Official 2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix **SPOILERS**

[kimducati]

As I said, I don't know how the electric motor is 'connected' to the transmission, that is to say whether it is contained within the trans as a whole or whether the motor(s) are external but either way, they must be able to be connected already and it's an easy switching job to reverse the rotation.
Not disagreeing, just thinking aloud
Kim

[Gary C]

DanTVR said:

Agree with that. Although it does make me wonder why still. If it takes a good 20s to engage rather than 2s after a mistake or an off then its all still race time. I guess as you say its just really low priority. At the risk of derailing the thread, and having limited knowledge there must be an easier way. As I see it the main things they need on the steering wheel...

Clutch/shift paddles
Brake bias - thumb wheel
Throttle map - toggle switch
Diff - rotary? open/close
DRS - button
Comms - whinge button
Drink - button
Energy recovery maps - rotary (im sure this will be set maps for each track and how much you would recover in each braking zone)
Energy deployment - rotary (preset maps for attacking/defending, could be same control as above)
Menu button - accessing different systems to reset?
Reverse - could be another button, instead it seems to be menu 5, mgu-h rotary 2, engine 4 and press ctrl alt del, hold A then engage clutch

Cant think anything else they would need but as said, not got much knowledge on the subject.

Suspension/antiroll- pretty sure no adjustment allowed
Cooling - dont think they use this
Engine maps - no longer allowed..
Aero balance - no adjustment allowed

So that is 4 paddles behind the wheel, probably 5 buttons, 4 rotary switches, a toggle switch and a thumb wheel. Suddenly in race the priority seems higher.

Maybe they should be able to say

"Alexa, engage reverse"

[TheDeuce]

kimducati said:

As I said, I don't know how the electric motor is 'connected' to the transmission, that is to say whether it is contained within the trans as a whole or whether the motor(s) are external but either way, they must be able to be connected already and it's an easy switching job to reverse the rotation.
Not disagreeing, just thinking aloud
Kim

The motor assists the motive power of the engine, it can't detach from the engine and send drive direct to the wheels only. I believe it's mounted to the timing loop running off the crankshaft, that might have changed in more recent designs though.. Either way, its ahead of the transmission - so it could only reverse the drive if the entire engine ran in reverse with it, which is a big ask, the engine has to obey at least some of the laws of physics

[Sandpit Steve]

A combination of trying to engage reverse in the first place, getting the wheels turning slowly enough not to spin up and beach the car, not wanting to stop for any reason in the gravel, and waiting for the gap in the traffic to enter the track in reverse, probably assisted by the team on the radio.

IIRC by the time he was back on the black stuff, the SC had already been deployed for the Russell/Bottas incident, he limped back and stopped for tyres and a new nose, then left the pits right behind MV a lap down just as the red flags came out.

[kimducati]

TheDeuce said:

The motor assists the motive power of the engine, it can't detach from the engine and send drive direct to the wheels only. I believe it's mounted to the timing loop running off the crankshaft, that might have changed in more recent designs though.. Either way, its ahead of the transmission - so it could only reverse the drive if the entire engine ran in reverse with it, which is a big ask, the engine has to obey at least some of the laws of physics

Ah ye cannae change the laws of phusics, Jim. (copyright Star Trek circa 1966).
If that's how it works, then yes I can see that reversing the motor is impossible in isolation.
Ah well, scrap that patent application.
kim

[Teddy Lop]

mattdavies said:

DanTVR said:

I still can't fathom why reverse is such a process to engage. There must be thousands of functions available on the steering wheel yet it seems a much lower priority than it should be.

Its probably something to do with the fact they shouldnt need it all being well, the primary purpose of the car is to go forward very fast for as long as possible not eating up the tires. Reverse is probably a device included later in the design process and I would guess is very small & weak gearset.

The dont even reverse into their own garage, they are pushed

yeah I pondered that - I guess they could make a better reverse albeit with a weight/performance penalty, and someone has considered what that loss would be, looked at how often scenarios occur where a better reverse might positively alter a race outcome, crunched the numbers and decided against, that the absolute minimum possible is what's optimum.

[troc]

As far as I’m aware reverse gear is literally only there because it’s required by FIA rules. It was, however quite useful for once

[SpudLink]

troc said:

As far as I’m aware reverse gear is literally only there because it’s required by FIA rules. It was, however quite useful for once

That’s what I thought. In the distant past I can remember comments from drivers that reverse gear was mostly theoretical. They didn’t really expect it to work if they needed it.

[TheDeuce]

kimducati said:

TheDeuce said:

The motor assists the motive power of the engine, it can't detach from the engine and send drive direct to the wheels only. I believe it's mounted to the timing loop running off the crankshaft, that might have changed in more recent designs though.. Either way, its ahead of the transmission - so it could only reverse the drive if the entire engine ran in reverse with it, which is a big ask, the engine has to obey at least some of the laws of physics

Ah ye cannae change the laws of phusics, Jim. (copyright Star Trek circa 1966).
If that's how it works, then yes I can see that reversing the motor is impossible in isolation.
Ah well, scrap that patent application.
kim

Indeed, it's not a workable idea as it stands.

It's also not a daft idea though. It's all but certain that one way or another F1 cars will further electrify and at some point it makes sense to simply put the electric motors contribution to (or one of..) the axle(s). There's a few reason why the motor is where it is presently, but if F1 is to follow road car trends even loosely in to the future, there are several sensible and performance reasons for putting it directly on the diff to contribute it's power there. In that instance the motor could fully power the car whilst the ICE does it's own thing so long as the box' is in neutral.

Edited by TheDeuce on Thursday 22 April 21:51

(or just skip forward 15 years and accept an F1 car or whatever the then equivalent will have a ~500hp digital motor per axle with no fussy ICE at all.. )

Edited by TheDeuce on Thursday 22 April 21:53

[Hungrymc]

TheDeuce said:

will have a ~500hp digital motor per axle

Or per wheel

[budgie smuggler]

Sandpit Steve said:

A combination of trying to engage reverse in the first place, getting the wheels turning slowly enough not to spin up and beach the car, not wanting to stop for any reason in the gravel, and waiting for the gap in the traffic to enter the track in reverse, probably assisted by the team on the radio.

IIRC by the time he was back on the black stuff, the SC had already been deployed for the Russell/Bottas incident, he limped back and stopped for tyres and a new nose, then left the pits right behind MV a lap down just as the red flags came out.

I wondered if he might have been putting the diff on a more 'locked' setting to avoid spinning up a single wheel?