Bemo,
I agree with the rationale and practice of post scrutineering inspection. My post was with respect to the fact that when it was done in the UK there was a large outcry over the resultant DQs. Teams were DQ'd in Germany for similar issues and there is almost complete silence. It appears that FSG had more post scrutineering inspection. Any question involved was merely wondering whether teams had noticed this and had accepted it as the norm. Including the level of scrutiny placed on aero dimensions.
We had people arguing the following points (amongst others):
a) Post scrutineering inspection was against the spirit of the competition as it assumes cheating
b) Post endurance event scrutineering of the event only mentions engine which disallows inspecting the aerodynamic dimensions
c) A penalty of DQ is not justified in the rules
d) If a penalty is to be applied a DQ is too harsh a penalty for a minor infraction
e) Aero dimensions a few mm out of spec do not provide a performance advantage and should not be DQ'd (points penalty at most)
There was a lot of heated discussion, including the accusation of bias of the UK scrutineers against European and/or electric teams. Some posters implied that their teams would consider not returning to the UK in protest of this.
In Germany there was at least one foreign team that had a post endurance inspection, during which an Aero dimension was out by a small margin, and as a result they were DQ'd from endurance.
There was little to no outcry over this.
I was wondering whether by the lack of protest that teams had now accepted the following as standard practice:
a) Post scrutineering is completely allowed within the rules at any time
b) Small deviations of aero dimensions constitute a failure to meet technical regulations
c) An acceptable penalty for failing to meet technical regulations is a DQ
Kind Regards,
Kev