867 replies to this topic

[BRG]

Just to point out that D'wing's detractors haven't just started commenting on its massive weight advantage.  I mentioned this when it was in Garage 56 at Le Mans for its first ever outing, where it had a power to weight ratio better than the LMP2 class and almost as good as the LMP1s.  Yet it was slower than them all.  Since then it has run far below the minimum weight that EVERYBODY else had to comply with.  Why is it allowed this huge advantage? I expect a level playing field.  Put it in a museum, I never want to see the ugly contraption again.

[RA2]

That car is must be incredibly cheaper to run with lighter chassis, smaller engine, lesser fuel, tyres etc

 

So why hasn't Elan Motorsport started making more of these units that could be sold to customers?  

 

Also wondered if they were a class of its own why didn't the team while making the new chassis stick a center seated cockpit with a smaller canopy? Were they asked to keep the LMP regulations with regard to cockpit dimensions?

Edited by RA2, 02 February 2016 - 14:40.

[Dan333SP]

That car is must be incredibly cheaper to run with lighter chassis, smaller engine, lesser fuel, tyres etc

 

So why hasn't Elan Motorsport started making more of these units that could be sold to customers?  

 

 

Fair question. I get the feeling that IMSA wouldn't allow anyone else to run it, they're just allowing Panoz/Elan to race with it because Don Panoz effectively created the ALMS and has invested a LOT of money in US sports car racing, so he gets carte blanche to run the DW.

 

That said, even if they allowed more of them in, I don't think customer teams would be lining up. I think Daytona is the track where it is most competitive relative to the other P cars, and customer teams want something that's fast at all types of venues.

[Imateria]

Originally when Panoz took over the plan was to sell them to customers eventually, but until Daytona the car has never proven particularly competative or reliable (jury's still out on the reliability but the team didn't have any problems over the weekend so it's a good bet that they've got that sorted) so it wasn't a a particualrly attractive proposition for anybody else to run. Maybe that will change, we will see. I'm also not entirely sure about it being cheaper to run at least as far as tyres go sinc ethey have to be especially made for the car so I expect that they'd have to pay a premium for them.

 

As for the off centre seating, I'd imagine thats to be with in keeping with all other sportscar racing than anything else.

[PayasYouRace]

IIRC the delta wing was originated as a design for the new Indycar formula. It had specific goals and none of them were to compete against conventional cars. I'd like to see the concept racing in numbers, not just a single example against a conventional sports car field. Maybe open up a class for that configuration? Give it whatever power/weight restrictions you want but have a bunch of them competing with each other and see if the original goals of a cat that provides good racing can actually be achieved.

[MattPete]

I think the original idea was to make a low-cost Indycar.  Since thoroughbred engines were so expensive, Bowlby wondered if he could design a suitable car around production-based turbocharged 4 cylinders.  In race guise, they should be able to make around 300 bhp.

 

The problem was that if they used a conventional Indycar design, the cars would be too slow around Indy.  So Bowlby had to reduce drag.  Enclosing the wheels and getting rid of wings helped a lot, but there was still  too large of a frontal area.  Hmmm…what if he reduced the frontal area as much as he could?  Well, the car would understeer like a pig.  To get around that, he’d have to shift the majority of the weight to the back (where there were fat rear tires with a wide track width), and move the center of aerodynamic pressure to the back.  Massive ground effects tunnels in the rear solved that problem.

 

The end result was the Deltawing.

 

“We wanted to make a car that is twice as efficient in every way, it should use half the fuel, cost half as much, use half the engine power and weigh half as much yet still go as fast or even faster than a current Indycar” explained Bowlby at the cars launch.

 

[Dolph]

They'd be pissed if it wins, is what I was implying. I like it, but I don't like the idea of a team just petitioning IMSA or the ACO or whoever with an idea for a car that doesn't meet any of the existing rules but does have largely similar power/weight numbers or whatever.

 

I understand that this was born out of the Garage 56 thing, and IMSA wanted to push "Green Racing" when they allowed it in to the ALMS, but now that all that has fizzled out it is still racing as more of a novelty than anything else.

 

Like I said, I'd like to see it win, but I would also understand how the other teams that are racing to a given ruleset would be upset when they're beaten by a car that doesn't fit within any of the regulations except by special exception.
 

 

The only way its gonna win is if all the planets and stars are alligned. Its not gonna happen. And even if it did its not gonna be because the car has some advantage. Its because everyone else fell off the road and for some miraculous reason the DW didn't. The car is not enjoying an advantage.

[Imateria]

The only way its gonna win is if all the planets and stars are alligned. Its not gonna happen. And even if it did its not gonna be because the car has some advantage. Its because everyone else fell off the road and for some miraculous reason the DW didn't. The car is not enjoying an advantage.

I wouldn't say it's got an advantage, but did you not watch Daytona where it was the fastest car out on track for the first 4 hours before it's crash? If it can maintain that kind of pace at other races then a win is definitely not out of the question.

[BRG]

Maybe open up a class for that configuration? Give it whatever power/weight restrictions you want but have a bunch of them competing with each other and see if the original goals of a cat that provides good racing can actually be achieved.

That would be fair to the rest of the field.  But I am not sure how the class would be defined.  A maximum front track width?  Otherwise somebody entering a conventional chassis car would romp away from the cars handicapped by an ineffective front axle layout.

[Dolph]

I wouldn't say it's got an advantage, but did you not watch Daytona where it was the fastest car out on track for the first 4 hours before it's crash? If it can maintain that kind of pace at other races then a win is definitely not out of the question.

 

But it can't

[PayasYouRace]

That would be fair to the rest of the field. But I am not sure how the class would be defined. A maximum front track width? Otherwise somebody entering a conventional chassis car would romp away from the cars handicapped by an ineffective front axle layout.

Obviously the track widths and probably the weight distribution would have to be specified for there to be a class of them. You wouldn't be able to enter a conventional car in that class. That was the whole point of what I was getting at.

[BRG]

The fact that such a class would need to have such prescriptive specifications highlights just how daft the whole Deltawing concept is/was. A bit like forcing Usain Bolt to run in ski boots so as to slow him down so that obese competitors can keep up.

[ensign14]

Actually, it could be argued the other way around - why are the regulations so prescriptive for everything else?  In sportscar racing they ought maybe to go with "anything goes" so long as it is street legal and a passenger of regular size can fit in the other seat.  After all, the R18 is no more a "sportscar" than is a Peel P50.  Except it's less able to cope with speed humps and the Sainsburys car park.

[Dan333SP]

Obviously the track widths and probably the weight distribution would have to be specified for there to be a class of them. You wouldn't be able to enter a conventional car in that class. That was the whole point of what I was getting at.

 

I wonder if they would be? Say you have a maximum weight and horsepower cap. Would the DW be competitive with conventionally laid out cars built to those general constraints? If nothing else, it should be capable of higher top speeds given its low drag. At least having a class where it succeeds as a concept on merit rather than being a single exception to the ruleset would make things interesting and allow the team to "prove" the car in a way that isn't contrived. 

[Kalmake]

They should make a class for ~600kg cars. I'd love to see them have a go against Radicals for example. Call it Petit Le Mans.

[asdf24]

http://www.autoblog....design-lawsuit/

Has this lawsuit gone anywhere?

[Imateria]

But it can't

Why?

[PayasYouRace]

The fact that such a class would need to have such prescriptive specifications highlights just how daft the whole Deltawing concept is/was. A bit like forcing Usain Bolt to run in ski boots so as to slow him down so that obese competitors can keep up.

The concept was never for it to race against conventional cars. That's what I'm getting at. It's never been tested as a means of providing good racing at a reasonable cost. A field of them might provide a competitive and entertaining race, but we've only ever seen a single example BoPed into a conventional field.