rec.autos.simulators

just for fun I made a small "research" of the techical failures that
occured during the F1 season 1967. I used "The Complete Encyclopedia
of Formula One" by Bruce Jones (ed.), Carlton 1998.

I examined only the cars represented in GPL, and that is why I also
left the first 3 races out: Some teams were still using -66 cars.

So only races in Spa, Le Mans(!), Silverstone, Nurnburgring, Mosport,
Monza, Watkins Glen and Mexico are included. (There were some private
drivers using some earlier version of Lotus than Lotus-Ford 49, they
are included.)

        starts  technical  %    most frequent
                failures         failure

Lotus     23      14      61    engine(3), ignition(3), suspension(3)
Honda      6       2      33
Brabham   26       8      31    engine(4)
BRM       27      17      63    engine(5)
Cooper    35      15      43    engine(6)
Eagle     13      10      77    engine(3)
Ferrari   11       2      18

Arto

PS And the number of accidents was only 2...

Hmmm.  Im gonna think twice about using the honda then.  I havent started a
season but it seems reliable and unlike the Ferrari i can actually drive it.
Back to the garage fo me!!!

----

In helping me decide about which car to use in an off-line series, I did
some research a while back as to the reliability of the various cars
from the actual 1967 season. Here are my results ....

First I looked at the percentage of laps completed.  To calculate this I
added the number of laps each car actually completed to get the
numerator.  The divisor is a little more complicated.  If the car was
still running at the end, I just added the number of laps completed.
Similarly, if the car was in an accident, I just added the number of
laps completed.  If the car had a mechanical DNF, I added the total
number of laps in the race.  There are some minor flaws in this - you
can get a 100% reliability rating if you crash out early; problems that
cause the car to dramatically slow, but still allow the car to finish,
are not reflected, etc.  Here are my findings for this approach:

1) Ferrari 95.7%
2) Brabham 89.7%
3) Honda 80.2%
4) Cooper 68.8%
5) Lotus 68.1%
6) BRM 64.5%
7) Eagle 36.4%

Second, I looked at the percentage of DNFs.  If a car crashed out, I did
not count it at all for the race.  So this calculation is the number of
times the cars was running at the end divided by the number of starts
for the car minus the number of times the car DNF'ed due to an accident
(not a mechanical failure).  

1) Ferrari 85.7%
2) Brabham 81.8%
3) Cooper 58.5%
4) Honda 55.6%
5) BRM 41.9%
6) Lotus 40.9%
7) Eagle 18.8%

No matter how you look at it, Ferrari and Brabham were by far the most
reliable cars and the Eagle was down right pitiful.  As bad as the Lotus
looks in these figures, it was actually even worse because a few times
Clark was leading only to have a non-fatal malfunction that cost him the
lead, but didn't cause a complete DNF.

I hope someone finds this interesting and/or useful.

Dave Ewing