Grandfather Rules

[Kevin Hayward]

I am inviting comments on an issue that predominantly affects Australian teams competing internationally.

As it currently stands Australian (and other late competitions) teams build cars to the year of competition. For example the Australians build to the 2012 FSAE rules for the 2012 comp. Unfortunately changes to the rules for the following year can make a 2012 car illegal for 2013, with potentially large changes required to meet new compliance. Furthermore given the release dates of rules it is not generally viable to design an Australian car to meet the following year's rules.

ECU Racing has hit a situation like this with the addition of legs to Percy and changes to front bulkhead rules for 2013. Both of these are very large initial design focused rules and are very difficult to accommodate post build. As such it is looking likely that the team will not be able to compete in the UK as planned.

Frankly I see this as a major disappointment and not in the spirit of promoting international competition.

I see 2 potential solutions for the future and wouldn't mind hearing some feedback on this issue, proposed solutions or alternative solutions.

1. Publish the rules at least a year in advance. (i.e. 2015 rules are available before the 1st of Jan 2014) This allows teams to accommodate for changing rules, and is a much better than stating intentions to change rules.

2. Build in a grandfather clause for international teams. For example an international team will be able to compete in a competition if they can demonstrate that the car competed in an FS sanctioned event less than 10 months previously and was designed to be compliant to the international rules at the time.


Both of these ideas require that the rules are fairly uniform between competitions.

Feedback?

Kev

[mech5496]

Kevin,

No.1 would be better for all teams cause we could plan ahead, but IMO it would make any rule changes a bit hard to implement. No.2 sounds much more straightforward and it has been done in the past (see introduction of template rules).

[AndreasK]

Hi,

isnt't that already the case? I havent found a explicit source, but in the 2013 fsae rules it says under ARTICLE 15: POSSIBLE FUTURE RULES CHANGES: Notice of Possible Rule Changes for the 2015 Formula SAE Series

I would assume that there are no rule changes for 2014 and therefor the same overall rules. That can of course not be said for the event specific rules.

[TMichaels]

Hey,

if 2) is applied, I can already see teams starting to plan their season in order to squeeze the maximum out of the "older" rules. It would lead to increased load on the organization and teams could also complain it being an unfair advantage.

1) is probably possible and already partly applied with the section for possible future rule changes. However, you can never be safe, because incidents at competitions or "clever" design solutions by teams can always trigger a last minute rules change.
The FSAE rules committee strives to have a two year rules cycle. Thus it is likely that no major rule changes are introduced for 2014 with the next rules cycle starting in 2015.

The change in event specific rules can not really be controlled anyway as the different organizations obviously have different targets/mindset regarding the focus of the competition and adjust their rules accordingly.

[Jon Burford]

Maybe we should look at it differently, In most motorsport you don't see teams building a car to enter the last race of the season and then expecting to use it for the next year.
Maybe, if you want to compete Internationally you will have to build a car in time for those competitions and then use it last at the Australian event. I.e. ending the season with Australia rather than starting with it??

[TMichaels]

Jon,
the concept of motorsport-series you are referring to is to participate in every race, because the championship is awarded for the team/driver with the most points. It can not be applied to FS/FSAE.

It does not only affect Australian teams. Many European teams for example build their car for their first European event and then participate in the US in the following year for example.
They would hit the same barrier.
Thus all teams would theoretically have to build their car for the first event in the year.

Additionally many teams decide later, after their "home" event, that the car is worth being taken overseas. More money is available after a successful season, therefore it is sensible to also go there with the car/team that raised this money and promises being successful.

[Bemo]

Tobias is definitely right here. For us it was never clear at the beginning of a season if we were going overseas with the new car. We always made it dependent of funding and results at the European competitions which showed, that it is worth it to take that car overseas.

I think the only possible way is to have the rules published as early as possible. At least when we are talking about rules changes like the new percy rule with the legs. It is clear that it is very hard to change that if your frame is just too short for it. Minor changes are no problem. But somehting like this should be announced as early as possible.

Tobias, was there any particular incident which led to this rule? It definitely makes sense. I'm just wondering how the process to introduce this rule went.

[TMichaels]

Tobias, was there any particular incident which led to this rule? It definitely makes sense. I'm just wondering how the process to introduce this rule went.

I am sure that I have received the documents/discussion regarding this rule, but I can not remember and don't have the mails anymore either. Thus I am not able to help, sorry.

Just to make it clear what I was talking about before: an incident must not be an accident. It can also be something which a lot of teams understood wrong or which caused trouble/uncertainty at Scrutineering.

[Racer-X]

Just make all rules changes go into effect the "season" after they are implemented. This would mean that anything done before Michigan goes into effect in 2014 and anything after is a 2015 rule. Then the rules can be finalized before that year's build. If someone finds a loophole good for them we all had the same opportunity.

A grandfather clause would be a mess.

[Mbirt]

Originally posted by Kevin Hayward:
2. Build in a grandfather clause for international teams. For example an international team will be able to compete in a competition if they can demonstrate that the car competed in an FS sanctioned event less than 10 months previously and was designed to be compliant to the international rules at the time.

I watched TU Graz win FSAE 2009 with their 2008 car that did not meet the new cockpit template rules. Have the rules been refined since to prevent this from happening? If strict enforcement in Europe is the problem, maybe ECU should just plan a trip to North America and enjoy our three lovely events that occur in one month's time?