Inside Bhai Tech – Driving Simulator & Software
Our trip inside the Bhai Tech Advanced Vehicle Science Centre, the cutting-edge centre located in Mestrino, near Padua, which was inaugurated by the Williams Team’s driver Pastor Maldonado, starts now. This year the centre celebrates its first anniversary. Thanks to its innovative design, the centre took part in a contest in Koln to be awarded the prize as 2012 best facility. Bhai Tech got through to the final, competing with the Austin-based Circuit of Americas for the win.
It’s a 2800 square metres structure on three floors which was conceived with the aim of providing teams and drivers with some facilities to support the development of Formula and GT cars and off-track training before taking part in a racing weekend, thanks to the presence of an advanced driving simulator and modelling software, which are the core of Bhai Tech’s offering.
Through the 6-DOF full-motion driving simulator, which is fully immersive with a 8 210° 8 m diameter curved screen, five off-board projectors and two rear view visuals to ensure the view of the car’s rear part, reflecting images on the rear-view mirrors , a driver can train and study all the features of the main preparatory formulas’ most important circuits. Complementing it with the Bhai Tech vehicle modelling software, squads can arrange a racing weekend in house and compare real data with virtual ones. Besides making fluid dynamics studies and analysing tyre’s behaviour, it is also possible to analyse setup in real time and check its different behaviours “In many categories time is very tight, so the possibility to make tests is very little. This is the reason why it’s so important to have a good setup and be well prepared since Friday’s practice”, says Roberto Costa, the technical director. “All that can be developed in our headquarter, where the best setup can be studied in details. Thanks to our software, all racing weekend’s data concerning setup, tyres, downforce, can be stored and compared. So, track conditions can be fully recreated without going to the track. That contributes to bring the costs down and reduces times. At that point, we can start the development work.”
It’s an all-rounder system which goes from track to simulation and goes back to track. With test limitations in F.1, the driving simulator is an extremely important device for a single-seater development and GP preparation. All the F.1 top teams have invested so much in this respects, but simulation is a very important resource also for the preparatory series, as through that a team can develop the car in details and a driver can study the circuits he will race at and his car’s behaviour “In F.1 hundreds of technicians work at the simulator to develop the car at best. This is so expensive, in addition, telemetry and all needed data to develop a car, which is designed by them, make everything even more expansive.
Thanks to our software, we’re able to enable a team to develop its car focusing on tyre modelling, which is a very important aspect, which usually requires so much time. We can provide different setup options according to customer needs”, ends Mr. Costa, the engineer.
At the Nurburgring, where the International GT Open Championship’s third round was run, the racing division took its first double win in the GTS class, thanks to Bhai Tech Racing’s four drivers Giorgio Pantano/Rafel Suzuki and Chris Van Der Drift/Luiz Razia at the wheel of the two McLarens MP4 – 12C. They ended the first half as the Championship leaders.
