I’m Stuart Taylor, I waffle on YouTube about
Formula 1 and today I’m going to be watching
‘Achievement Hunter’ take on single-seater
racing.
What Michael here has confused is the term
‘open wheel’ which refers not to the wheel
itself being open and thus letting all the
air out, but that the wheel is ‘out in the
open’ and not enclosed within the chassis.
Formula 1 is an open wheel series unlike,
say, NASCAR or LeMans Prototypes which enclose
the wheels.
Formula E is interesting as it basically enclosed
the wheels on its Gen-2 car but then put them
back out in the open again with its updated
Gen 2 Evo.
These rookie drivers seem unaware that the
type of rubber on the tyres affect grip and
durability. Softer rubber is grippier but
has a shorter lifetime, whereas rock hard
rubber last for ages but has limited grip.
See, the driver Grabbin Fee might find his
tyres wearing out pretty quickly.
Ah so interestingly these drivers made their
tyre compound choices before realising they
had to take pitstops. In real formula 1, the
drivers know ahead of time that they have
to make a pitstop. In this instance, this
isn’t very realistic.
Now here drivers Jermany and Grabbin have
got into an accident and lost bodywork - notably
wings. In real Formula 1, this would affect
downforce meaning the cars would have very
little grip and start sliding all over the
place.
So here Grabbin is complaining about ‘understeer’,
meaning he can’t get the car turned into
the corner properly. Whether he’s figured
out it’s because he has no front wing or
not is unclear
‘maybe hard understeers…’ - Ah, no.
He has not. The front wing gives the front
tyres grip, so without it they can’t grab
the car and turn it into the corner properly.
In
real Formula 1 drivers will have formed a
strategy with their teams about when they
go for a pitstop. Several strategies in fact
- They’ll have a Plan A, Plan B, and so
on depending on what happens in the race.
The driver Nikel not knowing this one lap
into the race would be concerning to me.
So Grabbin pits here and his car gets repaired
in an instant. Interestingly, this is not
that different to real life where pitstops
often take about 3 seconds of stopping time
to complete. Of course they wouldn’t be
able to fix all the bodywork and put a new
front wing on, but still.
Formula 1 cars don’t have a boost button
but they can hoompf up the power of both the
engine and the electric motor. It did used
to have a very weak boost button that lasted
six seconds and recharged once a lap.
So this is very similar to how the hybrid
engine recharges in Formula 1. Taking your
foot off the throttle changes the power flow
from the power unit powering the car to the
car charging the battery. So yeah, good job.
So what these single seaters don’t have
which is mandatory in Formula 1 is a halo
device. It’s a small protective cage over
the driver to protect their hands from being
hit by cars and debris - something that would
be useful right now for Jermany as the other
driver, Mort, is sitting on top of him [CUT]
These are older model cars though, so it checks
out.
Yeah so in real Formula 1, drivers are aware
of what the various parts of their car do.
Contrary to popular belief the rear wing actually
does something and isn’t just to look ‘cool’.
Without a rear wing your car will try and
spin like an ice dancer every time you go
round a corner. Germany Cruely should have
known this before he even got into that car.
Unrealistic.
Also they keep calling it a spoiler, but a
spoiler and a wing are slightly different
things. A wing directs the airflow to create
downforce whereas a spoiler is more like a
big blockade to slow the air down so the car
isn’t lifted up by a pressure difference
over the car.
So Lewis Hamilton is a moderately successful
Formula 1 driver, not the chief accountant.
It seems a little unrealistic that professional
race driver, Grabbin Fee wouldn’t know this.
The chief financial officer is Duncan Llowarch.
Something he probably wouldn’t know.
In real Formula 1 not only can you change
tyre type during the race - you HAVE to. You
are not allowed to complete the whole race
on a single type of tyre unless it’s raining
and you’re using wet tyres, which they are
not here.
So Nikel has been spinning his tyres up after
an incident and worn his rubber down to nothing,
meaning he’s lost all grip and is spinning
all over the road. This happens. Kimi Raikkonen
once lost about ten places in a lap after
his tyre rubber ran out and here we see Nikel
about to lose the lead, I think
Unlike the graphic here, in F1 we don’t
really have a monitor on Tyre ‘Grip’ - that
really comes from the driver feeling it and
reporting it. But the team does monitor temperature
across the rubber and will watch the TV for
any signs of damage and wear.
Yeah and this can happen too. If you push
a tyre beyond its limits 
the rubber will overheat and either wear through
or not be able to hold itself together as
it would under normal temperatures. NIkel
really should have treated those tyres like
an injured baby goose and carried them gently
back to the pits. Instead - [poof].
If this were real Formula 1, Grabbin would
have been disqualified and probably given
at least a race ban. Deliberately crashing
people in european single seaters will normally
see you banned from the sport, dropped by
your team and given a lucrative IndyCar deal.
Just don’t do it, it’s not worth it.
So it’s game over at this point. In real
life if you lose the rubber from both rear
tyres, you’re not getting that home. In
fact, The inflated rubber part of the tyres
is so large and the cars are so low that the
floor of the car will have hit the ground.
Nikel really needs to park that car safely
off track and walk back to the pits.
In Formula 1 you are allowed to finish the
lap you’re on once the leader has finished
the race but no more. You wouldn’t be prematurely
DNF’d in this humiliating fashion.
[While Achievement Hunter got a lot of things
right in their take on Formula 1 racing - the
tyre wear, the important of wings and the
general physics in play, what would never
have stood in a million years were the flagrant
disrespect to the rules from start to finish.
Even before the modern PC gone mad era of
disgusting over-regulation of ‘protecting
driver lives’ and ‘not letting you cheat’
you would have had a jolly good finger wagging
for trying to drive straight into another
driver.
So I recommend watching the real thing, whenever
that’s coming back. Anyday not, we hope.
Any day.
