Maybe they want to make the cars wider to avoid redoing all the aero because of the fatter tyres. Cars will look better for sure, but will make overtaking harder. I think that they can make grippier tyres without making them wider, just leaving more leeway to Pirelli instead of forcing them to deliberately make crap.
On a race car, if you opt for the larger tyre width, to put more power on the road, prevent wheelspin, etc... you should also add extra downforce, to compensate for the decrease in weight pressure of the contact patch (the area of tyre in contact with the road). Increasing tyre width is not a panacea for higher corner speed; you also increase rolling resistance with too much grip. Finally, in F1, tyres are an important factor in the drag coefficient, and putting larger tyres will significantly compromise the aerodynamics since it's an open-wheel configuration. Since you talk about road cars; I have seen several times boy racers reducing their top speed by fitting too wide tyres on their cars! If you don't increase the power, but just rolling resistance, you end up with the result opposite of what you wish for!
Agree in that fatter tyres are worse for aero and rolling resistance, but you were talking about grip. Even old open-wheel cars without wings used fat tyres when availiable.
Up to a point, but they didn't go too far in that direction. And wings where adopted in the late 60s precisely to put more weight on the tyres to increase grip!
Well, wings always bring more grip, with or without fat tyres. The first time someone put a wing on a car they still didn't have fat tyres.
BUt the grip you get by using wings is not ideal, because it's easily afected by other cars, the less wing you use, probably the less afected the chasing car will be.....extractors and undertray design would help more and be less afected than big wings...
Broad strokes look good to me. I'm sure they won't get it perfect, or to everyone's standards, but at least they are feeling around in the correct areas.
There's a nexus point where Ron takes over from an injured Button and drives himself and McLaren to WDC & WCC this year ....... theoretically
Even if they went back in time, and brought back ayrton to drive the car, it couldn't save them. They need carte blanc to start again with their engine design, pull it apart big time and re-engineer it. Trouble is, the FIA would rather see teams die than have common sense and allow them to make the racing interesting...... Damned stupid. I haven't wanted McLaren to do well since Senna left them, but they don't deserve the embarrassment of having to turn up and blow up every fortnight.
They've agreed to further reduce testing again, and NO in season tests at all; Cheers, Ian Testing seriously reduced in 2016 - Pitpass.com
So if your car isn't competitive by the Russian GP (May 1 - 4 races in) abandon all hope and focus on next year? That's a mind-bogglingly stupid rule change likely to make the end of season races even more pointless than they often are.
Agreed. "They" just don't seem to get it at all sometimes. However, we've got to remember *they* voted on it, and I believe it has to be unanimous to be implemented next season. As noted, April 1st does seem appropriate! Cheers, Ian
Next up: All cars eliminated in Q1 get 20kg penalty for the race. Those eliminated in Q2 get 10kg penalty.
No, I think he is right. The rules should handicap those without Mercedes engine even more. So, Q3 will be between 8 or 10 of them. Just kidding ... It's a great pity WEC doesn't have 21 races next year; I think I would prefer watching that instead. Say what you want, but GP2 and MotoGP look very attractive to follow now.
F1 needs to set up an independent technical body with a strong dictator calling the shots and get rid of this unanimous nonsense. All the teams are doing is watering down every great idea as they need all teams to agree to changes. Down that path lies mediocrity and then ruin. Numpties.
