American FH: Osterreichring

Well that was really useful, not!
Craig drove the formation lap so slow that the car overheated badly before we even got to the grid!

If you drive under about 130kph the car gains more heat than it can remove. And by 2/3 of a lap I was at 110deg, yet the car never goes over 104deg for all racing anyway!
Then he slowed even more for that last 1/3lap, to as slow as 80kph at times. So it got worse and worse. Almost 115deg by the grid!

And you can't do anything about it because you are trapped in your position. eg Can't go faster and run ahead to cool down.

The Motec shows it hit 110deg at that 2/3 lap area, and climbed to 115 by the grid. The engines blow at 120 approx.
I did a burn out just after the 2/3 point to see what it would do, but it just flicked up 1 deg and then back down, so it looked like it would hopefully stay near 110deg.

Then Craig slowing even more at times to 80kph and it was hitting 112deg... and looking a worry. A few burn out blips to test and it still only flicked up 1 deg and down again, so they weren't worrying it really, but the slow pace was!

I have never seen over 110deg even by the grid, or 115deg at race start at worst on a delayed start. But I was 115deg before any waiting this time!
I didn't know if I had an Igntion key set, plus hardly likely to turn it off and then get it going again in time for a start, so I just had to press on and see what happens.

100metres off the start KABOOM. 121deg.

You can't start 'slow' or you will cause carnage from everyone charging from behind, so you don't really have any options. Plus you need that 130kph+ to even be lowering heat anyway. So even a slow start was probably going to be fatal soon enough.

That was the worst F1 79 pace lap I have ever seen! Craig is always notorious for slow pace laps, but this was the slowest ever! And fatal for the cars.
150kph for a pace lap is 'dawdling' in these already, and there is no need to be doing only 100kph or less!

You could actually race a pace lap at FULL speed for the lap, and sit on the grid for 45seconds and not blow your car up!! But drive it at sub-130kph for a slow 2min+ lap and you are in trouble!

Peter, you're a doos.

My laptimes were mysteriously slow in that race. My best on race fuel offline was 1:33.6, and that was done easily on my very first fast lap on full race fuel, but my best was 1.3 seconds slower in the race, and that was on low fuel towards the end. The early laps were more like 2 seconds slower. And yet, the car felt just fine. It was as if the clock was running fast. Weird.

By the way, I'm not a fan of the slooow formation laps we run on R2P, but it was pretty typical for R2P.

Looks like you was the only one that overheated Peter. The other 2 dnf's was from accidents.
I have to say...you sitting in the middle of the track in turn 1 at 25mph sure made the first corner interesting.

That was the slowest formation lap ever seen.
I run with temp readout every race for the formation lap, and have never ever had to worry about it being so slow as to overheat the car when DRIVING!
The Euro race was totally fine and nowhere near as slow with Craig leading that formation lap too.
Same setup, same car, not over 110deg by the grid.

In any other Mod it is totally irrelevant so it doesn't even matter.

Intelligent would be to maintain a decent pace for the lap and then slow just in the last corner to the grid (any track), to assure everyone grids up over the shortest total time then.
Driving slower is actually far worse than having to wait a long time for gridding.

It also caused incessant concertina effects with people thinking the pace was being raised, then it was slowed right down again, time and time again. Which means everyone has to constantly be overly cautious because of the inconsistencies in pace. Cars zooming in from 0.5 to 0.1 behind me, being caught out by the changes. (should have stayed more back really anyway to allow for that).

And in this result of heating sequence, cars further BACK would overheat less. Because they get that shorter grid waiting time. So I bet lots were close to badly overheating, but luckily were further back and that kept them within limits. Most people probably never even watch or check their temps I bet.
Everyone knows the front cars get hotter due to longer waiting, but it is not an issue if they aren't even over-heated by the time you GET to the grid! And we even had quite minimal waiting time in this case. (10secs or less)

I checked the Euro race.
The Formation lap was 150kph to 130kph range almost all the way.
Slowing to 120kph from the last short straight to the last turn. And then slowing right down to the grid.
So what was fine and is exactly how they should, and need, to be done... and it is why temps never went even to 110deg by the gridding.
Going fast enough so cars were actually cooling and not gaining heat.

My car remained sub 105 all the way to the last turn. 108 on the grid.

So the ridiculous sub 110kph US pace (down to 80kph at times!!) was what caused it without doubt.

.
And Admin should have even instructed the pace to be raised, but I expect they don't even know this 'opposite' side of the car overheating before gridding due to a pace that is too slow. It is actually often the cause of gridding overheating, more than the delay time of back-markers!

Looking at the replay. I don't see Peter doing anything obviously wrong. But he was using 2nd gear when most of the cars around him were using 3rd for the early part of the lap. I did notice that Craig used 4th for almost the entire lap. That certainly would have kept him much cooler.

Well... Not overjoyed of the 5th place but with 45 mins preparations it was a reasonable race . Front cars went with their own pace and there was no point to try to catch them , so i settled with a comfortable pace and just concentrated of bringing it home in one piece.

Start was ok but i got a bit trapped behind another car and then there was that almost stationary Lotus in the middle of the track in 1st turn , last thing you would expect to see there and it was way too close and maybe there even were a slight contact but my car felt ok afterwards anyway.

Some tight wheel to wheel action early on with Rogier and it took a couple of laps to find a way past his Wolf but i didn't want to take any unnecessary risks and it was looking like i was faster at that point, then later on Bobby almost caught me but just when i was going for a defense mode he had some troubles and he dropped back.

Rest of the race was just lapping consistent laps and waiting for the flag.

About the pace lap... felt like a normal pace lap here on R2P , i don't think it's fair to accuse Craig for your own mistakes Peter. You drove on 1st and 2nd gear almost the whole warmup lap making multiple burnouts , thats like asking for trouble.
You should have adapted your driving if the pace is slow and to not have ignition and starter buttons mapped is not Craigs fault... Just another lesson learned hopefully ... ;)

Thx for the race and cya in next one... :)

Edit: P.S Sorry Anthony for cutting right in front of you in T1 , that broken Lotus took all my attention and didn't have time to think there , just reacted for the situation . I hope your car didn't suffer damage.

Edit2: Oh dear , wheres my manners... :| Congratulations to Steve , Craig and Jeff for the podiums , clean sweep from the GER...

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Samuel

That might play a part Aubrey. Though I always drive the 'same' way. (eg 2nd gear or maybe 3rd, according to suit the pace).
And I bet the Euro pace had me in third gear all the way!

I decided to go and have a look at the physics files and the game uses a formula of "Engine RPM creates Heat" and has no actual link between power used (as it should to be realistic). So lower revs does equal less heat - versus a real car would generate equal heat across any gear used (if engine revs still within some sensible ranges), as it needs 'energy X to go speed Y' anyway. And to produce Energy X the engine must produce close enough to equal Heat Y for all cases.

So that is definitely something good to know about the game!! Use a higher gear and lope around and you will gain less heat!! Not that it is something you would expect should be the result in real world terms.

And I also probably only needed 2 deg less and would have survived. So that was very bad luck!

But sub-130 kph still causes more heat gain than heat removal. So the pace should never be under that 130kph, until the very last short section to the grid.
Of course some people might run Rad4, for no real useful racing reason (high detriment to lap times really), but you can bet the real cars always ran the least possible and also never had slow pace laps (probably had NO formation laps anyway!)

You shouldn't "have to drive in 4th gear at super low revs" just to make up for a slow pace lap. No racing class needs to do that, not even real F1 79's. Though also no one probably ever has worked out WHY they overheat, so of course Craig won't either. But here is still no need for such a slow and inconsistent pace, which also causes all the other concertina problems.

And it was NOT a 'typical R2P F1 79' pace lap. I have checked 6 race replays and NONE go anywhere near that slow. Not even at Monaco! (it had slow parts, but not as slow and it is also not as long a lap). I am not over 112deg (Motec) on the grid and using Rad2 (same as all tracks) for Monaco.

Ignition-starter is useless. In 10 seconds grid up time you wouldn't even get it stopped and restarted anyway! So you are at high risk of being a 'stalled' car on the grid and causing mayhem then anyway! Versus the almost zero benefit even 5 seconds of engine off time would help. (maybe would some little bit).

Over 50 races and never a blown engine... I don't need to learn how to drive them, formation lap or not.
The pace was too slow, and also too erratic (almost), to be acceptable. (for those many reasons in total).

Ah , ok Peter.. sorry.. You only give advices , it's not allowed to advice you... :) Funny thing is that no-one else had any problems , but maybe it's just a co-incident ;).

If you think theres is nothing to learn then continue the way you've chosen , what do i care ... but accusing the pole man for your 'bad luck' isn't making the situation any better.

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Samuel