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Any similarities between F1 and audio?

Frank Dernie

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If the car is driven by an tom/dick/harry, I think it will be easy to blame the driver.... But a 7 time world champion and one of the very best driver on the planet said so? Then its a different story.
The World Champion has been, with a tiny number of exceptions, the better of the 2 drivers in the best car ever since the championship started in 1950.
Marketing, publicity and public opinion is dependant on hero worship, hence making the driver the target of celebrity as well as a few other engineers and managers over the years.

It is easier for a normal non-technically minded person to identify with the driver than the car.

The fact is, the car is the star, always has been and always will be.
 

Frank Dernie

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Oh, interesting to see this thread here.... I have posted a few times about what can be measured and what cannot using automotive (yes F1) as an example.
What is your Formula 1 measurement experience?

The press really don't get the real story and not every team has enough data.

In F1 it is very true that "those that say don't know and those that know don't say" and people like me who did know (about ground effect and porpoising anyway) have old facts not current ones, though there may be often be no difference.
 
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Holmz

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If the car is driven by an tom/dick/harry, I think it will be easy to blame the driver.... But a 7 time world champion and one of the very best driver on the planet said so? Then its a different story.

My point was that that it is likely easier to be a champion in a better car.
They are all very close in skill level.

Can we argue that Alonso might be a better driver?
Why is he not a 7 time champion?
Or does he just suck?
 

Frgirard

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It is 40 years since we last had ground effect cars in F1 and only Rory Byrne, retained by Ferrari as a consultant, and to a junior extent, Adrian Newey of Red Bull who was just starting out have any experience of it.

Back then there was a plausible explanation for the instability one could have which were taken by many as the explanation but actually was only part of the story - which is why not everybody solved it.

The aero R&D is either done in a wind tunnel with a model held at various ride heights and yaw angles sometimes with steer, depending on the wind tunnel, or using CFD which, up to the point I retired, was incapable of predicting unsteady flow and afaik still can’t. Wheel wakes are unsteady and dominate the flow round an open wheeled car.
Accurate enough CFD models are huge and with the limit in the rules on how much can be done testing at as many height/roll/steer combinations as would be needed for a (IMHO) good enough overall set of data is impossible.

So the inexperienced people didn’t predict the instability and the explanation still being rolled out is not the only problem to be solved. The information I have is that things I know to give instability are being done by some teams who have used static thinking for a dynamic situation - a common fault in engineers IME.

On top of this for decades people have judged the aero difference between cars by looking at the upper bodywork whereas with these cars it has gone back to unseen details under the car - so ”revolutionary” bodywork differences will be having second order effects and this may deflect the less experienced away from the real areas for study. People see the big difference in appearance of the top body between the poor performing Mercedes and the championship leading Ferrari as a big reason for the performance difference but this is very unlikely IMO.

One senior engineer from one of the teams was at a barbecue I was at a few days ago. I have known him since he was a teenager and he is a good engineer but the targets they had given themselves for this years car showed a lack of appreciation for dynamic stability.

I am too old to go back into it now but the problem always was more complex than was made public, and this will always be the case since no company in its right mind makes R&D data available publicly thereby giving free R&D to their competitors.

I watch with interest to see how long it is and which teams resolve their stability problems first. After all when the last big rule change happened, for 2009, the importance of a certain detail in the front wing was completely missed by both Adrian Newey and McLaren, both of whom had developed race winning cars to the older rules. McLaren didn’t have the right detail until quite late and Hamilton was driving for them that year …

It is no surprise to me that the only thorough textbook on speakers is Toole, all the others who know what they areec doing probably want to keep their knowledge to themselves. It is certainly my opinion that having a single performance score for a speaker is probably absurd.3xi
You do not read papers of genelec, cabasse, KEF, k+H...
Books of speakers design exists since the speakers exists.
 

Frank Dernie

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Books of speakers design exists since the speakers exists.
Indeed, but many of them, probably all of them, are either written by a journalist, who probably doesn't know that much, or a from manufacturers who keep their commercial secrets secure.
The only way to know anything about a subject is to:-
A be an engineer with a good grounding in scientific first principles.
B Read up as much existing and historic data as is available.
C Using first principles and experiment sort the historic data into probability and feasibility.

At the amateur level I am at I probably go further down this route than most hifi enthusiasts but not far enough to be competent to design and manufacture a speaker.
Mind you most people go nowhere near as far down this route as I have over the decades, usually because they don't comply with level A however enthusiastic they are.
 
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Holmz

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At the amateur level I am at I probably go further down this route than most hifi enthusiasts but not far enough to be competent to design and manufacture a speaker.

At some point, what they have that you do not have, are more failures and experience from that.
A grounding in the theory and fundamentals are a great basis for starting out.
 

clearnfc

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My point was that that it is likely easier to be a champion in a better car.
They are all very close in skill level.

Can we argue that Alonso might be a better driver?
Why is he not a 7 time champion?
Or does he just suck?

That i do agree. With a bad car, there is nothing a world champion can do...

But there are some exceptions...
 

clearnfc

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The World Champion has been, with a tiny number of exceptions, the better of the 2 drivers in the best car ever since the championship started in 1950.
Marketing, publicity and public opinion is dependant on hero worship, hence making the driver the target of celebrity as well as a few other engineers and managers over the years.

It is easier for a normal non-technically minded person to identify with the driver than the car.

The fact is, the car is the star, always has been and always will be.

I would say its both yes and no. While car performance is critical, you need an equally good driver to extract maximum performance out of the car. Its a complete package.

Since you are an expert engineer yourself, i am sure you have made adjustments and designs to suit the driver. I am also so you have ample experience with various drivers and understand their driving styles.

So, what i am trying to say is that you cant simply build the fastest car on the track (technically), then put in any driver and expect him to win every race.

You still have to tweak the design, setups etc in order to suit the driver. The driver has to feel "good" about the car in order to push it to the max.

Which brings me to the point of this "good" factor. There is no way to measure this "good". Its basically what the driver feels when he is going around the track. Its entirely subjective. Another related factor is "confidence", how confident the driver feels about the car. Professional sports pple are also affected by "form".

These are the non-measurable human aspect i am referring to.
 

Holmz

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I would say its both yes and no. While car performance is critical, you need an equally good driver to extract maximum performance out of the car. Its a complete package.

Since you are an expert engineer yourself, i am sure you have made adjustments and designs to suit the driver. I am also so you have ample experience with various drivers and understand their driving styles.

So, what i am trying to say is that you cant simply build the fastest car on the track (technically), then put in any driver and expect him to win every race.

You still have to tweak the design, setups etc in order to suit the driver. The driver has to feel "good" about the car in order to push it to the max.

Which brings me to the point of this "good" factor. There is no way to measure this "good". Its basically what the driver feels when he is going around the track. Its entirely subjective. Another related factor is "confidence", how confident the driver feels about the car. Professional sports pple are also affected by "form".

These are the non-measurable human aspect i am referring to.

Bull$hit!
A good driver is a human, and can therefore adapt to the nuance of an imperfect car.
(Stewart, Hill, a couple of Kiwi and Aussie drivers, Kimi, Alonso, Ayrton, Hamilton, etc.)
 

thewas

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A good driver is a human, and can therefore adapt to the nuance of an imperfect car.
(Stewart, Hill, a couple of Kiwi and Aussie drivers, Kimi, Alonso, Ayrton, Hamilton, etc.)
You forgot the possibly #1* of them all though https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/news/nr/greatest-formula-one-driver-ever-1.567358

Also in that study above is confirmed:

"Teams found to be around six times more important to success than individual drivers - and their importance has increased over time"

*Recommendable documentary film about him https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Life_of_Speed:_The_Juan_Manuel_Fangio_Story
 

Frank Dernie

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I would say its both yes and no. While car performance is critical, you need an equally good driver to extract maximum performance out of the car. Its a complete package.

Since you are an expert engineer yourself, i am sure you have made adjustments and designs to suit the driver. I am also so you have ample experience with various drivers and understand their driving styles.

So, what i am trying to say is that you cant simply build the fastest car on the track (technically), then put in any driver and expect him to win every race.

You still have to tweak the design, setups etc in order to suit the driver. The driver has to feel "good" about the car in order to push it to the max.

Which brings me to the point of this "good" factor. There is no way to measure this "good". Its basically what the driver feels when he is going around the track. Its entirely subjective. Another related factor is "confidence", how confident the driver feels about the car. Professional sports pple are also affected by "form".

These are the non-measurable human aspect i am referring to.
Not really.
By the time a driver gets into F1 he is certainly one of the best in the world so even the ones fans like to slag off are super exceptional. It varies a bit from year to year but most years in my experience, I started part time in 1974 and full time from 1976 to 2009, the difference between the cars exceeded that between the drivers, so pretty well any of them were good enough to be world champion, they only needed to be better than their team mate if they were in the best car.

My responsibility was the concept design of the car, mainly aero, and getting the best setup at the circuit. I did all the testing and the car setup for the race.

Getting the best setup is all about optimising the suspension to fly the car at the optimum ride height through the most important corners and getting the tyre temperature as near to optimum for as much of the grip limited part of the corner as possible.
It was me not the driver who achieved this and all the drivers I worked with were quick with the optimum setup and not a different one. Whenever one driver wanted a different setup to his team mate one was slower than the other.

Mind you I rarely had 2 drivers of identical talent in the team Jones and Reutemann had identical setups, for example and if one was quicker with a change the other would be happy to adopt it without trying. Mostly the better of the two was only a bit better but always was.

The reality is it is the drivers generally are as good at understanding the car as I would be at driving it - ie not very good.

F1 motor racing is not a good example of non-measurable human aspects IME, I suggest you find a more appropriate analogy :)

Amateur racing certainly has bigger human differences and even at quite a high level in single make formulae there are race engineers who concentrate on stuff they believe to be important but are not. Their teams don’t win however good the driver and the punters firmly believe all the cars are the same!
 

Frgirard

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A pilote is timed.
An human front of this hifi, what do you do?

A car without a pilote is useless.
A speaker without an human, reproduces sound and can be measured.
 

clearnfc

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Not really.
By the time a driver gets into F1 he is certainly one of the best in the world so even the ones fans like to slag off are super exceptional. It varies a bit from year to year but most years in my experience, I started part time in 1974 and full time from 1976 to 2009, the difference between the cars exceeded that between the drivers, so pretty well any of them were good enough to be world champion, they only needed to be better than their team mate if they were in the best car.

My responsibility was the concept design of the car, mainly aero, and getting the best setup at the circuit. I did all the testing and the car setup for the race.

Getting the best setup is all about optimising the suspension to fly the car at the optimum ride height through the most important corners and getting the tyre temperature as near to optimum for as much of the grip limited part of the corner as possible.
It was me not the driver who achieved this and all the drivers I worked with were quick with the optimum setup and not a different one. Whenever one driver wanted a different setup to his team mate one was slower than the other.

Mind you I rarely had 2 drivers of identical talent in the team Jones and Reutemann had identical setups, for example and if one was quicker with a change the other would be happy to adopt it without trying. Mostly the better of the two was only a bit better but always was.

The reality is it is the drivers generally are as good at understanding the car as I would be at driving it - ie not very good.

F1 motor racing is not a good example of non-measurable human aspects IME, I suggest you find a more appropriate analogy :)

Amateur racing certainly has bigger human differences and even at quite a high level in single make formulae there are race engineers who concentrate on stuff they believe to be important but are not. Their teams don’t win however good the driver and the punters firmly believe all the cars are the same!

Oh thanks for explanation...
 

clearnfc

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Bull$hit!
A good driver is a human, and can therefore adapt to the nuance of an imperfect car.
(Stewart, Hill, a couple of Kiwi and Aussie drivers, Kimi, Alonso, Ayrton, Hamilton, etc.)

Its fine to have different opinions but you should at least watch your language.
 

Sal1950

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The similarity part is there are both measurable and non-measurable components. But its not limited ot audio or automotive, its literally everything. From cars, to food, music to even computers etc...
You make incorrect assumptions.
Audio has been a solved problem for decades now, there are no non-measurable aspects in Hi Fi.
 

Doodski

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You make incorrect assumptions.
Audio has been a solved problem for decades now, there are no non-measurable aspects in Hi Fi.
Electronic metrology labs are using atomic clocks for time base reference and such at parts per million measurements. Audio electronics measuring is a drop in the bucket comparatively speaking as far as measuring stuff and the spec'd tolerances required for measuring. Peeps that are not in the know simply don't understand how fast and accurate electronics are. A carpenter I know asked me how his RAM pickup truck can change so fast from 4 to 8 cylinders and he said he doesn't believe that electronics can be so fast. He simply denied the knowledge that I gave him as per fast speeds of electronics and how accurate the circuitry can be. He is still thinking in terms of mechanical mechanisms controlling engines and such.
 

Sal1950

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Glen20

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Bull$hit!
A good driver is a human, and can therefore adapt to the nuance of an imperfect car.
(Stewart, Hill, a couple of Kiwi and Aussie drivers, Kimi, Alonso, Ayrton, Hamilton, etc.)
But only where the performance increases from their ability to adapt is larger than the difference in the car.
Look at Romain Grosjean
2020 f1 season placed 19th (2 points)
2020 f1 Bahrain GP Hi last f1 race. qual 19th out of 20 ( crashed out and traped in car while on fire by ankle)
2021 indycar. in his 3rd indycar race ever.

Grand Prix of Indianapolis

Qualify p1 Finish p2 !
 
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