Delta Wing Discussion ONLY

[Fogelhund]

Originally Posted by joeb

Thanks for the comparisons. Do you know hat the levels of fuel consumption were when the respective cars were making those times?

The NISSAN powered Deltawing seemed to be around 9.5 to 10.5 mpg depending on track etc... no idea about the current engine.

The Toyota 4AGE powered Atlantics were around 7 to 7.5 mpg.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by MkEagle

That's a great shot, very reminiscent of 'The Pass'.

[Machin]

Originally Posted by Fogelhund

The NISSAN powered Deltawing seemed to be around 9.5 to 10.5 mpg depending on track etc... no idea about the current engine.

The Toyota 4AGE powered Atlantics were around 7 to 7.5 mpg.

If two race cars have the same engine there would be very little difference: race car fuel consumption is nearly entirely driven by the engine power and engine efficiency efficiency: the chassis/aero has little effect. For example, if you put a go-kart engine in a tractor would it consume more fuel? Of course not.

Road driving is different; on the road we're all governed by the local speed limits, so the more efficient chassis needs less power to travel at that regulated speed. On a race track there is no governed speed, so better aero just means you travel faster; you don't use less fuel unless the driver uses less throttle.

I think the Imsa Lites are a worthy addition to the comparison:-

Laguna Seca 2.238 miles

2009 Formula Atlantic Swift-Mazda – 1:15.444 (300 HP , 1275 lb without driver)

2014 Corvette DP – 1:18.788 (600 HP , 2290 lb without driver)


2014 DeltaWing Coupe – 1:20.327 (350 HP , 1080 lb without driver)

2013 DeltaWing – 1:22.078

2013 IMSA Lite - 1:22.242 (230bhp, 1260 lb without driver)

i.e, Despite being 180lb heavier, and having 2/3 rds of the power (hence roughly 2/3rds of the fuel consumption), the IMSA Lite is basically as fast as the Deltawing.

[optica]

These comparisons would be more relevant if there were a comparable number of Deltawings being raced and developed as there are Imsa Lites or whatever well established formula you choose to make a comparison with. Why would anyone assume that the performance of a single undeveloped car is comparable with the fastest times achievable by other classes that have been competing against each other for years?

[Machin]

Why would anyone assume that the performance of a single undeveloped car is comparable with the fastest times achievable by other classes that have been competing against each other for years?

When something is truly "innovative" it makes "the old way" obsolete over night.







It is very easy to design a car with a unique appearance that is slower than its contemporaries.

[miatanut]

Originally Posted by optica

These comparisons would be more relevant if there were a comparable number of Deltawings being raced and developed as there are Imsa Lites or whatever well established formula you choose to make a comparison with. Why would anyone assume that the performance of a single undeveloped car is comparable with the fastest times achievable by other classes that have been competing against each other for years?

Exactly! You just have to look at the fit and finish of any of the DW-type cars compared to the regular cars. The regular cars are spending a lot of time on getting everything to fit together smoothly, because little details like that are where you beat your nearly-identical competition.

With the original DW, we saw lap times tumbling between LeMans test and qualifying until they hit the curb, broke it, and decided to take it easy after that. We do not yet have a good indication of what this design can do when refined. These comparisons are like comparing a 1920's racing engine to a modern racing engine. If there was a class that allowed open chassis with fuel consumption limited to this level, magically all the entrants, with various car geometries, would lap faster. Competition has a way of doing that.

Originally Posted by Machin

When something is truly "innovative" it makes "the old way" obsolete over night.







It is very easy to design a car with a unique appearance that is slower than its contemporaries.

How appropriate that you put a Chaparral in there. Jim Hall lost many races because his new idea broke, or something else on the car broke because they were spending so much time working on the new idea that the conventional parts of the car got neglected.

I'm scratching my head on what happened with the ZEOD. It seemed to be a properly supported factory effort, but it accomplished a lot less than AAR accomplished building the first ever car of this type on a very compressed schedule and on a shoestring. I think that says a hell of a lot about AAR, but it also seems to indicate Nissan got very poor ROI on the ZEOD.

In any case, we need two or three of these racing AGAINST each other so people raise their game and we can see what this approach is really capable of.

Your point about fuel consumption being entirely based on engine output and not influenced by chassis would be valid if the engine were at full output all the way around the lap. If you have a chassis that sticks better and allows the driver to be at full throttle in a section of the track where another car with the same engine is at part throttle, the car at part throttle will have lower fuel consumption (and a slower lap time). On the other hand, a car that is slipperier will go faster on the straight (at a very small fuel consumption benefit due to spending less time crossing that straight).

What used to make racing interesting was cars that were based on totally different concepts giving us great duels because of their different strengths and weaknesses, even if they had virtually the same lap time.

[MkEagle]

Originally Posted by joeb

Thanks for the comparisons. Do you know hat the levels of fuel consumption were when the respective cars were making those times?

Half the power. Half the weight. Half the fuel consumption. LMP2/DP performance.

Both DeltaWing and Atlantic Swift can do the job. Formula Atlantic costs less.

http://worldspeed.com/cars.htm

http://papers.sae.org/2006-01-3663/

[MkEagle]

Mosport 2.459 miles

2013 DeltaWing – 1:10.268

2009 Formula Atlantic Swift-Mazda – 1:10.460

2014 DeltaWing Coupe – 1:11.561

http://www.racingsportscars.com/resu...013-07-21.html

http://www.automobilsport.com/champc...g---68710.html

http://www.imsa.com/sites/default/fi...actice%201.pdf


DeltaWing Coupe: 350 HP , 1080 lb (without driver)

Formula Atlantic: 300 HP , 1275 lb (without driver)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTWc4Khx8Jo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwCh6ekP_Ho

[Fogelhund]

Originally Posted by miatanut

How appropriate that you put a Chaparral in there. Jim Hall lost many races because his new idea broke, or something else on the car broke because they were spending so much time working on the new idea that the conventional parts of the car got neglected.

Chaparral? I see a Porsche and a Lotus.

[miatanut]

Originally Posted by Fogelhund

Chaparral? I see a Porsche and a Lotus.

I can't see it either, but the blue question mark goes with an image for a Chaparral 2J.

[Machin]

Originally Posted by miatanut

How appropriate that you put a Chaparral in there. Jim Hall lost many races because his new idea broke, or something else on the car broke because they were spending so much time working on the new idea that the conventional parts of the car got neglected.

Indeed; it is appropriate: Like the Deltawings the car did break down, but the "sucker" technology truly was innovative and really was a game-changer; when it ran the car was quick. The Nissan Deltawing hasn't shown the promised speed even when it is running OK.

Your point about fuel consumption being entirely based on engine output and not influenced by chassis would be valid if the engine were at full output all the way around the lap. If you have a chassis that sticks better and allows the driver to be at full throttle in a section of the track where another car with the same engine is at part throttle, the car at part throttle will have lower fuel consumption (and a slower lap time). On the other hand, a car that is slipperier will go faster on the straight (at a very small fuel consumption benefit due to spending less time crossing that straight).

First things first: I actually said "There would be very little difference in fuel consumption" which is entirely different to saying "it is entirely dependent on the engine".

"Imagine" another scenario where you have a slippery car that is really slow in the corners. It may be cornering at less throttle, but it takes longer to go around the corner (i.e. it is consuming fuel for longer), so the fuel consumption isn't really affected. Then, despite being slippier (hence faster in a straight line), because it starts the straight at a lower speed it takes longer to transit the straight, all the while consuming fuel. The upshot is that if two cars have the same engine and are driven flat out and have the same lap time, the fuel consumption differences between those two cars will be negligible.

[MyNameIsNigel]

Don't know if this was posted before, but Don Panoz is apparently very keen on issuing open letters to Carlos Ghosn and Nissan Motor Company.

One open letter entitled "Have You Taken 'Frugal Engineering' A Little Too Far?" was issued a couple of weeks ago:

(source: CARandDRIVER.com)

Now followed by another one entitled "You Can Put As Many Nissan Logos On It As You'd Like: It's Still Our Design.":

[Rcz]

From what I understand about this car that it's supposed to be as fast as a P1 car but with far less power.

In fact it's supposed to be as fast as a Indycar with only 300hp when it was a concept car for that series.

Only once did it remotely did it function as advertised when it took the lead from the P1 cars during the ALMS race at Road America that one time.

It's clear that Panoz simply can't make good quality cars anymore, so until somebody else tries to build a car like this, we will never know its true potential.

[MkEagle]

Road Atlanta 2.54 miles

2012 Nissan DeltaWing – 1:12.850

2008 Formula Atlantic Swift-Mazda – 1:14.137

2013 DeltaWing Coupe – 1:16.206

http://www.racingsportscars.com/resu...012-10-20.html

http://www.automobilsport.com/champc...e---45440.html

http://www.racingsportscars.com/resu...013-10-19.html


Nissan DeltaWing: 300 HP , 1047 lb (without driver)

Formula Atlantic: 300 HP , 1275 lb (without driver)

DeltaWing Coupe: 350 HP , 1080 lb (without driver)

http://www.highcroftracing.com/deltawing/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtND-KK68GY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sC3iz-QV64U

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXhFLQbEW1M

[MkEagle]

Le Mans 8.469 miles

2012 Nissan DeltaWing – 3:42.612

2014 Nissan ZEOD – 3:50.185

http://www.racingsportscars.com/race...012-06-17.html

http://www.racingsportscars.com/race...014-06-15.html


Nissan DeltaWing: 300 HP , 1268 lb (with fuel and driver)

Nissan ZEOD: 400 HP , 1543 lb (with fuel and driver)

http://www.highcroftracing.com/deltawing/

http://www.ultimatecarpage.com/car/5...n-ZEOD-RC.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0R0HbarD_-E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnteswtryxE

[MkEagle]

Looking at the data we have now, it becomes clear that an open-cockpit DeltaWing is quicker than a closed-cockpit DeltaWing. The closed top generates too much aero lift relative to the DeltaWing’s small amount of aero downforce.

Revisiting Machin’s graph:



The ZEOD is inferior to the 2012 DeltaWing because of the closed cockpit. An open-cockpit ZEOD will be quicker.

[miatanut]

Originally Posted by MkEagle

The ZEOD is inferior to the 2012 DeltaWing because of the closed cockpit. An open-cockpit ZEOD will be quicker.

That's a very bold projection based on very limited data from a car where they never turned up the wick due to gearbox problems.

It would be nice to see one of these various versions get their act together so we could see what it would do really racing, rather than tooling around in demonstration mode. It's been demonstrated to death. It's time for a proper racing effort.

[Machin]

That's a very bold projection based on very limited data from a car where they never turned up the wick due to gearbox problems.

It would be nice to see one of these various versions get their act together so we could see what it would do really racing, rather than tooling around in demonstration mode. It's been demonstrated to death. It's time for a proper racing effort.

I tend to agree with the first part; I would think that the ZEOD must have been over-weight or not using the full claimed power output; otherwise it really was shockingly slow, and I don't believe the Delta layout is that bad.

I do think its unfair to say that the Panoz effort isn't a fair representation of the ability of the layout though... yes they've had reliability problems, but even when they've sorted those problems it still won't be a quick car unless it is given another huge BOP adjustment (It is already running in the same "LMP1" spec as it had last year, against LMP2 cars)....

[miatanut]

Originally Posted by Machin

I tend to agree with the first part; I would think that the ZEOD must have been over-weight or not using the full claimed power output; otherwise it really was shockingly slow, and I don't believe the Delta layout is that bad.

I do think its unfair to say that the Panoz effort isn't a fair representation of the ability of the layout though... yes they've had reliability problems, but even when they've sorted those problems it still won't be a quick car unless it is given another huge BOP adjustment (It is already running in the same "LMP1" spec as it had last year, against LMP2 cars)....

It may be the front brakes were under-designed, but it may also be the weight bias of the car isn't properly rearward. The key to the whole concept is those skinny little front wheels aren't doing much, and if the coupe design messed up the balance, it's not going to reach its potential.

I would really like to see the AAR built '12 DW in the hands of a capable team. I think that car could achieve the best representation of its potential. Bowlby was involved in the details of its construction, and it isn't weighed down by a bunch of batteries.

[MkEagle]

Le Mans 8.469 miles


2012 Nissan DeltaWing

Fastest Lap Time – 3:42.612 (Q1)

Top Speed – 309.5 kph (192.3 mph) (Q1)

Sector 1 – 34.459 (Q1)

Sector 2 – 1:25.649 (Q1)

Sector 3 – 1:42.130 (Q1)


2014 Nissan ZEOD

Fastest Lap Time – 3:50.185 (Q3)

Top Speed – 311.8 kph (193.8 mph) (Q3)

Sector 1 – 36.410 (Q3)

Sector 2 – 1:26.879 (Q3)

Sector 3 – 1:46.442 (Q3)


2014 LMP2 Alpine/Oreca-Nissan

Fastest Lap Time – 3:37.787 (Race)

Top Speed – 308.2 kph (191.5 mph) (Q2)

Sector 1 – 34.160 (Race)

Sector 2 – 1:24.296 (Race)

Sector 3 – 1:39.197 (Race)


http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/

Select season and event > Race > Hour 24 > Event Maximum Speed
Select season and event > Qualifying # > Best Sector Times


Nissan DeltaWing: 300 HP , 1268 lb (with fuel and driver)

Nissan ZEOD: 400 HP , 1543 lb (with fuel and driver)

LMP2: 460 HP , 1984 lb (without driver)

http://www.oreca.fr/en/technology-2/...oreca-03-lmp2/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FsJqiKxyCU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujEhBvT0vJA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1yAy2l204M


The 2012 DeltaWing is much quicker than the ZEOD in sectors 1 and 3 – where there are lots of corners. The reason for ZEOD’s slow pace is poor braking and cornering due to lack of downforce and extra weight.

The ZEOD’s top speed is faster than all the LMP2 cars, but its lap time is 12 seconds slower than the fastest LMP2 car.

[MkEagle]

Le Mans 8.469 miles


2012 Nissan DeltaWing
Lap Average Speed = 8.469 miles / (222.612 / 3600) hour = 136.96 mph

2014 Nissan ZEOD
Lap Average Speed = 8.469 miles / (230.185 / 3600) hour = 132.45 mph

2014 LMP2 Alpine/Oreca-Nissan
Lap Average Speed = 8.469 miles / (217.787 / 3600) hour = 140 mph


Power to Weight Ratio

Car weight includes driver and fuel. Assume combined weight of driver and fuel to be 90 kg during a low-fuel flat-out lap.
1 metric ton = 1000 kg

2012 Nissan DeltaWing
Power to Weight Ratio = 300 HP / (565 / 1000) ton = 531 HP/ton

2014 Nissan ZEOD
Power to Weight Ratio = 400 HP / (690 / 1000) ton = 580 HP/ton

2014 LMP2 Alpine/Oreca-Nissan
Power to Weight Ratio = 460 HP / (990 / 1000) ton = 465 HP/ton


http://www.highcroftracing.com/deltawing/

http://www.ultimatecarpage.com/car/5...n-ZEOD-RC.html

http://www.oreca.fr/en/technology-2/...oreca-03-lmp2/

The ZEOD has the highest power-to-weight ratio in this group, but it is the slowest car.

[MkEagle]

Originally Posted by miatanut

It may be the front brakes were under-designed, but it may also be the weight bias of the car isn't properly rearward. The key to the whole concept is those skinny little front wheels aren't doing much, and if the coupe design messed up the balance, it's not going to reach its potential.

Take a closer look at the front section of the ZEOD’s cockpit. It is flat instead of curved like the LMP1 Audi.

[chernaudi]

In theory a coupe should be faster in a straight line, but unlike the LMP1 cars, which have curved windshields as pointed out, the ZEOD's is flat, sorta more like a DP or GT car's windshield.

I wonder how much that effects the ZEOD's top speed and overall aero balance.

It seems looking at sector times, it's downforce /front to rear aero balance where the ZEOD has/had issues.

[miatanut]

Originally Posted by MkEagle

Take a closer look at the front section of the ZEOD’s cockpit. It is flat instead of curved like the LMP1 Audi.

The image I posted, which doesn't appear, yet does appear if I choose 'open image in separate window', is of the Panoz DW coupe, from the Panoz DW website, with the front brakes a nice cherry red and the rear brakes black.

I have been told by someone knowledgeable about these things that the ZEOD actually has the opposite problem. Over-worked brakes on the rear. Two different attempts at this concept which failed in different ways, due in part to a lack of consultation with the designer who initially proposed this approach.

Which is why I would like to see the black DW pulled out of mothballs and run by a capable team, preferably in consultation with Bowlby, to give a proper demonstration of the capabilities of the approach.

[Machin]

Two different attempts at this concept which failed in different ways, due in part to a lack of consultation with the designer who initially proposed this approach.

I thought Bowlby was an integral part of the design team on the ZEOD project?

To be honest, I see this as an excuse anyway... and a pretty poor one; outwardly the car may look different, but in reality it is still a car with four wheels, rear wheel drive, front wheel steering. Its just that the front track is narrow and the weight distribution is far back. The maths is still the same, it is just that the numbers you put in to the equations are slightly different.

It came as no surprise to me that the layout results in a car that is quick in a straight line, slower in the corners, and had good traction in the wet. I'm not surprised that it can't really compete fairly with "rectangular" cars on a twisty circuit. I actually put this suggestion to Ben Bowlby himself at the Pistonheads Sunday service (held at the Nissan/Renault HQ in the UK back in May 2012) I said; "I can see that it might be as quick as an LMP1 at Le Mans with half the horespower and half the drag, but what about at a twisty circuit like Brands hatch Indy circuit?", to which I got a fairly noncommittal answer along the lines of; "Mmmm yeah, I think we would be OK" or words to that effect.

The surprise for me is actually just how much slower it was in the slow corners and hence that it failed to achieve the promised speed at Le Mans.