The never ending Toyota return to Le Mans (LMP1) Saga

[alexkiller8]

anyway, just a telemetry video like the ones available for the audi will clear all doubts about revlimit and other questions.

[TF110]

Also the driver changes took longer, but the driver is sat on the left in the Toyota. Looks like speculation is clouding people's judgements. We don't know about the TS030 engine besides it's derived from the RVK8LM.

[Articus]

I think people make the TS030 engine sound more mysterious than it actually is. We know it does not have DFI. No Turbo's. And its derived from the SGT engine. Nothing special there. If you want to understand why the TS030 engine was beating the rebllion engine and making more power. I can name a number of things. They could have lightened pistons, change engine maps, increased revs, lightened basically all ht eparts and used some nice materials to reduce friction. But its not like the engine is some mystery that no one understands like some people make it out to be. We pretty much know everything there is to know about it. 3.4 liter V8 right?
Sounds familiar. Porsche did it. Acura did it. Heck Zytek did it too. Whats so special? We can basically deduce most of the other specs from the other cars.

[TF110]

I think the fact that it's not 'special' should speak volumes about what COULD be achievable if it were! Here's hoping 2013's or at least 2014's is a dedicated unit specifically for the WEC/LeMans.

[Articus]

You have to believe they are going to stick with it in 2013. Otherwise they would be building an engine for '12, 13' and 14'. Its not beyond doubt based on there F1 expenditures but from what you guys have already said. This is a shoestring budget.

[TF110]

For this year its true, but 2013/14's budget size remains to be seen.

[Mal]

I dont know why everyone is doubting them so. They have pretty well stuck rigourously to their announced plan from day one. They have stepped it up slightly to save the WEC and there original plan was a low key development year in 2012 and a full assualt in 2013 - I do not see anything that has changed that position and indeed that policy was clear at the pit visit.

The performance at Le Mans can only have helped that situation as it is clear performance wise they are going in the right direction.

[TF110]

Some great wallpapers are up on their website- http://www.toyotahybridracing.com/fa...er/wallpapers/

[deggis]

New video of the simulator: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fGdOLeLeTo

Related articles:
http://www.toyotahybridracing.com/th...or-what-is-it/
http://www.toyotahybridracing.com/we...ing-simulator/

[TF110]

Notice the track map of Monaco on the left?

[Victor_RO]

Originally Posted by TF110

Notice the track map of Monaco on the left?

Well obviously, they're using an old Toyota F1 chassis for the drivers to sit in, so that chassis may have seen racing action.

[TF110]

That was my point.

[CTD]

Originally Posted by TF110

That was my point.

Isn't anything new .

[pkollo]

That laptime in the simulator seems not to be so fast: 1:52 - compared to the laptimes from last year (Qualy 1:43 and Race 1:46).

[deggis]

Apparently it is the website media guy/whoever that is driving. That's how you understand it from the article.

In the article it was explained typically lap times are -1 sec from the real one which makes sense.

[TF110]

Originally Posted by CTD

Isn't anything new .

OK, my point is they still use the F1 cars in one form or another.

The journalist did say he was far off the times of the regular drivers. Not sure how much that is exactly, but 52s for an amateur isn't too bad.

[TRuss]

Originally Posted by chernaudi

Small V8s run flatplane cranks in them, which tend to vibrate badly at high RPMs, not a problem with larger V8s that run crossplane cranks. Of course, the Audi R8's V8 ran a flatplane crank in it, but it was a forced induction engine, and the fact that it was rev limited to about 7000 rpm (turbochargers are a torque multiplier--more torque equals more power at lower RPMs) vs Toyota's engine which in the TS030 probably has a 10,500 rpm limit, that makes a big difference with those vibrations.

But in the smaller engines, crossplane cranks aren't desirable, because of weight and issues with engine response (spin up and slow down times). I think that the TS030 running more RPM to make more power is the issue it has vs the Rebellion spec engine, which is largely the same aside from those variations.

It's also interesting to note that V10s aren't very balanced either, because, like an inline 5, they have an off-balance firing order. The 5.0 Judd V10s and larger V10s don't have the problem that smaller engines had due again to rpm restrictions and having more torque such that they didn't need to run an insane amount of RPM.

More torque equals more power at any RPM. HP=RPMxTorque/5252

[chernaudi]

More torque=more power that can be generated are lower RPMs. That's why rotory engines have to really spin to make power, because without a turbo at least, they don't have the grunt, and more RPMs equals worse fuel economy which is why rotaries have had a hard time winning, especially when normal piston engines got more reliable.

The current engine formula has taken huge amounts of torque out of the engines due to a displacement reduction. The only way to recover that is though forced induction, but that seems to the the realm of the diesels, as the 2.0 gas 4 pots have tended to be more like improvised explosive devices than reliable race engines.

So everyone is stuck with the 3.4 flat crank V8s unless you have a diesel. But even at that, Rebellion got one of their cars to finish 4th at LM this year, but TMG have had engine problems in testing and practice at LM even though the two engines are basically the same. That leads me to believe that TMG tried to crank up the redline on their own engines to get some extra power, and at LM, it proved to be too much. If you don't have torque, the only ways to get more power is more air, which is controlled by the restrictor, or more revs, which is somewhat controlled by the restrictor, and more so by mechanical frailty, and you can only push so far before you risk breaking something.

You can't really blame Toyota, as it's not their fault that Peugeot pulled out in the 11th hour and only they volunteered to try and make the WEC manufacturers' title somewhat meaningful.

[NaBUru38]

Originally Posted by deggis

New video of the simulator: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fGdOLeLeTo

Those graphics suck. GP3, rFactor?

[TF110]

Originally Posted by chernaudi

More torque=more power that can be generated are lower RPMs. That's why rotory engines have to really spin to make power, because without a turbo at least, they don't have the grunt, and more RPMs equals worse fuel economy which is why rotaries have had a hard time winning, especially when normal piston engines got more reliable.

The current engine formula has taken huge amounts of torque out of the engines due to a displacement reduction. The only way to recover that is though forced induction, but that seems to the the realm of the diesels, as the 2.0 gas 4 pots have tended to be more like improvised explosive devices than reliable race engines.

So everyone is stuck with the 3.4 flat crank V8s unless you have a diesel. But even at that, Rebellion got one of their cars to finish 4th at LM this year, but TMG have had engine problems in testing and practice at LM even though the two engines are basically the same. That leads me to believe that TMG tried to crank up the redline on their own engines to get some extra power, and at LM, it proved to be too much. If you don't have torque, the only ways to get more power is more air, which is controlled by the restrictor, or more revs, which is somewhat controlled by the restrictor, and more so by mechanical frailty, and you can only push so far before you risk breaking something.

You can't really blame Toyota, as it's not their fault that Peugeot pulled out in the 11th hour and only they volunteered to try and make the WEC manufacturers' title somewhat meaningful.

I don't think you know what you're talking about. No one knows what Toyota's works engine is like in relation to the engine that Rebellion uses. If it was so alike, it shouldn't have failed. The hybrid system and the engine are 'one unit' and work in conjunction, so that may be a reason why it didn't last. And we won't ever know if the #8 car would have gone on. At least Silverstone is in a few weeks.

[Peat]

Originally Posted by NaBUru38

Those graphics suck. GP3, rFactor?

Yep, because graphics are what are most important in a simulator......

They look fine.

[NaBUru38]

Graphics help to immersion. Like, seeing more realistic crowds will get drivers more into the meaning of the race.

[ss_collins]

ut TMG have had engine problems in testing and practice at LM even though the two engines are basically the same.

They are quite different from what I'm told. the TS030 engine is not based on the RV8

[chernaudi]

Sources at LM said that the TS030 engine is based on the Super GT engine--if it was much different, it would probably have DFI for one, and for two, I believe that the only major changes that Toyota used were to extract more power than the "customer" engines did.

From what few photos of the TS030's engine bay that emerged from LM, the two engines look basically the same, are about the same size dimensionally, and it's been reported as far back as Sebring that the TS030's engine wasn't drastically different than the Rebellion customer engines.

I do think that people are over emphasizing how big Toyota Motor Corporation and Toyota Motorsport GmbH are. They are huge companies, but we have to remember that Toyota only signed off on this project in the fall of last year, and it doesn't seem to have the budget and resources that it deserves right now, mostly because of how rapidly Toyota promoted this program from being a part season deal to a full season effort. And that only happened because Peugeot's 11th hour pull out and the fact that other teams, namely HPD, wouldn't up their commitment to a full factory effort, and Toyota had to step in and plug the gap. It's great that they volunteered for that role, but I think that it stretched the limited resources that TMC allocated to that program to the limit, and TMG paid for it with the testing accident and the mechanical issues that they had in testing and at LM. New car blues contributed, obviously, but we have to remember that the budget for this program was signed off back well into last year, and it seems that Toyota only stepped things up as much as they could under the budget--corporate budgets are corporate budgets, as we found out when Audi pulled out of the ALMS and Peugeot ditched their program this year.

[TF110]

Chern, we don't need reminders of whats been rumored. I'm sure the engine reliability has been looked over from 2 months ago. All the 'Toyota only signed such and such' has been discussed at length also. Maybe we should move the conversation forward?