Comments by "Tony Wilson" (@tonywilson4713) on "Why this Formula 1 Car was FASTER Without Suspension" video.

Being an Australian who was alive at that time, I remember the news broadcast of that Alan Jones test. From memory that test was at Paul Richard on the long circuit with the full length Mistral straight. It was BIG NEWS here in Oz. AJ had won the world championship was trying for a second and this car was the potential winner. BUT Jones was publicly saying these extremely stiff cars were going to be death traps. He said things to the effect that if they hit the wrong bump they would simply take off. Remember this was pre-carbon fiber and BEFORE the rules about drivers feet being behind the front axle. The almost indestructible tubs they now have were years away at this point. The tubs were basically aluminum sheet riveted and welded together. Part of the news was AJ saying that the rule changes were necessary because the cornering speeds had become too dangerous for those cars. This was before data loggers could tell the engineers what the suspension was doing. The tire compounds were real rubber from real trees not the synthetic stuff some science geek made in lab. There was actual concern being publicly voiced that our World Champion was going to be coming home in a box if their wasn't some common sense. One thing not discussed here and its related to the rule changes. As I remember was that the floating side skirts that followed the road surface were banned. The side tunnels were NOT banned but the side skirts had to be fixed and have a minimum gap to the road when STATIONARY. AJ voiced at the time that there were plans for cars to lower and seal the side skirts (or close the gap) using the normal suspension. He also said that would be just as dangerous because the cars would effectively be running with the suspension continuously bottomed. Which would be just like the car with no suspension. Great to see that footage again.
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@AndyFromBeaverton Is that possibly the Lotus with the double chassis?? There's vide here on YT about it.
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@dcrooky3 I actually remember that test session being telecast in Australia. As I said in a previous comment that Alan Jones was publicly voicing safety concerns over how teams were approaching the rule changes. What they did with the rules was put a limit on the gap between the side skirts and the road. Its intent was to get rid of the floating side skirts Lotus had developed that kept contact with the road. By having an air gap it reduced the effectiveness of the side tunnels by letting air get sucked in from the side. What teams were doing was setting soft suspensions so the car would lower and close the gap and increase the effectiveness of the side tunnels. Because they would be running with the suspension bottomed out it meant that ANY BUMP could send the car flying off into oblivion. AJ was quite vocal at the time about how dangerous the next season might be if the rules weren't clarified. I don't remember what they exactly did but they did something and the next season wasn't chaos. Its one of those really odd stories and I only know about it because it was news in Australia at the time.
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