Long-distance IT to assist F1 racers
Engineers in the U.K. will be just as vital to the success of the Williams Formula One team as track-side engineers in Australia.
Engineers at a U.K. factory will be just as crucial to the success of the Williams Formula One team as the track-side engineers at the Grand Prix in Melbourne, according to Williams co-founder and engineering director Patrick Head.
If there is an abnormality in each car's engine, brakes, wings, or power supply, the problem is expected to be noticed in the U.K. before its track-side engineers find it, which might not be until something goes wrong.
Each Williams F1 car is equipped with over 200 telemetric sensors, which feed data to both the Melbourne and U.K. teams in order to detect faults and to record and compare minute differences between the technique employed by the team's two drivers, Nico Hulkenberg --who made his F1 debut in Bahrain in March--and veteran F1 driver Ruben Barrichello. The team is backed up by an AT&T fiber link that supports its VPN connection back to the U.K.
Read more of "Williams' F1 IT support: man v machine" at ZDNet Australia.