Not enough fuel and, well! The fuel calculations per km of the race are made dating back to pre-season and the engine guys are keeping a close eye on how that is developing.
Basically the process is that race engineer will inform the engine engineer how many laps he is going to do, so for example in Q3 it was two runs of one lap and in the race it was 55 laps.
The engine engineer will then work out the fuel required and that will be put into the car. And there is another thing to consider. With refueling, pitstop duration was about 6 to 9 seconds, and a plenty room for good strategy and overtaking trough pits.
Without refueling pitstop duration is around 2 to 3 second and strategy should be impeccable. Often this short time can't be used for any meaningful strategy. But anyway, during pitstop in one typical Formula 1 race there were places to be won and lost to other drivers by mistiming the stop, so how did the teams decide? The teams have a more sophisticated timing system than the one available to the public and media.
It divides the lap into ten sectors, rather than the basic three available for rest of us and this gives them a much faster evaluation of the way the tires are behaving. Rather than wait 20 plus seconds to find out whether they are going off, they can tell every more or less 8 seconds how the performance is going. Engineers and computers study the trends and make the strategy calls based on what they see. This works in two ways; it tells them the precise moment when their tire compound are losing performance, and by reading the sectors of cars already on different compound, they can see what performance gain rivals are experiencing.
After one driver has pitted and his lap times went from 1m Rival engineers could see immediately the speed advantage he was getting from his new tires and decide to do and when to do their pitstop. The big among these is the widely-expected banning of refuelling.
The minimum weight of the cars is also being increased from kg to kg, and there are revisions to the rules governing KERS. However the F1 teams have now convinced the FIA that a refuelling ban makes sense on cost grounds, as it saves them having to transport refuelling equipment around the world at great expense.
To my mind a ban has always made sense in pure sporting terms and I now hope refuelling is gone for good. The consequences for the cars are clear — they will now require larger fuel tanks to last a full race distance. Tire wear over a race distance will now be more critical as the cars will be heavier. At this point it is often suggested that, as the cars will have to carry more fuel, they will be less safe. Logically that might make sense, but given how infrequently F1 cars catch fire it may make little difference.
Indeed the number one cause of F1 car fires — refuelling — will be gone, so I expect it will be beneficial for safety on the whole.
There were many views regarding the refuelling ban and the general feeling was that it was not a good thing for the sport - leading to processional racing with Alonso concurring: "Sometimes you were not very competitive, but you were on a more aggressive strategy with five or six laps less fuel and you qualified in front.
Now, these days, whatever your position is in qualifying, it's more or less your finishing position in the race. After a few races, I am sure the good drivers, the top drivers, will like it. I was in the no-refuelling camp and I believe this has been a cracking season, encouraging the driver to take greater charge over their race and we have certainly seen an increase in the importance of intelligent driving and more on track overtaking for position.
There was some caution from the teams at the beginning of the year especially given that lack of race simulations being achieved during pre season testing however we are seeing the teams comfortable with what they are working with and taking more risks in terms of tire strategy. I think it has its up sides and its downsides. I mean Bahrain, Spain and Monaco were all processions with little to no on track action at all and one advantage of refueling was less competitive teams could still qualify high up with low fuel loads like Alonso at Hungary last year - shame his wheel fell off.
And drivers all across the grid were on different levels off fuel which gave greater speed differences which also helps. The main problem of course being if a driver can't overtake another straight away then often they focus on protecting their tires from the turbulent air because they have to last a lot longer than in previous years where they could stick at it. I know there has been more overtakes this year than in previous years but how much of that is due to wet races and championship contenders qualifying out of position eg.
Malaysia and Monaco. There's also the double edged sword of having everyone on the same strategy. The refueling process can only go so quickly, and there is a lot of pressure to leave the pit stop in as little time as possible, leading to potentially hazardous situations. While cost did play a factor in the decision to end refueling Formula1 cars during the race, the first, and most important reason, was for driver and crew safety.
In such a dangerous sport, minimizing risk factors such as this are what allows the sport to continue to thrive without becoming an overwhelming hazard to everyone involved. Refueling Formula1 cars According to Formula1-Dictionary , refueling during pitstops became banned in the early s, leaving it limited to the quick change of the tires. Grosjean revealed the GPDA has gone with a specific list of items.
That led the conversation to what is becoming a hot topic in the paddock again -- refueling. That process was banned from races after the season, primarily for safety and cost reasons. That means modern race cars, which have been made heavier with recent regulation changes, start races with a full tank of fuel. FIA president Jean Todt recently confirmed refueling is back on the agenda for , although there is a split of opinion on whether that would be positive. Critics point to a reduction in overtaking done on track during the refueling era, with teams often looking to pass rival cars in the pits and through strategy.
It's a temporary fix for the car to be 70 kg lighter or 60 kg lighter. It's one of the reasons we are overheating the car like crazy. When asked if it could improve racing, he said: "Yes. It will help the tyres which is the big weakness.
It's [fully fueled] or something like that. The inch tyre, which is another 25 kg, the standard brake system, which is another 8 kg, so you're actually adding and adding and adding while the only thing wrong is to bring the weight down. Williams' Robert Kubica , one of a handful of drivers to have raced in the refueling era, said the practice should not have been banned in the first place.
This can also spice up a bit strategies.
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