Any Formula One Racing Fans?

[Donger]

Specs on the new Williams...

Facts and figures relating to the new Williams FW27, which was launched in Valencia on Monday...

*1.3 terabytes of aero data processed in CFD (1 terabyte is a thousand million bytes, equivalent to 69,333 volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica

*250,000 man hours of design time has been spent on the FW27, with a 250,000 man hours further required in fabrication and build

*4,500 drawings have been produced in the design of the FW27 chassis. End-on-end, these drawings would stretch for 5,350km with a further 4,000 expected to be produced to support the FW27's lifecycle. By the end of the season, drawings would reach from London to Buenos Aires

*The FW27 will accelerate from standing to 200kmh in five seconds, and deceleration forces on board will reach 5g. 1g equates to driving into a brick wall at 30kmh. Brake temperatures to generate the deceleration will reach 6000C in one second

*On board the FW27, exhaust temperatures reach 9500C and even the air temperature in the pneumatic valve system reaches temperatures two and half times boiling point at 2500C

*The BMW P84/5 contains 5,000 individual components, and takes 100 man hours to build. BMW have historically produced approximately 200 engines per season, but this figure will reduce in 2005

*BMW produce 1,000 drawings in the design of each engine

*The BMW engine weighs less than 90 kilograms

*At 19,000 rpm, 316.7 revolutions and 1,583.3 ignitions take place each second in the BMW F1 engine. 9,500 engine speed measurements are made, the pistons cover a distance of 25 metres, and 550 litres of air are drawn in

*In the P84, maximum piston acceleration was 10,000g. Peak piston speed was 40 metres per second

[Delano]

I'm not really a fan but those specs are ****ing amazing.

[Donger]

I'm not really a fan but those specs are ****ing amazing.

Heh. I'm a fan BECAUSE of those specs. "Racing" in F1 died about five years ago.

But, how the hell do they make a 3.0 liter engine that puts out 1000 bhp and weighs 180 pounds? That's just plain amazing.

[CanadaKC]

Put Jacques Villeneuve back in the driver's seat of one of these babys and someone will finally knock Schumacher off his a$$.

[Donger]

Put Jacques Villeneuve back in the driver's seat of one of these babys and someone will finally knock Schumacher off his a$$.

Ermmm, he's racing for Sauber this year.

EDIT: Unless, of course, you meant put him in a Williams.

[Pants]

Specs on the new Williams...

Facts and figures relating to the new Williams FW27, which was launched in Valencia on Monday...

*1.3 terabytes of aero data processed in CFD (1 terabyte is a thousand million bytes, equivalent to 69,333 volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica

*250,000 man hours of design time has been spent on the FW27, with a 250,000 man hours further required in fabrication and build

*4,500 drawings have been produced in the design of the FW27 chassis. End-on-end, these drawings would stretch for 5,350km with a further 4,000 expected to be produced to support the FW27's lifecycle. By the end of the season, drawings would reach from London to Buenos Aires

*The FW27 will accelerate from standing to 200kmh in five seconds, and deceleration forces on board will reach 5g. 1g equates to driving into a brick wall at 30kmh. Brake temperatures to generate the deceleration will reach 6000C in one second

*On board the FW27, exhaust temperatures reach 9500C and even the air temperature in the pneumatic valve system reaches temperatures two and half times boiling point at 2500C

*The BMW P84/5 contains 5,000 individual components, and takes 100 man hours to build. BMW have historically produced approximately 200 engines per season, but this figure will reduce in 2005

*BMW produce 1,000 drawings in the design of each engine

*The BMW engine weighs less than 90 kilograms

*At 19,000 rpm, 316.7 revolutions and 1,583.3 ignitions take place each second in the BMW F1 engine. 9,500 engine speed measurements are made, the pistons cover a distance of 25 metres, and 550 litres of air are drawn in

*In the P84, maximum piston acceleration was 10,000g. Peak piston speed was 40 metres per second

You have an extra 0 on all those temeprature values. And yeah, I used to follow F1 when I was younger and was into cars and all that jazz.

[Demonpenz]

I am an f1 and other road course fanatic. I am not a big fan of ovals in general. I miss Indycars when they had all the big names and ran on Road, Street, and Ovals. Those were the days

[Demonpenz]

remember this car?

[Demonpenz]

i am big into grand prix legends 5 out of 5 stars Not an arcade game... You've been warned!, July 19, 2000

Reviewer: Lawrence Bird (Alexandria, VA USA) - See all my reviews
Actually the word about GPL has been out for some time. GPL will challange even the most dedicated racing-sim addict. But it's worth it...

The graphics are still top-notch, but the crème de la crème is that wonderfully defiant physics-model. Even though I'd had other racing sims for some years, my first week with GPL was a joke. But after about 40 hours on the sim, I could at least complete a couple of laps at speed without taking out a flagman, the crowd or another car. Another month and I could actually race a fairly decent race, so long as I didn't get too agressive. These are brutal cars on unforgiving tracks, just like the orginals were. Close the throttle too quickly and you'll swap ends in a second, into a brick building -- run-off areas were often non-existant. There is little wonder that so few drivers of the 1967 era are alive today -- regrettably the cars and the tracks of the day ate them.

Papyrus has done an excellent job with this; except for one glaring fault. The learning curve is near vertical and there is no way to dumb-down the cars (except to reduce damage) for those who demand instant gratification. You'll just have to go through the long (but entertaining) process of learning the lost art of the four-wheel drift -- and you'll eventually learn the benefits (or at least usefulness) of power on/off understeer and oversteer. In some ways these cars drive like non-winged spint-cars on a very wet track -- but perhaps just a bit more volitile. GPL models wheel-spin well about 100mph, and you'll eventually learn that although these beasties are unforgiving, they can be oh so satifying when you finally get it right. The arcade mindset will only frustrate the new GPL driver, but with time the amount of satisfaction you get will be well beyond anything you'll get without four real wheels.