Audi LMP1 Discussion

[FstrthnU]

Clearly with the R18 setting the fastest lap of the race, there's nothing wrong pacewise. Seems that most of the issues stemmed from the Le Mans-bodywork and general 24-hour component wear. I think this still puts Audi in a very strong position for the rest of the WEC season with their pace and short-run reliability.

Also, this is the first time in a while we can say, "Audi may have lost the 24, but they are still in the fight for the LMP1 title."

[chernaudi]

Tech question about the R18:

Remember DSC's article from back in March stating that the sprint race cars (especially at Silverstone) were updated 2014 cars, while the LM cars were new. Do the LM tubs differ from the sprint race tubs, or were the LM chassis simply new builds?

Guess I have to wait a week or two for my B&N to stock the July issue of RCE.

Also, out of curiosity, would anyone like to guess what type of cross-pollination would happen between the LM spec and sprint spec for future races, if any.

[hcl123]

Thats Le Mans Racing...

About cross-pollination i have this feeling we wont see the Silverstone sprint version again... though its the same 'monocoque'... than even 2014 ( all the rest bodyworks are different).

About 2016 i think there will be a new 'monocoque'... even more aerodynamic efficient ( which only this last 'LM' version is approaching)... and the diesel engine being 'too heavy' is a myth, hardly 10kg more than an identical petrol engine... and i definitely think there will be e-superchargers( 2 ; 1 for each admission side)(i think they have or are about to include it in new(er) road going diesel and petrol models, tremendous efficiency gains at lower revs, up to 15% on a combined cycle) , and a battery pack for the 6 MJ-> what they will lose in fuel allocation they will gain in efficiency with the e-superchargers (small electric turbines in a admission valved bypass).

Definitely they will have to find some weight savings to include battery and e-supercharger, but a revised monocoque and else on a diet will do the trick, and hardly the engine will be an insurmountable obstacle (its already very light for a 'fast' diesel, if they could shave a couple of kg would already be very good)

[ger80]

Originally Posted by Velociraptor

Audi can easily save 20+ kg from the engine, since they only use cast iron and alloy components... Only question is will they choose to do so since they prefer materials that are viable in large series production cars.
6 MJ battery will make it an extremely fast car(I mean, look what they're doing with 4MJ flywheel)

What would you suggest and why don't they use it?

[ederss7]

Stupid things ruining at least one of their cars' race. At Silverstone a broken nose fixation. Spa a window blows away and now this bodywork issue. With all the testing, I wonder how these things aren't sorted out or encountered.
Funny to see Duval's crash contributed by a slow zone mistake and then the #7 drive through.

[Creep89]

I still don't think it was a mistake by Duval. You could clearly see green flags waved and so he accelerated up to full speed. One section later there were either yellow flags shown or the GT drivers were sleeping at the wheel. This caused major confusion for the cars in the later section of the track while Duval and one Oak car thought the track is clear, everyone up to speed.

Duval didn't get a penalty I think and the Oak car, which did the same like Duval, didn't receive one, too?

edit: Picture!

[Akrapovic]

Drivers were told during the briefing that should flags and light boxes contradict each other, that the flags are the correct signal to obey. Duval was in the right and was unsighted and caught out by some drivers not paying attention to race controls brief and the signals.

[Gingers4Justice]

I felt that Audi were racing outside their comfort zone trying to keep up with the pace set by Porsche. Not that they would have been surprised that perhaps the #17 or #18 might have acted like a "hare" early doors, but certainly the fact all three Porsches consistently lapped in the early 3:20s or even lower, while evening managing to quadruple stint, meant that Audi had to do the same with all three cars.

Audi were still fairly reliable as they got three cars to the finish, but it was an untidy performance by their standards. The three of them all carried issues of some kind as well but that's not out of the ordinary - what is out of the ordinary is the pretty much flawless race from the #19, the like of which I don't think I've seen before.

Porsche have raised the bar once more - they were both the tortoise and the hare at the same time. I can't wait to see what they do in response!

[joeb]

Originally Posted by Creep89

I still don't think it was a mistake by Duval. You could clearly see green flags waved and so he accelerated up to full speed. One section later there were either yellow flags shown or the GT drivers were sleeping at the wheel. This caused major confusion for the cars in the later section of the track while Duval and one Oak car thought the track is clear, everyone up to speed.

Duval didn't get a penalty I think and the Oak car, which did the same like Duval, didn't receive one, too?

edit: Picture!

That was a very unfortunate incident for all the cars involved. Audi paid the biggest price, but ultimately we were lucky the accident wasn't a lot worse given the number of cars on the track right there.

[hcl123]

Funny how things contradict each other... Duval accident in that zone was clearly above 200kmh(Allan Simonsen died slower than that), yet 5 minutes (perhaps less) of repairs in the box and he was as good as new !!!... then the engine cover supports on #7 didn't withstand the trepidation of going over the track guides at speed!... odd... bad luck for Audi this year...

Also some bad choices of tires specially at night... meaning the strategic superior Audi prowess isn't exclude of making mistakes to... because after that Lotterer was able to shatter the race lap record with a time good enough for the second position on the grid if qualifying(way above any of the Audi's upon qualifying)...

[Velociraptor]

#7 could have won the race if not for that slow puncture... that was the turning point of their race, after that they got stuck in the 2nd safety car train and lost a good amount of time.
Just shows how close it was, you need to have a super clean 24h run to have a shot at winning.

[hcl123]

was not to be, even not winning but managing to hold second place the #7 would have taken the points of victory, cause the #19 counts nothing for the points... even in this they were not lucky...

Nevertheless they need only one more victory and one place in front of the Porsches #17 and #18 to be champions... i think its quite possible...

[J Jay]

Ultimately, the Audis weren't fast enough (to overcome their problems and) win the race. So they didn't. Funny how things work out like that However it speaks to the pure pace of the #7 that even with two laps spent on the rear deck problems and half a lap for an extra pit stop, they were only two and a bit laps down on the #19 and its flawless run. Maybe Audi would have done better if they ran the race more like Audis of old...

As for the issues with the rear deck, I'm pretty sure I saw a crack in the cover on the #8 in one of its later pit stops, on the left-hand fender just below the BHH on the inside. If I'm not imagining things then it would show that the aero wasn't quite as sorted as it should have been. My guess would be that even thought La Sarthe is much smoother than it used to be, it is still bumpy compared to Grade 1 circuits and this is what led to air getting stuck under the engine cover and damaging it.

[ederss7]

In 2013(when weather conditions were never perfect and with the car weighing 915kg) they were still faster through the Porsche curves with max average speed of 270km/h. Even with new surface this year they weren't able to be faster there. Porsche on the other hand were able to improve massively their average speed, being almost as fast as Audi.
Also, the max top speed recorded on the speed trap was from Audi, 345km/h.

[Articus]

Originally Posted by Gingers4Justice

I felt that Audi were racing outside their comfort zone trying to keep up with the pace set by Porsche. Not that they would have been surprised that perhaps the #17 or #18 might have acted like a "hare" early doors, but certainly the fact all three Porsches consistently lapped in the early 3:20s or even lower, while evening managing to quadruple stint, meant that Audi had to do the same with all three cars.

I keep reading people saying this, but how is this related to the events that occured? In what sense did having to lap quickly hurt Audi? The bodywork exploded on it's own, the tire "punctured". Audi hurt themselves the most with the conservative tire choice during the night time. A 55 second gap blew out to 2+ mins before issues for the 7 and the 9 car which were unrelated to how fast they were going.

Maybe the only pressure incident was when Treluyer went wide coming into tetre rouge. Otherwise Audi didn't make an mistakes? They just had bad luck and unreliability with suspension/bodywork. But none of it was caused by running quickly which the cars were clearly capable of.

On the otherhand, we know the Porsche's were runnig conservatively as they were the only cars who did not better their qualy times. Why? Because they know the ERS systems go critical when running like that for extended periods of time.

[ederss7]

Funny that the safety car was only deployed after the #8 left the garage. During all their repair time the race was under green flag. That means they could have lost less time if the safety car had immediately been deployed.

[Starfish Primer]

Originally Posted by Creep89

I still don't think it was a mistake by Duval. You could clearly see green flags waved and so he accelerated up to full speed. One section later there were either yellow flags shown or the GT drivers were sleeping at the wheel. This caused major confusion for the cars in the later section of the track while Duval and one Oak car thought the track is clear, everyone up to speed.

Duval didn't get a penalty I think and the Oak car, which did the same like Duval, didn't receive one, too?

edit: Picture!

I was on Tertre Rouge during the Greaves yellow and it was a joke how different the drivers interpreted the slow zone. You could see cars accelerating 50 meters before the marshal post while other cars waited until crossing the line. I even saw and Aston Martin overtaking a P2 because it accelerated before.

[Artur]

Originally Posted by cokata

Porsche were quicker in big chunks of the race. And you can see on the alkamelsystems website that they even have the best ideal lap. It was really a similar situation to the Spa race the difference being that after the first 3-4 hours they could make the tires last as long as the Audis.

So, it wasn't a similar situation to Spa because there Audi had easily the best ideal lap(a full second faster than Porsche)

The thing is, Porsche best S2 came at ~9:30pm, best S1 at ~1:30am and and best S3 at ~6:30am. All of them when temp was cooler and they could be using a softer tire. And that's the only Porsche that had a better ideal lap. The other 2 was slower than all 3 Audis. But overall, they were all very closely matched on ideal lap

Audi's best times all came during the day with higher temps. We are comparing apples to oranges, to some extent.

Anyway, Porsche better highly develop their aero because Audi is going to 6MJ next year and that alone will give massive improvement while Porsche already hit the ceiling on ERS(or does anyone believe they are not still harvesting 8 MJ?).

[Articus]

I'm still somewhat reserved on who exactly has the quickest car. I do think that Porsche was running in a detuned state for much of the race as evidenced by straight line performance compared to the audis at many points during the race, which is why the thing ran reliably....Had all the knobs been turned up, Porsche would have been much faster than they were, but also not finished the race...They qualified in the 3:16s. They were the only cars not to improve on their qualy times in the race...which shows you how much they had in reserve (. But they just can't run like that and expect to finish 24 hours.

And obviosuly it depends on the circuit. Le Mans is a power track. As Puegeot reminds us. But a place like Spa, Audi had the fastest car on that day.

[hcl123]

Originally Posted by Articus

I

On the otherhand, we know the Porsche's were runnig conservatively as they were the only cars who did not better their qualy times. Why? Because they know the ERS systems go critical when running like that for extended periods of time.

That way they would never win...

http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/index.html

http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/Res...After_Race.PDF

#19 lapped faster on race than on qualy... #17 didn't mange the same feat by a tiny ~0.7 sec... the only one that was off was the #18 with a pole of 3:16 and a best lap of 3:19 (more than 2 secs).

The real myth ppl keep pointing is the Porsche Hybrid system !... they never had problems with batteries, not even in 2014 when they were over-regen in LM (they went retiring 2014 LM because of engine problems-> kaput)... and now this conservative pace is awkward lol ...

In reality this *must be* flat out full 24h new endurance style racing(else you wont win), and yes there are 'tires' (like Nissan boss stated) that perhaps worths more than 2 secs at LM, so accounting this factor, most probably not used for race cause of durability issues, i think is pretty safe to say Porsche was flat out all of the time(according to car possibilities)...

At a minimal least there was nothing conservative about any of the Porsche's pace, even #18 that was slightly out of balance upon braking (sorted out of track twice upon heavy braking... i think on Mulsanne corner both of times), and so didn't managed to be as fast as the others.

And the curious contradiction since you are at it... and without batteries... the one that had problems, according to the story, with the hybrid system spoiling the pace and a chance to win was the Audi #9.

[Articus]

Originally Posted by hcl123

That way they would never win...

http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/index.html

http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/Res...After_Race.PDF

#19 lapped faster on race than on qualy... #17 didn't mange the same feat by a tiny ~0.7 sec... the only one that was off was the #18 with a pole of 3:16 and a best lap of 3:19 (more than 2 secs).

The real myth ppl keep pointing is the Porsche Hybrid system !... they never had problems with batteries, not even in 2014 when they were over-regen in LM (they went retiring 2014 LM because of engine problems-> kaput)... and now this conservative pace is awkward lol ...

In reality this *must be* flat out full 24h new endurance style racing(else you won win), and yes there are 'tires' (like Nissan boss stated) that perhaps worths more than 2 secs at LM, so accounting this factor, most probably not used for race cause of durability issues, i think is pretty safe to say Porsche was flat out all of the time(according to car possibilities)...

At a minimal least there was nothing conservative about any of the Porsche's pace, even #18 that was slightly out of balance upon braking (sorted out of track twice upon heavy braking... i think on Mulsanne corner both of times)... and so didn't managed to be as fast as the others.

And the curious contradiction since you are at it...and without batteries... the one that had problems, according to the story, with the hybrid system spoiling the pace and a chance to win was the Audi #9.

I didn't specify the batteries as a direct weakpoint but the ERS system as whole but it doesn't matter who makes them, batteries will always be a weak point for racing applications if you study the science behind it. Only if you cool the batteries well can you keep running them. Porsche had overheating problems last year at Le Mans. You must have missed that.

Did you watch early in the race when the Audi's where matching the Porsche's down the straights? Not top speed (this too) but also in acceleration. That was key sign that Porsche has run conservative settings for most of the race.


If things were turned up on the Porsche, we would have seen 3:16 lap times during the race but there is no reliable way to run in that configuration for them.

[chernaudi]

One thing we do have to look at is that these cars still have potential for improvement, even if the 2016 cars will be refined versions of the current cars due to the impending 2017 rules changes.

Porsche has already bottomed out in terms of the 8MJ ceiling. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but they can't get any higher in terms of power out of the hybrid system because of the rules.

Toyota is also looking at moving to 8MJ, but it's already believed that they're switching from the 3.7 V8 to a about 2.0T 4 or maybe V6, and they've already been reported as developing the TS050, in order to maximize the benefits of such changes.

Audi are reported to be working on a refined version of the current R18, the biggest change is expected to a jump from the 4MJ flywheel to a 6MJ batter pack.

One consideration for Audi that we may be looking at is how the ACO might try and "slow" (in reality, probably cap) the pace of the cars. Fuel flow might not have much impact on hybrid power selection.

If the ACO try and raise the minimum weight of the cars to say, 900kg (Toyota and Porsche were both close to 900kg last season), then that gives Audi all the excuse they need to stuff the biggest hybrid system in their car that they can, in addition to the fact that they're already looking at performance gains.

And we have to remember that the reduction from 2000mm to 1900mm max car width was done to reduce drag, and reduce mechanical grip by forcing teams to cut 1.5-2 inches out of their tire widths. That doesn't seem to have worked, but the ACO know that they can't insist on narrower tires right now at least, so a weight increase and/or fuel flow decrease is probably on the cards for next season.

And especially if it's a weight increase, Audi will probably be the biggest benefactor.

[chernaudi]

Not directly related to any of this, but would any posters here who live in North America know of when/where the print edition of the July RCE would be available?

I know that Barnes & Noble carry both the print and digital/online editions, but last time I checked in my local B&N (almost two weeks ago) still had the June/Porsche 919 edition stocked.

[hcl123]

Originally Posted by Articus

I'm still somewhat reserved on who exactly has the quickest car. I do think that Porsche was running in a detuned state for much of the race as evidenced by straight line performance compared to the audis at many points during the race, which is why the thing ran reliably....Had all the knobs been turned up, Porsche would have been much faster than they were, but also not finished the race...They qualified in the 3:16s. They were the only cars not to improve on their qualy times in the race...which shows you how much they had in reserve (. But they just can't run like that and expect to finish 24 hours.

And obviosuly it depends on the circuit. Le Mans is a power track. As Puegeot reminds us. But a place like Spa, Audi had the fastest car on that day.

Again http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/index.html to the help

Neel Jani set the pole and fasted lap record of 3:16 with a top speed of 337Kmh (way off the top speed record this year of 345,6 of Luca di Grassi)

http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/Res...actice%201.PDF

So its obvious where the Porsche gained all that 'additional time' was on the corners and intermediary speed parts of the track ( don't tell Nissan lol)... most probably because of those special tires having a ton of grip by themselves to compensate... because if you compared with above chart all Porsches managed to achieve higher top speed on 'race' than on qualy (obvious better rolling qualities without qualy tires [diff is not much in straight, but corners !!...]).

The other obvious *and visible* issue, is the Porsche capacity to accelerate... and obviously that is because of the electric motor (absolutely superb) of the hybrid system... they depart to straights better than anyone else, like an arrow, yet on long(er) straights don't manage the top speed( so the engine is inferior to hybrid comparatively... yet small and economic).

About the fastest, if you take out qualy tires ... and give all cars the same MJ amount of energy... and you have an answer... but since all that is part of racing, and the balancing in rules, we can be here arguing until kingdom came (which is not wise... pray god spare me!)

[hcl123]

Originally Posted by Articus

Only if you cool the batteries well can you keep running them. Porsche had overheating problems last year at Le Mans. You must have missed that.

Ĩ have a record of last year LM race... and that batteries problem is a TV commentator issue, specially when Mark Webber went kaput... those TV commentators went all over blaming the batteries(this and that), fancy theories about overheating and exploding batteries cores etc lol... but when Mark gave a flash interview to Eurosport he was pretty clear as one can be in the circumstances about what can be said : " engine doesn't seem too happy" -> obviously there never was any real 'problem' with batteries, at least not a 'terminal' one ( of course this kind of batteries must be cooled, and can overheat, but AFAIK Porsche was always good with both of that)