Controversial it may be, but the FIA's push to make Formula One more relevant to the roadcar world does seem to be having an impact. Take KERS for instance. Introduced in 2009, outlawed in 2010 and reintroduced for 2011, there must be hardly an OEM vehicle manufacturer anywhere who doesn't have some form of energy recovery programme of one form or another. Likewise, the rules for 2014 stipulating not the maximum amount of fuel to be used during a race (as has hitherto been the norm)...
"One Man's Dream - The Britten Bike Story!" is the title of the DVD that goes alongside the biography of John Britten, the inventor of the Britten V1000, the legendary self-build race bike from the early 1990s that was able to threat the major manufacturers' superbikes for the podium. In this article I would like to show the inventiveness that small/low-level racing teams need for them to progress in their racing classes. Professional teams, with professional-level budgets,...
As in all mechanical systems when adjacent parts in contact move relative to each other, wear will inevitably take place. Even in the best designs, lubrication only serves to delay the onset of damage, and failure of one form or another will always occur. The interface between piston/piston ring and the cylinder bore is a perfect example. In reviewing wear therefore it is perhaps necessary to distinguish between what might be termed normal and abnormal events. Abnormal wear might be...
Maybe it's just me but for some reason choosing the most appropriate seal material for an application used to make me uncomfortable. Bamboozled by the plethora of the various product catalogues (for this was before the Internet age) the decision would often be left to the last possible moment, with all the attendant issues it created. I'm sure I wasn't alone but back then small leaks were often tolerated and, with engine accessibility far easier, could be readily repaired or...
When I last wrote a short piece on the subject of exhaust systems in Formula One, it was just ahead of the 2011 season. Little could we have predicted the central role that exhaust systems, combined with different engine management strategies, would play during the past season. The cause of the furore was the use by some of the more successful teams of exhaust flows to influence the aerodynamic behaviour of the car. The addition of significant mass flows of exhaust gas over, through or...