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

[wolfhound]

Originally Posted by Chiana

Unless the new LMP1/GTP rules are centered around constant performance balancing (which would be absolutely horrendous), I cannot see Aston Martin doing any good in top category even if they managed to get moderately bigger budget. Because they would need astronomically more funds than even for their Lola-borrowed campaigns. Will they free up that much money for Prodrive even with increased sales?

This is the company I have the least faith in when it comes to possibly lobbying new prototype rules. Even McLaren demanding road car styles, or Peugeot wanting economy cost caps is less worrying because at least they'd probably want to have more engineering in it, not just BoP mixed in with cheapness

Unless their link with Red Bull results in Mr A. Newey designing the car.

[Deleted]

Originally Posted by wolfhound

Unless their link with Red Bull results in Mr A. Newey designing the car.

I forgot that rebadging deal even existed

But mr. Newey's one month salary is probably bigger than all of Aston Martin Racing's campaign budgets for the entire year

[hondafan37]

Wow I see a lot of hatred to Aston Martin here!!!
you do not forget that Aston gave us the last LMP1 with iconic sound.
The V12 was fantastic. Many people in this forum are crossing their fingers for the return of Judd V10 next year and this V12 was even better.
I personally have the feeling that the victory of Mazda with that iconic rotary generated more passion than all the 13 victories of Audi many times with engines without soul.
The Valkyrie have a V12 engine and this moves my heart for a future GTP-LMP1.

[Deleted]

The engine in the Lola was amazing - and I did love DBR9 (except for 2006 ALMS) - but I haven't liked anything they've done since

[MaskedRacer]

Originally Posted by hondafan37

Wow I see a lot of hatred to Aston Martin here!!!
you do not forget that Aston gave us the last LMP1 with iconic sound.
The V12 was fantastic. Many people in this forum are crossing their fingers for the return of Judd V10 next year and this V12 was even better.
I personally have the feeling that the victory of Mazda with that iconic rotary generated more passion than all the 13 victories of Audi many times with engines without soul.
The Valkyrie have a V12 engine and this moves my heart for a future GTP-LMP1.

Well put it this way. I enjoy the Porsche 911 RSR, Corvette C7R, and Ford GT much much more than the Aston.

Would help if the Aston can get that sound back to be like the one their Lola LMP1 coupe was.

[MaskedRacer]

As far as 2020-21 LMP1 regs go. I think the Corvette DP is a great example of what the cars should end up looking like. Loved that car. Too bad no other makes could do something like it. Ford tried it but it was horrific. But yeah good past examples to go by would be the Mercedes CLK/SLR (non flipable), and Porsche GT1.

[Coach Ep]

très simple:

[TF110]

That R8C is closer than the R18, but you take the Audi logo off of either car and you won't know who makes it. That's why at least with this car you know it's a Mercedes because the headlight assembly, grille and the color for instance (color is tough because lots of companies use the same color, like red)

[Sodemo]

Such a beautiful car that Merc. The early Audi above isn't bad either.

[Coach Ep]

Originally Posted by TF110

That R8C is closer than the R18, but you take the Audi logo off of either car and you won't know who makes it. That's why at least with this car you know it's a Mercedes because the headlight assembly, grille and the color for instance (color is tough because lots of companies use the same color, like red)

That's why it's called 'styling clues', most of the late 90s LMGTPs couldn't be recognized if you take the badges and such off of them. It's just that the general shape and designs of those cars were more esthetically pleasing to most folks (me included) than nowadays prototypes.

[Adam43]

Originally Posted by Sodemo

Such a beautiful car that Merc. The early Audi above isn't bad either.

Impressive. However I’ve never thought it beautiful, the squashed look and proportions never did it for me. Not against it, variety and interest, is all.

I don’t care that theyhave to look like road cars. Especially if it is forced like the Merc grill. However I like variety and the general direction this might push the cars.

[Akrapovic]

To be honest, as beautiful as the GT1 hyper car regulations were, they weren't exactly good for the top class of the spot were they? It only lasted a couple of years before it all imploded at a rate that makes the Hybrid decline look like snails pace. We're going to see a handful of extreme hypercars built for Le Mans, and then it'll all die a death when costs get ridiculously out of hand because it's absolutely impossible to police road car development costs. And then there's the question of how do you integrate hybrids. So I'm not overly convinced that going down this route is going to be any good for the class.

The other problem is with customer cars and private teams. We've FINALLY gotten LMP1 privateers back, and we're then looking at a route that will absolutely depend on manufacturers selling cars to customers. Ford won't even sell the GTE car to customers, and we want them to start considering more expensive ones?

Other than aesthetics, I'm not seeing the advantage of this. And if we just want to make the cars look better, then that can be achieved by redoing the regulations from the ground up. One of the reasons the current cars are not the prettiest (I like them, but I appreciate others don't), is that they've just been making amendments to old regulations to achieve things. Ground up, you can achieve the same safety improvements with better solutions.

I know the cars would look absolutely gorgeous (potentially), but I don't see the GT1 hyper car class as good for the health of the series, or technological demonstrations.

[TF110]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Impressive. However I’ve never thought it beautiful, the squashed look and proportions never did it for me. Not against it, variety and interest, is all.

I don’t care that theyhave to look like road cars. Especially if it is forced like the Merc grill. However I like variety and the general direction this might push the cars.

I actually think that squished look is cool. It looks a little bit funny but it gives it that super low race car/prototype feel imo. The headlights may be a bit too low?

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by TF110

I actually think that squished look is cool. It looks a little bit funny but it gives it that super low race car/prototype feel imo. The headlights may be a bit too low?

I love the CLR as well. I liked the CLK too. The CLK GTR was nice. The CLK LM didn't sit quite as nicely, but it was still nice.

[Adam43]

Which is all cool. Different views. Love it.

[chernaudi]

How the ACO plan on enforcing EOT/BOP between LMP1 privateer and Toyota:

http://www.dailysportscar.com/2017/1...-outlined.html

[chernaudi]

Of note is that both the LMP1 EOT and LMP2 performance regs are set up similarly. Both are based off of data that the ACO can access, both aren't normal BOP in that once it's set, it won't change every race, and both have a 5 minute "sandbagging" penalty.

[hondafan37]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

To be honest, as beautiful as the GT1 hyper car regulations were, they weren't exactly good for the top class of the spot were they? It only lasted a couple of years before it all imploded at a rate that makes the Hybrid decline look like snails pace. We're going to see a handful of extreme hypercars built for Le Mans, and then it'll all die a death when costs get ridiculously out of hand because it's absolutely impossible to police road car development costs. And then there's the question of how do you integrate hybrids. So I'm not overly convinced that going down this route is going to be any good for the class.

The other problem is with customer cars and private teams. We've FINALLY gotten LMP1 privateers back, and we're then looking at a route that will absolutely depend on manufacturers selling cars to customers. Ford won't even sell the GTE car to customers, and we want them to start considering more expensive ones?

Other than aesthetics, I'm not seeing the advantage of this. And if we just want to make the cars look better, then that can be achieved by redoing the regulations from the ground up. One of the reasons the current cars are not the prettiest (I like them, but I appreciate others don't), is that they've just been making amendments to old regulations to achieve things. Ground up, you can achieve the same safety improvements with better solutions.

I know the cars would look absolutely gorgeous (potentially), but I don't see the GT1 hyper car class as good for the health of the series, or technological demonstrations.

Did you take the trouble to read what is the ACO idea of the new GTproto-GT1 rules? or only did you read the headlines?
The cars are going to be prototypes with a GT styled, but they will be prototypes and will not require any street homologation.
Obviously this rules opens the game for a brand to participate with a hypercar but this is not necessary.
Therefore you will have the same cost problem as now.
For the private teams surely will be Ginetta, Dallara or Oreca like now, but looking closer to a GT.

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by hondafan37

Did you take the trouble to read what is the ACO idea of the new GTproto-GT1 rules? or only did you read the headlines?
The cars are going to be prototypes with a GT styled, but they will be prototypes and will not require any street homologation.
Obviously this rules opens the game for a brand to participate with a hypercar but this is not necessary.
Therefore you will have the same cost problem as now.
For the private teams surely will be Ginetta, Dallara or Oreca like now, but looking closer to a GT.

I did read it. Read several variations of it too. However the big push for this is from a few manufacturers. Manufacturers who all, without exception, have dumped projects at record speed when things didn't go 100% the way they liked. Whether or not you use road cars as the base or just pretty them up to make them look like road cars, it's pandering to manufacturers, which historically has gone extremely badly without the privateer backup.

Meanwhile, private builders, who have no road car links, are finally back in LMP1 ranks. And we're going to take them down a route that's manufacturer specific, only a couple of seasons after they develop new cars? So if that's how we go for 20/21, then you can guarantee no additional entries for 19/20 as nobody is buying a car that's out of date before you even get it. And those 2 year old cars

Not sure how that seems like good business. Unless you're looking for very short term gain at the expense of long term stability - which is what the ACO is extremely good at.

[TF110]

Unless they force the manufacturers to make customer cars available for sale or something, the only inclusion of the private teams I see would be to keep their lmp1's eligible. Perhaps grandfathered in?

[hondafan37]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

I did read it. Read several variations of it too. However the big push for this is from a few manufacturers. Manufacturers who all, without exception, have dumped projects at record speed when things didn't go 100% the way they liked. Whether or not you use road cars as the base or just pretty them up to make them look like road cars, it's pandering to manufacturers, which historically has gone extremely badly without the privateer backup.

Meanwhile, private builders, who have no road car links, are finally back in LMP1 ranks. And we're going to take them down a route that's manufacturer specific, only a couple of seasons after they develop new cars? So if that's how we go for 20/21, then you can guarantee no additional entries for 19/20 as nobody is buying a car that's out of date before you even get it. And those 2 year old cars

Not sure how that seems like good business. Unless you're looking for very short term gain at the expense of long term stability - which is what the ACO is extremely good at.

Originally Posted by TF110

Unless they force the manufacturers to make customer cars available for sale or something, the only inclusion of the private teams I see would be to keep their lmp1's eligible. Perhaps grandfathered in?

According to DSC the Privateers LMP1 non-hybrid cars have been promised a stable rulebook for the next four seasons.

http://www.dailysportscar.com/2017/1...-unpicked.html

[chernaudi]

That's true, but we do have to consider that the ACO have also just said that the reserve some right to change EOT/BOP to attempt to equalize things between factory teams (only Toyota at this stage) and privateers.

How I see that happening, we'll probably have to wait and see. We've seen in the past, be it hybrids, diesel engines, or even going back to LMP900 and late '90s GT1/LMGTP, it's extremely hard to overcome a factory team's resources and investment. Not impossible, but usually extremely difficult as to be improbable.

At the same time, though, the LMP1 privateers have been granted several theoretical advantages now. Essentially they have no limits on wind tunnel time. They've got a ton more fuel flow than Toyota to try and make up for any power short falls, and if the sums add up, at least the sprint races could be interesting.

But again, that's also just as big a guess as saying that Toyota should run away with every race. At least we have the WEC Prologue to look at.

Another issue, especially for events like LM or Sebring, is the durability of the privateer cars. Granted, Toyota have been hit or miss at times with that issue themselves, and they've never been to Sebring (though the latter race is over a year away)but by next year hopefully the bugs will be worked out. But the ACO are trying to get privateer teams to goad IMSA GTP sprint race or qualifying power out of their new engines. I doubt that atmo engines like the Judd or Gibson can make that reliably, and even the turbo engines can't without tons of boost.

Needless to say, next year does stand to be interesting, one way or another. And in terms of entries, it's already a ton better than a lot of us were thinking a few months ago.

[AoB Special Stage]

Originally Posted by hondafan37

you do not forget that Aston gave us the last LMP1 with iconic sound.
The V12 was fantastic.

The problem was you heard the engine before you saw the car before after all the other P1s had already passed you by.

___________________________________

Again, how do they intend to enforce these styling cues? Because it will take Honda five minutes to have the 'styling language' of a V10 F1 car on their chassis if you let them.

[trickyd]

I think the thing to do would be to have two separate classes, rather than trying to make prototypes look like road cars with some weird facia. You could have a GTP class for cars based on a production car of a certain minimum production amount, say 100 or 250 or whatever's appropriate. Then, if they wanted to, McLaren/Porsche/Mercedes/Aston Martin/Ferrari can race a car based on their hybrid hypercar. They could be allowed to make it longer and wider up to a limit, add a wing/diffuser and some cooling/aero ducts and cutaways. But also you'd need to keep LMP1 for the specialist race car manufacturers (and also I suppose works teams who don't have a hypercar to base anything on) and private entrants. The rules would just be the same as they are now with maybe a lower minimum weight and I'd allow open cockpits but that's only because I prefer them! In an ideal world these two classes would then mix it at the front in a similar way that you had the Joest Porsche and Courage's mixing it with the works GT1 cars in the mid to late 90's. Then at least when the manufacturers take their toys away after a year or two you'd have a top class left.

My beef with trying to make LMP's look like road cars is that a) I don't think they look good and b) only very few manufacturers have a recognisable 'face'. For example, what does a Toyota look like, or a Nissan (or a Renault/Peugeot/Citroen/Ford)? They usually just look pretty practical and workaday. Also what does a McLaren looks like, or a Ferrari? A McLaren looks like whatever the wind tunnel says it has to look like. Likewise a Ferrari, the only thing that gives it away being the red paint job and the yellow badge. I would say only Mercedes, BMW, Porsche, Alfa Romeo and maybe Maserati have a recognisable grill or lights set up that could be glued on to the front of a racing car so that people could say 'that's a Merc/Porsche/Beemer'. And considering Fiat Group seems to have absolutely no interest in endurance sportscar racing that's a very small pool to work a set of rules around.

[TRuss]

Styling is a moving target. There are always changes in trends and various external influences on each generation of automobiles. The brands or particular models with heritage will always strive to make a stylistic connection to that heritage with their newest models. Of course the evolution of the automobile makes that really kind of impossible. Nevertheless a Corvette is still obviously a Corvette, a 911 is still a 911 and a bread and butter Ferrari is still a bread and butter Ferrari. Put at 488 next to a 308 and they're similar enough. The Ford's, Honda's and Renault's always strive for a family resemblance with each new line up. They may have no connection to the past, but at least the current generation is from the same family. How would this translate into a race car?Who knows? Hopefully it would be more obvious than the DPi cars. I also think that we shouldn't concern ourselves about "GTP" too much, seeing as that none of this has been confirmed. Or, maybe I just missed it. I don't know.