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jey 55 minutes ago [-]
Seems wild that they can code and deploy an update of a critical-seeming component in the field like that. I thought such a firmware update would need extensive QA in the lab, along with root causing why this bug slipped through their processes anyway.
But maybe that's the difference between shipping a controller for F1 versus shipping one for an industrial or consumer product? shrug.
LeoPanthera 44 minutes ago [-]
It seems they simply disabled a bunch of power limits. Probably just settings, rather than an actual code update.
tiffanyh 11 minutes ago [-]
F1 are effectively prototype cars.
Every GP is a slightly different car running bleeding edge tech and code.
dylan604 50 minutes ago [-]
I'm wondering how good the simulators are. At the start of the season, they were still learning the systems trying to figure out why they were losing power in the straights. So depending on the driver, issues may or may not become apparent. That's like trying to debug why an email can only be sent to a recipient less than 500 miles away.
rossriley 34 minutes ago [-]
Anthony Davidson who is the Mercedes test driver said that the teams can simulate these scenarios and it seemed that the Mercedes cars were not affected so it seems that other teams hadn't done similar testing in various scenarios.
altmanaltman 9 minutes ago [-]
One of the mercedes literally broke down and did not finish the race. They might not have faced the issue during the first time they went out in that race but Merc reliablity has been very shaky. And ofc Ant will talk only good things about Mercedes. But this is not the type of things they use the driver simulator for, it is to help the drivers train. These types of issues don't make sense to spend simulator time on with the driver in it
mvlipwig 33 minutes ago [-]
I think those engineers had some memories of their FSAE / FSUK days during that patch.
rapidfl 49 minutes ago [-]
It was probably just "config" changes or changing some hard-coded constants. So relatively straightforward.
jrflo 1 hours ago [-]
A question for someone who knows more about F1: Is this firmware shared by all cars? Or some local server at the track the cars connect to? Why is F1 able to control individual cars like this? The article is very light on details as to what exactly is going on...
vsskanth 1 hours ago [-]
The firmware situation is mixed. The ECU hardware is a standard TAG700 from McLaren. Basically these are software-defined ECUs where you can do whatever. However, FIA has some rules on what you're allowed to modify and has some "compulsory" software in there for monitoring and competition regulatory reasons. It appears there was very limited testing of this module in wet conditions which seems to have affected a lot of vehicles. (I work in Motorsports)
jrflo 37 minutes ago [-]
Wow. I just assumed it wouldn’t be firmware because going from making a fix in 50 minutes to having cars flying at hundreds of miles per hour on that firmware is kind of nuts
xeonmc 35 minutes ago [-]
So basically like mandatory rootkit anticheat for online games?
vsskanth 15 minutes ago [-]
F1 vehicles have a lot of actively controlled systems - Engine, MGU, Diff, Brake Bias, Aero etc. Their way of allowing active control but preventing "driver aids" like traction control, torque vectoring is to tightly regulate and give them a box where they can place their controls and what inputs they are allowed to use.
fishgoesblub 1 hours ago [-]
The FIA has this software to stop teams from creating a form of traction control (which has been banned for a good while now)
para_parolu 58 minutes ago [-]
Why? To increase chances of crashes that produces more views?
duskwuff 41 minutes ago [-]
Traction control was allowed before 2008. The problem was that it trivialized some aspects of driving - drivers could floor the throttle through turns at little to no risk. (I suspect there may have also been some concerns that drivers who pushed traction control too far could have easily ended up in unrecoverable situations.)
Basically, there's an endless struggle between "how much do we let automation control?" If there were no such rules, the role of the driver would be far less than it is now, which would effectively reduce competition.
Rastonbury 21 minutes ago [-]
There's some debate but it's kinda settled, it's the pinnacle of motorsports so no driver aids, they are moving away from hybrids, realizing road car relevance/parity is no longer the direction
johannes1234321 47 minutes ago [-]
I am not big in F1, but my understanding is that the primary goal is to have the driver be more relevant over the car/firmware producers.
pertymcpert 17 minutes ago [-]
Traction control removes of the most fundamental skills of a driver. It’s like allowing ABS.
vel0city 35 minutes ago [-]
We should allow batting machines for baseball players to hit the ball more reliably as well. Poker players should play with their cards face up. I agree.
Manually controlling to the limits of the car is a big part of the skill of racing.
stackghost 46 minutes ago [-]
The entire purpose of traction control is to reduce the driver skill required when cornering and braking. This is why traction control is omnipresent in consumer vehicles, because the vast majority of road drivers are awful.
FIA bans traction control so as to place more emphasis on driver skill.
57 minutes ago [-]
59 minutes ago [-]
markus92 1 hours ago [-]
They all run the same ECU and the same firmware on it, yeah. Teams can control some parameters though. It's to stop any kind of traction control.
junofan 59 minutes ago [-]
The teams use a single homologated ECU to prevent driver aids. I would assume it doesn’t have a downlink on-track to prevent tampering, but presumably with umbilical cord connected in the garage during red flag they can make changes, which the FIA probably sent over. Who knows.
algoth1 1 hours ago [-]
I can't not read it as "They vibe coded a patch in 50 minutes". Had they used Sol 6.1 they would still be waiting
throw03172019 10 seconds ago [-]
Is 6.1 Sol that bad? Or just slow?
dante54 1 hours ago [-]
Still waiting for 6.1 sol to patch a UI bug as am reading this
whalesalad 2 minutes ago [-]
Make race cars analog again
boredatoms 1 hours ago [-]
Time to go back to NA engines, the hybrids don't give the rock concert wall of sound
rapidfl 59 minutes ago [-]
Lets all vent in one more place. How this kind of regs get forced is sad. All the casual fans want something fun to watch. All the serious fans want NA engines. The drivers hate these "power units".
HHC-Hunter 18 minutes ago [-]
Honestly at this point, bring back the V10's.
h4kunamata 1 hours ago [-]
The Enshittification era keeps on giving.
Moved from one of the most fun auto sports to an EV mess.
The fact that they were able to vibe code ( You can't truly deliver a code without testing gates in place, let alone release to production, the cars themselves), tells:
1: The teams no longer own the car
2: F1 has become Formula E 2.0
superb_dev 55 minutes ago [-]
F1 teams have never fully owned the car, you’ll notice they all look pretty similar. The FIA has a lot of rules around the construction of the cars
lostlogin 44 minutes ago [-]
FIA, the FIFA of motorsport.
LoganDark 57 minutes ago [-]
Gotta love how people assume software patches have never been prepared in an emergency before LLMs. Ever heard of Apollo 14??
fishgoesblub 14 minutes ago [-]
Apollo 14? Is that a new model?
LoganDark 3 minutes ago [-]
No, Apollo 14 was one of the original moon-landing missions back in 1971. They had to make an emergency adjustment to the computer's memory in order to work around an electrical issue where the abort button would intermittently (and erroneously) register as pressed. Turns out they couldn't modify the actual machine code so it wasn't a "software patch" in the exact same sense, but there were no large language models back then.
aetherspawn 2 minutes ago [-]
Auto software engineer here.
It’s frankly because Motorsport software guys are pretty arrogant. They look down on road car and truck engineers, but reality is they develop stuff with virtually no processes and they usually have only very basic engineering skills, yet every day they are told Motorsport is at the forefront of technology.
“Motorsport grade” auto components usually means crappy, and everything requires a software patch to work correctly.
But maybe that's the difference between shipping a controller for F1 versus shipping one for an industrial or consumer product? shrug.
Every GP is a slightly different car running bleeding edge tech and code.
There's some interesting discussion of the history and technical aspects at: https://www.f1-forecast.com/pdf/F1-Files/Honda/F1-SP2_25e.pd...
Manually controlling to the limits of the car is a big part of the skill of racing.
FIA bans traction control so as to place more emphasis on driver skill.
Moved from one of the most fun auto sports to an EV mess. The fact that they were able to vibe code ( You can't truly deliver a code without testing gates in place, let alone release to production, the cars themselves), tells:
1: The teams no longer own the car
2: F1 has become Formula E 2.0
It’s frankly because Motorsport software guys are pretty arrogant. They look down on road car and truck engineers, but reality is they develop stuff with virtually no processes and they usually have only very basic engineering skills, yet every day they are told Motorsport is at the forefront of technology.
“Motorsport grade” auto components usually means crappy, and everything requires a software patch to work correctly.