McLaren MP4-X: a concept car for the future of motor racing. McLaren

This is the MP4-X, a Formula One concept designed by McLaren to showcase some of the advanced tech its Applied Technologies division is working on, and, in some cases, already using in other industries.

As well as boasting a protective canopy, the MP4-X is designed with a morphing chassis that can recover its original shape after an impact, an augmented cockpit visual setup with an HUD more akin to something found in a fighter jet, and vehicle systems operated purely by the driver's brain patterns.


Other features include real-time tyre pressure predictive analysis, to warn of blow-outs before they occur, and driver biotelemetry, where sensors built into the racer's suit transmit live biological information and even inform emergency crews on the wearer's condition at the scene of a crash.

Speaking to WIRED, Jim Newton, market development director, McLaren Applied Technologies (MAT), said: "Clearly all the things we have highlighted on the vehicle are not fully resolved solutions today, but this wasn't the brief -- it was to look beyond into a possible future. However, the truth is that we are already using some of this technology, for example battery packs as structural elements in the bodywork." MAT has also helped Rugby Football Union with instrumentation and data management to monitor players' fitness.

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The idea for the MP4-X concept came about after concerns for driver safety led to some at McLaren, including driver Jenson Button, positing it may be nearing the time to consider a protective canopy on F1 vehicles, as seen on Le Mans cars.

McLaren


"I was one of many drivers who said, 'This is open-cockpit racing, it should stay as open-cockpit racing,' but I think we've had enough now," Button commented. "We've got to get a canopy on the car of some sort, because we can't have these sorts of accidents happening as much as they have over the last few years. It's not the 1970s, we should know better."

The MP4-X concept canopy not only provides safety but better aerodynamics, and is both hydrophobic and photochromatic, as well as adaptive so that in certain conditions it would let the viewing public see inside while in, say, intense sunlight darken to improve the driver's visibility.

Other safety features include a race suit that would include smart fabrics with a mixture of conductive, energy-harvesting and energy-storage fibres, as well as in-built bio-sensors. In the event of an accident, the suit would display areas of impact trauma or injury to assist medical teams with a primary assessment.

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In order to make the car able to protect the driver in multiple impact events, the MP4-X would also use negative-stiffness materials, that "will take an impact and, to some degree, will reform into their original shape," said Newton. "Today the materials do this by using an elastic latticework. But this is one of the things [on the car] that's much further off."


Gallery: McLaren unveils brain-controlled, morphing F1 concept car Gallery Gallery: McLaren unveils brain-controlled, morphing F1 concept car + 28

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McLaren MP4-X: a concept car for the future of motor racing. McLaren

The car is also designed to be able to monitor and interpret brain activity from the driver, which sounds wonderfully like the plane in Firefox that can accept thought commands from its pilot. MAT is calling this feature "cognitive human-machine interface, gesture control and brain synaptic control".

MAT has been working with GlaxoSmithKline on monitoring and understanding neurological diseases such as Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. "Universities and companies are now able to understand brain patterns to an increasingly detailed level and then use this as a guide to understanding how people are thinking and behaving – this is a really interesting area," said Newton.

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Not only could the development of this technology lead to the driver being able to possibly control certain systems using brain patterns, but it might also aid the race team by letting them effectively read the driver's thoughts. "As a tactician and strategist, to know what's on the driver's mind at that time might help you in more tactical thinking, and then help you to optimise how you communicate with the driver. There's a reason that drivers mostly communicate on the straights, they're busy in the corners. So to understand to some degree what the driver was thinking without having to communicate verbally may be a considerable advantage," said Newton.

Other notable technological embellishments include Active Flow Control, an already established aerodynamic concept. Electrodes fitted to the surface of the car's wings would allow aerodynamic grip to be turned on just for cornering, then taken off along the straights. This works by the electrodes being switched on into corners to turn the air around the wings into plasma.

McLaren

"Plasma flow control would require quite a lot of power, but, in the future, we could take power from the engine and divert it to charge the system." said Geoff McGrath, chief innovation officer, MAT. "It's banned in the current F1 regulations -- but it's great for achieving high top speeds, particularly at circuits like Monza, where you want to shed all the downforce along the straights and then turn it back on again for the corners."

Other specifications for the MP4-X include ultra lightweight solar panels to work in conjunction with traditional regenerative systems to be used for on-board systems or a as a speed boost; a head-mounted augmented vision system to give the driver a 360-degree view of their surroundings allowing them to see through the walls of the track or behind the car; adaptive aerodynamic structures made from shape-memory alloys that change shape as an electrical current is passed through them; visual gesture control systems and holographic instrument panels; and finally a totally digital marketing skin, banishing traditional stickers in favour of a digital billboard where marketing logos are downloaded onto the car's surface. "Yes, there are things on this car that are pretty far out there," said Newton. "But things like the tyre de-lamination and biotelemetry are arguably more realistic in the near term. The most difficult is the cognitive aspects, the gestural work -- this is much further away, for sure."


McLaren

As a consequence, the most exciting tech on the MP4-X for Newton is not the ability to see through walls or holographic controls, but that predictive tyre de-lamination system. "It is an exemplar of the application of real-time analytics to aid decision making in the moment. An example of the sorts of things we are doing in oil and gas drilling, where we are providing real-time predictive analytics to real-time drilling in the North Sea [Ekofisk fields]." "Both of these activities involve the real-time sensing and generation of usable insight using predictive analytics to drive optimal decision making - this is very exciting as a concept in general," Newton said. "The other MP4-X feature that gets me excited is the tremendous advancements we are making in motor sport around battery technology," Newton said. "The power densities were are able to achieve are genuinely world leading -- in any industry. We are already seeing opportunities to apply these battery and hybrid technologies in diverse industries such as aerospace, and significantly change how those industries operate."

And if all this sounds like an impressive glimpse into a possible future of F1, it might be worth pondering on what tech McLaren has left off the table when designing its concept car. "There are certainly technologies we haven't used on the MP4-X, ones that are just too exciting to share," Newton said.