bshorey wrote:cheseroo wrote:The leader light thing seems useless to me and it wouldn't make any difference in the way I drive. If they are faster, they will pass me.
Technical solutions exist for a lot of things. I'm wondering who you propose paying for and maintaining all this technology?
Well, we used to time laps with a stop watch, keep track of laps on a clip board, and talk to drivers with a chalk board. We've made great advances with all of these, and somebody has figured out ways to get them funded and adopted, so why not with flagging?
bs
I'm a tech project manager so I'm aware of technical advances. I'm also the guy who sometimes gets put in charge of projects with technically interesting solutions but ones that ultimately make people's job harder so I tend to take a pragmatic approach to these types of things.
My take - Relying on lights in cars has too many moving parts.
Too complex to implement in specific track segments only with cars moving in and out of each segment at speed.
The in-car unit would need to be self contained like the transponders. If you ever saw the K-car wiring, you really don't want us wiring something extra into our cars.
Lots of people (particularly new drivers) tend to target fixate and not see gauges/dash lights, etc.
My suggestion -
Seems to me that most everyone (presumably) is looking out the windshield so if you are going to use tech to replace flags, it seems like someplace out the windshield is where you install your lights. Like lights in the corner where stuff has gone sideways. Like the fence lights at Sonoma. You can't miss those things. Make them LED and display advertising in non yellow/red colors to pay for itself. Removes the complexity of moving cars, chasing down people who don't give your tech back after the race and is a matter of running power to the lights and control wiring to the now obsolete flagstands.
1990 RX7 "Mazdarita" 1964 Sunbeam Imp (IOE 2013 Sears Pointless) 2002 Jaguar x-type (Winner C-Class 2021 Sears Pointless)
Gone bye-bye
1994 Jaguar XJ12 (Winner C-Class 2013 Sears Pointless) 1980 Rover SD1 (I Got Screwed 2014 Return of Lemonites)