[Tech Issue] A case for active suspension

[Richard C]

As I have been somewhat a critic of Taxi645’s ideas around narrow/shorter tires and flexible/passive aero. I figured I would give him and others a chance to be just as critical with an idea that I think does have legs. I am also not particularly much of an F1 historian, so apologies if I got some of the history wrong.

A recent history of active and passive control in F1
F1 has a history of active control solutions. The heyday of this in F1 was in the mid 1990’s in which you could see anti-lock brakes, traction control, semi/full automatic gearboxes, some drive by wire aspects and lastly fully active suspensions. While most of those have since been banned, you can see that more recently F1 has brought back DRS and brake by wire for rear brakes (which use a combination of kinetic recovery energy recovery along with traditional caliper/rotor setup to slow the car.)

With many active systems banned, F1 has also used and subsequently banned some passive systems. These include chassis tuned mass dampers, front and rear interconnected suspensions (FRIC) and suspension inerters (aka J Dampers). Mass dampers were banned in 2007, FRIC in 2014 and suspension inerters for 2022.

What was active suspension about and why was it banned?
Initially Lotus brought active suspension to F1 to solve underbody wing porposing problems (like we are seeing today). Given that the issue was a right height control issue, things such as stiffer springs, etc. was not a good solution. The idea was to create an “active” spring that could dynamically adjust ride height. And this was done via a computer-controlled system. While this was initially about solving porposing, it was clear this was just one of many things the concept could be used for.

Williams took this to the next step. Their system was more about obtaining optimal aero benefits (such as adjusting ride height to reduce drag on long straights) than trying to focus purely on optimal ride height. Additionally, the system could learn the circuit and know where it was so it could adjust the suspension in advance of bumpy parts of a circuit or adjust ride height to increase speed on straights.

This all sounds fantastic, so why was it banned? If you are able to control the attitude of the car so tightly over an entire circuit, you can then optimize the aero solution to work within that new narrower window of expected situations. The argument for the ban was that this more narrow performance window created cars that could be very unstable in non-optimal scenarios. Additionally the cars were able to create higher cornering speeds and the regulators have always had to periodically dial back the performance of the cars (for safety reasons) as technology reduces lap times. F1 banned active suspension in 1993.

Why has active suspension not returned?
With the rework of the regulations for the 2022 season, active suspension was a serious contender for returning as an allowable option. It is nearly three decades since it was banned and given the technology is now not particularly bleeding edge, it could be much easier to implement today than it was back then. With ease of following leading cars being a large design goal of the 2022 regulations, there was concern that bringing back active suspension might once again create particularly peaky solutions that would be contrary to the 2022 goals. So it was not included.

https://www.racefans.net/2019/07/19/...nsion-in-2021/

I hypothesize that another reason for this is that given the cost cap introduction that the teams had a large amount of rework on their hands. They had to not only switch from a generally flat bottom car to one with an underbody wing, they also had to adapt to the wheels and tires. You could say that active suspension might make both challenges much easier, but in the end, I suspect it was just too much for the teams to tackle.

Should we bring back active suspension now?
I don’t think active suspension should be introduced now. It would need to wait until the next set of significant technical regulation changes. And that will be in 2026. While details are not final, it is generally expected that the basic internal combustion setup of today will carry forward (turbo v6), but there will be the removal of the complex MGU-H system and the MGU-K will be expanded in size. This includes a larger battery as well. With the potential for the cars to be slightly less efficient (loss of MGU-H, I suspect there may be an increase in fuel capacity as well as a larger batter pack. I fully expect these core changes will trigger all new designs in 2026 from the chassis perspective. Core things such as fuel cell size, battery size, and potentially overall PU dimensions will drive core design aspects of the car. This could be the time to introduce active suspension.

What problems does active suspension solve?
It solves the same problems it tried to solve back in the mid-1990s. That is to achieve the level of suspension control that designer want, you either need some type of active system, or you have to implement complex mechanical and pneumatic systems to get around active system bans. Therefore, things such as mass dampers, FRIC and suspension inerters came about. All of which were banned due to their complex and esoteric nature.

I also say there is another reason to do this. The analogy I use is that F1 suspension is very cool, but also very esoteric and expensive Swiss mechanical clocks in a world of cheap commodity quartz clocks that tell better time. The complexity and intricacy of classic race car suspension (especially in the bespoke world of F1) is impressive. But it is also totally unnecessary. They are entirely gratuitous in their implementations. But they are this way only because more modern solutions have been banned.

I think an active system could be a huge cost savings for teams, perform better and allow F1 to stand out from other series. There have also been major advances in computing, sensors and actuators and the general miniaturization and cost reduction of all the above. Building an F1 active suspension should be relatively cheap and trivial. Money could be spent elsewhere.

How do we avoid the issue of “peaky” cars?
The active suspension of the 1990’s was impressive for it’s time. And I understand the concerns of it creating highly optimized solutions. If you can control a ton of variables that previously was difficult or impossible to control (car attitude at all locations on the track) then you are able to build a much more optimized solution. And this optimized solution is likely to have much worse than optimal performance when outside of that window. I guess this is the definition of “peaky”.

I think the solution is to allow for a closed loop system, but to restrict it from things like “learning the track” dynamically or even knowing where it is on a specific track that has been pre-programmed into it. Both of which can allow for it to have predictive actions.

If the car has no knowledge of what is about to happen, but rather only what is happening “right now”, then this can provide a solution that is better than today, but maybe not quite as good as what was done in the 1990’s. Teams could not create such highly optimized solutions. I am suggesting that it would control more, but not all of the variable. With the further extension being that the cars maybe don’t have to be as peaky as the regulators fear.

What are the downsides?
The concerns about peakyness might be real. The concerns about failure of active systems might be real. People are concerned the cars are too easy to drive. This will make it easier. The initial cost of transitioning from legacy to active suspension might be a bit of a pain. Teams have a vested interest in how things work today. They have staff who focus on the design and tuning of the suspension. And generally speaking, they have a specific and unique set of knowledge with that being about the legacy style of suspension. While some of their knowledge will transfer over to active suspension, it would be a revolution in that those departments with winners and losers.

What would the regulations look like?
As I mentioned above, I think this would be part of the 2026 regulation change. If the desire to move to active suspension is generally settled upon in advance, teams can devote time and budget toward that goal in advance of the switch over.

I think the regulations should have a few goals
• Cheap to implement and develop
• Simple mechanically
• Controls in place to move innovation into software vs mechanical solutions.
• Limits to prevent a costly arms race.
• Capability limits to prevent overly optimized solutions

My solutions we be as follows
1. Implement a standard ECU just like is used for the Power Unit

2. Hard exclusions/requirements
_a. Track prediction and learning.
__i. The cars should not be able to figure out they are on X track and then act accordingly.
__ii. The cars should not be able to learn the track
__iii. No technology such as GPS, geolocation, dead reckoning navigation, etc. to try to determine their location.
_b. No car to pit or pit to car communication with respect to active suspension.
__i. The car is only governed by the local ECU. No AI elsewhere telling it what to do
_c. Driver controls
__i. Driver can set some limited modes. (such as via rotary knob on wheel). Otherwise it is just the ECU doing it’s thing
_d. Fault detection mode that triggers some type of “limp mode” that provides a safe operation in the event of a failure. In short, don’t crash the car if some sensors fail. This will allow a driver to safely retire the car in the event of a serious failure.

3. Set a fixed number of input channels for the ECU.
_a. Each input is tied to a single sensor.
_b. You can’t combine multiple sensor inputs into one channel.
_c. This means input channels count equals sensor count

4. Set a fixed number of output (control) channels for the ECU
_a. Each output is tied to a single actuator
_b. This means output channel count equals actuator count

5. Provide a standard set of homologated sensors and actuators
_a. This prevents tricky multipurpose sensors and actuators.
_b. It puts everyone on the same playing field

6. Provide some additional language on implementation
_a. Allowable suspension elements (such as basic double wishbone or limited multi-link setups)
_b. Prevent actuators from driving downstream complex mechanical systems. This may be as simple as saying that a linear relationship should exist from an actuator movement and movement of the suspension. Non-linear actions could be controlled in software.

No doubt I am missing something. I think the last item will be the area that would need the long-term adjustments as team look to find loopholes. With software updates being the primary method of R&D and bringing updates to the track, I am on the fence as to allowing “per race” updates. Which would create the situation of teams creating packages that could be optimized (including mode operation) to an individual track. You might be able to resolve this by limiting teams to a fixed number of updates per season, or require them to only update every so often (with and exception to address safety or reliability issues, but with them having to provide evidence that the changes are for those reasons only)

In short, I think it would set F1 apart, be cheaper, can be regulated if done correctly and also be done in a way that avoids the issues from prior implementation by creating something that is better than what we have today, but not to the full extent of what could be technically capable.

Lastly, while I don’t mention it. I think active aero (beyond DRS) could be implemented using pretty much the same formula of standard ECU, standard homologated components, limited on implementation capabilities, etc. You could even combine the two concepts into one or have them work with each other.

Thoughts?

Richard

[TrapezeArtist]

Yes.

[Taxi645]

Excellent post Richard. Very well set up and thought out. I think indeed cost control and it actually being the driver that drives the car are the two most important criteria to me personally. I'm going to be a bit boring and say that I also agree for the very most part with the regulations and solutions you propose.

For me it could be as simple as indeed a standardized control unit which controls the ride height/preload per axle based on a mapping that takes only speed of the car and fuel load as inputs. So each axle will see exponentially increasing loads from downforce and this system counteracts that to allow stable ride height at each axle. If you are already doing that anyway, it would be a shame not also allow them to input fuel load as well (in order to account for the change in weight because you burn off up to 110kg of fuel). This would be determined by the standardized ECU based on the start amount put in the by the team (as it leaves the garage) and the amount burnt off from that point as measured by the fuel flow meter.

I think this would indeed be a very simple, low cost, standardized system that would solve the porpoising problem and on top of that makes the car handle better because of the changing weight due to the dropping fuel load during the race can then also be taken account for. I think it would be hard to really spent lot's of development on it or do anything devious with it, because:

1 It is standardized.
2 Has simple inputs and outputs with no proactive or responsive terrain surface reaction element to it.
3 Works on each axle in stead of each corner.

Personally I think something like you describe we might even see before 2026 (perhaps 2024 already). 1. Because the need is very obvious and urgent and 2. It might be better to not change too much at the same time in 2026.

[crmalcolm]

Originally Posted by Taxi645

Personally I think something like you describe we might even see before 2026 (perhaps 2024 already). 1. Because the need is very obvious and urgent and 2. It might be better to not change too much at the same time in 2026.

Just to seek clarification - can you expand on what the very obvious and urgent need (for active suspension) is?

I can understand the argument for it being an option - but I don't currently see it as a need, rather a desirable (for some).

[Taxi645]

Originally Posted by crmalcolm

Just to seek clarification - can you expand on what the very obvious and urgent need (for active suspension) is?

I can understand the argument for it being an option - but I don't currently see it as a need, rather a desirable (for some).

Mainly for safety. Imagine a race situation with a fight for position at the end of a straight. The overtaking car switches of his DRS, the car drops down too far because the slip-stream and DRS caused a higher speed and thus downforce level than anticipated by the engineers. The air flow stalls just when the driver slams on the brakes. That could lead to a pretty serious accident.

That said, you are right, it would be better see how the first few races go before stating it as a need.

[crmalcolm]

Originally Posted by Taxi645

Mainly for safety. Imagine a race situation with a fight for position at the end of a straight. The overtaking car switches of his DRS, the car drops down too far because the slip-stream and DRS caused a higher speed and thus downforce level than anticipated by the engineers. The air flow stalls just when the driver slams on the brakes. That could lead to a pretty serious accident.

I can imagine the situation you present - but haven't we already had DRS for a while? I don't recall the situation you put forward here as actually having happened with the current fixed wing and non-active suspension.

[Taxi645]

Originally Posted by crmalcolm

I can imagine the situation you present - but haven't we already had DRS for a while? I don't recall the situation you put forward here as actually having happened with the current fixed wing and non-active suspension.

The situation is new because we now have much stronger ground effect aerodynamics that become increasingly strong the closer the car gets to the ground before suddenly collapsing because the car becomes so close too the ground that the air stalls. We haven't had this downforce increasing and than disappearing ground effect nearly as strong with the previous cars where more of the downforce came from the top side of the car.

[Sodemo]

I would say yes, it should return if it solves the problem with Porposing. Having said that, wouldn't the (now banned) "mass damper" also solve this problem pretty much by itself?

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by Sodemo

I would say yes, it should return if it solves the problem with Porposing. Having said that, wouldn't the (now banned) "mass damper" also solve this problem pretty much by itself?

It could. But it continues the idea of complex passive mechanical system vs simple active ones. Why not bring back FRIC, inerters, etc.? And in the end, they would be less optimal solutions (complex, esoteric, lesser performance, etc.) Those solutions were used because active ones were not allowed. The argument for active suspension is not centered on solving porpoising.

My general thoughts on the current porpoising problem. Would active suspension fix this? Absolutely. However, I feel there is zero chance active suspension will show up prior to 2026. Teams will find other ways (less optimal ways) to address the porpoising. But active suspension is too big of a change to implement in the current spec. Cars and aero concepts would be totally redesigned. It's too much given the cost caps. 2026 IMHO is doable.

Richard

[crmalcolm]

Originally Posted by Taxi645

The situation is new because we now have much stronger ground effect aerodynamics that become increasingly strong the closer the car gets to the ground before suddenly collapsing because the car becomes so close too the ground that the air stalls. We haven't had this downforce increasing and than disappearing ground effect nearly as strong with the previous cars where more of the downforce came from the top side of the car.

Understood - I just think we are in a hypothetical situation that is not known to be an issue.

It would require much greater analysis to determine, but in the situation you refer to (DRS being deactivated at the precise point the underfloor stalls), it seems to me that this is not an issue under the current regulations because the fixed wing profile is reinstated at the point of DRS deactivation, and that would engage with the airflow and provide the down-force required to prevent the incident developing.

I may be repeating myself here, but my position has not changed (yet). We have a new set of regulations, and there has been an issue during testing of cars porpoising.
Issues during testing are not new and one could argue that is exactly what testing is for - to explore and identify issues, then resolve them.

To deliberately take it far in one direction - do we have to change the hydraulic regulations because Alpine had a failure in testing?

We don't know if the teams will solve this issue without cause to change the regulations, and they may already have done so:
Jan Monchaux “To be fully transparent and honest, we didn’t anticipate that. We had discussed during the last months about those kind of phenomena that could happen but none of our tools – windtunnel and other simulation tools – were giving a hint of it. We were a bit taken aback, which has been the case for probably all of the teams or most of the teams. In itself, I would suspect that we are going to get that under control with some modifications mainly on the floor that will allow us to get a bit closer to our optimum [ride height] but with the current state of the rules I would also expect that we would have to settle slightly higher than we all thought at the beginning. So the question would be how much higher? Is it 3-5mm or or is it 20mm? I hope it will be 5mm because the rework on the car will be less, but we will see. We can have a chat in a month’s time or so and then I will be able to give you a better, more precise, answer.”

[Taxi645]

Originally Posted by crmalcolm

Understood - I just think we are in a hypothetical situation that is not known to be an issue.

Agreed, though I would formulate it as; not known to continue to be an issue.

It would require much greater analysis to determine, but in the situation you refer to (DRS being deactivated at the precise point the underfloor stalls), it seems to me that this is not an issue under the current regulations because the fixed wing profile is reinstated at the point of DRS deactivation, and that would engage with the airflow and provide the down-force required to prevent the incident developing.

Unfortunately that is not the case. The airflow at the rear wings is not the issue. The issue is the stalling airflow below the car because the car gets too low for the air to cleanly pass through. The downforce of the rear wing is actually contributing to the problem because it contributes to push the car too low which causes the airflow stall under the car. That's why the porpoising doesn't not happen with DRS or at lower speed, the car then doesn't get pushed down low enough for the airflow too stall.

I may be repeating myself here, but my position has not changed (yet). We have a new set of regulations, and there has been an issue during testing of cars porpoising.
Issues during testing are not new and one could argue that is exactly what testing is for - to explore and identify issues, then resolve them.

To deliberately take it far in one direction - do we have to change the hydraulic regulations because Alpine had a failure in testing?

We don't know if the teams will solve this issue without cause to change the regulations, and they may already have done so:
Jan Monchaux “To be fully transparent and honest, we didn’t anticipate that. We had discussed during the last months about those kind of phenomena that could happen but none of our tools – windtunnel and other simulation tools – were giving a hint of it. We were a bit taken aback, which has been the case for probably all of the teams or most of the teams. In itself, I would suspect that we are going to get that under control with some modifications mainly on the floor that will allow us to get a bit closer to our optimum [ride height] but with the current state of the rules I would also expect that we would have to settle slightly higher than we all thought at the beginning. So the question would be how much higher? Is it 3-5mm or or is it 20mm? I hope it will be 5mm because the rework on the car will be less, but we will see. We can have a chat in a month’s time or so and then I will be able to give you a better, more precise, answer.”

Your above quote from Monchaux helps to explain a bit further why the scenario I described earlier can be a problem. The quote explains teams need to compromise on ride height choosing between too much porpoising or too much loss of performance. Put it too high and you won't have much porpoising, but you'll loose significant performance. Put it too low the performance will be good, but you'll the porpoising problem at the end of the longer straights.

Consider the decision for a race set up. Say your normal top speed will be 195mph, but with an overtake with slipstream and DRS you will reach 210mph. Are the teams then going to set the car high enough to prevent porpoising at the one or two times in a race they go 210mph in an overtake and loose a lot of performance the 50 other laps of the race because the car is set up too high? Or is it more likely they set the ride height lower to optimize performance for the other 50 laps of the race and hope the results are not too bad when they airflow under the car stalls the one or two times the driver closes the DRS at 210mph and tries too brake at the latest to make the overtake stick and then finds the wheels don't have any grip because most downforce is gone with the stalled airflow?

Most likely they will choose closer to the latter and thus is could become a safety risk. A simple active suspension system would be able to keep the car at ride height sweet spot for performance and preventing porpoising at all speeds (downforce levels) and fuel loads. But you are right though, we should wait and see before drawing premature conclusions.

I would propose those interested to read the below article to better understand the issue. I don't mean this in any condescending way, shape or form, but it does help to understand what's going on and thus keep the thread more on topic:

https://www.racecar-engineering.com/...ising-problem/

As the ground effect aerodynamic load comes on, the car gets lower to the ground, exponentially increasing the underfloor load. If the car’s floor gets too close to the ground or even hits the tarmac, the underfloor flow field is destroyed, suddenly shedding the load, and the car shoots back up to static ride height. Once the ride height goes up to a point where the flow field can recover, the aero load recuperates, and the process repeats.

Jody Egginton, Technical Director at Scuderia AlphaTauri, says, ‘With a ground effect floor, getting the most aerodynamic load means running the floors as close to the ground as possible – there’s an attractiveness in that, and there’s an aerodynamic benefit to do it. So, logically we all try to exploit that. The closer you get to the ground, the higher the risk of inducing instability from things like the floor choking.

[P38 in workshop]

As eloquently stated in post #9 the last few years have seen all manner of complex mechanical parts introduced to attempt to provide the solution that active can more easily control.I didn't notice tuned mass dampers btw.The occasional objections tot he principle seem to be based on the notion that software would have to be rewritten on a nearly continual basis.I understand that the same basic control software would remain largely untouched,but the parameters and sub-routines within it might need to have various values altered to bring about changes.In fact,given the ability to analyse data and adjust while in motion,it could be that within a handful of laps and with no human (expensive) innovation,the cars would deal with their own evolution.given a standard,open source,control program it needn't cost huge amounts of money when compared to producing truckloads of mechanical components.A fair analogy might be the way that CFD has supplanted dozens of wind tunnel runs and the attendant hill of parts by the bin.by all means mandate,or issue,standard parts to limit the boundaries.

[crmalcolm]

Originally Posted by Taxi645

I would propose those interested to read the below article to better understand the issue. I don't mean this in any condescending way, shape or form, but it does help to understand what's going on and thus keep the thread more on topic:

https://www.racecar-engineering.com/...ising-problem/

As the ground effect aerodynamic load comes on, the car gets lower to the ground, exponentially increasing the underfloor load. If the car’s floor gets too close to the ground or even hits the tarmac, the underfloor flow field is destroyed, suddenly shedding the load, and the car shoots back up to static ride height. Once the ride height goes up to a point where the flow field can recover, the aero load recuperates, and the process repeats.

Jody Egginton, Technical Director at Scuderia AlphaTauri, says, ‘With a ground effect floor, getting the most aerodynamic load means running the floors as close to the ground as possible – there’s an attractiveness in that, and there’s an aerodynamic benefit to do it. So, logically we all try to exploit that. The closer you get to the ground, the higher the risk of inducing instability from things like the floor choking.

Interestingly, that very article indicates that there is not really a significant problem, but a minor issue that can easily be addressed.

'Pat Symonds, Chief Technical Officer at F1, said, ‘F1 and the FIA don’t change rules. Anyone who’s worked in sportscars or worked in Formula 1 for a long while knows the phenomena. It’s fixable within the framework of the rules and the technology allowed on the cars now. As it always has been, the secret is to minimise the instability while keeping the performance.’'

In the context of this thread (from that article) - 'The consensus is that there is an aerodynamic solution to the porpoising issue.'

[Taxi645]

Originally Posted by crmalcolm

Interestingly, that very article indicates that there is not really a significant problem, but a minor issue that can easily be addressed.
'Pat Symonds, Chief Technical Officer at F1, said, ‘F1 and the FIA don’t change rules. Anyone who’s worked in sportscars or worked in Formula 1 for a long while knows the phenomena. It’s fixable within the framework of the rules and the technology allowed on the cars now. As it always has been, the secret is to minimise the instability while keeping the performance.’'

In the context of this thread (from that article) - 'The consensus is that there is an aerodynamic solution to the porpoising issue.'

Indeed (although the person laying out the new rules would be inclined to say that of course). So we should indeed, as you suggested, wait and see if the teams in fact get on top the problem and no issues occur during setting fastest single laps and during racing. If they can fix it, fine. If they can't sufficiently fix it, further measures would be appropriate.

Here is another video explaining the phenomenon more visually:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xByKRdRhapE

[Sodemo]

One aspect I was surprised at was how much suspension travel these cars seem to have. When the cars bounce there was a surprising amount of compression.

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by Sodemo

One aspect I was surprised at was how much suspension travel these cars seem to have. When the cars bounce there was a surprising amount of compression.

With there being less sidewall to flex, they have transitioned that level of compliance to the actual suspension.

Richard

[Sodemo]

Originally Posted by Richard Casto

With there being less sidewall to flex, they have transitioned that level of compliance to the actual suspension.

Richard

Understood, although I thought I read the opposite; that the cars had become stiffer due to the underfloor aero, so it seems contradictory.

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by Sodemo

Understood, although I thought I read the opposite; that the cars had become stiffer due to the underfloor aero, so it seems contradictory.

They might be run stiffer overall due to the need to try to keep inside a specific ride height window. But what level of movement we may see will be more in the suspension than in the sidewalls. No more of the slow motion shots of the tires vibrating and wrinkling like big balloons as they crash over curbs.

Richard

[chillibowl]

Originally Posted by Richard Casto

Teams will find other ways (less optimal ways) to address the porpoising.

cherry picking that for a question...

why would finding a solution within both the current rules and within the current budget cap be less optimal?

rather, wouldn't solving the problem (or only partially solving it even) without losing time and money to a rule change that may also require many other changes to the car to be made be the definition of optimal?

again just a thought i hand reading that one line so could be looking at it out of context. apologies if i am. probably also confusing 'optimal' with 'expedient'.

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by chillibowl

cherry picking that for a question...

why would finding a solution within both the current rules and within the current budget cap be less optimal?

rather, wouldn't solving the problem (or only partially solving it even) without losing time and money to a rule change that may also require many other changes to the car to be made be the definition of optimal?

again just a thought i hand reading that one line so could be looking at it out of context. apologies if i am. probably also confusing 'optimal' with 'expedient'.

We are in agreement. So the context of that quote is...

Originally Posted by Richard Casto

My general thoughts on the current porpoising problem. Would active suspension fix this? Absolutely. However, I feel there is zero chance active suspension will show up prior to 2026. Teams will find other ways (less optimal ways) to address the porpoising. But active suspension is too big of a change to implement in the current spec. Cars and aero concepts would be totally redesigned. It's too much given the cost caps. 2026 IMHO is doable.

I bold in the text above what I think is agreeing with your points.

When I speak to "optimal solution", I am talking optimal from a technical perspective. So the more elegant (or optimal) technical solution to porpoising is active suspension. But for the reasons you call out (and I do as well), it would be too disruptive (especially from a budget perspective) to introduce active suspension now.

I wish they had included it in 2022, but I think they were considering a much more open solution than I am proposing. So I am proposing it come in 2026.

I think teams today are going to have to solve porpoising via a combination of aero tweaks and suspension setup. Those will work, but will be less effective (and bring other compromises) than something like active suspension. I also think that while teams may generally get it under control, we are likely to see it occasionally pop up during the season. More at first, but probably as well through the duration. I find the following article very interesting...

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/h...-2022/8630412/

Basically what it says is that running the car higher is likely to help alleviate porpoising. But that might sacrifice some overall speed. Conversely running the cars low will improve performance (underbody wing performance is better), but with an increased risk of porpoising. So given the importance of qualifying well, some teams may be take the risk of triggering porpoising by running the cars lower. Sort of like the situation if your car is draggy, then you just take some wing off of it to get your top speed up, but the car is a handful in the corners. And that DRS (which seems to help reduce porpoising) might hide the issue during practice and qualifying. So go fast in qualifying , but have problems in the race.

We will see porpoising during the season and it will be fodder for those who want to slag the new regulations.

Richard

[Taxi645]

https://the-race.com/formula-1/activ...-but-wont-get/

"Given porpoising is a well-known phenomenon in ground-effect formulas, Brawn argues that it will be down to the teams to deal with.

But he did add that should it become a problem then the FIA could tweak the floor rules to fix it."

[chillibowl]

Originally Posted by Richard Casto

We are in agreement. So the context of that quote is...

good good...i get worried when we are not i agreement!

Originally Posted by Taxi645

https://the-race.com/formula-1/activ...-but-wont-get/

"Given porpoising is a well-known phenomenon in ground-effect formulas, Brawn argues that it will be down to the teams to deal with.

But he did add that should it become a problem then the FIA could tweak the floor rules to fix it."

for my part, seeing the how the teams go about solving a problem will add something to this year's contest. last year, by virtue of the carry over, the cars were really well understood so we didnt see this challenge to fix something under the budget cap.

for sure the porpoising looks really silly though so i might have to change my mind!

Originally Posted by Richard Casto

Basically what it says is that running the car higher is likely to help alleviate porpoising. But that might sacrifice some overall speed. Conversely running the cars low will improve performance (underbody wing performance is better), but with an increased risk of porpoising. So given the importance of qualifying well, some teams may be take the risk of triggering porpoising by running the cars lower. Sort of like the situation if your car is draggy, then you just take some wing off of it to get your top speed up, but the car is a handful in the corners. And that DRS (which seems to help reduce porpoising) might hide the issue during practice and qualifying. So go fast in qualifying , but have problems in the race.

again, for me this is brilliant. not only creates the opportunity for teams down the grid to shine if they figure it out but also introduces more set up differences between team mates.

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by chillibowl

good good...i get worried when we are not i agreement!

LOL! Well, I am also happy when people point out when I am objectively wrong

Originally Posted by chillibowl

again, for me this is brilliant. not only creates the opportunity for teams down the grid to shine if they figure it out but also introduces more set up differences between team mates.

So I agree. I think this should be viewed as a place for teams to shine. As I said earlier, I expect there will be complaints. But it will be more the situation of fans watching their favorite team or driver do poorly due to something like porpoising.

Instead of seeing that their team needs to do a better job, they will blame the regulations for causing problems. I think this will be especially true if some of the previously top teams end up slipping down the rankings. That it all will be considered as "unfair" that their previous high performance has been muted.

If multiple teams are impacted, you may see coalitions form in which they group together and ask for changes to "remove the flaw in the regulations". I think short of a pervasive across the board issue that creates clearly unsafe conditions that nothing should be done. If some teams have solved the problem and if the problem can be mitigated by make the car go slower, then my message to the other teams would be... Suck it up Buttercup and get your act together!!

Richard

[wnut]

Good article on why McLaren is not suffering from porpoising and the role of the floor edge and edge wings in controlling the phenomenon.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/other...?ocid=msedgntp

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by Richard Casto

Thoughts?

Just no. The engineers should fix the porpoising problem using the tools available within the regulations, which is raising the car. If they are stubborn and refuse to do that, then a minimum static ride height of 60mm or whichever height, will be forced upon them perhaps...


The infamous FIA laser from 1983 which enforced a minimum 60mm ride height... But no blatant cheating the test by using hydraulics this time!

A tuned mass damper smooths out oscillations which is not what you want as a regulator. You want to restrict the tools available in the suspension and make the cars more rudimentary.

As a regulator you WANT the cars to be choppy and to oscillate (in a safe way during corners or over serrated kerbs). It makes for a better spectacle and better engineering challenge, than overly sophisticated cars with a smooth, stable aero platform.

Even worse would be active suspension, talk about killing the spectacle...

Life should be hard for Grand Prix car engineers, they shouldn't be allowed to add stuff to the car willy-nily to solve their aero problems.

Originally Posted by Richard Casto

If multiple teams are impacted, you may see coalitions form in which they group together and ask for changes to "remove the flaw in the regulations".

There isn't one, teams just need to raise their static ride height by 40mm, 60mm, 80mm, or 100mm as necessary so the car doesn't bottom out at top speed. Too easy.