If there were no rules...

I have absolutely no doubt that such a race series is coming in my lifetime.

It's a cinch that self-driving cars (whatever we end up calling them) are the future, and at that point, I can see two kinds of racing. Nostalgic/historic racing with the drivers piloting the cars, and "modern" racing where the emphasis is on the vehicle and technology entirely.

I think both series would be cool to watch.

 

Hmm, not sure I like that.

The one without drivers in the cars will only be watched by some tech geeks. As they said in "The right stuff": No Buck Rogers, no bucks. Without the human element and the risk of somebody getting hurt, the audience won't be there.
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I loved the raw shriek of the Honda when revs were dropping.

 

Lamborghini V12 was the best of the era; prior to that the Ligier Matra.

 

It wasn't Formula "1" it was "Libre" .... although your point is taken, perhaps it should been called "no formula" and Libre

Whilst some comments here about adding weapons do show how silly you could make this, I actually think there was something to the concept behind it - that was to, as far as possible, unshackle the engineers.

The massive mistake in the "reduce spending at all costs" path F1 has been heading down is it has constipated creativity. In reality we have homogenous cars where we get excited about a break-through of a tenth a lap. Now add some "super mario" gimmicks to induce copious amounts of flavourless passing (yawn).

I still fervently maintain that a massive freeing up of the rules would provide the right environment for the "brilliant" ideas and concepts that can come often with little cost. There's a reason the Horners of the world want to keep the restrictive rules in place - it ensure other teams have little scope to match, let alone surpass them.

 

Formula Libre was also at a time when there was not as much overall control on the Grand Prix circuit...

you could have F-1 cars, indy cars, sports cars all competing at one time. Libre was so that people who had cars pre war could race the newer cars...

I think opening the rules up is very important.

 

There have to be some rules: so let us state some useful rules:
A) car has to fit in a box (max length, max width, max height)
B) there must be a limit on the amount of fuel carried
C) there must be a limit on the width of the tires

Given such minimal set of rules:

D) G forces exceeding 7 Gs would be "no problemo" for the car in braking
E) at least 6 Gs in cornering
F) movable aerodynamics would allow 275 MPH on tracks like Indianapolis
G) race distances would be limited by fuel carried

 

I agree with Rule A, but not the others. I propose:

A) car has to fit in a box (max length, max width, max height)
B) Race distance will be 150 miles to the nearest lap. Use as much fuel as you want. Have as many tyre changes as you want. Have re-fuelling if you want.
C) There will be rules on driver behaviour so deliberate blocking etc would be sanctioned so weapons etc wouldn't be an advantage.

 

I think the most sensible way would be to allow the use of the existing chassis and engines, but with no engine restrictions.

 

The Red Bull concept merely supposes streamlined wheels and closed cockpits are allowed (or mandatory); just go back through all the things that have been tried and banned (or banned before they found their way into F1):

alcohol fuel (banned 1958).
fully enclosed bodywork (banned 1961).
big aerofoils mounted directly on unsprung uprights.
'fan car', both with 2 engines or with gearbox fan .
skirted ground effects.
more than 4 wheels.
more than 1 engine.
engines with 12 or 16 cylinders, or gas turbines or Wankels.
coachwork separated from sprung chassis, e.g. Lotus 88.

And then all the fine-tuning on wing sizes, tyre widths, engine size and configuration, underbodies, blowing exhausts, etc., etc.

These were spoofs but more like what the imagination of an F1 designer would come up with:
http://pds.exblog.jp/pds/1/200409/29/87/b0028287_1173298.jpg

http://www.mm2france.fr/wp-content/uploads/mm2/records/Molki/cheating_german.jpg


Paul M

 

interesting read. great thread.

 

While it did indeed sound good, that's about all it was good for!...... IIRC, it was always ~50-100HP down on the others. It was, basically, ****!

*Loved* that motor! For reasons unknown to me it was always unique & instantly recognizable.

Cheers,
Ian

 

When i was a kid, the Matra was the loudest and had the highest pitch ... BRM and Ferrari were loud too but not like the Matra. you could tell the difference

the Lambo in the 1990's was a nice sound... had some real low down grunt... I remember being at Spa hearing it at la source and then at the bus stop chicane ... the Ferrari was really awsome on the blast up from Malmedy...

 

I agree. I think its time to re open old banned technology.. some of it was for safety sake vs. real performance. I like the idea of limit the fuel and maximize the distance... GP's should be 2 hours min, 3 Hours max.

With all the electronics today, and composite materials high mounted wings directly on the uprights would make sense... much stronger than anything back in the 60's... Multi cyl engines - up to 24 cyl... wankel, turbine, diesel, Hydrogen, etc... all should be encouraged.

moveable aero and active suspension - IVT, all that needs to be encouraged. 4wd ....
I'm for bringing back the big wings, fat tires, big engines... 1000HP max. simply raise the weight and weight distribution to limit performance.....
the other thing is you have to let people be able to buy a chassis and engine ... to compete. that is what keeps the cost's so high.

LOLA, Dallara, March, Penske, VW, BMW etc.. could all be making money from selling chassis or engines - and spice up the F-1 world. Right now its a closed club, of whinging rich guys.... while I dont mind the rich guys, I mind the total lack of innovation... its just a spec series now.

 

Just give teams a maximum engine size 2.4 liters for example and what ever configuration.
Bring back refueling.
Active areo
What ever traction control you want

 

Not exactly, McLaren was going to use Lambo motors and Senna even tested a modified chassis with one equipped and was very complimentary. In the end, the deal fell apart

 

Aren't tires the real limiting factor? How many laps at 9Gs do you think a tire would last?

Dale

 

Well, given that they were looking into doing a deal he's hardly going to get out of the car and say "it's ****" is he?.......

Maybe he did say just that behind closed doors and that's the reason the deal fell thru? Just a thought.

Cheers,
Ian

 

About 3 more than the driver.

 

Or they took a quick dance with the Italian chick to make someone else jealous.

 

+1 [Or two if they're Pirelli's ]

All joking aside, and it's been touched upon above, would a g-suit even work in this environment?

As we know, they're (basically) designed to keep blood flowing to the brain when it all wants to go to the feet; A very different problem to that which they'd encounter in a car with huge lateral loading.

As for tires that could take it; I don't see any real reasons why it couldn't be done? It would obviously take *huge* amounts of D/F to get anywhere near those loads, but as long as they're not slipping too much all should be good I think.

Cheers,
Ian

 

Well there seems to be a trend in music. Why not F1? They can't be more mechanical than some of today's drivers.

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Nah, it fell apart because Ronnie wanted to switch to Peugeot due to the fact Renault was the best engine at the time and he believed that a power war between the two French manufacturers would take off. Obviously, he was wrong.

Of note - from Wikipedia:

Straight from Senna's mouth. Sounds like it had some balls to me.