Comments on: Which ‘blatantly illegal car’ won a championship?

By: Graham Coles

Graham Coles — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 13:29:37 +0000

Sorry,

Previous post should read –

…The reason that it WASN’T banned in short order…..

As a point of interest the rams were justified as they were part of an active suspension system allowable in those days.

As another point of interest the F1 cars made in those days were the most technically sophisticated that have ever been built …. and were fantastic. They often had a capability far exceeding the drivers physical limit.
The Williams’ of this era were really something with even ‘predictive’ suspension being mooted that would set the car up to its optimum prior to each corner as they approached it.
Those were great engineering days …. but also very expensive ones.

By: Graham Coles

Graham Coles — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 13:22:16 +0000

The ‘blatantly’ illegal car that won the championship was the Parmalat Brabham.
To get around the excessive ground effect that was being generated by the car underbodies pre ‘plank’ the FIA ruled that the cars had to have a minimum ground clearance.
To get around this the Brabham was fitted with hydraulic rams on its suspension that jacked the car up as it entered the pits and stood in the garage but then lowered it to ‘almost scraping’ along the ground after the car had left the pits and was ‘ready to race’.
The only problem was the excessive ‘throw’ of the rams. I can remember seeing the Brabham drifting in and out of the pits as though it was on stilts, on occasion literally about a foot off the ground. 30 seconds later coming out of the second corner there’d be sparks and shredded bodywork being discarded as the thing scraped along the ground.
The reason that it was banned in short order was because at that time there was no technology deemed reliable that could be used to measure the ground clearance when the car was out of the pits and in motion.
Photographs never seemed to be considered as useable.

By: Joe

Joe — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 18:12:58 +0000

Don’t you guys get it?!? F1 is not a sport!!!!! I have been a fanatic since 1986, and I don’t hesitate for a second to say that F1 is not a sport! F1 is more like WWF (now called WWE), where the result is more a function of what the FIA thinks will bring in the most money! Until 2006, the FIA made 30% of the revenues of FOM, which meant that an umpopular champion ould make the FIA lose money, directly! In 94, Schumi + Benetton broke all kinds of rules on their way to the championship (traction control, illegally low car, Schumi driving his opponent OFF THE TRACK SO BLATANTLY… and don’t take my word for it, those were official FIA findings, except for Schumi driving Hill off track. The FIA expected us to believe that a driver fighting for the championship in the last race of the season had forgotten that his championship rival was on his tail for the entire race! Sure, and my name is Gilles Villeneuve!). Why were they allowed to keep it? The FOM were just about to sign a very very lucrative TV contract with the Germans, that contract might not have been so lucrative had the FIA taken Michael’s title away from him, as it was judged that it would make the German fans angry and less interested in F1.
In 2002 Toyota had literally copied the Ferrari from 2001, an act so blatant that they were found guilty in criminal court (ie there was more than enough evidence). The FIA’s reaction? Nada, nothing, not even a slap on the wrist, not even a footnote in one of their many press releases. Five years after that, and with only flimsy circumstancial evidence, McLaren get the worst punishment ever handed out in the history of all competitive sports (by a huge margin), because they used Stepney’s information to finally take away Ferrari’s Bridgestone advantage, an advantage that FIA and Bridgestone had promised that Ferrari wouldn’t have when Michelin was FORCED OUT.
I have learned not to expect justice and fairness form F1 a long time ago. Exactly why I remain such a loyal fan, I don’t know…

By: Kuba

Kuba — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 10:28:23 +0000

I’d vote for 1994 Benetton.

As for the team that used TC in 1999, it is widely rumored that it was Jordan.

By: Bernd Haste

Bernd Haste — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 12:42:12 +0000

2007 Australian grand prix

i`m still confused over this race. Was the Ferrari floor illegal? If so why wasn`t Ferrari penalised? That race was a great contributor to the outcome regarding Raikkonen/Hamilton.

By: Don Speekingleesh

Don Speekingleesh — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 17:56:28 +0000

Beats me. This is the first I’ve heard of them. So they certainly weren’t widely known.

By: Robert McKay

Robert McKay — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 17:21:29 +0000

Yes, I meant illegal in that classic retrospective sense the FIA employs (see mass dampers, Michelin tyres and flexible floors). I just wondered if the traction control allegations were/are entirely separate from that.

By: Don Speekingleesh

Don Speekingleesh — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 13:32:48 +0000

The third brake pedal was perfectly legal and McLaren, Williams and Jordan ran it with the full knowledge of the FIA from late 1997 up until round 2 1998, when Ferrari got the stewards to ban it. It had also been public knowledge of a while at that stage, so it wasn’t banned when it was discovered – it was banned when Ferrari found someone sympathetic in the steward’s room.

By: Robert McKay

Robert McKay — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 12:12:23 +0000

Is the “Mclaren having illegal traction control in ’98/’99″ related to (or being confused with) their illegal third brake pedal which was discovered and subsequently banned, or is this an entirely separate thing? That happened around the same time (I can’t remember it if was 1998 or 1999).

By: Nathan Jones

Nathan Jones — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 01:29:21 +0000

iheard a story a while back that in ’99 a team was caught some yrs after (’01 i think) to have been using TC! it was said “the team is british and thier performance was greatly improved that year” but it was never stated which team it was.