rec.autos.simulators

by **Jason Steine** » Fri, 15 Apr 2005 13:36:16

> > You and me certainly have a different view of what racing is, but
> > that's ok...

> Well, we all certainly love to see close, on track action and
> racing for the lead. But racing, and particularly F1, is about more
> than that. The race for the constructors Championship and also the
> drivers Championship should be a great fight 'til about the last
> race I'd say. It's certainly a lot better than wondering by what
> race MS will have tied up the title, that's for sure.

Was every other racing series on the planet just not enough for you?
You had to have F1 too?

Can't we have one for people who want to see the state of auto
designing art advanced to the highest level possible? Just one? Is
that too damn much to ask?

I guess so.

jason

--
"Listen, my boy, I can't abide children. I know it's the style nowadays to
make a terrible fuss over you - but I don't go for it. As far as I'm concerned,
they're no good for anything but screaming, torturing people, breaking things,
smearing books with jam and tearing the pages." - The Neverending Story

by **Byron Forbe** » Sat, 16 Apr 2005 17:21:33

>> > You and me certainly have a different view of what racing is, but
>> > that's
>> > ok...

>> Well, we all certainly love to see close, on track action and racing
> for
>> the lead. But racing, and particularly F1, is about more than that. The
> race
>> for the constructors Championship and also the drivers Championship
>> should
>> be a great fight 'til about the last race I'd say. It's certainly a lot
>> better than wondering by what race MS will have tied up the title, that's
>> for sure.

>> Didn't like Trulli pushing Alonso earlier? It does require a little
>> brainwork/imagination to appreciate F1 compared to some other forms of
>> the
>> sport. :)

> I just don't like things being done to stop one man from winning. It
> should
> be up to the teams to get better, not rules and regulations being changed
> to
> bring one driver back to the pack. Might as well turn it into NASCAR and
> make it artificially competitive.

I doubt this is the case - I definantly don't want to see the results
determined b4 the cars even roll off the trucks by who's the best money
gathering team - anything to minimize this factor is a good thing. Ferrari's
lateness at getting their new car ready is no ones fault but theirs - maybe
a little complacency creeping in here.

by **Dave Henri** » Sat, 16 Apr 2005 21:14:24

The tire rules were pushed by Michelin and all their teams, they knew
they had skins that would hold up better than Bridgestone. Next, Ferrari
was not late with their new car. for the last 3 seasons they have taken
the extra time to develop their new car. For the last 3 years the old car
was more than capable of dealing with the 'new' cars of the other teams.
So no ***, just ego on the part of the Red Team, ego that has been
deflated since several teams have finally stepped up to Ferrari's level.
Finally somebody has brought the fight to Mr Schumacher. And this is
partly due to the rules. Which were most definately 'aimed' at him.

dave henrie

by **Byron Forbe** » Mon, 18 Apr 2005 11:17:10

Well in any case, I'd say if it's ok to pour extreme amounts of money
into a race car then fiddling with the rules is just as acceptable -
anything goes. Most of Ferrari's budget is probably mafia money anyway.
***Ferrari!

by **Jason Steine** » Tue, 19 Apr 2005 15:08:22

> Well in any case, I'd say if it's ok to pour extreme amounts of money
> into a race car then fiddling with the rules is just as acceptable -
> anything goes.

Money poured into technology produces something new and useful.

Fiddling with the rules produces nothing useful.

Historically, racing has been a way to develop newer and better
things. Better breeds of horses, better bicycles, better cars, better
planes. And most of those innovations have eventually trickled down
to the common man. Pouring extreme amounts of money into a race car
is both more true to the spirit of racing, and more useful to the
man on the street.

jason

--
"Listen, my boy, I can't abide children. I know it's the style nowadays to
make a terrible fuss over you - but I don't go for it. As far as I'm concerned,
they're no good for anything but screaming, torturing people, breaking things,
smearing books with jam and tearing the pages." - The Neverending Story

by **Byron Forbe** » Tue, 19 Apr 2005 19:32:01

>> Well in any case, I'd say if it's ok to pour extreme amounts of money
>> into a race car then fiddling with the rules is just as acceptable -
>> anything goes.

> Money poured into technology produces something new and useful.

> Fiddling with the rules produces nothing useful.

> Historically, racing has been a way to develop newer and better
> things. Better breeds of horses, better bicycles, better cars, better
> planes. And most of those innovations have eventually trickled down
> to the common man. Pouring extreme amounts of money into a race car
> is both more true to the spirit of racing, and more useful to the
> man on the street.

Depends on what it's spent on. Ferrari's budget mainly adds up to more
testing and refining of everything relative to other teams. The "man on the
street" is gaining nothing from millions being spent to refine the same
thing to the nth degree. Maybe, indeed, the "man on the street" is indeed
out on the street because he has no job since conglomerates like Ferrari
spent profits on a few cars instead of creating jobs? Close to a billion
dollars per year for a few F1 cars??????????? - insane!

Also, more money = less need for genuine innovation in many ways. If
teams have less money to spend testing/refining then the engineers would
spend more time trying to come up with something revolutionary rather than
just refining the same old stuff. The rules do limit this though no doubt.

by **David G Fishe** » Tue, 19 Apr 2005 20:27:33

> > Well in any case, I'd say if it's ok to pour extreme amounts of money
> > into a race car then fiddling with the rules is just as acceptable -
> > anything goes.

> Money poured into technology produces something new and useful.

> Fiddling with the rules produces nothing useful.

> Historically, racing has been a way to develop newer and better
> things. Better breeds of horses, better bicycles, better cars, better
> planes. And most of those innovations have eventually trickled down
> to the common man. Pouring extreme amounts of money into a race car
> is both more true to the spirit of racing, and more useful to the
> man on the street.

> jason

You've posted your F1 comments in a newsgroup which for some reason which I
will never understand has a large % of people who like slow, old cars that
handle like junk. :-)

They even seem to prefer new cars that are slow and handle like junk.

--
David G Fisher

by **Jason Steine** » Wed, 20 Apr 2005 01:58:04

And that's cool. I don't mind limited racing, but there should be at
least one unlimited class.

jason

--
"Listen, my boy, I can't abide children. I know it's the style nowadays to
make a terrible fuss over you - but I don't go for it. As far as I'm concerned,
they're no good for anything but screaming, torturing people, breaking things,
smearing books with jam and tearing the pages." - The Neverending Story

by **Jason Steine** » Wed, 20 Apr 2005 02:08:12

> Depends on what it's spent on. Ferrari's budget mainly adds up to
> more testing and refining of everything relative to other teams.
> The "man on the street" is gaining nothing from millions being
> spent to refine the same thing to the nth degree.

Sure they do. The refining techniques themselves are useful. For
example, the computer models required to tweak airflow over the
body enough to get a competitive edge could very well be applied
to passenger vehicles. Put a slightly better Cd on millions of
passenger cars, and you've saved billions of gallons of fuel and
billions of dollars.

If Ferrari's willing to invest money in that kind of basic research
to win some races, GOOD.

It's Ferrari's money to spend. And all that money goes to keep
researchers employed. More research money means more research
jobs which means more people going to school to learn how to
design better cars. That's a better job than just putting new
cars together - which robots mostly do these days anyway - and
contributes more to the future.

Automotive design is a mature art that's heavily limited by physics
(gravity, air pressure, the strength of materials) and chemistry
(there's only so much energy contained in the chemical bonds in
gasoline, and only so much friction that can be had between ***
and asphalt). At this stage you're not going to see anything truly
revolutionary. It's going to be a series of small refinements that
slowly approach those limits over time.

jason

--
"Listen, my boy, I can't abide children. I know it's the style nowadays to
make a terrible fuss over you - but I don't go for it. As far as I'm concerned,
they're no good for anything but screaming, torturing people, breaking things,
smearing books with jam and tearing the pages." - The Neverending Story

by **John Wallac** » Wed, 20 Apr 2005 03:14:15

> Sure they do. The refining techniques themselves are useful. For
> example, the computer models required to tweak airflow over the
> body enough to get a competitive edge could very well be applied
> to passenger vehicles. Put a slightly better Cd on millions of
> passenger cars, and you've saved billions of gallons of fuel and
> billions of dollars.

> If Ferrari's willing to invest money in that kind of basic research
> to win some races, GOOD.

It will be a cold day in hell before any of us see a Ferrari road car
marketed via it's fuel consumption figures...!

There are some - no doubt Honda's work in F1 spawned many road car
benefits in the early 90's, but in a general sense it's difficult to see
how the F1 spend really equates into road improvements. Indeed many of
the FIA rule changes that people complain about are designed to FORCE
the teams to do exactly that. The purpose of the F1 teams is "how do I
make my car go faster" - end of story. If there's a real-life
application that's fine, but it's by lucky chance.

The involvement of Mercedes, BMW etc on the engine side sees that
changing, as Honda did in the past. These guys are looking for how to
save some money, or how to get dual-benefit from their investment money,
but the F1 guys surely are not.

Actually it's our money. We buy stuff, the people who make that stuff
have advertising budgets, and that goes to Ferrari (who give it to
Michael Schumacher). As for the more research money means more research
jobs, that's a big leap - most of it will go on wind tunnel operation
and computer analysis. Anyway, Ferrari hire a few more engineers, other
teams forced to cut engineers because they need to find money to invest
to keep up with Ferrari - if it's even a zero-sum game I'd be surprised.

by **Jason Steine** » Wed, 20 Apr 2005 06:42:52

> > If Ferrari's willing to invest money in that kind of basic research
> > to win some races, GOOD.

> It will be a cold day in hell before any of us see a Ferrari road car
> marketed via it's fuel consumption figures...!

So? That was just one example, and there's nothing that says
Ferrari has to be the one to bring it to market. Technology
transfers between companies happen all the time, by licensing,
by buyout, by patents expiring, and so forth.

Think of all the spinoffs from NASA. The reason you do this stuff
is because you can't predict in advance what you're going to find.
It's all lucky chance.

And that's when it stops being your money. Don't like it? Don't
buy products that advertise through Ferarri.

Wind tunnel operators and computer analysts need to eat too. And
once you have the people and technology to do that kind of analysis,
you can apply it in all sorts of ways.

Invest in what? If it's technical innovation they need, they're
going to have to invest in... engineers. You're talking about
cutting engineers to buy more engineers.

jason

--
"Listen, my boy, I can't abide children. I know it's the style nowadays to
make a terrible fuss over you - but I don't go for it. As far as I'm concerned,
they're no good for anything but screaming, torturing people, breaking things,
smearing books with jam and tearing the pages." - The Neverending Story

by **Byron Forbe** » Wed, 20 Apr 2005 18:02:00

>> You've posted your F1 comments in a newsgroup which for some reason
>> which I will never understand has a large % of people who like
>> slow, old cars that handle like junk. :-)

>> They even seem to prefer new cars that are slow and handle like junk.

> And that's cool. I don't mind limited racing, but there should be at
> least one unlimited class.

Well then, define unlimited!

No safety measures? Any dimensions? Jet/rocket engines? Trillion dollar
budget per team? Etc, etc, etc............

by **Byron Forbe** » Wed, 20 Apr 2005 19:01:02

>> > If Ferrari's willing to invest money in that kind of basic research
>> > to win some races, GOOD.

>> It will be a cold day in hell before any of us see a Ferrari road car
>> marketed via it's fuel consumption figures...!

> So? That was just one example, and there's nothing that says
> Ferrari has to be the one to bring it to market. Technology
> transfers between companies happen all the time, by licensing,
> by buyout, by patents expiring, and so forth.

>> The purpose of the F1 teams is "how do I make my car go faster" -
>> end of story. If there's a real-life application that's fine, but
>> it's by lucky chance.

> Think of all the spinoffs from NASA. The reason you do this stuff
> is because you can't predict in advance what you're going to find.
> It's all lucky chance.

>> > It's Ferrari's money to spend. And all that money goes to keep
>> > researchers employed. More research money means more research
>> > jobs which means more people going to school to learn how to
>> > design better cars. That's a better job than just putting new
>> > cars together - which robots mostly do these days anyway - and
>> > contributes more to the future.

>> Actually it's our money. We buy stuff,

> And that's when it stops being your money. Don't like it? Don't
> buy products that advertise through Ferarri.

>> the people who make that stuff have advertising budgets, and that
>> goes to Ferrari (who give it to Michael Schumacher). As for the
>> more research money means more research jobs, that's a big leap -
>> most of it will go on wind tunnel operation and computer analysis.

> Wind tunnel operators and computer analysts need to eat too. And
> once you have the people and technology to do that kind of analysis,
> you can apply it in all sorts of ways.

>> Anyway, Ferrari hire a few more engineers, other teams forced to
>> cut engineers because they need to find money to invest to keep up
>> with Ferrari - if it's even a zero-sum game I'd be surprised.

> Invest in what? If it's technical innovation they need, they're
> going to have to invest in... engineers. You're talking about
> cutting engineers to buy more engineers.

> jason

Well, we can talk about all the alleged fantastic applications for
humanity in general, but are you saying that no matter how many people are
employed, and no matter how much money spent, that the returns will always
validate the outlays? That's absurd!

The thing that makes me laugh about professional sport is that you could
get most of the sportsmen to do what they do for free. Michael Schumacher
would be on about $50Mil per year and that is nuts - what does the world get
out of that? And this same thing applies to all in F1 that are paid based on
how good they are. Simple solution - pay them all nothing.

What we have in formula one at the moment is NOT motorsport - it is an
exercise in money gathering. Everything that happens on the track is pretty
much proportional to the budget of each team. Ferrari have dominated on the
track for years but it is simply a reflection of budget. F1 needs to
introduce some sort of parity with respect to budget otherwise it will
become a total joke to everyone.

by **Jason Steine** » Thu, 21 Apr 2005 02:15:54

> > And that's cool. I don't mind limited racing, but there should be at
> > least one unlimited class.

> Well then, define unlimited!

> No safety measures? Any dimensions? Jet/rocket engines? Trillion dollar
> budget per team? Etc, etc, etc............

Assuming auto racing you've got to define what you mean by 'auto' and
'racing'. Presumably four wheels, fits within a standard lane, and
follows a defined course for a specified number of laps. Beyond that,
why should you limit it to, say, internal combustion when the next
great engine might turn out to be a jet? Running jet engines in
ground-based vehicles is an interesting problem. Turbines are
efficient, but not well-suited to the varied loads of auto racing.
I'd like to see someone come up with a turbine powered car that could
stand up to the rigors of racing. Maybe enough other people would be
interested in watching it to make it worth a trillion dollars to
advertisers. Which might fund the research to make it practical in
ordinary cars.

But we'll never know.

jason

--
"Listen, my boy, I can't abide children. I know it's the style nowadays to
make a terrible fuss over you - but I don't go for it. As far as I'm concerned,
they're no good for anything but screaming, torturing people, breaking things,
smearing books with jam and tearing the pages." - The Neverending Story

by **Jason Steine** » Thu, 21 Apr 2005 02:03:50

> Well, we can talk about all the alleged fantastic applications for
> humanity in general, but are you saying that no matter how many
> people are employed, and no matter how much money spent, that the
> returns will always validate the outlays? That's absurd!

Apparently the investors think that the money is well spent. That
might not be true, but it's their money, and in their opinion, the
opportunity cost of advertising with F1 teams is not outweighed
by other opportunities.

The same is true of any sport. But I can say with certainty that the
money spent on auto racing produces more technology than money spent
on, say, basketball.

Ferarri gets a charismatic representative. Which in advertising,
is everything. You could get a lot of people to play basketball
for free too, but not very many will draw the kinds of crowds that
the advertisers want.

And lose your audience, and lose your investors, and kill the sport.

All the more reason to have charismatic and talented personalities
to attract an audience, investors, and money.

If that was all it was, they could burn the money and have the
same results. But they don't. They invest it in technology and
engineers to create technology, and that investment is wisely made.
If another team can invest more wisely and obtain more with less,
they'll win. Alternately, if another team can attract better talent
and a larger audience, they can get a larger budget too.

You already have every other race on the planet. Why isn't that enough?

jason

--
"Listen, my boy, I can't abide children. I know it's the style nowadays to
make a terrible fuss over you - but I don't go for it. As far as I'm concerned,
they're no good for anything but screaming, torturing people, breaking things,
smearing books with jam and tearing the pages." - The Neverending Story

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