Brock Yates "Sandbox Formula" - formula libre

[Jared]

Brock Yates has a column on www.speedvision.com about how alike the cars are that run in F1, CART and the IRL. He gives a proposal for a new formula car where, outside of a survival pod for the drivers, the rest of the car is totally formula libre. He encourages readers to e-mail in suggestions for the type of car they would build. There's also a dig at NASCAR which I'm sure some of you will like. Check it out. It's http://www.speedvision.com/pub/artic...s/000314a.html

If you do partake in this, I would like to see your ideas posted here. What do you say?

[Peter Mallett]

Hi Jared,

The rules normally say no url posting but as its part of the topic I think its ok. I am also interested in the response to this one.

[KC]

The article is a good one. It is food for thought. He recalls the golden ages when Ford V8s, Ferrari V12s, and Renault Turbos all fought on the same track in F1. When Offenhausers, turbines, and Millers fought for Indy 500 honors. The rules of the day have brought motor racing down to the common denominator. All of the CART and F1 cars look so much alike minus their paint. He has called for a common wheelbase and track configuration with a standard driver safety cell design. He also calls for races to be a common distacne like 500 miles. Reduce the number of street courses to the few traditional events like Monaco and Long Beach. He also suggests that fuel be standardized to methanol and there would be no fuel stops. Everything else would be open to interpretation. Engine size and capacity would be limited to the amount of fuel the car could carry feasibly. It would allow the teams to employ any type of cylinder configuration or allow the use of turbocharging in an effort to balance horsepower with reliability, fuel economy and manufacturer interest. The issue of cost would arise but his argument is that nomatter what type of racing is doen on a large international scale it will be expensive and no amount of rules will keep it from being so. I like his ideas.

[THR]

Is this guy mad?
altho i might be nice to have a free formula 1 where the cell is the only common thing. but its not possible to make a cell strong enough. yet.
also, typical yank. likes methonal, and going round and round in boring circles.
do yanks have no idea of how to race?

no one is going to pay for this, it would cost a fortune, far more than F1.

i would say they only need to make the regs a little more free to make them better
none of this radical change **** !

[Graham De Looze]

OOOOOOOOOOOOppsssss

[Jared]

Okay, THR, it was just an idea; a "what-if" proposal. He even stated that cost would be no object. And he said that they would race on ovals AND road courses.

And yes, we Yanks know how to race. At least the road courses on this side of the pond haven't had their ball$ cut off in the name of safety.

I can't believe all the mouths and "brains" on this board have had nothing to say on this.

[Graham De Looze]

Youre right about the balls thing,bring back Nurburgring

[Peter Mallett]

Let's just make something plain here folks. The idea sounds interesting. It may not be to everybody's taste and maybe thats why the response is a little subdued. However let's not get tied up with the old chestnut of ovals versus road courses. They are two totally different disciplines and require dramatically different set-ups, such that to compare them is meaningless.

Okay folks, back to the thread.

[THR]

good point. ovals and road are different.

y dont many, if any drivers in the US make it to F1? do they not aspire to race in the best series in the world?

anyway...
i still think that this idea is very silly.
and no one would back it.
well, perhaps two companies might, but then u would have wot... 4 cars?

useless.

[Michael M]

In general no bad idea, although in practice most probably unworkable.
500 miles distance? This is abt. 800 kms or 2 2/3 the distance of current GPs, meaning race duration between 4 and 5 ½ hours, depending on track and weather! And no fuelling stops? Current F1 cars consume abt. 65 ltr/h, for 500 miles this would be in the range of 250-350 litres, the CART figure is 1.85 miles/gallon equivalent to more than 1000 litres for 500 miles. Surprised? Consider that the calorific value of methanol of only half that of gasoline, meaning that for same energy production double volume is needed. Main engineering task for such „Formula Libre“ would be to build a tank fitting into the proposed rectangle of 8 x 3 ft. Okay, you can lower engine capacity and power in order save fuel. What would be a realistic tank volume for a single seater? Not more than 150 ltrs I believe. Potential consumption figures would be 18.8 ltrs / 100 km, resp. 12.5 mls / US-gallon. These are methanol figures, to compare them with standard gasoline use the factor 2, resulting in 9.4 ltrs / 100 km resp. 25 miles / US-gallon. As everybody now realizes, this is the figure of an average road car, engine size 2 to 3 ltrs, power 120 to 180 HP, driven under moderate conditions. Race conditions will increase fuel consumption considerably, so I expect max. engine power of 100 HP based on constants 500 miles, methanol, and 150 litres tank size. This figures would change CART into Kart, and F1 into FF! Great future for GP racing, isn‘t it?

Safety? Is there really one among you believing that a standardized safety pod solves all problems in one go? Even if such pod is so stiff that no deformation at all will be possible, what about g-forces at heavy highspeed crashes? What about fire? The invisibilty of methanol flames doesn’t make it harmless! The combination of „no refuelling“ and „no lower weight limit“ will form a perfect marriage - thinwall rolling fuel tanks!

By the way, methanol and „green“? In terms of exhaust emissions – may be, but before you burn that stuff it’s poisonous like hell.

As I said in the beginning, in general no bad idea, but some details need to be changed, and some more rules applied. 200 miles is enough, free fuel, minimum weight of „dry“ car. Plus some creative additional safety rules, which may contain some totally new ideas (public refusal of car by driver, penalty points for accidents due to constructional risks, etc.).

However, who wants such cars? For sure not the people sitting at the switch boards of motor racing. F1, CART, IRL – all this is (1) big business, and (2) only motor sports. Nobody will drop a successful business and start again from scrap. And what would we like to see? A driver’s or a constructor‘s championship? Do you like a backmarker winning races due to genious construction ideas, or should the best driver win on basis of equal technical equipment? Frankly spoken, I don’t know!