Any F1 fans ?

[IT]

I went on a corporate day today at Lotus F1 in Chipping norton..... Included a 2 hour factory tour, including 3D 'laser printing' of test parts from epoxy resin, wind tunnel testing, suspension testing, carbon fiber chassis manufacture, and an exploration of all the different materials that they use. wow.

also, some engine specs (iirc)

Max RPM - 18000

Litres of engine oil circulated per minute - 90
Max time a particle of oil takes to do a whole trip round engine - 3 seconds
Oil pressure - 5 Bar
Force exerted on pistons at 18000 rpm - 9000g

All pretty huge numbers........

On a techie side, approx 15Mb of data collected from all the cars sensors per lap....

Some say, its not as good as top gear, but not a bad way to earns a days wages

[Adrian E]

Nice - so this is the outfit that was Renault I presume?! I still struggle with all the name swapping fiasco....

Friend of a friend works for McLaren and always had interesting titbits on how teams function which was always interesting to hear.

It always fascinates me that you can't start an F1 engine from cold as the fit on the pistons is too tight for the engine to turn over without having warm fluids pumped round to get the tolerances correct first

Resin test parts was just coming in when I studied manufacturing engineering back in the day - was very cool to watch!

[Zip]

Were a customer of mine until end of last year. We did all their in car telemetry. I had unlimited access to their factory for 2 years... Good museum, and their data centre is very impressive - built under ground to aid cooling.

Always impressive when they do the engine tests in doors...hand out ear plugs. All the employees stand on the gantries overlooking the build area to watch. What a noise!

PS. Was a guest of theirs at Silverstone a couple of times...

Miss it.

zip

[HPsauce]

Awesome, I just love that stuff.

And on a related note, I once got to make a bit of noise on Eddie Jordans's "office" drum kit on a trip round the Jordan base opposite Silverstone.

That was during a corporate day out at the circuit during off-season testing. I got to lean on the Armco on the INSIDE at Becketts while Rubens and a couple of others were belting round, just feet from the cars! My ears still haven't recovered.

Everyone else on the "awayday" was just arsing around on a skid pan in a Lotus 7 with silly tyres on; I had something much better to do and skipped that.

Then my day was made perfect. A Silverstone car (some little runabout) drove up and stopped right near me. The driver got out and wandered over to watch the action from the spot I'd chosen (there'd been a BRDC meeting earlier as I soon discovered) and started chatting to me. It was one of my all-time heros, John Watson!

He stayed to watch, told me loads I would never have noticed, and stayed about half an hour! I was in HEAVEN.

[sarg]

hell yes, which is why I'll be off on my annual pilgrimage to Monaco in May

[Architex_mA8tey]

Really strange actually but in the last few months we've been dealing with Tony and Jeanette Jardine (Tony used to drive and then commentate on F1 many moons ago) and then a chap from Northern Ireland called Gary Anderson. I didn't really know who he was until I phoned him on the Thursday before the British Grand Prix last season and could hear F1 cars zooming past in the background. When I told him that I thought he was a bit keen getting there on the Thursday he said he was commentating for ESPN and Dallara/Irish TV. Anyways he's popped up this year on the BBC as their "Technical Analyst" and hes had a huge history in Motor Racing as I found out HERE.

Gary Anderson has a wealth of motorsport commentary experience, having commentated on F1 for Eurosport and the former F1 Digital channel.
“I'm thrilled to be joining the BBC F1 team. It's a dream come true to be broadcasting from Grands Prix all over the world with such a prestigious broadcaster”
He has also commentated for Sky on A1 Grand Prix, for Eurosport and ESPN on the US-based Champ Car series (now IndyCars) and most recently on the British Touring Car Championship and Superleague on ITV.
Anderson had a 13-year career as an F1 technical director, starting with Jordan in 1991 before moving to the Stewart and Jaguar teams, plus a second spell with Jordan.
He started his career in the 1970s, graduating to become Brabham's chief mechanic, before moving on to McLaren and then designing cars in other areas of motorsport before joining Jordan for their debut F1 season in 1991.
Since leaving motorsport engineering, he has gained experience in broadcasting, working for Ireland's RTE television station, as well as F1 journalism.

BBC Interview with him HERE also

[The_Laird]

I went to a Grand Prix at Silverstone when I was still at school (and, yes, the car had been invented by then!) and didn't think much of it. The noise was crippling.

And last weekend I heard a wonderful description of it that, IMHO, matches Oscar Wilde's description of golf as "a good walk, spoiled".

F1 was descrbed as "a fast queue".