F1 testing 18" wheels this week

[WickerBill]

Finally. And, other than the tiny rotors (barely visible here), I think it looks really good.

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/lotus-18-inch-886x664.jpg

[stroker]

And the advantage to this change would be....?

[opinionated ow]

I think they look ridiculous. Aside from the aesthetics it's going to need full redesign of the suspension systems. The cars have been designed with large, flexible sidewalls and are a huge part of the car's suspension. From a commercial perspective if you were the tyre provider you'd be dirty at how much they had shrunk the advertising space....

[WickerBill]

It's Pirelli who want the change (and when Bridgestone was leaving, Michelin only wanted in if they'd move to 18" wheels as well).

The advantage of going this way is that 13" wheels and giant sidewalls do not relate to anything on the roads today, doesn't relate to sports cars, etc -- it is a bygone standard (literally decades old) and doesn't help tire or suspension work in F1 trickle down to road cars at all.

[opinionated ow]

It's Pirelli who want the change (and when Bridgestone was leaving, Michelin only wanted in if they'd move to 18" wheels as well).

The advantage of going this way is that 13" wheels and giant sidewalls do not relate to anything on the roads today, doesn't relate to sports cars, etc -- it is a bygone standard (literally decades old) and doesn't help tire or suspension work in F1 trickle down to road cars at all.

I doubt you could actually use anything from F1 suspension in a road car anyway...not since they went away from the Lotus 79's torsion beam

[cameraman]

If the manufacturers could get their Le Mans tires and their F1 tires to be similar they would probably save quite a bit in development costs.

[gerhard911]

It's gonna take me a looooong time to get used to seeing that.

Yes, I am an intransigent old fart.

[cameraman]

Sure it will...

http://www.motorimania.net/manifestazioni/f1/images_ferrari/1979.Ferrari.312.T4.jpg

http://www.farzadsf1gallery.com/image_upload/Stewart_5s.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b0/Nigel_Mansell_1988_Canada_2.jpg

http://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4124/4990864650_8caefebc53_z.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a6/Mika_Hakkinen_1999_Canada.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ae/Jarno_Trulli_2004.jpg

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog.com/media/2010/05/10037sp.jpg

Oh noes they changing the look of F1 cars.:rolleyes: You won't even be noticing it two races into the season.

[SteveH]

665

[Easy]

I think they look ridiculous. Aside from the aesthetics it's going to need full redesign of the suspension systems. The cars have been designed with large, flexible sidewalls and are a huge part of the car's suspension. From a commercial perspective if you were the tyre provider you'd be dirty at how much they had shrunk the advertising space....

First off, they have 2 years to adapt suspension designs. Second, this is being done at Pirelli's insistence, they must not be too bothered by the loss of branding space.

[TrueBrit]

Sure it will...

http://www.motorimania.net/manifestazioni/f1/images_ferrari/1979.Ferrari.312.T4.jpg


Oh noes they changing the look of F1 cars.:rolleyes: You won't even be noticing it two races into the season.

And the first one is the best looking one of the bunch...sounded the best too...

[gerhard911]

The one constant in all of the pics Cameraman posted? 13" wheels & tires.

And I never did get used to grooved tires and still think the narrow rear wings look ridiculous.

As I said...

[cameraman]

Fine

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/Tyrrell_P34_2008_Silverstone_Classic.jpg

[Insomniac]

665

Side-by-side, they look quite different, but I thought it looked fine in the original post. 13" looks better IMO, but they will be gone so there won't be anything to compare.

Will it help cooling the brakes?

[SteveH]

Would they use larger disks creating increased braking performance?

[WickerBill]

I can't imagine them having even more stopping power than they do today. Perhaps they'd move to larger, but steel/alloy brakes and outlaw carbon to save money.

[cameraman]

I can't imagine them having even more stopping power than they do today. Perhaps they'd move to larger, but steel/alloy brakes and outlaw carbon to save money.

They would never go for Steve Matchett's old favorite talking point, unsprung weight.

[WickerBill]

They would never go for Steve Matchett's old favorite talking point, unsprung weight.

Your comment took my brain in a far different direction. For whatever reason, I jerked to Dan Dierdorf calling football games and always, always, always harping on guard and tackle play. Any run that resulted in >3 yards, he filled the huddle time with illustrations and stories about how well the guard and tackle did on that side of the line.

The best thing about Dierdorf was that he never covered my team two weeks in a row. I always had next week to look forward to, with a different announcer pair.

NBCSN should do that. Give us Diffey / Matchett / Hobbs for 4-6 races, give us the BBC commentator feed for their races, and give us the Sky commentators for the remainder. The NBCSN guys don't seem quite so bad if I haven't watched them for a couple of races, but I can only tolerate them in smaller and smaller doses -- I think it's because they've poisoned me to their key phrases (Hobbs: "boy oh boy" and "no doubt about THAT" // Matchett: "David, your klag" and being unable to say Ferrari without "Scuderia" in front of it).


Sorry. I think the 18" wheels look fine and would potentially level the suspension / car setup playing field for a year or two.

[gerhard911]

They would never go for Steve Matchett's old favorite talking point, unsprung weight.

Well, they certainly did with these 18" wheels & tires. Both of which add to unsprung weight.

[cameraman]

To the tune of 4 kg each.

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/13-inch-18-inch-886x590.jpg


The difference being there is a financial driver behind the change to use the larger wheel. Switching back to steel disks doesn't have that and I'd venture that they would add a lot more than 4kg per wheel too.

[chop456]

Your comment took my brain in a far different direction. For whatever reason, I jerked to Dan Dierdorf calling football games

"Tho many timeth, Al...."
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</shudder>

[Mary]

"Tho many timeth, Al...."
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</shudder>

I don't remember how long Boomer Esiason did Monday Night Football, but I clearly remember at the end on one season, Al Michaels told him that he needed "testosterone liposuction." Seriously.

As for the 18" wheels--whatever. I'll get used to them after a few races.

Mary