2012 FSAE Rules Published

[Bill Riley]

The SAE website will be updated with the rules soon, but the rules are available now on our updated fsaeonline.com website.

2012 Rules (http://www.fsaeonline.com/content/2012_FSAE_Rules_Version_90111K.pdf)

[Bill Riley]

The SAE website will be updated with the rules soon, but the rules are available now on our updated fsaeonline.com website.

2012 Rules (http://www.fsaeonline.com/content/2012_FSAE_Rules_Version_90111K.pdf)

[ZAMR]

Is LiFePo supposed to refer to Lithium Iron Phosphate chemistry, LiFePO4? The way it is written looks like Lithium-Iron-Polymer battery.

[Bill Riley]

Correct, Lithium Iron Phosphate.

[povelocj]

And Percy remains a legless cripple. That makes me relieved because our drivers as tall as the 95th percentile male.

[Fantomas]

Bill,
could you elaborate why the proposed change of the Economy Scoring was not integrated?
It was part of the possible future rules changes in 2011 already and now again sits in this spot.
I do not really understand why this was not changed since it makes economy/efficiency scoring fairer and does not really change the design of the cars in any way.

Fantomas

[Bill Riley]

We're going to a two-year cycle of changes. Fixing typos and clarifying frequently asked questions is not included in that, but wherever possible we're avoiding changing things on the 'off year'. Changing from economy to efficiency could change the system level decisions in choosing a powertrain. The efficiency change is on the list for 2013 potential changes.

[Fantomas]

Bill,
thank you for this insight / clarification.
Can we expect this rule to change for 2013? How would you rate the chances for that?

Fantomas

[StevenWebb]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Bill Riley:
Changing from economy to efficiency could change the system level decisions in choosing a powertrain. The efficiency change is on the list for 2013 potential changes. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

and yet the AAustralian addendum decides it wants to change all the point allocations under a year from the competition.

Just a thought, with the new rule "If ENDURANCE SCORE &lt; Laps Comp, then ENDURANCE SCORE = LapsComp
LapsComp is the number of full laps completed by the team. " wouldn't that mean the points could change depending on that competitions track length?

[bob.paasch]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Bill Riley:
Changing from economy to efficiency could change the system level decisions in choosing a powertrain. The efficiency change is on the list for 2013 potential changes. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Bill, I respectfully disagree. The only teams that would change their powertrain based on economy vs efficiency are those small handful of teams (I can think of maybe 2 or 3) who's main competition goal is winning fuel economy. For everyone else, this is a tuning issue.

And it's a mixed bag next year anyway. The two North American competitions use economy, FSG uses efficiency, FSUK and FSA use carbon. Making the two NA competitions consistent with FSG would have been a good thing.

[Bemo]

I'm also not really happy with the growing differences between competitions. As Bob already stated there are already three different ways to calculate economy/efficiency score. Point distribution for the disciplines also varies. FSG is already going their own way and now Australia introduced another point distribution.
At Austria, UK and Hungaria electric and combustion cars are running against each other at FSG they are in seperat competitions.
I think that more consistency between competitions would make things a lot easier for everybody as teams have to get used to one set of rules and don't get confused as they mix up which rule is in charged at the competition they are taking part at.
In the past there weren't these large rules variations and I don't see a reason why they should be today.

Just my opinion.

[TMichaels]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Just a thought, with the new rule "If ENDURANCE SCORE &lt; Laps Comp, then ENDURANCE SCORE = LapsComp
LapsComp is the number of full laps completed by the team. " wouldn't that mean the points could change depending on that competitions track length? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
Yes it does.

Regards,

Tobias

[TMichaels]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">'m also not really happy with the growing differences between competitions. As Bob already stated there are already three different ways to calculate economy/efficiency score. Point distribution for the disciplines also varies. FSG is already going their own way and now Australia introduced another point distribution.
At Austria, UK and Hungaria electric and combustion cars are running against each other at FSG they are in seperat competitions.
I think that more consistency between competitions would make things a lot easier for everybody as teams have to get used to one set of rules and don't get confused as they mix up which rule is in charged at the competition they are taking part at.
In the past there weren't these large rules variations and I don't see a reason why they should be today. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
Hungary does not allow electric cars, but Spain does.

We score the two classes at FSG separately, because it would be very hard to balance the rules sets. You would have to tweak them every year and it may still happen that the rules of a particular year exactly tell, if an electric or combustion car will win the competition.
Changing parts of the rules every year which directly affect vehicle performance, which has to be done in that case, would somehow restrain well developed cars in my opinion.
Scoring the classes together has some advantages and disadvantages from an event point of view:
You save some money for awards,etc. and some time during the award ceremony. You need more time for the endurance to make sure that all cars may run in the same heat. This is probably not a problem with middle sized events like Spain and Austria, but at FSG with 103 teams last year of which 77 started in the Endurance this is hard to achieve without sacrificing quality by sending out to many cars at once.
Before you mention the UK event: They had 92 teams at the event and 67 Endurance starters this year. So we had to calculate with about 10 teams more and the fact that due to the competition date you usually have more teams with a running car later in the year.

Regards,

Tobias

[Bemo]

Sorry, I mixed up Hungary and Spain ;-)

All the points you mention are pretty clear. And I'm not a fan of letting electric cars run against combustion cars either exactly because the issues you mentioned.

The fact I don't like is that things like these are handled in different ways from competition to competition.
But as far as I know you already started to make the FSE rules comply with the UK rules for electric cars. So I hope that in the future other differences in the rules will also dissapear.

[TMichaels]

Yes, we resolved a lot of differences this year. Just have a look at the published FS UK rules draft. They truely show the result of our combined efforts to merge the rule sets.
But letting the classes run together or not is not part of the technical rules http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_frown.gif
This will therefore remain a decision of the particular event.

Btw: It also makes it very hard to develop the new world ranking lists which is still not finished and which causes us a lot of headache right now. Because it is hard to account for the fact that classes "steal" points from each other in mixed events. Therefore you usually see lower overall points scored at mixed events by both classes. Usually an FSE car will win Acceleration and Efficiency for example which means that all FSC cars get less points in these disciplines compared to a single FSC event, which is a disadvantage with respect to the world ranking.
On the other hand it is probably not an option to leave the mixed events out of the world ranking as we would not be able to include UK, Spain, Austria and Australasia any more.

Regards,

Tobias

[Bemo]

Well, I discussed the problems regarding the world ranking list with Ziby yesterday during lunch http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_wink.gif

[TMichaels]

I see.

I think it also a big problem how to choose the CO2 conversion factor. It heavily influences the conversion factor, if you take into account the whole life-cycle of the respective car/class or just the CO2 production while running. Additionally there may be different conversion factors for different countries, because the mix of electrical energy generation differs heavily from country to country and influences this as well.

Regards,

Tobias

[bob.paasch]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by TMichaels:
I see.

I think it also a big problem how to choose the CO2 conversion factor. It heavily influences the conversion factor, if you take into account the whole life-cycle of the respective car/class or just the CO2 production while running. Additionally there may be different conversion factors for different countries, because the mix of electrical energy generation differs heavily from country to country and influences this as well.

Regards,

Tobias </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Tobias, this is exactly the problem with a merged competition. At the 2011 FSUK advisors meeting, Jon Hilton announced the merger of class 1 and 1A for 2012, and said that he wanted to keep the two classes competitive with each other. Recognizing the resources necessary to field a competitive electric car, he didn't want them to dominate the competition. His method for doing that was to limit the electric cars to 85 kw.

I talked with him after the meeting, and told him the 85 kw limit would do nothing to keep the combustion cars competitive. I predicted that the Delft e-car, with 55 kw, could well be the fastest car at the competition. I was almost right. http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

I told Jon that the key was scoring the efficiency event. If the e-cars are given the same 50+ point efficiency advantage that they are at Austria, there is no way even the best combustion cars can make that up on the good e-car teams.

GFR has made no firm decision on 2012 FSUK yet, but given the way the rules have been structured my inclination is to field an e-car only.

[TommKG]

Bob, I'm not so sure but wasn't it always the plan that a university can only run one car?

If GFR fights all the time to be recognized as one team, wouldn't it be hypocritical to use the possibility to enter the competition with two cars (E car from Ravensburg, C Car from Oregon)?


Anyway, I'm also not that happy about the combination of FSUK...

I don't think that the combustion cars are not competitive with a 85kW barrier...

Delft, Zurich, Ravensburg and Munich showed this year what's possible right now with an electric car.

If you look at Silverstone:

(Accel and Skid Pad were wet so let's forget them)...

In the Auto-X, Delft was only just faster than a whole pack of 7-8 car, so it's a top result but let's be honest, a Delft combustion car would also be that fast... Zurich had only one safety-run with a new driver so the time difference is explainable with that...

In the Endurance, Zurich drove "eco-mode" and was a bit slower than Stuttgart, with full power I guess those top teams would drove about the same speed, also ok. Delft drove in the rain against the top teams about the same speed as Munich, so no gain there either.


In Austria:

Zurich drove the same AutoX times like Munich, Karlsruhe or Erlangen.
In the endurance they were little bit faster than Munich and Erlangen.

In Germany the electric cars dominated acceleration and Zurich was the fastest car on skidpad but if it comes to AutoX, the fastest two cars (Munich and Delft) would have placed right behind Munich (C), Rochester and OxBrooks.

So in my opinion, the E-cars are still not faster than the combustion cars, it's fair to give them a little bit of gain in the fuel economy but after that we can expect a damn close competition in Silverstone between the Electros and the combustions...

But let's not forget that there is always a little black car with huge wings which defined the speed this year and also has an amazing fuel economy... Don't take it the wrong way, but your concept still is the one to beat with this reglementation...

[bob.paasch]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by TommKG:
Bob, I'm not so sure but wasn't it always the plan that a university can only run one car?
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, my mistake. I had completely overlooked the fact that combining classe 1 and 1A means only one entry per university. I need to turn on my brain. http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_eek.gif

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">
If GFR fights all the time to be recognized as one team, wouldn't it be hypocritical to use the possibility to enter the competition with two cars (E car from Ravensburg, C Car from Oregon)?
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, that would be absolutely hypocritical. We have no intention of doing that. I just finished a related conversation with SAE about preregistration for the NA events. GFR is one team, we get one preregistration. That's how we want to be treated.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">
Anyway, I'm also not that happy about the combination of FSUK...

I don't think that the combustion cars are not competitive with a 85kW barrier...

Delft, Zurich, Ravensburg and Munich showed this year what's possible right now with an electric car.

If you look at Silverstone:

(Accel and Skid Pad were wet so let's forget them)...

In the Auto-X, Delft was only just faster than a whole pack of 7-8 car, so it's a top result but let's be honest, a Delft combustion car would also be that fast... Zurich had only one safety-run with a new driver so the time difference is explainable with that...

In the Endurance, Zurich drove "eco-mode" and was a bit slower than Stuttgart, with full power I guess those top teams would drove about the same speed, also ok. Delft drove in the rain against the top teams about the same speed as Munich, so no gain there either.


In Austria:

Zurich drove the same AutoX times like Munich, Karlsruhe or Erlangen.
In the endurance they were little bit faster than Munich and Erlangen.

In Germany the electric cars dominated acceleration and Zurich was the fastest car on skidpad but if it comes to AutoX, the fastest two cars (Munich and Delft) would have placed right behind Munich (C), Rochester and OxBrooks.

So in my opinion, the E-cars are still not faster than the combustion cars, it's fair to give them a little bit of gain in the fuel economy but after that we can expect a damn close competition in Silverstone between the Electros and the combustions...

But let's not forget that there is always a little black car with huge wings which defined the speed this year and also has an amazing fuel economy... Don't take it the wrong way, but your concept still is the one to beat with this reglementation... </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

My point was not that the e-cars are faster than the c-cars, it was that the e-cars are just as fast. Now give the the e-cars a 50 point advantage in efficiency. 50 points is a huge margin, give any top teams that and they will dominate.

By the way, that is not a complaint. If GFR attends Silverstone, we'll be there with an e-car. I'm just pointing out Mr. Hilton will not get the equalization he's expecting.

Wait until someone fields an e-car with Oklahoma or Monash's active aero. http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

[TommKG]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by bob.paasch:


Wait until someone fields an e-car with Oklahoma or Monash's active aero. http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif </div></BLOCKQUOTE>


Well for that, we look at you guys http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif

[Bemo]

I completely agree with Bob here. The e-cars have pretty much the same performance on the track as the c-cars. The 85kW limit won't change a lot. Our e-car last year had a maximum power output of 94kW and we already limited power in AutoX to 80% if max power to make the car controllable http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif.
And as already stated here. Delft had 55kW "only" and was as fast as the fastest c-cars, so the power limitation doesn't even affect them.
I don't see any way to win with a c-car if the e-cars are given a 50+ points advantage in efficiency.
In my opinion merging classes is comparing apples with oranges. The way FSG is going is much more reasonable. You can still see c-cars and e-cars compete on track against each other and compare times, but you don't have to think about convertion factors for efficiency, which will always be questionable.

[TMichaels]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Tobias, this is exactly the problem with a merged competition. At the 2011 FSUK advisors meeting, Jon Hilton announced the merger of class 1 and 1A for 2012, and said that he wanted to keep the two classes competitive with each other. Recognizing the resources necessary to field a competitive electric car, he didn't want them to dominate the competition. His method for doing that was to limit the electric cars to 85 kw. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Well, the 85kW is also the limit on which we agreed when merging the rules. Without merging the rules we would probably have left it at 100kW, as we introduced this value for safety reasons only.

Even if a lot of c-car enthusiasts do not want to hear that:
This kind of competition seems to be tailor-made for electric cars, because of the limited range that has to be covered. The "always available" torque does the rest.
Therefore they will in the future, in my opinion, be faster / more competitive than the c-cars, if they will not be heavily restricted. That is why I see no reason in directly comparing the two classes. They are just completely different and every effort to make them even will end in disadvantaging/penalizing the e-cars for their intrinsic advantages.

Regards,

Tobias

[Bemo]

+1 on that.

If you want to have c-cars and e-cars running against each other and both should be competitive you will always have to adjust the rules.
I'd suggest to increase Endurance distance to 100km. Then I doubt that the e-cars will still be competitive http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif.

[TMichaels]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">So in my opinion, the E-cars are still not faster than the combustion cars, it's fair to give them a little bit of gain in the fuel economy but after that we can expect a damn close competition in Silverstone between the Electros and the combustions... </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

The sample which we currently see, does not necessarily reflect the whole potential of the concepts. The car from Delft was their first electric car and had no sophisticated vehicle dynamic controls in place, as far as I know. The car from Zürich is their second electric car, but they faced some technical problems at competition and they ran their own motors for the first year. Munich also built their first electric car with very sophisticated vehicle dynamic algorithms (just have a look at the Endurance lap times in heavy rain), but a bit heavy compared to the Top3 of the competition.
I expect the level of the e-cars to raise once the rules have settled (which we want to achieve as fast as possible) and the teams have gained even more experience.
I am not saying that some of the cars are not really advanced right now, but there are still things to come.

Regards,

Tobias

[TMichaels]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by TommKG:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by bob.paasch:


Wait until someone fields an e-car with Oklahoma or Monash's active aero. http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif </div></BLOCKQUOTE>


Well for that, we look at you guys http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

It would be interesting to see two, more or less, completely identical cars with different drive-trains. But then there is the driver...

At FSG2012 we should introduce the "Race of Classes" instead of the "Race of Champions" on Sunday after the final four where each university building two identical cars with just different drive trains is allowed to set lap times with the same drivers http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif
Any comments on that?

BTW: We are getting way off-topic, I think.

Regards,

Tobias

[Bemo]

Definitely an interesting idea. Although I'm not sure how many universitys that may concern. This year it would have been Munich and Karlsruhe. GFR had the aero package only on the c-car so I wouldn't consider the cars identical.

But as said. Definitely an interesting idea.

[mech5496]

Any idea on when the 2012 FSE rules will be available? (even a draft that is...)

[Schmidt]

Hey,
next year there will probably be a quite a few more electric cars. I know of a few teams who want to make the switch. Maybe the combustion teams can be stashed in that tent and the electrics go in the garages http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

Even though I feel the electric competition was already strong this year, more teams will make the class even more competitive. I always considered the merging the classes like diesel&petrol LMPs and fwd&rwd touring cars who seemed to have a new balance of performance every other week.
In reality though, I thought the idea worked really well in FSAustria.

Also I don't see the problem with having different scoring systems for different competitions. The fact that they are not the same is less important than the fact that some are not to my liking (ie. too much autocross & fuel scoring)

Erik

[TMichaels]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by mech5496:
Any idea on when the 2012 FSE rules will be available? (even a draft that is...) </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
When they are done http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

We are currently finishing the draft and it still has to go through internal review and will then be released. Should be in the next couple of days.

Regards,

Tobias

[Ben A]

What are the biggest and most significant changes in the 2012 rules for the combustions? Today i´ve only over flow the PDF.

[Michael Royce]

Ben,
Read them for yourself! Or, if you are within a couple of hundred miles of Detroit, the Detroit Section of the SAE will be holding its annual FSAE Workshop on Saturday, October 22nd at the U of Michigan-Dearborn. The 2012 Rule Changes will be among the topics covered.

[Mazur]

Interesting. I don't see any mention of having to run a smaller restrictor for FI.