New F1 engine sound...it's not good

Keith Tanner wrote: So there are fuel limitations to encourage greater efficiency. And then the fuel limitations are juggled to make the engines less efficient just so people don't bitch about the sound. Stupid. I say, set the fuel limits. Let the engineers take it from there. If they want a 300 rpm two-cylinder with four turbos or a V16 that revs to the moon, go for it. Then we'd have a variety of engine sounds and some really interesting design concepts.

It's kind of like the whole thing with how they regulate use of the variable wings so that there is more passing.

I agree. Set a fuel usage limit, and also allow unlimited energy recovery from any type of energy recovery system as long as the system is fully discharged at the start of the race. After that, let the engineers go nuts. That could be just about the ultimate racing series in the world today.

Driven5 wrote:

Keith Tanner wrote: So there are fuel limitations to encourage greater efficiency. And then the fuel limitations are juggled to make the engines less efficient just so people don't bitch about the sound. Stupid. I say, set the fuel limits. Let the engineers take it from there. If they want a 300 rpm two-cylinder with four turbos or a V16 that revs to the moon, go for it. Then we'd have a variety of engine sounds and some really interesting design concepts.

It's kind of like the whole thing with how they regulate use of the variable wings so that there is more passing. I agree. Set a fuel usage limit, and also allow unlimited energy recovery from any type of energy recovery system as long as the system is fully discharged at the start of the race. After that, let the engineers go nuts. That could be just about the ultimate racing series in the world today.

Unleashing the engineers means technological advances but those come with a very high cost. And money is something that is in "relatively" short supply, at least in F1 terms. The FIA, the teams and the manufacturers all co-operate (to some degree) to keep costs down and there is a move to restrict expenses even further. It's a matter a balancing the rules to ensure there is a full grid instead of a handful of cars. Do you really want to watch 8 or 10 cars on a 2 1/2 mile track?

If you're craving cutting-edge technology, follow the WEC. The rule set there is far more conducive to the ultimate racing series of your fantasies.

Oh, and the sounds of the new spec engines is just fine to me.

Agreed, Le Mans is far more interesting technically.

It was the conflicting "you only get this much fuel" and "but you have to spin at 10,000+ rpm" requirements that underlines the goofiness of the current F1 rules.

8 or 10 (competitive) cars on a 2.5 mile track? Reminds me of a race series a few years ago. Can-Am. Everyone hated that.

oldsaw wrote:

Driven5 wrote:

Keith Tanner wrote: So there are fuel limitations to encourage greater efficiency. And then the fuel limitations are juggled to make the engines less efficient just so people don't bitch about the sound. Stupid. I say, set the fuel limits. Let the engineers take it from there. If they want a 300 rpm two-cylinder with four turbos or a V16 that revs to the moon, go for it. Then we'd have a variety of engine sounds and some really interesting design concepts.

It's kind of like the whole thing with how they regulate use of the variable wings so that there is more passing. I agree. Set a fuel usage limit, and also allow unlimited energy recovery from any type of energy recovery system as long as the system is fully discharged at the start of the race. After that, let the engineers go nuts. That could be just about the ultimate racing series in the world today.

Unleashing the engineers means technological advances but those come with a very high cost. And money is something that is in "relatively" short supply, at least in F1 terms. The FIA, the teams and the manufacturers all co-operate (to some degree) to keep costs down and there is a move to restrict expenses even further. It's a matter a balancing the rules to ensure there is a full grid instead of a handful of cars. Do you really want to watch 8 or 10 cars on a 2 1/2 mile track? If you're craving cutting-edge technology, follow the WEC. The rule set there is far more conducive to the ultimate racing series of your fantasies. Oh, and the sounds of the new spec engines is just fine to me.

Exactly why I want to see a budget cap.

oldsaw wrote: Unleashing the engineers means technological advances but those come with a very high cost.

It kinda seems like what the folks with the big wallets object to is the uncertainty of that sort of ruleset.

For a long time, the very restrictive rules meant that the only way to get ahead was to have three shifts of aerodynamicists running wind tunnels 24/7. That's expensive. But it's relatively predictable. You throw X cubic dollars at wind tunnel time, and if your staff is good, you should stay abreast of the competition. Throw in more, go marginally faster.

But you were safe from being shown up by somebody who showed up with a totally different idea and making your current design outdated.

I follow MotoGP more closely than F1, and I may be letting that color this: The major works teams are heavily involved in rules creation there (though some of their works have come back to bite them a bit and they've lost some cred by not providing the full grid that was desired), and they tended towards rules which let the manufacturers' primary teams duke it out, but which more or less guaranteed that a non-works team had virtually no chance of outright victory. The tendency was toward fairly restrictive rules that allowed small but significant advantages in software and seamless shift (no dual clutches allowed, which would make seamless shift attainable for all) and similarly expensive pursuits. If you had the big dollars, you were going to be in with a shout, but if you didn't have Honda/Yamaha/Ducati(Philip-Morris) money, you were fighting for spots well off the podium (mostly).

Again, it seemed like they were keenly focused on keeping the battle set up in terms that might provide challenge, but no surprises. I'm not sure to what extent that's influencing F1, but the aversion to blue-sky thinking seems similar, though in F1 it may be more about making sure the "show" stays tight (also a concern in MotoGP, but the racing there never got quite as processional as F1).

In reply to ransom:

Yep, I see the parallels between F1 and MotoGP, too.

The works teams may have more influence on the rules and I think that's because they don't have the budgets seen in F1 and never will. They want a place to exploit their technical prowess but don't want to kill the golden goose; a lot of people learned lessons from the CanAM series.

The good news is that the satellite teams are pretty darn close to the A-teams and fight for podium spots. With Suzuki likely to return, things look even better. Who knows, maybe Audi will throw enough money towards Ducati so they can hire some better designers and engineers, too.

The bad news is that there still is a lack of bikes on the grid - even after they created CRT class.

McLaren actually made money during much of the Can-Am due to the size of the purses. Yes, Porsche steamrollered everyone with the 917/30 - but McLaren, the dominant marque to that point, had pulled out that year so there really wasn't any competition. Ironically, what spelled the end of the 917/30 was fuel consumption regulations. It wasn't necessarily budgetary.

In reply to Keith Tanner:

McLaren pulled out because they couldn't match Porsche's performance with the 917/10. N/A aluminum block, 509cid Chevy engines in the M20 chassis weren't cutting the mustard.

Ever stop to think those fuel consumption regs were introduced to effectively neuter the Porsche dominance? Even then, the damage was done. Add a bad economy and the oil embargo, racing (in general) received a big hit and CanAm took a round to the temple. It was over.

The resuscitated CanAm with envelope-bodied F5000 cars doesn't count. That series was on life-support before the first car touched the track. And talk about fugly cars.

It's a pretty common trend actually for racing where big money is involved to slowly turn into a nice stable environment for teams with big money who don't want to have the boat rocked by scrappy upstarts.

doesn't seem soo bad to me. Most modern F1 engines don't sound "good". Just high-pitched shrieking. That's the same thing, but with some odd sucking noise to accompany it. Like someone else said, might sound just a bit different in real life.

GameboyRMH wrote: It's a pretty common trend actually for racing where big money is involved to slowly turn into a nice stable environment for teams with big money who don't want to have the boat rocked by scrappy upstarts.

Trouble is, its those scrappy upstarts that spark any real development.

z31maniac wrote: But then enact a budget cap.

Sure, that sounds enforceable.

Kenny_McCormic wrote:

GameboyRMH wrote: It's a pretty common trend actually for racing where big money is involved to slowly turn into a nice stable environment for teams with big money who don't want to have the boat rocked by scrappy upstarts.

Trouble is, its those scrappy upstarts that spark any real development.

Please list some names and what they introduced or accomplished.

So we're talking about a 1.6L engine that makes 750HP and complaining about the sound it makes?

I don't care if it sounds like my dryer when I forget to take the change out of my pants. I want one for my Miata!

oldsaw wrote:

Kenny_McCormic wrote:

GameboyRMH wrote: It's a pretty common trend actually for racing where big money is involved to slowly turn into a nice stable environment for teams with big money who don't want to have the boat rocked by scrappy upstarts.

Trouble is, its those scrappy upstarts that spark any real development.

Please list some names and what they introduced or accomplished.

Back to Can-Am: Chaparral.

In reply to Keith Tanner:

Except Chaparral was racing for 5 years when the CanAm began in 1966. By then, the team had already earned the status as a leading, championship-winning team.

Innovative? Yes. Upstart? No.

oldsaw wrote:

Kenny_McCormic wrote:

GameboyRMH wrote: It's a pretty common trend actually for racing where big money is involved to slowly turn into a nice stable environment for teams with big money who don't want to have the boat rocked by scrappy upstarts.

Trouble is, its those scrappy upstarts that spark any real development.

Please list some names and what they introduced or accomplished.

I don't keep up on F1, but its a pretty common thing in any even marginally competitive environment.

Typically the big money team takes the scrappy upstarts idea and uses their big money to give it an edge over the upstart. The upstart never wins, but they rock the boat enough to evolve stuff. I used to be on a FIRST FRC team (a truly competitive engineering environment if there ever was one) and that's exactly how it worked. The 100+ person teams backed up by Lockheed Martin and the like usually won, based on cobbled together at the last second by 7 people robots they saw in the pits from their runner ups last year. As head mechanical guy, that was my job when I wasn't sleeping, reading mcmaster-carr or fixing our scrappy robot, wandering around the pits and thinking, "why didn't we do it that way". To think the bigger teams didn't do the same, and act on it with their larger budget and manpower would be asinine.

Junkyard_Dog wrote: So we're talking about a 1.6L engine that makes 750HP and complaining about the sound it makes? I don't care if it sounds like my dryer when I forget to take the change out of my pants. I want one for my Miata!

So put a big turbo on the Miata and spin it fast enough that there's no time for detonation to occur despite the acres of boost you are feeding it.

On the plus side, it should still last longer than a F1 engine. I hear that they have to last for TWO races now!

Now if you want a good engine to copy, try the old Group B engines... most were 1700cc because of how the weight breaks worked, and while they were "only" 400-500hp, that was power intended to be used over 2000 miles of racing and transiting per rally. No zero-margin gram shaving there.

oldsaw wrote: In reply to Keith Tanner: Except Chaparral was racing for 5 years when the CanAm began in 1966. By then, the team had already earned the status as a leading, championship-winning team. Innovative? Yes. Upstart? No.

Sorry, I didn't read your rulebook. It was a two-man shop that was first on the track with some of the most important developments in racing history, forcing the rest of the field to change to keep up. I figured that was good enough.

Keith Tanner wrote:

oldsaw wrote: In reply to Keith Tanner: Except Chaparral was racing for 5 years when the CanAm began in 1966. By then, the team had already earned the status as a leading, championship-winning team. Innovative? Yes. Upstart? No.

Sorry, I didn't read your rulebook. It was a two-man shop that was first on the track with some of the most important developments in racing history, forcing the rest of the field to change to keep up. I figured that was good enough.

Keith- Chaparral was virtually a works GM team. They did a lot of development on the black lake, and pioneered a lot of new data acqusition. All thanks to GM. They may have done upstart things, but had massive engineering support- which was never actually official since GM didn't race.

Just read "Race Car Vehicle Dynamics" by the Millikens.

So, is this sound really offensive?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3nnAtVq74o

It's a turbo 1.6 that does not spin to 15k.

I can't imagine them sounding worse than Indy cars and I like the Indy sound quite a lot this year.

Just looks like a thread for (the same) people to bitch about F1 instead of really being much about the sound of the new engine

alfadriver wrote: So, is this sound really offensive? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3nnAtVq74o It's a turbo 1.6 that does not spin to 15k.

Nope. This was a neat piece as well regarding that car:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldTEesFbd5s

alfadriver wrote:

Keith Tanner wrote:

oldsaw wrote: In reply to Keith Tanner: Except Chaparral was racing for 5 years when the CanAm began in 1966. By then, the team had already earned the status as a leading, championship-winning team. Innovative? Yes. Upstart? No.

Sorry, I didn't read your rulebook. It was a two-man shop that was first on the track with some of the most important developments in racing history, forcing the rest of the field to change to keep up. I figured that was good enough.

Keith- Chaparral was virtually a works GM team. They did a lot of development on the black lake, and pioneered a lot of new data acqusition. All thanks to GM. They may have done upstart things, but had massive engineering support- which was never actually official since GM didn't race.

For the engines, yes. And the sucker car, of course. But the flipper wings and the emphasis on aero in the first few years of the series? I don't think that was GM. That was Jim Hall.

But apparently my impressions of Can-Am aren't those held by the majority. So I'll step out of this discussion.