Wednesday 9th September 2009
Eco-Friendly F3 Car To Hit The Track
Chocolate-fuelled 'Flying Carrot' racer to compete at Brands Hatch
Flying Carrot in alll its veg-based glory
It might sound like the plot for an episode of Wacky Races, but a car made from carrots and powered by fuel made from chocolate is set to race at Brands Hatch on 17 October.
The F3 car, known officially as the WorldFirst but affectionately as the Flying Carrot, has been permitted to enter an F3 race at the Formula Ford Festival, despite not exactly confirming to the sport's technical regulations.
The engine is a heavily modified BMW turbodiesel tweaked to run on biofuel, while the body uses vegetable fibres (cellulose nanofibres in science-speak) and carbon fibre recycled from the aerospace industry.
The cockpit, wheels and tyres conform to normal F3 specifications, although the steering wheel is made from carrots (no, we can't believe we've just written that either). Of course, in accordance with the time-honoured rules of vegetable comedy, the steering wheel is not orange. "We don't know why it turned out purple," says Kerry Kirwan, a senior researcher on the project. "Perhaps there was some beetroot in it."
Flying Carrot cost £500,000 to develop and has been built by the Warwick Manufacturing Group at Warwick university with the financial and technical support of more than 50 companies, including Lola and Scott Racing.
The idea behind the project is to show that motorsport and ecological thinking can mix. "We want to show that green can be sexy," says Mr Kirwan. "You can still do exciting things, using recycled and sustainable materials."
The driving seat will be filled by 21-year-old Aaron Steele, a well-regarded young racing prospect, and Kirwan is bullish about the Flying Carrot's chances. "We haven't entered to come last," he says.
The Flying Carrot can reach 60mph in 2.0sec (quicker than a regular F3 car) and manages 35mpg at race speeds. Nobody on the WorldFirst project will comment on the chances of seeing the Flying Carrot in a night race though...
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havoc
Original Poster
20,152 posts
104 months
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Nope, not April Fool's Day.   Mind if I pull up a seat and wait for the puns to start?!?
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Quattronaut
71 posts
53 months
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Interesting that the steering wheel turned out purple.. carrots used to be purple until they were cultivated to be orange by the Dutch, supposedly to honour William of Orange. You also may or may not know (care?)that they are originally from Afghanistan http://www.carrotmuseum.co.uk/history.html ("Discover the power of carrots" - extraordinary) 
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The Wookie
9,329 posts
97 months
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All that talk about carrots, and not a single mention of horsepower?
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pantalooons
23 posts
57 months
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Forbes82
735 posts
48 months
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Not sure why its allowed to race if it doesn't conform to regs and is infact faster accelerating than a standard car... Turns the race into a bit of a joke IMO.
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Fluffsri/?
1,145 posts
65 months
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Saw this at Goodwood, seemed quick enough. Wonder if its as fast as a veggie madras the day after???
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MrTappets
734 posts
60 months
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Can't see this being a success in any locust-infested countries.
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Groober
669 posts
49 months
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MrTappets said: Can't see this being a success in any locust-infested countries. It wouuld be funny though. Todays race has been cancelled folks due to the cars being devoured by a hugry swarm of locust! 
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philis
392 posts
86 months
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I bet it will be good in the dark
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Collaudatore
796 posts
71 months
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Quattronaut said: Interesting that the steering wheel turned out purple.. carrots used to be purple until they were cultivated to be orange by the Dutch, supposedly to honour William of Orange. You also may or may not know (care?)that they are originally from Afghanistan http://www.carrotmuseum.co.uk/history.html ("Discover the power of carrots" - extraordinary) So why aren't Afghan carrots purple?
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stifler
34,054 posts
57 months
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Not a hope with that particular driver.
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Lead
122 posts
97 months
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Hope he doesn`t get hungry during the race!
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450Nick
3,473 posts
81 months
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I agree. A friend of mine used to mechanic for him in Formula Renault and I think he spend most of his time in the car heading towards walls at high speed... With that in mind I wouldn't expect it to last long...
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Scuffers
10,403 posts
143 months
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in another article they go on about it's top speed being 125Mph, so I think we can assume it's got sod all power (relative to a current F3 car)
Also, they go on about all the saftey stuff being non-green, I guess that will be the CF tub then?
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AaronSteele
9 posts
44 months
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stifler said: Not a hope with that particular driver. i would like to know what you base this opinion about myself on?
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AaronSteele
9 posts
44 months
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450Nick said: I agree. A friend of mine used to mechanic for him in Formula Renault and I think he spend most of his time in the car heading towards walls at high speed... With that in mind I wouldn't expect it to last long... firstly i would like to know who your friend was that said this to you, as actually this is not true. i have had accidents in the past as ALL racing drivers have, it is how you learn... i wonder how many times you have crashed driving on the road? hmm.. Secondly, you may have noticed that in the article it says: "The driving seat will be filled by 21-year-old Aaron Steele, a well-regarded young racing prospect" considering that you don't know me or anything factual to do with me, i wonder how you can agree with the above comment? I am IN FACT, a B.R.D.C Rising star, something that is granted to young up coming drivers, something you have to show talent to achieve! Do you think it was by luck then or talent that this year i was A1 GP Team GBR's rookie driver for the final round at Brands Hatch?
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coxyboy83
119 posts
68 months
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AaronSteele said: 450Nick said: I agree. A friend of mine used to mechanic for him in Formula Renault and I think he spend most of his time in the car heading towards walls at high speed... With that in mind I wouldn't expect it to last long... firstly i would like to know who your friend was that said this to you, as actually this is not true. i have had accidents in the past as ALL racing drivers have, it is how you learn... i wonder how many times you have crashed driving on the road? hmm.. Secondly, you may have noticed that in the article it says: "The driving seat will be filled by 21-year-old Aaron Steele, a well-regarded young racing prospect" considering that you don't know me or anything factual to do with me, i wonder how you can agree with the above comment? I am IN FACT, a B.R.D.C Rising star, something that is granted to young up coming drivers, something you have to show talent to achieve! Do you think it was by luck then or talent that this year i was A1 GP Team GBR's rookie driver for the final round at Brands Hatch? Ha Ha - Touche! I wouldn't worry about it Aaron, 90% of "pistonheads" haven't got a clue about racing anyway, or driving full stop for that matter. No doubt i'm going to be shot down for saying this now, with a million "my friend said" and "but i've driven at the ring" comments, but at the end of the day they're just billies - who gives a s  t. Good luck with testing
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AaronSteele
9 posts
44 months
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Thanks! i sure will, and your right they probably are just billies, but that does kind of make it a little more infuriating because they know even less about what they are talking about... however i am very much looking forward to the weekend and the amount of media attention is quite astonishing! I think a fair few people may turn up to just see the car, i have already tested it, so anybody with any genuine question, feel free to ask! 
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xr287
818 posts
49 months
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AaronSteele said: I think a fair few people may turn up to just see the car, i have already tested it, so anybody with any genuine question, feel free to ask! So how competitive is it? Same aero package and weight? What's the difference in power delivery and overall power? Is it going to be at any disadvantage to the standard cars?
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AaronSteele
9 posts
44 months
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xr287 said: AaronSteele said: I think a fair few people may turn up to just see the car, i have already tested it, so anybody with any genuine question, feel free to ask! So how competitive is it? Same aero package and weight? What's the difference in power delivery and overall power? Is it going to be at any disadvantage to the standard cars? When i tested it it had a 'school car' setup on it, basically making it easier to drive for the warwick uni guys with not much experience of driving a proper car, by encouraging it to understeer a lot, which is inheritantly slow... so we need to change the setup on the test day of the weekend to get it working the tyres in the correct way. The aero is the standard to the original specified lola, so it will have a good amount of downforce similar in levels to cars of the same age, which is what it will be racing against. With regards to power, i would say the car is a little down on power on a standard f3 car, but we will be tuning the map of the engine on the test day to sort this. Getting certain information about the engine from BMW isnt the easiest thing in the world as you can imagine!! power delivery is similar again to a normal f3, which is designed to have a lot of low down torque, and with this being a diesel.... it will be no different, exact levels i am not sure of, but the diesel may possibly have more! One other thing that a couple of people have said about the top speed. Because this is a diesel and is lower revving it requires lower gear ratio's. The ratio's in the car are the lowest that can be bought, off the shelf, however the top one is not quite there and a little low, so a custom final ratio is being manufactured as we speak, which should give the car around a 150mph top speed, which for brands hatch indy circuit, is plenty! I am very confident in the car and myself enough to say you will see it on the podium that weekend!
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