[WEC] LMP Future Regulations (was Le Mans EVO rules - now hypercar rules)

[JAG]

Originally Posted by SimonXS

My point exactly.

I find it massively unfair that Diesels are dominating with Forced Induction, yet there are no options to build a decent version in petrol. 2.0ltrs is not enough as Aston Martin are finding out right now, struggling to produce 400bhp.

I think 2.5 would be ideal for petrol, would be ideal for a V6. Nissan with their current knowledge with the 350Z/Skyline would be ideal to develop such and engine.

With similar restrictors the AER 2.0T was putting out over 550bhp almost a decade back, the Aston was run in a conservative mode to protect the engine. When fully developed a 2.0T straight six has the potential to be the most powerful petrol engine.

Much of this equivallence discussion is flawed, comparisons are being made with grandfathered, underdeveloped or underfunded chassis and engines. HPD's P1 was even a compromise, a development platform for the Wirth coupe, but the chassis and engine at least were developed by a factory in P2 form, before being adapted to P1.

The question is not do diesels have a performance advantage, it's how large it is, and how much is down to the engine.

From my non-technical point of view, based on car specs, and previous years performances, I don't have a shadow of a doubt a customer P1 like the HPD is capable of doing 3.30-3.32, that's potentially six seconds quicker than anyone went at the test day. If the diesels go quicker still, deal with them, but the ACO can't be giving huge performance breaks to petrol cars just because they didn't show their potential at a test, that's before factoring in what a factory could achieve.

[littleman]

Why do you fail to see why "modern electonics" will fail to bring improvements?

How fast and what memory did your PC have 10 years ago? What's it got today?

[Victor_RO]

Originally Posted by littleman

Why do you fail to see why "modern electonics" will fail to bring improvements?

How fast and what memory did your PC have 10 years ago? What's it got today?

There's only so much you can do with electronics before you run into the buffers of thermodynamics.

[littleman]

Also, what's really unfair is where does a well healed LMP1 privateer team lay its hands on a racing diesel engine? Oh - they can't!

So not only are Pescarolo,Rebellion,Oak etc forced to use petrol engines they have to run them at a disadvantage to. Why does anyone bother!

[Victor_RO]

Originally Posted by littleman

Also, what's really unfair is where does a well healed LMP1 privateer team lay its hands on a racing diesel engine? Oh - they can't!

Oreca had a deal with Peugeot for a diesel engine in the Oreca 02 before that project was shelved for unknown reasons.

[JAG]

Just noticed the F1 second practice results from Barcelona, there's a seven second gap between first and last, even mid-table teams are two to three seconds down.

This is a circuit half the length of Le Mans, with all teams using the same spec engines, and 2011 chassis.

[Pandamasque]

Originally Posted by JAG

Just noticed the F1 second practice results from Barcelona, there's a seven second gap between first and last, even mid-table teams are two to three seconds down.

This is a circuit half the length of Le Mans, with all teams using the same spec engines, and 2011 chassis.

Exactly. They are racing under the same set of rules, so can only blame themselves. Le Mans teams are not. In 2006-2011 the overall victories at Le Mans 24h were given to diesel cars by ACO.
The funny thing is that the diesel technology hasn't even proved to be superior. They just utilized the immense advantage given to them so that they do their marketing routine.

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by Victor_RO

There's only so much you can do with electronics before you run into the buffers of thermodynamics.

Indeed. A few billion transistors will not change the fact that 14.7 kg of air is needed to burn 1 kg of petrol fuel (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air-fuel_ratio) and that the air mass going into the engine is limited with a restrictor.

Maybe another example: Moore's Law has not changed the boiling point of water

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by arakis

A turbocharged 3.5L petrol engine would blow any turbocharged 3.5L diesel out of the water with bouth hp and torque figures, provided they have the same restrictors!!!

Here we go again... I have lost the count of how many time people have come with this argument.

Diesel engine need more air than petrol engine to produce the same power

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by SimonXS

I find it massively unfair that Diesels are dominating with Forced Induction, yet there are no options to build a decent version in petrol. 2.0ltrs is not enough as Aston Martin are finding out right now, struggling to produce 400bhp.

The inability of Aston Martin produce decent power has nothing to do with the engine rules.

JAG already gave the example of the AER engines.

The Lehmann turbo engine produces 520 bhp according to http://www.oreca-racing.com/racing-c...facturer/lmp1/. That is without the temporal boost of the Flybrid KERS.

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

The funny thing is that the diesel technology hasn't even proved to be superior. They just utilized the immense advantage given to them so that they do their marketing routine.

For the same power output diesel engines produce more torque at low revs (extremely flat torque curve) and they have a better fuel economy

[JAG]

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

Exactly. They are racing under the same set of rules, so can only blame themselves. Le Mans teams are not. In 2006-2011 the overall victories at Le Mans 24h were given to diesel cars by ACO.
The funny thing is that the diesel technology hasn't even proved to be superior. They just utilized the immense advantage given to them so that they do their marketing routine.

The likes of Audi will be at the front of the grid whatever technology they run, today it's diesels, in the future it will be hybrids, in the past it was FSI and quick change rear ends.

I'm hoping to see petrol privateers do themselves justice, like Highcroft at Sebring, it's no suprise they were running tried and tested, factory developed, technology. A couple of teams aside, it will be 2012 before much of the grid have equipment designed to take full advantage of the regs, in addition to the required testing.

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by gwyllion

Okay, I focussed too much on the minor restrictor increase, which is good for only 1 sec a lap. It seems that the biggest performance balance change is the difference in fuel flow restrictor:
So petrol cars get an improvement in average lap time of in total 3 seconds.

http://endurance-info.com/version2/a...ance-7230.html has an interview with Henri Pescarolo. He calculated the performance adjustments will slow down the diesels 0.8 seconds and make the petrols 1.8 seconds faster.

Of course he points out that this will not put the petrol cars within 2% of the diesels, because he claims that the gap was 10 sec before the performance adjustment. Remember that Duncan Dayton predicted a gap of 6 sec for their car (see http://trussers.blogspot.com/2011/04...all-in-to.html).

He also regrets that the ACO decided to make the slowest cars (i.e., petrols) faster, instead of slowing down the fastest cars (i.e., diesels).

The same article says that Oak Racing will chose the combination -10 kg weight reduction/2% restrictor increase, because the 3% restrictor increase might cause reliability issues.

[JAG]

Pescarolo and co. go into such detail yet ignore the obvious, 3.36 is not a representative petrol time, neither is 3.30 a lap time limit, it's the average over a stint.

What a shame Highcroft won't be there to give a representative benchmark.

[Deleted]

You really feel the need to mention Highcroft and their relative performance on every post you make?

[Pandamasque]

Originally Posted by JAG

The likes of Audi will be at the front of the grid whatever technology they run, today it's diesels, in the future it will be hybrids, in the past it was FSI and quick change rear ends.

Good for them. But why award them the prises without even testing that statement?

Originally Posted by gwyllion

For the same power output diesel engines produce more torque at low revs (extremely flat torque curve) and they have a better fuel economy

Wonderful. Why not impose equal energy limit per race distance (like group C with all kinds of fuels) and have them all go at it with more or less free drivetrain rules. Also the cars should be light enough to make hybrid cars, or ones with very big engines stay above minimum weight. Then a 10 second/lap advantage would actually be something to admire.

Originally Posted by JAG

Pescarolo and co. go into such detail yet ignore the obvious, 3.36 is not a representative petrol time, neither is 3.30 a lap time limit, it's the average over a stint.

I may as well say that the diesels were sandbagging at 3:26!!! Add to that the superior performance in traffic.

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

Wonderful. Why not impose equal energy limit per race distance (like group C with all kinds of fuels) and have them all go at it with more or less free drivetrain rules. Also the cars should be light enough to make hybrid cars, or ones with very big engines stay above minimum weight. Then a 10 second/lap advantage would actually be something to admire.

That is exactly what the ACO has in mind for 2014

• Weight of the car: only one minimum weight. This weight can be obtained with a car using a gasoline engine and without energy recovery system. Minimum weight proposed: 775 kg. General agreement for 775kg.
Could be reduced in relationship with evolutions of technologies.
• Power: limited by a maximum instantaneous amount of energy that can be used. The control will be made with a mandatory common box that will drive the injectors.
Precision and application of such equipment raised as being very challenging.
Other proposal: control could be achieved by allocation of fuel quantity. Such quantity for race refueling being directly linked to the amount of laps done and policed by ACO.

see: http://www.mulsannescorner.com/newsjuly10.html

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by Chiana

You really feel the need to mention Highcroft and their relative performance on every post you make?

Because that car is the benchmark for the petrol cars
Best chassis, best aero and best engine of all petrol powered LMP1s.

[littleman]

This helps explain my comments regarding petrol engines using modern electronics and lightweight materials.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars...nt-than-diesel

[CTD]

Originally Posted by littleman

I've heard rumours that Peugeot are going to switch to petrol engines in the near future - I bet the ACO make damn sure the petrol rules work then!

Originally Posted by Victor_RO

Oreca had a deal with Peugeot for a diesel engine in the Oreca 02 before that project was shelved for unknown reasons.

No.
The deal was a Peugeot petrol engine.
This never happened other than maybe some computer designs, on both sides of the project.

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by littleman

This helps explain my comments regarding petrol engines using modern electronics and lightweight materials.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars...nt-than-diesel

That article does not contain many specifics regarding the "improvement in electronics and materials"

Which materials do you mean? The current LMP engines already make extensive use of aluminium (e.g., block, head) and titanium (e.g., con rods).

BTW the article you refer to lists direct fuel injection and turbochargers as important technologies to improve thermodynamic efficiency of petrol engines. In your original post you were talking about high revving normally aspirated F1 engines and I immediately suggested that a turbocharged direct injection petrol engine is the way to go

[Joe Taylor]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the onset of knock the major issue with petrol engines? This can only be improved via more knock-resistant fuel mixtures. You can reduce knock electronically, but this involves changing the ignition timing, which invariably reduces the power. Obviously incremental developments on other areas to reduce losses will occur all the time, but these are equally applicable to diesel engines.

Of course this is all completely irrelevant to the sportscar debate, which is entirely related to restrictors and the torque properties of each engine.

[gwyllion]

The article also mentions "lean-burn combustion and homogeneous charge compression ignition (HCCI)". Those technologies help reduce emissions and fuel consumption.

I don't know if they are usefull in Le Mans where around 80% of the lap is full throttle.

[littleman]

The ACO would do everyone a favour if they split LMP1 into 2 classes,namely P1D and P1P.

This would allow the petrol cars to race for a recognised class victory which the PR boys at Honda,Toyota,Nissan etc,etc could put to excellent commercial use.What you can't do is allow the diesel cars to humiliate their petrol opposition in public because manufacturers don't like that.

Let Audi and Peugeot continue to share Le Mans victory between them but let it be known that there is nobody else in their class and its a diesel defeating a diesel.

Alot more manufacturers would probably enter sports car racing on that basis.

[MitchZ06]

LMP Diesel, LMP Petrol, LMP2 is how it should be broken up but that'd make it 5 classes (LMPD, LMPP, LMP2, GTE-Pro, GTE-Am) at LM and 6 when the LMPC/FLM cars are included.