I like the lay down seating positions both because it makes sence from a CoG point of veiw and it makes for great looking cars. Just take a look at that new car from TU Darmstadt! Who wouldn't want one of those to play with on the weekend? Also they fit in our shipping crate, which an upright seat car will not!

There is no doubt it is easy to get the belt and seat arangement wrong, and the current rules don't really cut it as they are in this regard when the driver is layed down. The tech inspectors don't want to have to argue with every second team as to why, although it meets the letter of the rules, its just not safe.

But it can be done, and has been done, even in FSAE. Maybe two sets of rules could work. One much the same as the current rules applying to cars with seat back angles more upright than 'x' angle. The second for seats below 'x' far more stringent, including rules regarding an appropriate seat, and requiring proper belt positions and angles to the body of every driver at the comp.
This way means more rules, but the safety issues would be covered, and although many teams may opt for the simpler option just to avoid the hassle anyway, at least you could still build what you want. As long as you are prepared to do it properly!

Pete.

I must agree. More and more we see the rules pushing all the cars towards one design family.

A a driver structural equivalency form seems like a good start.

One quick question for you fellows about template Y.

When it say's it will be passed through the cockpit to a point "100mm behind the face of the rear-most pedal blah blah blah..." by "behind the face" do they mean behind relative to the car? Or behind relative to the pedal? (assuming the "front" of the pedalbox is the side closest to your feet)

The wording just seems so vague. Aren't engineers supposed to be good at clear, concise writing?

I like the Formula whale comment. Maybe I'll have some stickers made up for anyone who wants some, haha.

I think the first team to paint their car up to look like a whale should get bonus points in design.

I played with the logo a little bit. Please, I mean no disrespect.

Perhaps this might be more appropriate...

The second one rules! LOL

Hey guys, lets sponsor the first team that has the guts to do the whale paintjob. I offer 10 bucks, given in hands at FSAE West 2009 if I see the car on the design contest. But it has to be clear that is a whale. C'mon people, if we get 50 people or more giving 10 bucks each, might be a way to smaller teams be funny and get some cash! lol

now, just to keep on the topic: up to what point is THAT necessary to make it too wide? They can say that is to help the driver egress and blah blah, but as far as I remember, things loose inside a crashing car tend to damage more (that's why we use seatbelts, right?). With the legs "floating" around, in case of a side crash or the car rolling laterally, the knees and ankles will suffer. "Ok, add some pads and you keep the legs in place", they might say, but then, what about the driver egress? lol

I'm just trying to figure out why that rule...

Wow... how times have changed. I posted my disgust with the new template-rules at the first hint of their introducation and was soundly boo-ed on these forums.

In my oppinion we're only a couple rule-revisions away from a minimum weight limit.

Hey all,

At the awards ceremony at the end of formula student I believe Mr Royce mentioned the new rule changes, they look certain to be bought in, apart from the very silly rule about being able to lift your knees in front of the roll hoop.

He also said that they are trying the re write the costing rule to get rid of the $25000 maximum limit and also get rid of proof of purchase using receipts, but it is not known if this will be done in time for the 2009 rules.

So it looks like that these new template rules are a dead certain for the 2009 competition, so lets stop whingeing about them and get a little creative with some interpretations. The chassis are going to be bigger and this is going to open some different design avenues, with all this extra space knocking in the cockpit there is going to be opportunities for running a front or even side engine arrangements.

How about this for an idea. Mount a Suzuki sv650 motor that has been de-stroked to 610cc at the front of the car, running a prop shaft down the side of the chassis into a avt differential, with the driver laying low directly on top of the diff! The rear roll hoop then ends at the very rear of the car.

I seriously believe the formula SAE/Student has some of the most talented and innovative young engineers and these new templates should pose no real hurdle if you just look outside the box a little!

So how about doing some rough cad work and trashing out the positives and negatives of any unusual designs on this forum!

well James, how about we don't risk a year's worth of work on an unproven concept?

If your team is interested in being remembered as 'the guys who built the crazy thing that didn't work', by all means go ahead. But don't tell others how to run their teams. Some teams are not interested in innovation, but rather winning.

I always thought a suzuki bergman 650 scooter engine parallel twin front engine would be pretty neet. Put your keep over the engine. It already is designed to laydown really far.

quote:

Originally posted by James Morris:
Hey all,

At the awards ceremony at the end of formula student I believe Mr Royce mentioned the new rule changes, they look certain to be bought in, apart from the very silly rule about being able to lift your knees in front of the roll hoop.

I don't know if the getting your knees past the front roll hoop is that silly, I think it probably makes more sense in terms of driver safety/removing an injured driver than having a 350mm square able to pass through the cockpit. Our chassis for this year has been built to the proposed 2009 rules and I'm 6'1 and can get my knees past the steering wheel plane. To achieve it all we had to do was sit the driver up slightly (from 40 degrees to 45) and change the shape of the front of the cockpit opening to be wide enough for 2 knees to get through.

I'm not sure anyone is really complaining that much about the rules, we all have to meet them so noone is really disavantaged (although some of us have started implementing them earlier than others), I think it's more just a bit of friendly banter about how some of them seem a bit on the large size.

Yep, Wollongong is also building a bus this year. Whether they take it overseas or not will depend heavily on the financial situation.

I have a legitimate question.

How in the world are they going to pass template Y through the cockpit if the steering column is in the way on all the cars? Are they just going to eyeball it? Special collapsible/expandable template? STOP BEING VAGUE!!

have you read the rules clarification on the SAE website? I'm pretty sure it states that they'll have a 50mm slot cut halfway through the template, which may or may not have a flap over it. Once they get halfway along the cockpit they'll turn the template upside down so the slot is on the bottom

@flavorPacket

What makes you think that a front or side engine formula student would not work? I believe that there is an Australian team out there that is really competitive running a car with a side engine!

And please don’t think that I am trying to tell you how to run your team! I’m simply stating that these new rules are going to imply that the chassis is going to be bigger and that there is going to be a much larger amount of retail space available for packaging of components. With this extra space, and therefore weight added to the chassis, new designs possibilities are now available as previous they would have been disregarded they would have added weight or made roll hoops to big.

As for innovation lets just look at the history books shall we;
· 1923 Benz Tropfenwagen
· 1934> Auto Union Type A,B,C & D
· 1937 Mercedes-Benz W125
· 1954 Lancia D50
· Anything designed by Vandervell, Cooper or Chapman in the late 50, early 60!
· The Cosworth DFV and the aero development needed to utilise all its power
· 1976 Tyrrel P34
· 1977 Renault RS01
· 1978 Brabham BT46B
· 1983 McLaren MP4
All these cars are innovative in some way, with either the designs trends being still being used today or having the technology band as it was deemed to much of a performance advantage!

Perhaps we will build a front engined formula student, perhaps we wont, but we will experiment with these ideas and try to find performance advantages and in the process learn a lot instead of just following the old formula of feet, front wheels, body, engine, rear wheels!

As for winning, after just designing the car which averaged 2nd place overall in the dynamic events place at formula student last weekend, I think I can say we are thoroughly interested in winning, and our team will explore every possible performance avenue to find some advantages.

@ Rob Woods

Your on my wavelength, and that engine could be packaged in some very interesting ways, I like where your coming from!

@ MalcolmG

The other side of this argument is that in a roll over there is nothing stopping you knees and therefore legs flailing around outside of the chassis, and it does point most designs down the same road.

James Morris
Swansea Metropolitan University

I'm not sure that the rules really allow you much extra space to do crazy things, remember this space must be open and free of obstructions (except removable padding). The only extra space that was created on our car was behind the seat, as the monocoque width was considerably wider around the driver's shoulders than it used to be, so it creates a bit of room on either side of the front of the engine. I don't really expect to see these new rules allowing more room for innovative layouts, in fact I imagine that template X may be causing some issues for Deakin (Ashley? I saw you guys are building to the templates, any comments?)

Isn't there talk of a minimum seat back angle requirement, too? I recall hearing somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 degrees.

That's suggested for 2010 I believe...

The University of Central Lancashire (UCLAN) in the UK has been running a side engined car for a number of years.

Linky 1

Linky 2

It looks like they will need a really wide car to accomodate the cockpit width template and the engine.