Michelin
Michelin is a French tyre manufacturer based in Clermont-Ferrand in the Auvergne région of France. It is the second largest tyre manufacturer in the world after Bridgestone and larger than both Goodyear and Continental. In addition to the Michelin brand, it owns the BFGoodrich, Tigar, Riken and Uniroyal tyre brands. Michelin is notable for its Red and Green travel guides, its roadmaps, the Michelin stars that the Red Guide awards to restaurants for their cooking, for its company mascot Bibendum, colloquially known as the Michelin Man. Michelin's numerous inventions include the pneurail and the radial tyre. Michelin manufactures tyres for space shuttles, automobiles, heavy equipment and bicycles. In 2012, the Group produced 166 million tyres at 69 facilities located in 18 countries. In 1889 two brothers, Édouard Michelin and André Michelin, ran a rubber factory in Clermont-Ferrand, France. One day, a cyclist turned up at the factory; the tyre was glued to the rim, it took over three hours to remove and repair the tyre, which needed to be left overnight to dry.
The next day, Édouard Michelin took the repaired bicycle into the factory yard to test. After only a few hundred metres, the tyre failed. Despite the setback, Édouard was enthusiastic about the pneumatic tyre, he and his brother worked on creating their own version, one that did not need to be glued to the rim. Michelin was incorporated on 28 May 1889. In 1891 Michelin took out its first patent for a removable pneumatic tyre, used by Charles Terront to win the world's first long distance cycle race, the 1891 Paris–Brest–Paris. In the 1920s and 1930s, Michelin operated large rubber plantations in Vietnam. Conditions at these plantations led to the famous labour movement Phu Rieng Do. In 1934, Michelin introduced a tyre which, if punctured, would run on a special foam lining, a design now known as a run-flat tyre. Michelin developed and patented a key innovation in tyre history, the 1946 radial tyre, exploited this technological innovation to become one of the worlds leading tyre manufacturers; the radial was marketed as the "X" tyre.
It was developed with Citroën 2CV in mind. Michelin had bought the then-bankrupt Citroën in the 1930s; because of its superiority in handling and fuel economy, use of this tyre spread throughout Europe and Asia. In the U. S. the outdated bias-ply tyre persisted, with market share of 87% in 1967. In 1966, Michelin partnered with Sears to produce radial tyres under the Allstate brand and was selling 1 million units annually by 1970. In 1968, Michelin opened its first North American sales office, was able to grow that market for its products rapidly. In 1968, Consumer Reports, an influential American magazine, acknowledged the superiority of the radial construction, setting off a rapid decline in Michelin's competitor technology. In the U. S. the radial tyre now has a market share of 100%. In addition to the private label and replacement tyre market, Michelin scored an early OEM tyre win in North America, when it received the contract for the 1970 Continental Mark III, the first American car with radial tyres fitted as standard.
In 1989, Michelin acquired the merged tyre and rubber manufacturing divisions of the American firms B. F. Goodrich Company and Uniroyal, Inc. from Clayton, Dubilier & Rice. Uniroyal Australia had been bought by Bridgestone in 1980; this purchase included the Norwood, North Carolina manufacturing plant which supplied tyres to the U. S. Space Shuttle Program. Michelin controls 90% of Taurus Tyre in Hungary, as well as Kormoran, a Polish brand; as of 1 September 2008, Michelin is again the world's largest tyre manufacturer after spending two years as number two behind Bridgestone. Michelin produces tyres in France, Spain, the USA, the UK, Brazil, Japan and several other countries. On 15 January 2010, Michelin announced the closing of its Ota, Japan plant, which employs 380 workers and makes the Michelin X-Ice tyre. Production of the X-Ice will be moved to Europe, North America, elsewhere in Asia. Michelin participated in MotoGP from 1972 to 2008, they introduced radial construction to MotoGP in 1984, multi-compound tyres in 1994.
They achieved 360 victories in 36 years, from 1993 to 2006, the world championship had gone to a rider on Michelins. In 2007, Casey Stoner on Bridgestone tyres won the world championship in dominating fashion, Valentino Rossi and other top riders complained that Michelins were inferior. Rossi wanted Bridgestones for the 2008 season. In 2008, Michelin committed errors of judgment in allocating adequate tyres for some of the race weekends. Dani Pedrosa's team switched to Bridgestones in the midst of the season, a unusual move that caused friction between Honda Racing Corporation and their sponsor Repsol YPF. Other riders expressed concerns and it seemed that Michelin might not have any factory riders for the 2009 season, leading to rumours that Michelin would withdraw from the series altogether. Dorna and the FIM announced that a control tyre would be imposed on MotoGP for the 2009 season and Michelin did not enter a bid ending its participation in the series at the end of 2008. Mi
Australia
Australia the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area; the neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea and East Timor to the north. The population of 25 million is urbanised and concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Australia's capital is Canberra, its largest city is Sydney; the country's other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide. Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians for about 60,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century, it is documented. After the European exploration of the continent by Dutch explorers in 1606, who named it New Holland, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain in 1770 and settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day; the population grew in subsequent decades, by the 1850s most of the continent had been explored and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established.
On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories. Being the oldest and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils, Australia has a landmass of 7,617,930 square kilometres. A megadiverse country, its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east and mountain ranges in the south-east. A gold rush began in Australia in the early 1850s, its population density, 2.8 inhabitants per square kilometre, remains among the lowest in the world. Australia generates its income from various sources including mining-related exports, telecommunications and manufacturing. Indigenous Australian rock art is the oldest and richest in the world, dating as far back as 60,000 years and spread across hundreds of thousands of sites. Australia is a developed country, with the world's 14th-largest economy.
It has a high-income economy, with the world's tenth-highest per capita income. It is a regional power, has the world's 13th-highest military expenditure. Australia has the world's ninth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 26% of the population. Having the third-highest human development index and the eighth-highest ranked democracy globally, the country ranks in quality of life, education, economic freedom, civil liberties and political rights, with all its major cities faring well in global comparative livability surveys. Australia is a member of the United Nations, G20, Commonwealth of Nations, ANZUS, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, World Trade Organization, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, Pacific Islands Forum and the ASEAN Plus Six mechanism; the name Australia is derived from the Latin Terra Australis, a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times. When Europeans first began visiting and mapping Australia in the 17th century, the name Terra Australis was applied to the new territories.
Until the early 19th century, Australia was best known as "New Holland", a name first applied by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1644 and subsequently anglicised. Terra Australis still saw occasional usage, such as in scientific texts; the name Australia was popularised by the explorer Matthew Flinders, who said it was "more agreeable to the ear, an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the earth". The first time that Australia appears to have been used was in April 1817, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie acknowledged the receipt of Flinders' charts of Australia from Lord Bathurst. In December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office. In 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known by that name; the first official published use of the new name came with the publication in 1830 of The Australia Directory by the Hydrographic Office. Colloquial names for Australia include "Oz" and "the Land Down Under". Other epithets include "the Great Southern Land", "the Lucky Country", "the Sunburnt Country", "the Wide Brown Land".
The latter two both derive from Dorothea Mackellar's 1908 poem "My Country". Human habitation of the Australian continent is estimated to have begun around 65,000 to 70,000 years ago, with the migration of people by land bridges and short sea-crossings from what is now Southeast Asia; these first inhabitants were the ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. Aboriginal Australian culture is one of the oldest continual civilisations on earth. At the time of first European contact, most Indigenous Australians were hunter-gatherers with complex economies and societies. Recent archaeological finds suggest. Indigenous Australians have an oral culture with spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime; the Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. The northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited s
David Brabham
David Brabham is an Australian professional racing driver and one of the most successful and experienced specialists in sports car racing. He has won three international Sports Car series and is one of four Australians to have won the Le Mans 24 Hour sports car race, winning the event in 2009. Brabham won the American Le Mans Series in 2009 and 2010, he competed in Formula One, racing for the Brabham and Simtek teams in 1990 and 1994 respectively. Brabham is the youngest son of three-time Formula One world champion Sir Jack Brabham, brother to Geoff Brabham and Gary Brabham, he is brother-in-law to Mike Thackwell, father to Sam Brabham and uncle to Matthew Brabham. Brabham, born in Wimbledon, spent his childhood in Australia. Despite his father's motor racing fame he took little interest in motor racing until after he left school; as a child he played soccer up until the age of twelve and took up Australian rules football when the family moved to Sydney. Growing up, Sir Jack did not force David into racing, it was only after discovering go-karts at 17, that he became enthusiastic enough to purchase a second-hand go-kart with his next-door neighbour and to begin racing.
Brabham's professional racing career began in Australia in 1983, racing karts for two years, after which he moved into the Ford Laser "one make" series for 1985. In 1986 he switched to Formula Ford 1600 and subsequently to Australian Formula 2, winning the 1987 Australian Drivers' Championship in that category; the 1987 ADC was, unlike previous years, only held as a single race rather than a series of rounds and was run as a support category to the 1987 Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide. After starting 38th on the grid due to carburettor and electrical problems with his Ralt RT30 Volkswagen in qualifying, he caught and passed leader Rohan Onslow on lap 13 of the 15 lap race and went on to a 1.7 second victory. He competed in the New Zealand Formula Atlantic series, the American Formula Atlantic series and in the South American Formula 3 Championship during the 1987 season. A move from Australia to Europe under sponsorship from Camel in 1989 saw him joining the Bowman team and winning the British Formula Three Championship.
Brabham's break into Formula One in 1990 with the Brabham team met with little success. He had raised a considerable amount of sponsorship to join the team bearing his family name but financial constraints hindered the team all season. While David had been hired to drive ahead of the season he requested to skip the first two races to prepare himself, Gregor Foitek taking the seat instead, his brother Gary attempted to qualify for the first two rounds in the ill-fated Life before quitting. His first outing with the team was the 1990 San Marino Grand Prix, his first Formula One start came at the next race in Monaco where his father Jack had won in 1959, his first championship year. In 14 races he only managed to qualify the uncompetitive Judd-engined car six times, including the last race of the year at home in Australia. This, David being unable to raise the reported $3m needed to keep his place in the team, led to him being replaced at the end of the season. Brabham joined the Tom Walkinshaw Racing Jaguar team in 1991 and in that year won the Spa 24 Hours driving a Nissan Skyline R32 GT-R alongside Naoki Hattori and the late Anders Olofsson.
Brabham returned to Formula One in 1994 with the under-funded Simtek team after his father bought shares in the team. The second seat was to be filled by paying drivers, with Roland Ratzenberger taking the first five races before Jean-Marc Gounon took over; the S941 chassis was overweight, used a manual gearbox as opposed to the semi-automatic types used by most teams and inferior wire-spring Cosworth HB customer engines. Despite this Brabham qualified for every round of the series; the team suffered the blow of the death of Roland Ratzenberger during qualifying for the San Marino Grand Prix. Traditionally the other team driver would withdraw in such a situation, but seeing the demoralisation around him, Brabham decided to race on, only to crash out after a suspension failure of his own. In Ratzenberger's memory the team made a collective decision to see out the season, with Brabham's strong leadership cited as a key factor. While the Simtek was uncompetitive he won considerable acclaim for his determination and for improving the speed of the underfunded package handily out-performing his various teammates.
Brabham quit Formula One at the end of that year to begin touring car racing – while he wanted to help Simtek the salary offered by the BMW works team was too good to ignore. 1995 in a BTCC BMW was not a success, but subsequent successes included winning the 1996 JGTC GT500 championship in McLaren F1 GTR, the 1997 AMP Bathurst 1000 in its Super Touring era. Driving a BMW 320i at Bathurst with brother Geoff, the pair were flagged in 2nd but were elevated to the win soon after the finish when their BMW Motorsport Australia teammates Paul Morris and Craig Baird were disqualified, the team making an error at the last pit stop by not doing a driver change and leaving Baird in the car for the run home, not realising that he would exceed his allowed driving time before the race ended, he won the Professional Sports Car Championship in the United States with the Panoz racing team in 1998, the 1999 Petit Le Mans race with Panoz. Brabham joined Sumo Power GT for the 2011 FIA GT1 World Championship, teaming with Jamie Campbell-Walter in a Nissan GT-R.
The duo finished 10th in the driver's championship. He will join the Blanc
Longitudinal engine
In automotive engineering, a longitudinal engine is an internal combustion engine in which the crankshaft is oriented along the long axis of the vehicle, front to back. This type of motor is used for rear-wheel drive cars, except for some Audi and SAAB models equipped with longitudinal engines in front wheel drive. In front-wheel drive cars a transverse engine is used. Trucks have longitudinal engines with rear-wheel drive. For motorcycles, the use of a particular type depends on the drive: in case of a chain or belt drive a transverse engine is used, with shaft drives a longitudinal engine. Longitudinal engines in motorcycles do have one disadvantage: the "tipping point" of the crankshaft tilts along the entire motorcycle to a greater or lesser degree when accelerating; this is resolved by having other components, such as the generator and the gearbox, rotate in the opposite direction to the crankshaft. Most larger, "premium" vehicles use this engine orientation, both front and rear wheel driven, because powerful engines such as the inline-6 and 90° big-bore V8 are too long to fit in a FF transverse engine bay, while most mainstream modern vehicles use front wheel drive along with a transverse engine arrangement.
Cars with longitudinal engines have a smaller minimum turning circle than those with transverse engines. This is because there is more space to the sides of the engine, allowing deeper wheel arches so the front wheels are able to turn through a greater angle; this is a list of typical examples of types of engines which can be placed in motor vehicles: in-line or straight engine — where two, four, five and eight cylinders are placed in a single plane. V engine — where two, six, ten, twelve, or sixteen cylinders are placed in two separate planes, looking like a "V" when viewed from the end of the crankshaft. Flat or boxer engine — where two, six or more cylinders are arranged in two diametrically horizontally opposed planes. W engine — where two vee engines are siamesed together, where at eight, twelve or sixteen cylinders are arranged in four separate planes
Johnny Herbert
John Paul "Johnny" Herbert is a retired British racing driver. He raced in Formula One from 1989 to 2000, for 7 different teams, winning three races and placed 4th in the 1995 championship, he raced sports cars winning the Le Mans 24 Hours in 1991 driving a Mazda 787B. He enjoyed much success in lower-level motor racing. Winning the Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch in 1985, Herbert caught Eddie Jordan's attention, together they won the 1987 British Formula 3 title. Herbert suffered career-threatening injuries in 1988, as a championship hopeful in International Formula 3000 when he was caught up in a major accident at Brands Hatch,when Gregor Foitek hit him from behind, causing Herbert to slam into the wall cockpit-first, sustaining severe ankle and foot injuries after multiple collisions with the barriers; the threat of amputation loomed but it passed after multiple surgeries and months of physiotherapy, though the extent of Herbert's injuries would permanently hinder his mobility, leaving him unable to run and forcing him to change his driving style.
Despite his immobility, Herbert returned to racing at the beginning of 1989 in Formula 1, scoring points on his debut at the Brazilian Grand Prix in Rio de Janeiro driving for the Benetton team managed by his long-time mentor and friend Peter Collins. Herbert finished 4th in Brazil, only 10.5 seconds behind the race winning Ferrari of Nigel Mansell and only 1.1 seconds behind the 3rd placed March-Judd of Maurício Gugelmin and only 2.6 seconds behind the 2nd placed McLaren-Honda of double World Champion Alain Prost. Herbert's teammate, the rated Italian Alessandro Nannini, finished in 6th place, 7.7 seconds behind Herbert. However, Herbert's performances could not keep up to that standard, with the Benetton team under new management he was dropped after failing to qualify for the Canadian Grand Prix and was replaced by McLaren's test driver Emanuele Pirro. Herbert returned to Formula 3000, this time in the regarded Japanese series, it wasn't long before he received another call from this time with Tyrrell.
From 1990 to 2000, Herbert was a fixture in Formula One, switching to the dwindling Lotus team, now managed by Peter Collins. During 1991, he drove two rounds of the Fuji Long Distance Sports Car Series, co-driving a Mazda 787B, finishing fourth both times, his decision, at the July round, to stop his car and aid a fellow competitor, who had suffered a puncture at high speed, would earn him the Sportsman Award at the 1991 Autosport Awards. After 3 years of frustration, Herbert left Lotus in mid-1994, joining Ligier and Benetton for the last few races of the season. Although he failed to score any points in 1994, he was retained as Michael Schumacher's teammate for 1995. At the British Grand Prix, he inherited a Grand Prix win after Damon Hill and Michael Schumacher collided, he followed this in similar circumstances at Monza. After being dropped by Benetton, Herbert drove for Swiss team Sauber in 1996–1998, scoring two podium places. Moving to Stewart Grand Prix in 1999, he was outqualified by his younger teammate Rubens Barrichello but scored his third and final Grand Prix win in the rain-affected European Grand Prix.
Staying at Stewart after the team was purchased by Ford and became Jaguar, Herbert endured another frustrating and pointless season, ending the year being stretchered off at Malaysia after a suspension failure caused him to crash heavily. Since retiring from Formula One racing, Herbert has concentrated on Sports Cars, trying to repeat his Le Mans 24 Hours overall win of 1991. Recent years have seen him as one of the front runners in the American Le Mans Series, where he won several events and was a challenger for the 2003 crown. In 2004, along with Jamie Davies won the Le Mans Series championship at the wheel of an Audi R8 winning the races at Monza and Spa along the way. In 2005, Herbert was appointed to the post of Sporting Relations Manager at Jordan Grand Prix, renamed Midland F1 for the 2006 World Championship. However, in September of that year Spyker Cars bought the team, renamed it Spyker MF1. Another of the new owners' decisions was to not renew Herbert's contract. In 2007, Herbert entered the Le Mans 24 Hours driving for the factory Aston Martin team at the wheel of the Aston Martin DBR9 in the GT1 class.
Herbert, along with Peter Kox and Tomáš Enge drove the 007 numbered car to a 9th placed overall finish and 4th in the GT1 class. In 2008, Herbert won the first season of the Speedcar Series. In 2009, Herbert made his debut in the British Touring Car Championship for Team Dynamics at the wheel of a Honda Civic at round eight of the championship, Silverstone, he qualified 17th for the first race, after moving up the order, finished in 13th. In the second race, he finished inside the points in eighth place, scoring three points. In the final race of the day, a reverse starting grid is operated; the first six, eight, nine or ten cars to finish race two, start race three in reverse order. This is decided by the winner of race two drawing a number between ten out of a hat. For the final race of the day, the top 9 finishers were reversed, meaning Herbert started from second, he was running well, was holding 4th, but was forced to retire on lap 13, after contact with Jason Plato. Herbert went on to compete in the final two rounds of the season.
Herbert runs a charity event called the Johnny Herbert Karting Challenge every year for charities like the halow project, now held at Capital Karts in London. This event invites celebrities and professional ra
Monocoque
Monocoque structural skin, is a structural system where loads are supported through an object's external skin, similar to an egg shell. The word monocoque is a French term for "single shell" or "single hull". First used in boats, a true monocoque carries both tensile and compressive forces within the skin and can be recognised by the absence of a load-carrying internal frame. Few metal aircraft can be regarded as pure monocoques, as they use a metal shell or sheeting reinforced with frames riveted to the skin, but most of the wooden aircraft are described as monocoques though they incorporate frames. By contrast, a semi-monocoque is a hybrid combining a tensile stressed skin and a compressive structure made up of longerons and ribs or frames. Other semi-monocoques, not to be confused with true monocoques, include vehicle unibodies, which tend to be composites, inflatable shells or balloon tanks, both of which are pressure stabilised; the term is misused as a marketing term for structures built up from hollow components.
Early aircraft were constructed using frames of wood or steel tubing, which could be covered with fabric such as Irish linen or cotton. The fabric made a minor structural contribution in tension but none in compression and was there for aerodynamic reasons only. By considering the structure as a whole and not just the sum of its parts, monocoque construction integrated the skin and frame into a single load-bearing shell with significant improvements to strength and weight. To make the shell, thin strips of wood were laminated into a three dimensional shape. One of the earliest examples was the Deperdussin Monocoque racer in 1912, which used a laminated fuselage made up of three layers of glued poplar veneer, which provided both the external skin and the main load-bearing structure; this produced a smoother surface and reduced drag so that it was able to win most of the races it was entered into. This style of construction was further developed in Germany by LFG Roland using the patented Wickelrumpf form licensed by them to Pfalz Flugzeugwerke who used it on several fighter aircraft.
Each half of the fuselage shell was formed over a male mold using two layers of plywood strips with fabric wrapping between them. The early plywood used was prone to damage from delamination. While all-metal aircraft such as the Junkers J 1 had appeared as early as 1915, these were not monocoques but added a metal skin to an underlying framework; the first metal monocoques were built by Claudius Dornier. He had to overcome a number of problems, not least was the quality of aluminium alloys strong enough to use as structural materials, which formed layers instead of presenting a uniform material. After failed attempts with several large flying boats in which a few components were monocoques, he built the Zeppelin-Lindau V1 to test out a monocoque fuselage. Although it crashed, he learned a lot from its construction; the Dornier-Zeppelin D. I was built in 1918 and although too late for operational service during the war was the first all metal monocoque aircraft to enter production. In parallel to Dornier, Zeppelin employed Adolf Rohrbach, who built the Zeppelin-Staaken E-4/20, which when it flew in 1920 became the first multi-engined monocoque airliner, before being destroyed under orders of the Inter-Allied Commission.
At the end of WWI, the Inter-Allied Technical Commission published details of the last Zeppelin-Lindau flying boat showing its monocoque construction. In the UK, Oswald Short built a number of experimental aircraft with metal monocoque fuselages starting with the 1920 Short Silver Streak in an attempt to convince the air ministry of its superiority over wood. Despite advantages, aluminium alloy monocoques would not become common until the mid 1930s as a result of a number of factors, including design conservatism and production setup costs. Short would prove the merits of the construction method with a series of flying boats, whose metal hulls didn't absorb water as the wooden hulls did improving performance. In the United States, Northrop was a major pioneer, introducing techniques used by his own company and Douglas with the Northrop Alpha. In motor racing, the safety of the driver depends on the car body which must meet stringent regulations and only a few cars have been built with monocoque structures.
An aluminum alloy monocoque chassis was first used in the 1962 Lotus 25 Formula 1 race car and McLaren was the first to use carbon-fiber-reinforced polymers to construct the monocoque of the 1981 McLaren MP4/1. In 1992 the McLaren F1 became the first production car with a carbon-fiber monocoque; the term monocoque is misapplied to unibody cars. Commercial car bodies are never true monocoques but instead use the unibody system, which uses box sections and tubes to provide most of the strength of the vehicle, while the skin adds little strength or stiffness; some armoured fighting vehicles use a monocoque structure with a body shell built up from armour plates, rather than attaching them to a frame. This reduces weight for a given amount of armour. Examples include the German TPz Fuchs and RG-33. French industrialist and engineer Georges Roy attempted in the 1920s to improve on the bicycle-inspired motorcycle frames of the day, which lacked rigidity; this limited their handling and therefore performance.
He applied for a patent in 1926, at the 1929 Paris Automotive Show unveiled his new motorcycle, the Art-Deco styled 1930 Majestic. Its new type of monocoque body solved the p
Tom Kristensen,
Guy Smith,
Rinaldo Capello,
Eric van de Poele,
David Brabham
Stéphane Ortelli
Butch Leitzinger