IMSA DPi Discussion

[kvenom]

The whole marketing thing is nonsense anyways. I have two Mazda and live 20mins away from Mazda headquarters. Not a single peep about the program, from dealers, from advertising etc. The only time I’ve seen the program mentioned is in the official Mazda magazine and that talked about the Kodo design. No one would bat an eye if they used a different engine, probably because there is nothing “Mazda” about the AER engine they currently use. Mazda are much more into grassroots racing with the miata than with prototypes

[chernaudi]

I'd bet that the only genuine Mazda part on that engine is the Mazda decals on the intake plenum. They'd maybe actually be better off going back to the stock block route. The original Mazda-AER engine had good reliability and power. But I think they're pushing things too far with the current engine.

But in reality, what reasonable alternatives do the have in the short term? They hopefully will have decent reliability in the sprint races, but I doubt they'll be championship contenders.

They can maybe badge the Gibson V8 as a Mazda (like OAK did with the Judd V8 about a decade ago), or they can maybe take their V6 and make a twin turbo version of it, but that'll take time and the rebadge of the Gibson engine would probably require IMSA approval.

Fact seems to be that in a world a fairly big forced induction V6s and fairly big V8s, the Mazda is a minnow. Yes, Toyota and Porsche took four bangers and turbocharged the hell out of them, but Toyota sunk millions of dollars and hundreds if not thousands of man-hours into that engine, and so did Porsche, with the added benefit of hybrid power boosting.

But Mazda is unable or unwilling to put that much effort or costs into an in-house program. If things were in-house, they'd at least have a bigger say over quality control.

[canaglia]

Thinking better, mazda dpi engine is ALREADY a mazda rebadged engine.... so rebadge gibson lmp2 motor should not be different from badge an AER engine....

unlikely nissan/GM/HPD would complain....

[Kimi7]

Originally Posted by TF110

Imo, the Riley Mazda won't win anything this year. The car is not reliable, and that's that. The engine needs to be on it's way out. You can't keep going on and on with something that has continually failed for nearly the past decade. It's long time Mazda put up something for a new one or they'll continue to look at the rear of the other dpi's and p2's. The car has improved it's pace, but it's not enough. Otoh, the Penske Oreca Acura will get better and better this season and seeing how it's already on pace I think it will be a title favorite. Sebring should be a very good race.

They managed to get some podiums last year with a most unimpressive lineup of drivers. I dont expect them to contend for a championship but maybe will get a win this year. I think its becoming more and more clear the mediocrity of their past driver lineups though... not a good look for guys like nunez being so far off the pace of their new teamates.

fastest race laps from the 24...
The reality is that the Mazda driver line-up has never been great. Look at the first race in with

77 Oliver Jarvis 1:38.175 187 198
77 Rene Rast 1:38.356 24 172
55 Harry Tincknell 1:38.107 132 156
55 Jonathan Bomarito 1:38.358 157 199
55 Spencer Pigot 1:38.531 46 186
77 Tristan Nunez 1:39.296 6 160

new mazda drivers 1-2-3

Even after cutting Long and Miller, who I didnt realize was so far off the pace until seeing how uncomeptitive he was to Pato this weekend in the Oreca, yikes.

Fastest race laps for the 38, and Miller did over 140 laps
38 Pato O'Ward 1:38.539
38 James French 1:39.199
38 Kyle Masson 1:39.404
38 Joel Miller 1:40.289

[Rcz]

The Toyota GTP had a inline 4 engine, in the 90s, with around 700 hourspower. It can be done.

Maybe Joest/Mazda should look at an Super GT/Class one engine.

[Damian Baldi]

Originally Posted by Rcz

The Toyota GTP had a inline 4 engine, in the 90s, with around 700 hourspower. It can be done.

Maybe Joest/Mazda should look at an Super GT/Class one engine.

I agree with that, but they can't change the engine now, they must wait until next year. That's what I was trying to say some posts ago. Joest should have ask to change the engine when they joined Mazda.

[TF110]

Mazda does have a little partnership with Toyota coming up. Maybe they can ask for some help? I think they'll continue with the current AER for the foreseeable future because it's something they know and it's probably inexpensive.

[Turbodcc]

Originally Posted by TF110

Mazda does have a little partnership with Toyota coming up. Maybe they can ask for some help? I think they'll continue with the current AER for the foreseeable future because it's something they know and it's probably inexpensive.

I think you've hit it on the head right there. Inexpensive. And to be fair, looking at old lola installation images, the structural work around that I4 looks not much better than last year when Riley did it and certainly not as good as the lola days. Saw an image of the 55 in garage at some stage through the race with a radiator being changed, clearly the cooling is not resolved like they thought.

On a positive note the BOP looked good for the prototypes... for the time they were all on the grid together!

[kvenom]

Lots of stuff still to fix, apparently Joest said the tires weren’t working at roar, exhaust problems caused the #55 to catch fire and the #77 had electrical problems along with exhaust fire fears. Juttner is not going to get much sleep.

[Maelochs]

Joest most have been hurting bad for cash, or Mazda must be paying a lot of it.

It's hard for me to conceive of how Multimatic/Riley. Speedsource, Mazda, and Joest have combined all their experience, titles, race wins ... and produced unquestionably the worst prototype north American racing has seen this century----season after season. And I have been trying to be a fan.

[WolfsburgRS]

It reminds me a lot of the Ford GTP programs. Lots of promise, but not much in results. The Zakspeed built and tuned engines basically blew up constantly and rather than refine, repair, or figure out what should be changed to make them reliable, they just kept everything the same and kept blowing things up until Ford was sick of wasting the money.

[joeb]

I had to chuckle a little bit at this article

https://www.motorsport.com/imsa/news...owing-1000648/

Mazda is upbeat despite disastrous Daytona performance.

So we shouldn't be concerned I guess, they aren't.

[WolfsburgRS]

Originally Posted by joeb

I had to chuckle a little bit at this article

https://www.motorsport.com/imsa/news...owing-1000648/

Mazda is upbeat despite disastrous Daytona performance.

So we shouldn't be concerned I guess, they aren't.

[FormulaFox]

Originally Posted by joeb

I had to chuckle a little bit at this article

https://www.motorsport.com/imsa/news...owing-1000648/

Mazda is upbeat despite disastrous Daytona performance.

So we shouldn't be concerned I guess, they aren't.

They're not wrong. Like I've been saying, while they still clearly have issues to sort out with reliability they've quite blatantly solved the car's issues with pace. That is indeed reason to have hope. With only half a year of development time it's amazing they were able to so concretely improve either side of the matter to such an extent. They did an amazing job in the time they had to work with.

[JLGarcia]

Originally Posted by joeb

I had to chuckle a little bit at this article

https://www.motorsport.com/imsa/news...owing-1000648/

Mazda is upbeat despite disastrous Daytona performance.

So we shouldn't be concerned I guess, they aren't.

I've long suspected John Doonan is locked into some sort of Brewster's Millions-style game. In order to get a racing budget in the 7-8 figure range, he has to spend 6 figures yearly for a certain number of years, but can't have anything material to show for it at the end of the year and he can't tell anyone else what he's doing.

[joeb]

Originally Posted by JLGarcia

I've long suspected John Doonan is locked into some sort of Brewster's Millions-style game. In order to get a racing budget in the 7-8 figure range, he has to spend 6 figures yearly for a certain number of years, but can't have anything material to show for it at the end of the year and he can't tell anyone else what he's doing.

That is hilarious! And might just be true!

[skycafe]

Originally Posted by JLGarcia

I've long suspected John Doonan is locked into some sort of Brewster's Millions-style game. In order to get a racing budget in the 7-8 figure range, he has to spend 6 figures yearly for a certain number of years, but can't have anything material to show for it at the end of the year and he can't tell anyone else what he's doing.

[Irie]

Originally Posted by FormulaFox

They're not wrong. Like I've been saying, while they still clearly have issues to sort out with reliability they've quite blatantly solved the car's issues with pace. That is indeed reason to have hope. With only half a year of development time it's amazing they were able to so concretely improve either side of the matter to such an extent. They did an amazing job in the time they had to work with.

I always ask myself how much the result is because of the work done by the teams and what comes from the BoP. Remeber they were allowed to run lighter than everybody else.

[FormulaFox]

Originally Posted by Irie

I always ask myself how much the result is because of the work done by the teams and what comes from the BoP. Remeber they were allowed to run lighter than everybody else.

Given how far behind they were last year, I strongly doubt it's down to the BoP. BoP can only do so much, as last year proved.

[Matt]

put a rotary in ittttttt

[TF110]

Originally Posted by Matt

put a rotary in ittttttt

Sound is amazing, not so much the fuel economy. They'll get even more bop favors if they did run one!

[RWill2073]

Originally Posted by JLGarcia

I've long suspected John Doonan is locked into some sort of Brewster's Millions-style game. In order to get a racing budget in the 7-8 figure range, he has to spend 6 figures yearly for a certain number of years, but can't have anything material to show for it at the end of the year and he can't tell anyone else what he's doing.

This is brilliant!

[ModelT]

Quote:
Originally Posted by JLGarcia View Post
I've long suspected John Doonan is locked into some sort of Brewster's Millions-style game. In order to get a racing budget in the 7-8 figure range, he has to spend 6 figures yearly for a certain number of years, but can't have anything material to show for it at the end of the year and he can't tell anyone else what he's doing.


This is brilliant!

He can't tell tell anyone else what he is doing, as he has no idea himself of what he is doing!

A complete and utter amateur trying to play in a professional world, akin to ex Nissan, Darren Kox.

[Mike E]

How fast will DPi/LMP2 be on Michelins? A control tyre developed in an open tyre category should give a useful boost.
And how close will GTD get to GTLM?

http://sportscar365.com/imsa/iwsc/mi...or-imsa-teams/

[Dyson Mazda]

I kind of wish they had just given the GTD deal back to Continental to keep them in the series. It sort of would have made sense from both a performance and financial point of view.