by now with all other teams shouting and screaming )

 

No ... "'The brake system must be designed in order that the force exerted on the brake pads within each circuit are the same at all times.'..."

Ferraris system reduces the pressure in the rear circuit initially, thus how can it be the "same at all times"?

The rule though states that you are not allowed to alter the pressure/force in each circuit ... except ofcourse if the driver changes his force on the brake pedal.

Ferrari's system is illegal IMO ... and Stepney&Co, Florian would have to spend a whole year investigating any F1 car to create the final list of all illegal points, which would be a nice and long list. I accept that all cars sitting on a race track grid are illegal, and that teams cheat ... wish we could though return to racing competitors on the track instead of using "mates in the right places" to remove them .
Pete

 

At that stage, Ferrari must have known they had a mole..

Just add to that, then they may have let it go on and bingo.. Got Mc hook line and sinker in the sh@t well who knows..

 

No. Just imagine the opposite situation - if the force had to be the same on front and rear, we wouldn't have a brake balance. You have the front circuit with left and right brake pads (="brake pads within [front] circuit"), and the force on the left brake pads has to be the same as on the right brake pads at all times. Same thing with the rear circuits. Concerning one circuit for each wheel, I'm sure that there's a rule stating only 2 circuits (front and rear) are allowed.

Speaking of automatic brake balance systems (which you say are banned, I don't know): In engineering terms, if it was automatic, it had to actively measure the state of the brake system, calculate the optimal state with any sensor input possible and adjust the brake balance to match the optimum. Reading the Speed article, this isn't the case - it's just a manually adjustable spring that delays braking at the rear end.

 

Stepney was the chief mechanic. The brake system they had is such a major part he'd have to know it inside out.

 

In your view Florian did Mclaren adopt this system it's quite plain to see they knew of the system before hand only they used valves instead of springs..??

 

That could indeed be the case. The moving floor is not visible to anyone outside the car, to know of its function you either have to be deeply involved in the team or hang under the car with a caliper gauge at 300km/h. Wasn't it the detergent-in-the-tank thing that started unveiling the whole affair?

 

Don't agree. It states the force must be the same at ALL TIMES, thus what they are after is a static brake balance setting between the front and rear of the car (thus statically 80% front and 20% rear, for example). Ferrari intentionally added this spring to dynamically alter that. Thus when the brakes are first applied by Kimi or Massa we might (for example) have 85% front and only 15% rear, and then over time (a very short time, milliseconds probably) it returns to 80% front to 20% rear. We know that their rear brake balance alters OVER TIME, thus it is illegal. You are either choosing to ignore this fact or have not read up on the function of this spring .

The drivers altering the balance via that lever is okay, but not the spring because the springs function is to vary the brake balance and thus it is not a static setting but CHANGING over time.
Pete

 

Yes indeed its all a bit cloak and dagger double crossing and stuff , dont suppose we ever know but I suppose its time to move.. on

 

True. A badly made point on my part. I still say that every race car has atleast 10 illegal items, etc. on any race day. You must push the boundaries to win .

Pete

 

I honestly don't know... thing is, the idea with the spring looks so incredibly simple I can't imagine that no one else in 50 years F1 had thought of it before. There has to be some crucial point which prevented its use, and which Ferrari overcame with some clever solution that no one else has thought of before. McLaren didn't succeed in developing a system with valves which surely was way more sophisticated in its working principle. McLaren engineers aren't stupid, someone of them must have said "well why don't we try a simple spring instead of our valves, ah yes, because of reason X" before. If I was Coughlan, I'd gratefully accept such a new solution to an old problem.

 

No, I agree with you and didn't say anything because I'd thought you did a good job of pointing it out and that nothing more could be said. Though in hind sight I should have given my support to your ideas.

So a late +1 on it being illegal.

 

Interesting Stuff Pete you appear to have a point ..But I cant be bothered looking at rules and regs.