Totally OT BBC PC rant.

[Brian Morrison]

He meant during the collision with the tyre barrier, we all know the damage that was done during the spring impact.

[Man at B&Q]

[e-mail]...

To show the irrelevance of your comparison with a climber.

We don't. We say that injuries sustained due to an F1 car hitting the tyre wall at the speed it did are little consequence compared to what had already happened.

I like the way you choose to be selective in what you read from other peoples posts.

MBQ

[Steve Firth]

It's still s**te, he's no idea what damage was done at whioch phase of the accident. The fact that he can't explain himself is even more of a disgrace.

[The Natural Philosopher]

wrong on both counts.

[geoff]

In message , "dennis@home" writes

Once again it shows your double standards ...

[geoff]

In message , "dennis@home" writes

No dennis - you're getting confuse, aren't you

go and have a lie down

[Dave Liquorice]

There are a few in wales and one on the A69 near Brampton after the long decent from the Pennines. It's a bit different stopping a relatively slow moving and heavy car or lorry compared to a light and very fast moving race car though.

It is a bit disconcerting having your brakes fade, it's only happened to me once after a "spirited" decent down Hartside to Melmerby. They went nearly at the bottom and the first bend with them on the way out was "interesting". I managed to nurse them down the rest of the way and it was a good couple of miles past Melmerby before they came fully back.

[dennis]

how?

[Bob Eager]

off the QE2 bridge at the Dartford Crossing...

[Tim Ward]

I would feel inclined to stop if that happened to me.

[dmc]

>Coming off the QE2 bridge at the Dartford Crossing...

Dover as you drop down the Jubilee way:

in Folkestone has been turned into a gravel trap (and had a car in it last week!) has the roundabout at the bottom of the A260: one on the road into Folkestone from Capel: it's just Shepway - we have plenty. These are just the ones that I can think of. :-)

Pretty sure there is one on Bluebell hill between Chatham and Maidstone as well.

Darren

[Dave Liquorice]

No where to sensibly stop except in Melmerby, anyway nursing them wasn't that difficult just used engine braking instead and the air flow cools them off quicker tha parked up. And you can find out relatively safely if they've come back. I was surprised how long it took TBH.

[Roger Chapman]

There is (or at least was in 1956) one on the steep hill between Lynton and Lynmouth.

There is the sign for one on the A59 on the Western approach to Bolton Abbey outside Skipton. It is by no means clear where the actual trap is.

It is more than a bit disconcerting having brake failure on a steep hill. Happened to me in 1980 on the steep hill near my house. I was just changing down into first to negotiate the tight 120 degree hairpin above my entry when my right foot joined my left foot flat on the bulkhead. I managed to get round the bend but deliberately rammed the bank rather than taking my chances on the 1 in 5 below and the possibility of the handbrake still working.

For years I thought I had made the wrong decision in taking the bend but

20 odd years later white van man had a similar brake failure and went straight on, down my steep front lawn, through a dry stone wall, onto another wall at right angles, finally toppling sideways into a neighbours field.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Oh..I had it reasonably often. My Opel Manta was not good at the last

30mph from a 110mph stop. I tried it once.

OTOH I got prefect stopping from 130mph in the XKR.

Totally irrelevant for F1 as te technology is completely different.

[dennis]

You needed harder pads and a stronger foot then.

Harder pads and a bigger servo.

Are F1 cars not using friction braking any longer then?

I knew there was a new technology on the test circuit but I though it still relied on friction and still got very hot. I thought it was just the way the hydraulics acted on the friction plates that was new.

[Jules]

Nah, they toss a little anchor over the side of the car these days and hope for the best.

[The Natural Philosopher]

No, I need vented disks actually.

No, vented disks of massive proportions.

Not fibre pads on steel discs, no.

No. Its the materials.

[Jon Green]

Believe me. when a brain hits an unyielding and nobbly lump of internal skull at 60-160mph, it doesn't come away unscathed. If you don't believe that, try this experiment. First park a sacrificial car, nose into a wall (to give a crumple zone backed by a solid object). Then, wearing a crash helmet to give your head a bit more momentum, get your car up to 60mph, and ram it into the back of the other one, in gear, with your foot full on the throttle.

After a month or two in Addenbrooke's, come back here and tell us how it felt.

The skull damage was certainly due to the spring, but the concussion's probably caused as much by the sudden deceleration on impact as by the spring's impact. The HANS wouldn't have made that much difference, because Massa's brain's would still have been playing trampoline on his frontal and parietal bones when he whacked into the tyres. Even though the brake was being pressed as he went into the barrier, so was the throttle! Energy was being pushed into the system, and would have added to the deceleration force.

Sorry, NP, that's utter poo. Considering that the other drivers were, almost to a man, saying that there needs to be more thought put into driver safety, the BBC is simply going along with advice from the experts.

There's still scope for some kind of debris deflector in front of the driver -- it might even help with downforce, so it'd probably be a popular idea.

Jon

[Jon Green]

That's fair comment, though. Once the full situation (Barichello's spring's loss and impact) was known, I suspect the Beeb simply couldn't be bothered to change its headline.

The other possibility that occurs to me is that the Beeb may have been shy of blaming BrawnGP for the incident, given how litigious the F1 industry is. Can't blame them for that, I guess, although I would expect Ross B to be more likely to say, "Fair cop, guv," given the kind of guy he is, rather than suing the crap out of F1's best friend.

Jon

[Brian Morrison]

In >30 years of watching F1, I can only remember one other similar near-incident which occurred in roughly 1994-5 when a camera fell off Gerhard Berger's Ferrari and almost hit the following Ferrari of Jon Alesi. I've never seen a spring fall off this way before, and there are very few instances of wheels hitting anyone even before tethers appeared (yes, they don't always work, I know).

If you partake in F1 as a driver, then you have to have accepted the risks of injury. Being paid lots helps too.

I wouldn't want to return to the carnage of the past, and I'm pleased that the FIA has done good things like insisting on better helmet standards and HANS and various other improvements. But please let's not try to make it entirely risk free, because the only way to do that is to stop racing.