"roflcopter" (roflroflroflcopter)
12/12/2013 at 01:22 • Filed to: None
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"roflcopter" (roflroflroflcopter)
12/12/2013 at 01:22 • Filed to: None | 1
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So. RBR and Vettel's RB9. I know. I know. This has been gone over and over and over. But I has ideas. Good ideas. And they don't include KERS, modified electronic control units, or black magic. If you don't wanna hear 'em, you don't gotta click.
The common theories seem to center around both the KERS and extra electrical systems in the car. First I will confront the issue of any electrical system in the car(besides KERS) that they might be using to implement traction control. The sensors and actuators in the cars that are used for engine management are just about as isolated as possible from the ones used for telemetry, which means that a team doesn't have any reliable way to mess with what goes on engine side, so no torque limiting from that side. The closest they could get would be altering the signals inside the wires between the sensors and ECU to act as a piggyback of sorts to 'trick' the ECU into doing what they want(which is actually kind of a good idea, maybe I'll do another post describing how that could be accomplished without breaking any rules or being detectable).
As for using KERS in a traction control scheme, it seems relatively plausible. I mean you can brake the wheels without brakes(harvest mode) and add power(boost mode) which is all you really need to create a traction control system. The fatal flaw with this plan is that it would be pretty easy to detect and you would need sensors hooked up to the control systems that RBR actually has control over, which isn't much(F1 uses a generically supplied ECU from McLaren Electronics). I'm sure the FIA would have caught on to anything they were doing in this direction and it would be in direct violation of the rules in place against traction control.
Now that those are covered, let's go into my theory(or should I say hope?) of how they are controlling traction. I like to think of how things can be done in their absolute simplest form and in roundabout ways at the same time, if that makes sense. I had the idea of a fully mechanical system, which to begin with might sound crazy, but it would be neigh impossible to detect and I think it would be feasible to implement. My idea is essentially induced, and controlled, wheel hop. When's the last time you put down power and had your wheels start to spin? If the suspension is tuned correctly the wheels will spin and you have to come way off the power to allow them to slow down enough to match the vehicle speed to gain traction again, all while you are trying to keep the rear-end in line. Now... if your suspension is improperly tuned, or your shocks are blown, then the wheels will start oscillating up and down while spinning, which is called wheel hop. While this is happening you get the chance to back off slightly to regain traction quicker and one or the other tire has traction which keeps the rear-end from getting too crazy. Now with that general concept, and a few million dollars of R&D, I think a team with the resources of RBR could tune a suspension to create a perfectly diminishing oscillation to keep traction at a maximum and allow Vettel to react quick enough to keep from losing the rear-end. Now this explains the tire marks, sound, ability of him to get on the power earlier, and take better lines. While these things would allow for him to shave a little bit of time off, would it be enough for his car to actually be 30+ seconds faster? I think that there may be more to this theory than just the suspension. Since even in a true traction control system you can only maximize the time the tire is in contact with the ground and limit the slip, not actually increase the grip produced, I think there is room for further improvement. If you remember from a few years back, F1 was using a tool called a mass damper in the nose of the cars to limit the effects of clipping rumble strips and small variations in the track surface. In this season there were rumors of RBR using a form of mass damper in Vettel's car(even though they are outlawed) that was actually just the front wing/splitter. This same idea could be used in the rear aero as well. Think of the wheel hop as a diminishing wave and the flex in the bodywork that is not regulated by the FIA as another diminishing wave. As the wheels and tires bounce upwards during a specific wheel hop it transfers energy into the chassis of the car through the suspension which would normally continue to carry the mass of the car upwards as the suspension pushed the wheel/tire back down. If the bodywork was flexing in the way I'm describing, this kinetic energy could be stored in it, then put back into the chassis at the correct moment to force the wheel/tire down onto the pavement even harder. While this kind of system can never be perfect, with enough time on a chassis dyno, suspension modeling sophistication, and prototyping abilities it wouldn't be unheard of to match these different components to gain the most possible grip while still limiting the amount of wheel spin to short bursts instead of a total loss of traction.
For anyone who has made it this far, I'm sorry for making you read that.
*disclaimer: I know just enough about all of these different systems to occasionally sound like I know what I'm talking about and fool people into listening to me.
Flat Six
> roflcopter
12/12/2013 at 01:47 |
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Cool idea. It's so crazy, it MIGHT JUST WORK!
With-a-G is back to not having anything written after his username
> roflcopter
12/12/2013 at 11:34 |
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Interesting but if it's inducing hop it's doing the opposite of what the mass dampers were designed to do. Furthermore, unless you are also modulating the torque in time with the high-normal-force phase of the cycle, you will induce more wheel slip because the wheels will easily accelerate when lifted and then hit the ground with sliding friction instead of rolling friction.
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roflcopter
> With-a-G is back to not having anything written after his username
12/12/2013 at 11:48 |
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The suspension is what is inducing the wheel hop, the mass damper would be used as a system to keep the wheel hop in check, so it becomes a limited system instead of allowing the wheel hop to keep building on itself.
I don't believe that he is truly getting to flat foot it out of the corners with this system, I think this system would only allow him a bit more room for error before spinning the car. Good exit speed is all about maximizing your time not only putting power down but also putting it down with the car pointed in the right direction. It would just allow him to grip up sooner with less throttle modulation than if the wheels were spinning together, all without having to countersteer because the back end got loose.
I'm really just working through this in my head so please don't take this as me trying to say I'm right, I just enjoy talking about ideas like this.