Delta Wing Discussion ONLY

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by the.cosmic.pope

I can't really disagree with what's been said. This is a class for new technology, but the DW doesn't have any new technology, it doesn't even have a new concept.

I thought the vector steering was something no one had done before; hence new technology?

[rantanamo]

never seen so many crybabies. Takes away from the enjoyment of reading the board.

[Adam43]

I don't need it to prove the efficiencies. I don't see it as a great example of a new way. I do see it as different to what we have. It is.

Let's hope people stop banging on about it whether it is the saviour, or not.

[the.cosmic.pope]

Originally Posted by miatanut

I've seen this argument before. If it does nothing new, why were so many people saying it would fall over the first turn, comparing it to Reliant Robin's, etc? If there was nothing new about it, why didn't anybody come up with this in the 1960's or 1970's, before sanctioning bodies got hung up with specifying virtually every detail of the cars? It appears Bowlby's out of the box thinking IS something nobody else came up with before.

I don't see how the lack of new technology and the stability of the car are related?

Why did nobody do it before? Because it's slower. The car has less weight, less drag and operates completely outside the rule book, and it's still slower than the conventional cars. It may be a concept which would work in a spec series, but when it has to race conventional cars it can't match them.

It's hardly a new concept anyway. The whole idea is reduce drag and the frontal area, which exactly what happened in the 60s in F1, with the increasingly tiny chassis. The only difference was F1 teams kept the wheels outboard to give a wider track, lowering the centre of gravity, increasing stability. The DeltaWing brings them inboard.

All it's doing is proving what everybody already knows - that less drag and less weight is a good thing, and utilising this will allow you better fuel efficiency and require less power. It's a fine car for what it is, but it isn't new technology, it doesn't prove anything, and given it is allowed to operate completely outside the rule book, it isn't that impressive in terms of speed either. I don't hate it, and I think it has its place in racing, I just don't think this is it.

[the.cosmic.pope]

Originally Posted by bjohnsonsmith

I thought the vector steering was something no one had done before; hence new technology?

Unless I'm misunderstanding it, Mitsubishi have been using it since the 90s. Source

[miatanut]

Originally Posted by the.cosmic.pope

I don't see how the lack of new technology and the stability of the car are related?

Why did nobody do it before? Because it's slower. The car has less weight, less drag and operates completely outside the rule book, and it's still slower than the conventional cars. It may be a concept which would work in a spec series, but when it has to race conventional cars it can't match them.

It's hardly a new concept anyway. The whole idea is reduce drag and the frontal area, which exactly what happened in the 60s in F1, with the increasingly tiny chassis. The only difference was F1 teams kept the wheels outboard to give a wider track, lowering the centre of gravity, increasing stability. The DeltaWing brings them inboard.

All it's doing is proving what everybody already knows - that less drag and less weight is a good thing, and utilising this will allow you better fuel efficiency and require less power. It's a fine car for what it is, but it isn't new technology, it doesn't prove anything, and given it is allowed to operate completely outside the rule book, it isn't that impressive in terms of speed either. I don't hate it, and I think it has its place in racing, I just don't think this is it.

I guess part of it is what one considers new technology. To me, when open wheelers moved the engine from the front to the rear, that was new technology. It may be the same old piston engine, but making the car work better by moving where it is in the car is new technology. Lowering the CofG to me is new technology. A lot of that involves re-working how to mount things in the car a better way. Lots of little improvements.

Coming up with a triangular car that doesn't fall over in turns was something of a breakthrough. A few months ago a lot of people were arguing "It will never work." The DW team made it work.

What is it slower than? Four of the P2's turned in slower best laps and they had a nearly 50% horsepower advantage. All the GT's had a power advantage.

What 1960's F1 car can out-race this car? The 1966 and onward cars have a little more horsepower, so they should be able to beat it, right? I have little doubt how that race will come out. The late 1960's F1 cars are my all-time favorite racing cars, but they would come out far behind this, even on the same tires.

This is probably the fastest non-winged road racing car ever developed.

If the rule book forces people to design inefficient cars that don't go any faster, or go only a few seconds faster around Le Mans, why does it do that?

That's the question this car was created to ask.

Of course anyone can ask that question. This makes it real for people, which has a lot more impact.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by the.cosmic.pope

Unless I'm misunderstanding it, Mitsubishi have been using it since the 90s. Source

Thanks for the link. That's a very interesting article and according to it Mitsubishi came up with their AYC (Active Yaw Control), which was an active differential, in 1994. It wasn't until 2003 that they came up with their S-AYC which included active breaking.

[dxk1]

Originally Posted by Aysedasi

And?

Well it's supposed to be this new innovative thing and it's running times GT cars ran in 2008.

DK

[Pandamasque]

Originally Posted by miatanut

It appears Bowlby's out of the box thinking IS something nobody else came up with before.

Exactly because it makes no sense! The aerodynamic benefits of a rectangular car and improved weight dist. with more 'mechanical grip' would hugely outweigh the marginally higher weight and drag. I'm sure Bowlby realized that by now as during its development the DW's wide section became prolonged towards the front for aerodynamic reasons.

It throws nearly all the weight and nearly all the downforce way to the rear of the car. A rectangular car couldn't do that.

That is only required for a tricycle-shaped vehicle not to fall over.

There have been some good articles in Racecar Engineering over the years with various designers arguing the spec era hasn't really saved money, as teams pour all their available resources toward finding smaller and smaller increments of time, and at the same time, the current way of thinking generates cars that are all clones, so they can't pass each other, leading to less interesting racing and making racing much less interesting from a technical viewpoint.

I fully agree. But DW is not the cure. If they had to compete with others on a similar unregulated formula they'd come up with something completely different. Perhaps something with 4 covered wheels, one at each corner.

Coming up with a triangular car that doesn't fall over in turns was something of a breakthrough. A few months ago a lot of people were arguing "It will never work." The DW team made it work.

Fair enough. The designer of Robin must be kicking himself for not thinking of extending the wheelbase to 4 meters so that all the weight would be way at the back.

My point is that this concept not only hardly makes any sense for an unrestricted race car, but also transforms the vehicle into something that is not perceived as an automobile anymore, since the concept neither can be transferred to road cars, nor is it properly four-wheeled.

And I'd much rather see another car in a battle for 8th position. Because as it stands right now we'll be missing even more actual racing because in addition to dr. Ulrich's head (with all due respect) taking too much of the air time, there'll be DW tooling around and (not) breaking down.

[Matt]

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

Exactly because it makes no sense! The aerodynamic benefits of a rectangular car and improved weight dist. with more 'mechanical grip' would hugely outweigh the marginally higher weight and drag. I'm sure Bowlby realized that by now as during its development the DW's wide section became prolonged towards the front for aerodynamic reasons.
That is only required for a tricycle-shaped vehicle not to fall over.
I fully agree. But DW is not the cure. If they had to compete with others on a similar unregulated formula they'd come up with something completely different. Perhaps something with 4 covered wheels, one at each corner.

Fair enough. The designer of Robin must be kicking himself for not thinking of extending the wheelbase to 4 meters so that all the weight would be way at the back.

My point is that this concept not only hardly makes any sense for an unrestricted race car, but also transforms the vehicle into something that is not perceived as an automobile anymore, since the concept neither can be transferred to road cars, nor is it properly four-wheeled.

And I'd much rather see another car in a battle for 8th position. Because as it stands right now we'll be missing even more actual racing because in addition to Ulrich's head taking too much of the air time, there'll be DW tooling around and (not) breaking down.

4 unboltable wheels are 4 wheels...

[Pandamasque]

Sure. If you add another front wheel to a tricycle, does it automatically become a car? It does, according to ACO. But not in the real world.

[miatanut]

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

I fully agree. But DW is not the cure. If they had to compete with others on a similar unregulated formula they'd come up with something completely different. Perhaps something with 4 covered wheels, one at each corner.

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

My point is that this concept not only hardly makes any sense for an unrestricted race car, but also transforms the vehicle into something that is not perceived as an automobile anymore, since the concept neither can be transferred to road cars, nor is it properly four-wheeled.

I agree the DW is probably not the ultimate solution to a very efficient, yet very fast racing car. Maybe somebody could do kind of a torpedo-shaped car with ground effect but faired wheels out at each corner and it would be faster. What we need is a class that has strict energy limits, safety requirements, and maximum overall dimensions but otherwise very open regulations and see what the designers do.

Racing could be fun again.

As a thought-provoking concept to encourage debate, the DW has been very successful.

Let's hope it leads to a much less restricted formula where other innovative ideas can emerge to beat it.

[Mt. Lynx]

Q:
Take an LMP2 car - say the Lola B12/80 Coupé - strip off all of its wings, and give it groundeffect instead. How much more efficient would it get in terms of fuel, drag and tyrewear?

[Aysedasi]

Originally Posted by dxk1

Well it's supposed to be this new innovative thing and it's running times GT cars ran in 2008.

DK

Again, and?

What does this mean or prove?

I'm pretty sure there'd be an awful lot of noise here if the DW was posting times at the top of LMP2. Anyhow - we've all seen precious little yet. Let the darned thing race.

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

Sure. If you add another front wheel to a tricycle, does it automatically become a car? It does, according to ACO. But not in the real world.

Says who? You?

I guess it depends on which 'real world' you live in. Whatever that is.......

[Javi]

i just wonder why people is so afraid of the DeltaWing... It won´t collect points, nor win the race from Audi or Toyota, it will be restricted in top speed and laptimes... it is just a technological testbed... And, by the way, thanks to the DW, some spanish newspapers and TV programmes that have never cared a bit about this race have talked about Le Mans again...

[Simmi]

Originally Posted by Javi

i just wonder why people is so afraid of the DeltaWing... It won´t collect points, nor win the race from Audi or Toyota, it will be restricted in top speed and laptimes... it is just a technological testbed... And, by the way, thanks to the DW, some spanish newspapers and TV programmes that have never cared a bit about this race have talked about Le Mans again...

This should have been posted as an auto-response to about 50% of the posts in this thread. So true!

[ArnageWRC]

Originally Posted by Simmi

This should have been posted as an auto-response to about 50% of the posts in this thread. So true!

Isn't that what 'Garage 56' is meant to be about? As well as 'different' technology, etc something to promote a healthy discussion?
I can't make my mind up about the DW, but acknowledge it's right to be there, and that Sportscars as a sport encourages such thinking.

[Simmi]

Originally Posted by ArnageWRC

Isn't that what 'Garage 56' is meant to be about? As well as 'different' technology, etc something to promote a healthy discussion?

Yep. The key being a healthy discussion and that has sometimes been lacking. Back in the day when teams were trying out crazy solutions you would have had exactly the same issues if there had been a place like this to vent them. Just realised we hadn't heard from AGD in a while.

[Victor_RO]

Brief OT:

Originally Posted by Simmi

Just realised we hadn't heard from AGD in a while.

Don't see him on the member list any longer, so I suspect he's on "vacation".

Pretty sure the 3:47s-3:48s on Sunday weren't 100% representative of the car's potential, and they never did more than 7 or 8 laps on a fuel run so far. I'm actually looking forward to the massive PDF full of stats after the race so that we can number-crunch what the car is actually capable of.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by Pandamasque

Sure. If you add another front wheel to a tricycle, does it automatically become a car? It does, according to ACO. But not in the real world.

What is the real world, one that fits your construct?

[Aysedasi]

Originally Posted by Simmi

Just realised we hadn't heard from AGD in a while.

No we haven't.

[the.cosmic.pope]

Originally Posted by miatanut

What is it slower than? Four of the P2's turned in slower best laps and they had a nearly 50% horsepower advantage. All the GT's had a power advantage.

But saying the LMPs had a power advantage is only half the story. The DW has a huge weight and drag advantage. But yet it's still slower.

What 1960's F1 car can out-race this car? The 1966 and onward cars have a little more horsepower, so they should be able to beat it, right? I have little doubt how that race will come out. The late 1960's F1 cars are my all-time favorite racing cars, but they would come out far behind this, even on the same tires.

I didn't say 60s F1 cars were faster - I simply argued that this concept is not new like has been claimed. Of course this car is faster - it has 50 years worth of motor racing development on anything in the 60s. But it isn't new.

If the rule book forces people to design inefficient cars that don't go any faster, or go only a few seconds faster around Le Mans, why does it do that?

But the very fact the cars are "only a few seconds faster" means it isn't inefficient, they are actually more efficient. They are faster. And it isn't just a few seconds off the pace, it's 22 seconds off the pace, despite being allowed to operate 100% outside of the rule book. This car literally has no rules to adhere by, and it's 22 seconds off the pace (and 6 off of P2), using old concepts that everybody already knew is true. At least the Green GT is attempting to introduce a power system which we haven't seen in motor racing yet. Ok that's hellishly ugly too, but it actually has technology motorsport hasn't used yet, and could be a real benefit to the future of the sport.

I believe this sort of concept does have place in motorsports, but this isn't it. My major problem with it is the massive deal that is being made out of it. So you made a thinner car with no wings and it has less drag? Yay? Nissans coverage of it is almost sickening in how terrible it is. The chap on RLM sat there and said this is what Nissan is all about, and they are always developing silly and funny things "like the Juke-R" (You put a big engine in an inappropriate car? Nobody has ever done that before.) And whats worse is Nissan had nothing to do with the development of this car, they've just come in late to the party, slapped a sticker on it, and apparently swapped out the old RML WTCC Chevy engine for one of theirs, and job done. Again, I'm not anti-DW, and I do think it's fine for what it is, but it's not proving anything we didn't already know, it isn't bringing anything to the table, and it isn't going to revolutionise motorsports.

To me, the DeltaWing is like the Danica Patrick of sportscar racing. It's fine for what it is, it'll get the job done, but the media hype and fans around it make it sound like it's the greatest thing to ever grace motorsports.

[Adam43]

This is a great discussion. It is faster than an LMP2. Ah, but it is slower than another. What insight!

All the cars are constrained by the rules. Change the aero, power, tyres, whatever on GT, LMP or garage 56 and they could be faster or slower. If you have problem with garage 56 because of this, then you have a problem with all the grid. The point is that with a very different design (power, weight, aero, track) it can be there or there abouts. Interestingly.

There is no danger of all LM cars looking like this, rest easy. However is does show that the current rules aren't the only way to crack an egg. I'm surprised that those who naturally whinge haven't picked this up to add weight to the view that sportscar racing could be improved in all categories.

It is garage 56, it isn't meant to be the same. Equally the rationale that it isn't new technology doesn't stack up either, it is never going to be completely new technology. Even fuel cell isn't. The ACO wouldn't let it race if there wasn't some background.

[Adam43]

Originally Posted by the.cosmic.pope

To me, the DeltaWing is like the Danica Patrick of sportscar racing. It's fine for what it is, it'll get the job done, but the media hype and fans around it make it sound like it's the greatest thing to ever grace motorsports.

I see little difference in the hype you describe and the anti-hype. Both as bad as each other. Apart from i seem to hear more from the anti! It is one car, not the best or worse thing ever.

[the.cosmic.pope]

Originally Posted by Adam43

It is garage 56, it isn't meant to be the same. Equally the rationale that it isn't new technology doesn't stack up either, it is never going to be completely new technology. Even fuel cell isn't. The ACO wouldn't let it race if there wasn't some background.

Well, despite the claims of many, motor racing doesn't actually introduce much technology to the market. People often claim stuff like disc brakes were first introduced in motor racing, but they were seen elsewhere first. So I was going on the idea of it being 'new to racing' technology, rather than never seen before.

As far as I know, hydrogen fuel cell hasn't been used before in professional motor racing, which makes it new enough. The closest to new technology that the DW brings is the torque vector steering, but Mitsubishi first ran that in WRC in the 90s. This is the first time it's been used in sportscars I think though.

Here's an interesting question, largely based on aesthetics, that I haven't seen asked (or answered) before. Why does it have 2 roll blades? The original IndyCar concept had 1 roll blade, but when that project failed and it moved to sportscars, it suddenly had a second roll blade. I presume that is there only to make it look kinda half like an LMP, but if the point was to look like an LMP, then the second roll blade doesn't do much to undo the rest of the cars unique looks. Given the entire point of the car was to reduce drag, wouldn't it be better just to go back to 1 roll blade, since the second is purely there for aesthetics, and adding drag? I found that a very odd design choice.

Of course with 1 blade they wouldn't have been able to use an existing chassis I suppose, but the choice of the extra blade was made long before it was discovered that the AMR-One was a failure.

I'm surprised that those who naturally whinge haven't picked this up to add weight to the view that sportscar racing could be improved in all categories.

Was "add weight" a pun used on purpose? I found that rather clever.