Discussion
Just a quick question -
While watching Martin Brundle in the 1992 Benetton around Silverstone, ITV played some clips of the 1992 championship. Alot of the cars were sending sparks up from the back - It brought me torrent of nostalgia as I remember this happening all the time!
What was the reason for this, and why doesn’t it happen anymore?
While watching Martin Brundle in the 1992 Benetton around Silverstone, ITV played some clips of the 1992 championship. Alot of the cars were sending sparks up from the back - It brought me torrent of nostalgia as I remember this happening all the time!
What was the reason for this, and why doesn’t it happen anymore?
FNG said:
The sparks were from sacrificial skid plates on the bottom of the chassis, titanium I think.
We no longer get this spectacle because the ever-forward-looking FIA mandated a wooden plank as the lowest point on the car, must've been 1994 or thereabouts.
A wooden plank. I ask you.
actually, it'a not wood, but some composite...We no longer get this spectacle because the ever-forward-looking FIA mandated a wooden plank as the lowest point on the car, must've been 1994 or thereabouts.
A wooden plank. I ask you.
I understood it to be a resin-impregnated wood of a particular and fantastically exotic type.
So technically a composite, but actually basically a plank
Titanium skid plates meant there was no particular penalty (in terms of low ride height / better aero) in allowing the car to bottom out (this ignores any effect of unloading the suspension over bumps) so teams were running very low for aero gains.
Idea of the plank was that it was allowed to wear no more than 10% of its depth throughout a race, therefore ride heights were effectively restricted; teams could no longer run a massively progressive spring that would, for talking's sake, give a ride height that passed the regs statically but which would reduce dramatically once a small amount of downforce was applied on the move.
So technically a composite, but actually basically a plank
Titanium skid plates meant there was no particular penalty (in terms of low ride height / better aero) in allowing the car to bottom out (this ignores any effect of unloading the suspension over bumps) so teams were running very low for aero gains.
Idea of the plank was that it was allowed to wear no more than 10% of its depth throughout a race, therefore ride heights were effectively restricted; teams could no longer run a massively progressive spring that would, for talking's sake, give a ride height that passed the regs statically but which would reduce dramatically once a small amount of downforce was applied on the move.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the reason Senna went off was due to previous laps behind the saftey car caused the pressure in his tyres to decrease and then when they went back to full racing speed the already marginal ground clearance caused the car to bottom out before that corner which then screwed the aero effect and hence the car lost momentary downforce which sent it off the track.
Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
motormania said:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the reason Senna went off was due to previous laps behind the saftey car caused the pressure in his tyres to decrease and then when they went back to full racing speed the already marginal ground clearance caused the car to bottom out before that corner which then screwed the aero effect and hence the car lost momentary downforce which sent it off the track.
Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
Whether it bottomed out or not, the low ride height of Senna's car meant its aero would always be very sensitive to changes. I don't see the problem with the 'plank', yes I liked the sparks as much as anyone but then there are plenty of other rule changes that have foregone part of the spectacle for safety.Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
motormania said:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the reason Senna went off was due to previous laps behind the saftey car caused the pressure in his tyres to decrease and then when they went back to full racing speed the already marginal ground clearance caused the car to bottom out before that corner which then screwed the aero effect and hence the car lost momentary downforce which sent it off the track.
Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
Sadly I felt the need to do a bit of googling on this, most of the references seem quite old and I couldn't hang my hat on any of them, but it would seem that the composite material is Jabroc which is a series of wooden veneers. A carefully controlled composite but definitely basically wood.Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skid_block
Of course the material may be summat else by now...
FNG said:
motormania said:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the reason Senna went off was due to previous laps behind the saftey car caused the pressure in his tyres to decrease and then when they went back to full racing speed the already marginal ground clearance caused the car to bottom out before that corner which then screwed the aero effect and hence the car lost momentary downforce which sent it off the track.
Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
Sadly I felt the need to do a bit of googling on this, most of the references seem quite old and I couldn't hang my hat on any of them, but it would seem that the composite material is Jabroc which is a series of wooden veneers. A carefully controlled composite but definitely basically wood.Those sparks were indeed titanium plates to prevent the car from bottoming out.
The 'plank' so rightly said is a composite material which has the colour of wood, hence why people it is wooden.
hope that clears it up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skid_block
Of course the material may be summat else by now...
It is Jabroc, i use it to make the front splitter and skid plates on our racing cars. It's a hard wood ply with resin to bond the ply's, that is then placed under extremely high pressure during the curing process. It's an extremely hard material, you can drill and tap it like steel. I use it in 5mm thick sheet, the F1 and F3 skid blocks are much thicker than this, 15mm. A 5mm thick 2mtr x 1mtr sheet costs about £100.
I don't fancy the idea of titanium on my cars, it might look the b
ks, but if you developed a fuel leak you could end up with burnt bks, so i'll give that one a miss thanks.
I don't fancy the idea of titanium on my cars, it might look the b
ks, but if you developed a fuel leak you could end up with burnt bks, so i'll give that one a miss thanks. Riverside said:
eccles said:
A sheet the size of the underneath of a F1 car must weigh a fair bit of the total weight of the car!
But if every car has to have one the weight isn't a factor. I can understand that it would need to have very consistent wear rates from plank to plank though.johnfelstead said:
It is Jabroc, i use it to make the front splitter and skid plates on our racing cars. It's a hard wood ply with resin to bond the ply's, that is then placed under extremely high pressure during the curing process. It's an extremely hard material, you can drill and tap it like steel. I use it in 5mm thick sheet, the F1 and F3 skid blocks are much thicker than this, 15mm. A 5mm thick 2mtr x 1mtr sheet costs about £100.
I don't fancy the idea of titanium on my cars, it might look the bks, but if you developed a fuel leak you could end up with burnt bks, so i'll give that one a miss thanks.
Why would you get burnt bits using titanium? perhaps you are confusing it with magnesium.I don't fancy the idea of titanium on my cars, it might look the b
ks, but if you developed a fuel leak you could end up with burnt bks, so i'll give that one a miss thanks. Titanium is used on aircraft to form firewalls/heatshields as it's much more fire resistant than alloy.
It's threads like this that make me love Pistonheads ... we can enjoy ourselves talking about a plank! I am sure that the High Technology F1 (copyright Bernie) world prefers a fancy composite name, you can't spend all that research & development money and end up with a PLANK after all!
... and the original post was "just a quick question" ... not such a quick answer though!!!
... and the original post was "just a quick question" ... not such a quick answer though!!!
Edited by johnzo on Sunday 6th July 11:40
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