WATER WETTERS:

Quaint term indeed. Water has numerous properties and such things as surface tension. Ever noticed how water drops sometimes form little blobs static on certain surfaces but collapse and run away immediately on others .... like on your freshly polished car when it rains just as you've finished the job .... :)

These properties mean there can be some resistance to adhere closely (surface area at a molecular level) to certain surfaces under certain conditions. This is bad news for heat transfer in cooling systems. Water wetters help overcome this which enables better heat transfer from the hot metal to the water. Even some modified performance road cars which because of those mods, generate more heat than the cooling system can sometimes cope with, benefit from water wetters in their coolant.

back to the title
MOVE OVER DC,LET ALEX WURTZ HAVE A GO!!

"Now I'm confused NOT. Are you saying that irrespective of the way or when he changes gear, brakes and/or uses the throttle, the gizzmos ALWAYS have the final engine saving say? Might just as well screw the throttles open wide and let the gizzmos do the rest...."

Yes, that is precisely the situation. Kimi can only demand the power via his throttle pedal, the ECU decides how it will give him that power. He cant over rev it, he cant even downshift too fast to blow it up, the electronics wont let him. You dont run 800BHP plus out of 3 litre engines without the electronics being in charge. Kimi did nothing wrong, even if he wanted to he wouldnt be allowed. :D

That doesnt mean you screw the throttle open and let the electronics do the work, he still has to balance the car and drive it using the various inputs like throttle, brake and steering, it just stops him blowing it up and maximises the grip, power delivery etc.



"My query was that one of those who "assisted" MS back onto the track from a "dangerous position" was not a Marshall. Looked more like a spectator and if so, how come he had such immediate access to the track."

Thats a question for the organisors to answer, it has no bearing on the fact that MS was assisted legally. What would you prefer, a driver being excluded because the organisors cant keep the spectators out of the race track? hardly fair on the driver/team is it?

"We were also informed that the stewards were looking into J-P-M's driving during the incident. Why only his?"

Probably because he was the person to gain from it? It was a rather pathetic thing to do, but then again, there was contact between the cars, so its most likely in the rules that they have to investigate if contact occurs. They came up with the right decision, which was that there was no issue with the move, so i dont see what the drama is about with regards to that.

the thermal conductivity of aluminium is 205W/m K, steel is 50W/m K. titanium is 20W/m K. So Steel is 4 times less conductive of heat energy than Aluminium, Titanium is 10 times less conductive of heat energy than Aluminium.

Aluminium is lightest, then titanium and then Steel. Aluminium is cheaper than stainless steel, stainless steel is cheaper than titanium. So you base the caliper piston choice on weight, cost and heat requirements.

The fluid shunt systems use one way valves that allow fluid movement out of the caliper on releasing the brake pedal, yet when aplying presure they close, so the brakes still work. This means the caliper has two brake lines, one for fluid in, one for fluid out. The fluid going in will be much cooler than that going out, by how much i dont know, i have never used this system myself so dont have any measurements, no doubt that varies from aplication to aplication.

[Edited by johnfelstead - 6/30/2003 11:17:33 PM]

Thanks MGJohn :)

and thanks John Felstead :) How come you are not using such a brake fluid cooling system? Dont you experience fade of your brakes when driving the car hard? Or has this system got inconveniences which I am not aware of?

you make the system as simple as you can, dont put something on the car that isnt needed as its just another thing to go wrong and cost you money.

I dont need to use any of that specialist kit on my Impreza, the race car was fine once we changed the pistons from aluminium to stainless steel. That enabled us to remove the water cooling system saving weight.

fade isnt a fluid issue, thats a brake pad/disk choice and cooling issue, a totally diferent area of brake tuning.

I see... I meant fade as in pedal going to the floor (boiling?) What's that called?

thats called the oh $hit moment. :D

You can call it loads of things, getting a long pedal, fluid boiling, spongy pedal etc

It all boils down to the same cause though. :D

And back on track with a slightly less serious post :)

From this months 'Sniff Petrol'

http://www.sniffpetrol.com/AdCoulthard.jpg

Chris