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22 Nov 2007, 01:27 (Ref:2073082) | #26 | |||
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22 Nov 2007, 01:33 (Ref:2073085) | #27 | ||
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Yes but how much of that is down to the drivers rather than the chassis? Highcroft had a better driving line up than Lowes or AGR. IMO. If you want to talk about results though, how well did the LC75 do in the LMS this year? As I remember it was consistantly out performed by the Zytek's, Lolas and Radicals in the LMP2 category.
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22 Nov 2007, 02:10 (Ref:2073110) | #28 | |||
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And as I am a Highcroft supporter I will only say that I believe that Fernandez and Diaz are more than capable. As was the AGR pairing, whichever one. L.P. Last edited by HORNDAWG; 22 Nov 2007 at 02:12. |
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22 Nov 2007, 02:15 (Ref:2073112) | #29 | |||
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22 Nov 2007, 02:26 (Ref:2073118) | #30 | |||
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The LMS LC75 were honestly gentleman driven ..... mostly . That will explain your differance , although , what did Radical do at all this year ? |
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22 Nov 2007, 02:28 (Ref:2073119) | #31 | |||
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22 Nov 2007, 02:46 (Ref:2073125) | #32 | ||
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No ..... and the chassis wasnt changed . All the bits "on" the chassis were changed , but the tub is still the same .
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22 Nov 2007, 03:28 (Ref:2073144) | #33 | ||
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^ according to robert clarke the tub was part of the problem. apparently it's overweight, which has held back the acura in comparison to the porsche, which isn't.
it's not that courage was incompetent, but up against the best LMP in class, or possibly currently in competition, any less than optimal parts or design aspects are magnified a lot... |
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22 Nov 2007, 08:39 (Ref:2073215) | #34 | |
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and reading between the lines possibly lacking a bit in rigidity.......
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22 Nov 2007, 09:47 (Ref:2073312) | #35 | |||
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Regarding the LC75 in the LMS this year though. Lets just look at qualifying pace shall we? Guonon was driving the car so it should at least have been quick during qualifying if not in the race and Noel Del Bello are a decent outfit too so there shoudnt be too many problems on the team front. At Monza the lone Courage C75 of Saulnier racing qualifed 8th in class out of 10 entries, well behind the leading Lola's, Zytek's and Radical's. At Valencia the Nol Del Bello LC75 qualifed 6th in class out of 11 entries, again well behind the leading Lola's, Zytek's and Radical's. At Le Mans the Saulnier racing entry qualifed 7th out of 11 entries, again behind the leading Lola's, Zytek's and Radical's. At the nurbugring the Saulnier entry qualifed 8th in class out of 11 entries, once again behind the Lola's Zytek's and Radical's. At Silverstone Saulnier qualifed 5th out of 10 entries, once again behind the leading Lola's, Zytek's and Radical's. Now Im aware that Salunier are perhaps not the most established team in sportscar racing but they did have some pretty decent drivers during the year like Bruce Jouanny. If the Courage is as good as you say surely it would have out qualifed in amongst the front runners of the LMP2 class in the LMS. Sure it didnt have the best driver line up but then neither did RML with Mike Newton in the car or Binnie motorsports, they all seemed to find more pace than the Courage's in qualifying though. I say again, the main reason the AGR and Fernandez didnt beat Highcroft was the drivers. IMO of course. And as for what the Radical did? Well it showed a heck of a lot more speed than the Courage, and Greaves and Moesly certainly arent what I would call top professional drivers. |
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22 Nov 2007, 14:44 (Ref:2073561) | #36 | ||
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I would think using race lap times would be a better guide as one never knows what kind of setup the teams are using during qualifying.
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22 Nov 2007, 16:25 (Ref:2073605) | #37 | |
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It's already been made quite clear the Acura 'Courage' was more Acura than Courage by the time it hit the track at Sebring.
Knowing Courages LMP1 reliabilty issues in the LMS, it's quite clear their cars were either put together on an extremely tight budget, or they simply did not have the engineering talent to produce a decent car. Yves Courage believes ORECA can bring much to his organisation, and maybe help produce a car out of the box that's a match for factory cars. There's a similarity with ORECA'S re-engineering of the Saleen S7R. |
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22 Nov 2007, 16:44 (Ref:2073621) | #38 | ||
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Courage's poor reliability in the past reduced interest from drivers with budgets as they often were not able to get in the car for the race. |
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22 Nov 2007, 17:15 (Ref:2073646) | #39 | ||
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I'm pretty sure that a lot of the components in the suspension etc. of the AGR and Highcroft cars were different, at least at the beginning of the season, because they were trying two alternate routes with their two AXR-01as. That may have contributed to the difference.
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23 Nov 2007, 03:10 (Ref:2073939) | #40 | ||
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I guess you guys don't keep up on battery technology.
Racing will improve the breed for battery technology, you need to have the INVESTMENT that can not me made in the private sector by a couple of "smart people" Smart people make other people money, they usually are BOOK smart, not street savvy which makes the point, when was the last time you saw a Scientist make 6 digits? Doesn't happen, not to often anyway. Visit 123 Systems and check out the battery technology that will be going into the Chevy Volt, 2nd gen Toyota Priuis and I am sure a few other cars. First it was knocking E85, E10, E100, pull your heads out of the sand. This is the ONLY place that will see future technology that you will see in your future car purchases. Look I am just as high performance as anybody else that loves cars, but I am also a tech geek and that makes it fun. About Courage, hmmm does Yves have a 7 post shaker rig? How could he have known his chassis was flimisy by HPD standards? He couldn't have, he also doesn't have the budget to use a full scale wind tunnel either. Now you can understand why Miracle struggled when the competition got tough... No budget to develop... For Courage more often than not they got engine deals and it was just for engines, not additional chassis development. For Yves and now Ocrea, you hope whatever HPD learned about the car has filtered down to them. |
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23 Nov 2007, 08:22 (Ref:2074004) | #41 | |
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If the tub is as flimsy as is being suggested, Acura will have to build and crash test a new one. Is that being proposed?
While it is clear that the Courage has had very limited development, it is also very easy to lay the blame on the guy who did it before you. |
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23 Nov 2007, 23:07 (Ref:2074454) | #42 | ||
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in the articles, it's mentioned the next car will be all acura...
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24 Nov 2007, 00:51 (Ref:2074486) | #43 | |||
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24 Nov 2007, 00:54 (Ref:2074489) | #44 | |||
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24 Nov 2007, 02:11 (Ref:2074514) | #45 | ||||
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24 Nov 2007, 10:25 (Ref:2074593) | #46 | ||
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It seems that this element (tub and crash structure) will be left to the time when they construct a P1 car...which makes sense. The tub will be designed with the engine configuration in mind and will be integral to the whole design. Courage and others are more generic in that several engine installations are possible...although most appear to structure the tub/aero design for normally aspirated engines. The drag factor associated with the additional cooling needs would dramatically affect the overall effectiveness of some of these packages (Courage, Zytek, Creation, Pesca and Lola). It is interesting to note that Courage's attempt at Turbo engines was always affected by cooling issues. |
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24 Nov 2007, 14:08 (Ref:2074683) | #47 | |||
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25 Nov 2007, 20:04 (Ref:2075347) | #48 | ||
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Canam, I think you're a little hard by saying that Courage had always coolings probs with Turbo engines. Don't forget that their 3rd and 2nd place at the 24 Hours of Le Mans was with Porsche Turbo engines. The 3 titles of the C65 were won with the AER 2.0L Turbo engine. No cooling probs there , same thing with the Nissan V8 Twin Turbo. The only prob they've encounterd was in 2007 when changing from Mugen to the AER V8 Twin Turbo, but here the prob was mainly different views on intercooler design and not internal airflow.
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25 Nov 2007, 20:39 (Ref:2075357) | #49 | |
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I was referring entirely to the latest P1 car and tub as it was the base for the Acura.
I suspect the tub is pretty good but it is not bespoke (like the Porsche) for the engine installation. Yves Courage has a great knowledge of Turbos given his experience with Porsche and Nissan. Given the dearth of P1 Turbo motors when the LC70 was conceived, I suspect he had NA in mind in the design process. In P2, there is less power and less heat to deal with so it would have been less of a problem. I would be interested in hearing your views on 'intercooler design' being the problem not air flow. Chamberlain and Dyson ran AER Turbos within the past two years and they seemed to get sufficient cooling with those massive scoops. |
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25 Nov 2007, 22:17 (Ref:2075417) | #50 | |||
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as it seems are any of the customer cars apart from the lola and courage LC70 now actually built specifically for turbo engines?, from the outset noone seems to want to actually run a turbo engine in a pesca or a zytek but the fact that most of the cars are more set-up for N/A engines may be changed if the manufacturers began to sell their turbo engines ala swiss spirit might prompt more people to run turbo engines. also why would the tub for the porsche not be bespoke for the porsche V8?, are porsche possibly going to experiment with other engines or possibly sell rolling chassis like lola? maybe if acura want to get in LMP1 quickly they might just use the LC70 chassis to save having to build a new tub and crash test it like they have done with the ARX-01a but obviously with the P1 courage chassis as a base and acura make the surrounding parts for the car, engine, gearbox, suspension and brakes and aero package. any more news on acura honda in LMP1 yet?, are they still on course for 2009? |
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