DD Diffuser teams fight back?!

[ioan]

Sources close to the FIA have confirmed that three teams, whose identities currently remain undisclosed, have formally complained against no fewer than two teams for using "questionable" KERS systems during the season opener.

The allegations centre upon the amount of horsepower available to the drivers, with claims that several teams breached the 80 horsepower limit.

The duration of KERS used per lap is governed by the sport's new Electronic Control Unit (ECU), but it is alleged that certain teams have developed a workaround to allow the additional 80bhp output by the systems to generate additional power (up to 96bhp) while keeping the usable boost-time per lap within the allowable limit. Evidence presented against teams running the alleged illegal system stems from sophisticated sound recordings of their engines during the race.

A statement is expected from the FIA prior to the first free practice session in Sepang.

http://www.pitpass.com/fes_php/pitpass_news_item.php?fes_art_id=37402

Hopefully is just an April fools joke.

If it isn't I wonder how can sound recordings be used to prove anything about something no one saw?!

I mean the DD diffusers can be measured and all, but you can't prove the power of that KERS is more than 80HP without directly measuring it.

Is this another disgusting joke like the one that Williams pulled on RBR and Ferrari in Oz?!

[christophulus]

I'm going to call April Fools on that one, there's no way that I know of that you can tell the power available from a sound recording..

It'll be easy for the stewards to check how legal the KERS is anyway when they check the cars on Thursday

[ioan]

I'm going to call April Fools on that one, there's no way that I know of that you can tell the power available from a sound recording..

I hope so too. There's enough that hit the fan already.


It'll be easy for the stewards to check how legal the KERS is anyway when they check the cars on Thursday

Not without a dyno.

[Knock-on]

I'm going to call April Fools on that one, there's no way that I know of that you can tell the power available from a sound recording..

It'll be easy for the stewards to check how legal the KERS is anyway when they check the cars on Thursday

You can tell RPM and rate of change but without additional data such as drag etc, I am at a loss to understand how they can differentiate an additional 16bhp.

Oh well :rolleyes:

[Psycho!]

That's ridiculous!!!

[Mark]

You can tell RPM from a sound recording, but, that's freely available information anyway, you see it on the TV coverage after all!

[ioan]

Given that this "news" didn't make it to any serious F1 site I believe it's just an April Fools joke.

[Robinho]

it hought it must be April Folls, but its not a traditional jokey sort of story, maybe there is something in it, but i think we would have heard it elswhere

[Sleeper]

Ultrasound recording s of the engines have been used for years to measure an engines horspower in F1 trackside, but I doubt its completely accurate so any protest couldnt work.

Mind you, McLaren and Ferrari seemed to get a bigger bost from theirs than BMW or Renault did, but Renault say their system needs work.

[Tazio]

I hope the teams with these Bandit KERS havn't broken the spirit of the rules :mark:

[chuck34]

Sound has been used in the past to measure HP. Afterall sound power is directly related to engine power. I'm not sure exactly how it works. I'll do some digging to find out, but I know it can be done.

But as Sleeper says, I'm not sure of the accuracy. But it would be a good starting point. Sort of like probable cause for a search warrant.

Also on the in-car with the McLarens, it did sound very strange. Almost like they were shifting down then back up again. Not sure what that means.

[Mark]

Sound has been used in the past to measure HP. Afterall sound power is directly related to engine power. I'm not sure exactly how it works. I'll do some digging to find out, but I know it can be done.


It goes off frequency. You can tell how many revs an engine is doing according to the frequency of the sound it emits. Knowing that and the weight of the car you can give an estimate of the horsepower. But there is guesswork involved, such as gear ratios etc.

[ioan]

It goes off frequency. You can tell how many revs an engine is doing according to the frequency of the sound it emits. Knowing that and the weight of the car you can give an estimate of the horsepower. But there is guesswork involved, such as gear ratios etc.

Yeah, but that is for the usual combustion engine.
What happens when you couple both the combustion engine and KERS? How the heck are they going to calculate what power exactly KERS is delivering to the transmission out of the whole power?
And for sure the combustion engine's sound characteristic will change a lot at the moment when KERS is used.

This is either an April Fools joke or the DDDiffuser teams are having another Williams type brain fart moment.

[nigelred5]

Also on the in-car with the McLarens, it did sound very strange. Almost like they were shifting down then back up again. Not sure what that means.

I noticed that as well. I suppose activating the KERS has to actually boost the engine RPM not merely the transmission, so the engine note would change.

[chuck34]

It goes off frequency. You can tell how many revs an engine is doing according to the frequency of the sound it emits. Knowing that and the weight of the car you can give an estimate of the horsepower. But there is guesswork involved, such as gear ratios etc.

Still haven't found the exact equations but gear ratios have nothing to do with it. It is all based on sound power, and frequency I believe. Basically you measure your car's sound power as it goes by and by knowing your horsepower, you have a baseline. Then you measure your competitor's sound power as they go by. That difference is the difference in HP.

However, Ioan does raise a good question. Since the KERS is not increasing engine HP, sound isn't all of it. But I suppose that if you measure the engine HP by sound, then you measure speed at that point, assume some drag number, then you can calc out the difference between the HP needed to move the car through the drag and the HP the engine is producing. That difference would be the KERS output.

But of course untill I actually find the equations, I'm subject to being mistaken.

[SGWilko]

This is how I measure the HP delivered by KERS.

1. Wet Finger. This is very important. Must be r/h index.
2. Stand on one leg. Left is good, unless you are an Ex-Beatle-Ex, then concessions can be made.
3. Ask your wife, g/f, b/f, lover, mistress, beatch, or pimp to gentle caress your left inner thigh.
4. Count to ten.
5. Think of a number between 79 and 81.........

:D :laugh: ;)

[ioan]

This is how I measure the HP delivered by KERS.

1. Wet Finger. This is very important. Must be r/h index.
2. Stand on one leg. Left is good, unless you are an Ex-Beatle-Ex, then concessions can be made.
3. Ask your wife, g/f, b/f, lover, mistress, beatch, or pimp to gentle caress your left inner thigh.
4. Count to ten.
5. Think of a number between 79 and 81.........

:D :laugh: ;)

Point 2 is not funny at all.

[SGWilko]

Apparently, one year, paul mccartney bought his wife a plane for herbirthday, he had no idea however what to get for the other leg......

[airshifter]

Yeah, but that is for the usual combustion engine.
What happens when you couple both the combustion engine and KERS? How the heck are they going to calculate what power exactly KERS is delivering to the transmission out of the whole power?
And for sure the combustion engine's sound characteristic will change a lot at the moment when KERS is used.

This is either an April Fools joke or the DDDiffuser teams are having another Williams type brain fart moment.

I don't think it would be too hard to do. If they can calculate HP based on the rise of the RPM, then they should be able to calculate the difference in the speed of the rise when using KERS and thus the HP KERS is producing.

Being that there are many, many times that throttle is 100% in any given gear, but only 6.5 seconds per lap that they can do so with the aid of KERS, there are more than adequate chances to record each.

[PSfan]

I'll call this, and the November Montreal race as tied for April fools joke of the season...

This one probably got more people believing, and the Montreal one gets some credit for fooling us by coming out a few days early :p

[Dave B]

It's a rather pathetic story, just about believable but full of bad research and poor writing. In other words, just like most of the other content on Pitpass.

[Knock-on]

It's a rather pathetic story, just about believable but full of bad research and poor writing. In other words, just like most of the other content on Pitpass.

QED :up:

[chuck34]

Ok I found the equation for measuring sound power. Lw=10log(W/Wo), where Wo is the reference power. Usually the reference power is 10^-12 (lowest power humans can hear). However, if you use your car's known power (in watts) then you can back out the competitors power.

I'm still not sure though how KERS relates to this. Does the KERS system feed it's power through the engine, or straight out to the wheels? If it goes through the engine then I suppose it would show up in the sound measurements. Pick two spots, one with KERS, one without and compare the two. I suppose it could be as simple as that.

[ioan]

Ok I found the equation for measuring sound power. Lw=10log(W/Wo), where Wo is the reference power. Usually the reference power is 10^-12 (lowest power humans can hear). However, if you use your car's known power (in watts) then you can back out the competitors power.

I'm still not sure though how KERS relates to this. Does the KERS system feed it's power through the engine, or straight out to the wheels? If it goes through the engine then I suppose it would show up in the sound measurements. Pick two spots, one with KERS, one without and compare the two. I suppose it could be as simple as that.

I would rather say that if KERS feeds the power directly to the transmission than you might have a chance to filter the noise produced by it, but if it goes through the engine than good luck making calculations with an engine that is revving higher than it normally would, not to mention that there will be different power loses in the 2 different cases.

Anyway, unless the plaintiff teams know exactly the KERS layout of the other teams, I doubt they can draw any conclusions. Maybe this is what they want to find out, how did the others implement KERS. However I doubt that their sound measurements will be accepted as proof in any court.

[chuck34]

I would rather say that if KERS feeds the power directly to the transmission than you might have a chance to filter the noise produced by it, but if it goes through the engine than good luck making calculations with an engine that is revving higher than it normally would, not to mention that there will be different power loses in the 2 different cases.

Anyway, unless the plaintiff teams know exactly the KERS layout of the other teams, I doubt they can draw any conclusions. Maybe this is what they want to find out, how did the others implement KERS. However I doubt that their sound measurements will be accepted as proof in any court.

As I said earlier, the sound measurements are NOT proof, but they are evidence of probable cause. Now if the FIA does their job (I'll give you a minute to stop laughing). They would take that evidence and put the cars in question on a chassis dyno, and find out for sure one way or the other.

[Malbec]

Ok I found the equation for measuring sound power. Lw=10log(W/Wo), where Wo is the reference power. Usually the reference power is 10^-12 (lowest power humans can hear). However, if you use your car's known power (in watts) then you can back out the competitors power.

I'm still not sure though how KERS relates to this. Does the KERS system feed it's power through the engine, or straight out to the wheels? If it goes through the engine then I suppose it would show up in the sound measurements. Pick two spots, one with KERS, one without and compare the two. I suppose it could be as simple as that.

Given that the energy transmitted through the driveshaft from KERS would be from a silent source, whether electrical or a flywheel I doubt the sound power would be altered much.

Also I suspect that the type of exhaust used will also alter the amount of sound transmitted outside the car.

Anyway all this doesn't really matter since pitpass admitted it was an April Fool's article anyway...

[chuck34]

Given that the energy transmitted through the driveshaft from KERS would be from a silent source, whether electrical or a flywheel I doubt the sound power would be altered much.

Also I suspect that the type of exhaust used will also alter the amount of sound transmitted outside the car.

Anyway all this doesn't really matter since pitpass admitted it was an April Fool's article anyway...

I suspect that you are correct about KERS not changing the sound power through the exhaust. Other calcs may be usefull but a lot of assumptions must be made, drag, gearing, etc.

The type of exhaust will change the pitch and/or sound "quality", but the power, is the power, is the power. Sort of like a light bulb. The color comming out of two different bulbs can be different, but the wattage is the same. I know for a fact that this technique has been used in the past.

I missed the part about it being an April Fool's deal. It's a good one because it's based, at least in part, on reality.