Quote:
Originally Posted by Kampfer
in addition to some engineers who think aerodynamics are the most useless thing to transfer to cars. This last point is exacerbated by the fact that 70-80% of a racecar's performance these days is all about aero.
F1 should be pioneering NEW, RELEVANT technologies that lower classes can adapt. For example, Audi was the first manufactuer to introduce diesels into racing (even though Taurus Sport in 2004 [before Audi] tried to get VW to help them with the same thing).
Maybe I'm just getting old...
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On the surface, I would agree with your comments, but if you look at the technologies employed in the tools utilized to design F1 cars, I believe there is a lot of knowledge transfer within a manufacturer.
Aero - do road cars benefit from advances in F1? Sure, an F1 car aero is all about balancing downforce vs drag - the principles/software/theories/hardware used to better determine this in F1 trickle down to production cars - but with the balance more towards less drag and less towards downforce. Lots of cars now have cD's of less than 0.3 - almost unheard of a generation ago.
Tires - same thing plus the learnings taken from the chemistry in the tire compounds
Engines - ditto. Now we start adding the leading edge practical application of combustion dynamics, material advancements, FEA modelling basis reliability/weight, etc. that are developed in the lab, fine tuned in F1, and then transformed into use in the design of production cars.
Organization - want to motivate your engineers and put them on almost vertical learning curves? Assign them to the F1 team. Learn more in one season than ten on the assembly line.
Return on Investment - want to develop a new car line? Well, would you rather take a $1B and spread that out over 6 years or 4 before generating a return. I'll take 4, and to do that I need leading edge management of change processes, rapid prototyping, computer design, etc. All things that the F1 pressure cooker teaches and pushes.
Probably many more examples than that if I could type quicker.
