Stay On Track: Isn't it Iconic...
On Friday, ESPN.com published this Associated Press item about the ICONIC panel:
"The group has met several times already and has come up with some ideas for what the future of IndyCar will look like."
Wouldn't you love to be a fly on THAT wall. When looking back on all of the public information and firsthand quotes, there is a pattern to this process that might not be hard to guess. Here goes:
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Engine spec: There was some question as to whether this panel was responsible for the selection of the next IndyCar engine specification, and who might still be considered as a supplier. On Monday, Gordon Kirby published this quote from Erik Berkman of Honda Performance Development (HPD):
"We've told the League that June 1st is a hard date for us as an engineering company to get to our objectives for 2012. It should have been April 1st. But we respect and appreciate that Randy [Bernard] needs these two months to be able to do his process."
Honda's stated preference for the next race engine is a turbocharged V6. Design work is underway, and is frozen pending a decision from IICS. Berkman adds: "We don't have a GRE [Global Racing Engine] design. We have not put one ounce of engineering effort into designing a GRE."
The GRE is a proposed turbocharged four cylinder, similar to the engine that Delta Wing has selected for their prototype. No other alternative turbocharged V6 manufacturers or suppliers have been publicly identified.
It would appear as though this decision is not a difficult one for the ICONIC panel. The current engine supplier, and apparently the sole supplier, has spoken.
Regardless of opinions on the Delta Wing concept vehicle, that makes this chassis a very unlikely choice. A vehicle designed around a 173 lb. four cylinder engine, with a total gross weight of 1030 lbs. including driver, is not going to accept a V6 turbo without significant design alterations.
To my fly's eyes, Honda trumps Delta.
There has been discussion about why the other chassis designers have offered only renderings, and not begun their own prototype construction. Designer Andrea Toso of Dallara, speaking to "Stop and Go" on Feb. 3, 2010:
"As I wrote above, IRL and IMS must define the concept of the vehicle which includes the architecture and engine capacity, which may be single or multiple vendors..."
Monocoque (tub) design? Fuel cell size required, based on the consumption rate of the engine selected. Rear tub bulkhead and engine bay layout dependant upon the choice of stressed-engine (Honda V6) design or other engine architecture. Sidepod configuration must enable the radiator and oil cooler required for the selected engine...so a designer can't get too far without knowing what engine to draw the car around, can he? General configuration, yes. Construction blueprints, no.
If Honda is the choice, and the engine design has not been completed, the selected chassis designer still has some time to kill. Even if the engine spec is announced on June 1, 2010.
One other decision that looks clear-cut through my fly's eyes:
Wheel protection: From Racecar Engineering Magazine, August 12, 2009. Indy Racing League's senior technical director, Les MacTaggart:
'We are looking at bringing the bodywork out so it is flush with the wheels," explains MacTaggart, "but the problem with this is that it reduces drag dramatically as 60 per cent of it is created by the wheels. However, if we narrow the track and narrow the bodywork, the aesthetics of the car will remain the same....The clever part - and we are working on some ideas - will be how to prevent front-to-rear wheel contact."
Many fans have looked at the prospective chassis designs and raised the "open wheel" argument: that the next IndyCar must maintain tradition and remain absent of wheel fairings and enclosures that are present on many of the contructors' renderings.
To me, this one is a no-brainer. The IICS knows that the single most important safety factor yet to be addressed is the prevention of wheel contact. You only need to look back as far as the season opener in Brazil, where Mario Moraes' car climbs up over Marco Andretti's left rear tire. Near disaster, and at relatively low speeds.
Do you want to see a "New Track Record" at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway within the next 5-10 years? If incidents of wheel contact can be significantly reduced...and airborne racecars become an "unintended consequence" of the past...perhaps the measures enacted to limit top speed can be relaxed. The safety feature of front and rear wheel protection must be added to IndyCars, and now is the time to regulate it.
So the drawings are laid out on the ICONIC table. Each designer's rep is standing before the panel. And the fly hears:
"Right then. The new car gets a stressed-engine V6 turbo. The new car will have front and rear wheel fairing that will withstand significant impact. If your design cannot accommodate those first two criteria, take it off the table."
You gotta start somewhere. That's what I'd expect to have seen so far.
Next comes the "great downforce debate". If you read the previous article, linked below, you might suspect my hopes for what that will sound like. Stay On Track.
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