Williams FW31 diffuser given all clear
FW31 Rear Diffuser
By Andrew Hooper
February 6 2009
Recent reports cast doubt of the legality of the diffuser of the Williams FW31. There was concern about the design of the diffuser and whether or not it complied to the maximum height, 175mm, rule. But the design has been given the all clear according to FIA president Max Mosley. In an interview Mosley stated that the FIA could not find anything illegal about the Williams teams "clever" design.
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Recent reports cast doubt of the legality of the rear diffuser of the Williams FW31. There was concern about the design of the diffuser and whether or not it complied to the rules, in that it exceeded the maximum height of 175mm. The Williams diffuser is quite different to that of their rivals.
But reports now in autosport.com
have given the all clear to the diffuser with it been cleared according to FIA president Max Mosley. But this does not mean that a team or teams will not protest the design at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.
Mosley added:
"The current FIA view is that Williams and Toyota have been clever and have
exploited the wording of the rules in a clever way. But somebody may
challenge it and the stewards may take a different view - it could happen.
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As Max said, expect someone to challenge the ruling and expect the stewards in Oz to declare it illegal.
This is worse than Ronspeak but it is typical of the problem you encounter when trying to rely on the FIA to have a clear thought.
"Immutable laws of physics be damned, we are the FIA and we are the masters of the universe!"
To your point K1, is the air a physical property? We know it has mass becuase we measure barometric pressure, i.e. the weight of the air's mass.
Below is the portion of the Technical Regulations that Max was referring to, judge for yourself if he is correct or not.
3.12.7 No bodywork which is visible from beneath the car and which lies between the rear wheel centre line and a
point 350mm rearward of it may be more than 175mm above the reference plane. Any intersection of the
surfaces in this area with a lateral or longitudinal vertical plane should form one continuous line which is
visible from beneath the car. A single break in the surface is permitted solely to allow the minimum
required access for the device referred to in Article 5.15.
Additionally, any bodywork in this area must produce uniform, solid, hard, continuous, rigid (no degree of
freedom in relation to the body/chassis unit), impervious surfaces under all circumstances.
3.12.8 All sprung parts of the car situated behind the rear wheel centre line, which are visible from underneath
and are more than 250mm from the centre line of the car, must be at least 50mm above the reference
plane.
i am fully aware that air is a gas and as such is made up of various molecules which if viewed througn an electron microscope would indicate 'surfaces'.
to link the identification of a surface to either an 'unsprung' or 'sprung' portion of a construct is rather obtuse in the extreme. it could be said that the entire car in essence is 'sprung' if it has a moveable suspension, which it does.
maybe someone with the necessary academic qualifications could enlighten me on this.
With regard to sprung and unsprung weight, this is a very common principle as relates to cars. Simply put, any portion of the car that is supported by the cars springs is "sprung". Portions not supported by the springs are "unsprung".
Wheels,tires and brakes are typical unsprung components. The chassis, etc. is sprung.
If you, or anyone else on this forum can make sense out of the exerpt from the FIA Technical Regulations, please feel free to comment. It is quite clear that someone at the FIA has one opinion but that they expect there to be a different interpretation, or not. That is my point. These bloody regs are so totally arcane as to be idiotic becuase they are never fully thought through before they are adopted and so the FIA relies on a "system" clarifications and protests to settle what they should have resolved before the regulations were published.
As for the references to "physical properties with mass", I was having a bit of fun with you, it looked as if you were launching on to an academic postulate of a dubious nature. I apologise.