Kers

[blacktulip]

From Itv.F1.com
KERS will have a “detrimental” affect on a car’s performance at “almost all circuits” in its current development state in the early part of the season.

That is the view of Toyota’s chassis chief Pascal Vasselon, who believes the increasing number of teams expressing doubts over whether they will use the new-for-2009 technology in the year’s first races validates Toyota’s earlier fears about the likely initial performance advantages of the devices.

It has become increasingly apparent that potentially only a handful of teams are likely to use them from the off with even the system’s staunchest advocate, BMW, admitting last week that KERS may not now feature on its Melbourne-spec F1.09.

[blacktulip]

At the moment our estimation is that KERS will be detrimental on almost all circuits, because of the weight and the difficulty to manage braking.

“Of course it’s something which will change according to the level of development of the system, but at the moment I would say that even if our system is working – it’s doing what it is supposed to do – we would not expect to gain performance on any circuit.

“We said quite early, around last October, that we did not intend to run KERS at the beginning of the season because of this conclusion.

“And now we see that most of the other teams, one by one, came to the same conclusion.

“I’ve even seen that BMW are not sure to run KERS in Melbourne.”

And while a working system would provide a driver with an undoubtedly useful push-to-pass power boost, Vasselon added that KERS could only be introduced if it didn’t have a negative affect on overall performance.

“I think it was just our anticipation of how challenging the development of the system would be,” he said.

“It’s one thing to have a working system, which is difficult but manageable.

“The next step is to get a net performance gain – and this step is difficult.”

With battery-powered KERS systems weighing around 35kg, ballast levels available for teams to position in their cars will be almost halved.

Vasselon says this issue, and the fact KERS systems will be situated towards the rear of the car, presents two key problems: it increases the centre of gravity height and gives engineers less scope to move weight distribution forwards.

“It’s no secret that if you take a current Formula 1 car without ballast, the weight distribution is too much rearward compared to what you would like to have considering the tyre characteristics,” he said.

“So what you need to do is take the remaining weight, the ballast available, and move it forward.

“If you use this ballast in a KERS system – which is by necessity in the middle of the car – you restrict the weight distribution; you cannot move it as far forward as you would like to do.

“Also, the centre of gravity is higher.

“These are the two inevitable consequences of the KERS: you move your centre of gravity up, and your weight distribution is further to the rear.”

He added that it is also only likely to exacerbate rear tyre wear, saying: “Clearly it leads to more rear tyre degradation – obviously.

“The difference is something which will have to be measured, but the theoretical expectation is that it will make the life of the rear tyres much more difficult.”

While Toyota has no plans to run KERS in the early part of the campaign, Vasselon says the option of introducing it later in the year remains – but only if the performance benefits are clear.

“We have the option open,” he said. “We had two criteria to decide it.

“The first was obvious: to be confident that there were no safety issues in normal running. Crashes are another problem; we are working on it but it’s more difficult to be totally certain that nothing will happen.

“But in normal running we wanted to be totally convinced that there were no issue – that was the first precondition to run the car that we ran in testing at Portimao.

“The second criterion – the one which will decide the race introduction – is to be convinced that there is a performance gain.

“And this second criterion is quite difficult. Again, you can have a system which is working, but the question is does it give a net performance gain when you have taken into account all the performance losses?”

He added that should Toyota introduce a KERS-equipped TF109 at some point in the campaign then the normal chassis would not have to undergo significant change.

“We have a KERS option on our car, but it’s basically the same monocoque design,” he said.

“We decided on a KERS packaging which doesn’t really interfere with the rest of the packaging of the car, so it’s very transparent.

“We put the KERS system under the fuel cell, so the only thing we change between the KERS/no KERS option is the size of the fuel cell. All the rest is similar.”




KERS is proving problematic for some teams
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[blacktulip]

this is from F1.bog
Ferrari, albeit a fierce critic of the new energy re-use technology, worked on an innovative solution for its 2009 KERS system.

The Swiss publication Motorsport Aktuell reports that, parallel to a more conventional in-house project, engineers at Maranello devised a system whereby the KERS batteries were located in the front nose of the F60 single seater.

The solution would have negated one of the teams’ main concerns about deploying KERS in 2009: that the location of unwanted ballast in the centre of the car disrupts the ideal weight distribution towards the front.

During initial testing of the new Ferrari, reports indicated that one of the problems encountered was in the area of the front wing.

The front nose solution for KERS would also have resulted in the need for high-voltage cables to run through the williepit.

[foxy]

according to autosport, the teams are having varying success with KERS.


They reckon, BMW seem to have got a handle on it very early after a few teething problems.

But Ferrari, by their own admission, are lagging badly behind at the moment. Their partner Magneti Marelli will also supply Red Bull, Toro Rosso and Renault with KERS technology.

The Mercedes Brixworth High Performance Engine facility has been looking more like a KERS factory than an engine plant recently. The mood of quiet optimism shows they may have cracked the demands of the technology.

Ironically, just a couple of weeks before pulling out, Honda appeared to have made a flying start, Alex Wurz tested the system extensively, with few apparent problems.

Toyota, on the other hand, seem to think KERS will prove more bother than it is worth and probably won't be running it, in the early part of the season at least.

Williams have a unique flywheel KERS, using a totally different principle to all the others and developed at a fraction of the cost.

[raikkofan]

This might be a time for Toyota to take a gamble and not run KERS all season. Maybe the other teams will have so many problems that Toyota can make some gains in season points by simply running as they normally do. Meanwhile they can continue testing the system and monitor the experiences of other teams with KERS.

[gizzy]

Flywheel (mechanical) KERS has been tried for a long time...might be a good alternative. This technology has been around since the 1970's. Having a flywheel in a vacuum spinning at -40,000-100,000 rpm is a good idea.

Mechanical vs Electrical KERS...is the same as VHS vs Beta in the recording wars. Which one is the most efficient versus which one has the most marketing money backing it up?

[susieq]

I've read that Renault are placing there system under the fuel tank, and my concern is that the batteries can overheat! Has anyone heard of any incidents where this has happened before, and surely thats a big safety factor?

[knightelcid]

I don't think there is a single team that has truly master the KERS to this point yet. Actually, I wont be surprised if most of the teams think it is a waste of time and their money.
Late last year I posted a video where it can be seen a mechanic suffering an electric shock. Like I said, this thing can be dangerous. Flavio said a week ago that the sport has done a very good job of trying to minimise the risk, to mechanics, technicians and trackside people, but there is still a risk. It's several hundred volts and the potential to be tens of amps, so it's pretty lethal. And it's DC (direct current), so if you hold it you cannot let go.
I guess we have to wait and see what happens in Australia.

[blacktulip]

Your right about DC El Cid, it clings to you and it is most unpleasant, the only way is to get a non cunductive hold on them and pull free which is not easy