10 replies to this topic

[wingsbgone]

Okay, before you respond with, "which configuration?" or "MS 2001, X:yy.zz", my proposal is this:

Which race vehicle would post the shortest lap time around the current Spa configuration, assuming the best driver possible for the vehicle. My intent is to see what everyone thinks would be the "fastest" race vehicle (1993 Williams? 1974(?) 917? ...).

Sub section "B": What would be the fastest hybrid vehicle (ie. Porsche 5.4l tt from a 917-50 in a lengthened F1 chassis, or 3.5l F1 motor in a F2001 chassis). Please keep the combos as feasible as possible. This is where things will get a bit hairy...

I will now step aside and let the action commence.

[wati]

Originally posted by muppet
It would have to be this year's Ferrari F1 fitted with slick qualifying tyres from 3 seasons ago. Just look at the lap times, year on year.

Your "hybrid" question is fascinating. I think the fastest combo would be the Newey-designed active suspension Williams chassis that Mansell used to win the championship in 92, with Ford's 1987 F1 GBA 1400hp V6 turbo shoehorned in the back. That really would be a pretty good handful. It would blitz anything.

Although Ford got into the turbo engine stuff late, the GBA in its final few races was the easily the class engine of the field. Unfortunately it was all too late for Ford. Next year the FIA banned turbos....

2001 grooved tyres are faster than 1997 slicks.

1993 williams was faster than 1992, and ford's turbo was far bigger than 1993 renault engine. It had far higher COG, don't think it could go faster than today's cars.

Wattie

[wingsbgone]

muppet- I didn't take into account tires. How about we stick (pun intended) with the tires the vehicle would have been required to run with/on at the time. We can move tires to the hybrid discussion.

for the hybrid- What about this year's Ferrari (with some mods), with a 3.5l motor? Assuming the 3.5 would put out more bhp than the 3.0, think it would be faster?. And what about a lighter, earlier version for the chassis/monocoque? And utilizing the larger slicks from a few years back (was it 3 years ago they were reduced in width?)?
I like the '93 fully electronic Williams, with a CART engine from a few years ago. Actually, I'd HATE the effect of the t/c, but if it's speed we're after, then t/c it is. And for an ultimate hybrid, how about an active ride, fully skirted (or even vaccuum-assisted) chassis, with an enclosed body (ie. Pugeot 905 Group C), and a maximum boost CART engine??? I think the biggest challenge would be to find a driver to take it to its limit (Jacques, are you out there??).

As a side note, I recall an incident at Montreal several years back during one of the last Group C races. A car actually sucked a man-hole cover up and onto the track. Race had to be stopped, then eventually terminated! Now that was some serious negative pressure.....

[Yelnats]

The fastest existing car would be the 2001 Ferrari with all the ballast removed running on modern versions of the old 1 lap qualifying slicks with Michael Schumacher at the wheel.

The fastest Hybrid woulld be a streamlined version of this car with enclosed wheels and full "contact" undertray and active wings. It is not practical to stick any old engine in a modern F1 car and introduce radical suspension changes, as it would be simpler to engineer a completly new vehicle. So I have stuck to the existing engine (and suspension) but internally modified it with berryllium (and whatever other mods that the FIA has banned) to increase it's power to the 1000 HP range.

This should knock a good ten seconds off the 2001 lap times but Michael would need to strengthen his neck as cornering forces at Eau Rouge would be in the 5 G range! (existing is 3.5G)

[scarbs]

Section A
Keke rosberg in the Williams Honda (86 I recall) as they did the fastest ever Silverstone lap...

Section B
As I see it you need all the elements not just chassis engine. so; Chassis, engine, gearbox, tyres, fuel, driver aids and suspension, plus the driver. If you can build the car then resurrecting senns should be no problem...!
Full ground effects are needed, dont mistake yourself that because flat bottom cars are now faster that they're better than big venturis along the sids of the car. A Turbo is need to make the most of the grip from the chassis about 1500bhp on Q boost and super fuel should do it, sticky tyres to et the power to the road via the best gearbox, driver aids and active suspension we can find. MMC brakes with power asssit to help slow it all down into the bus stop chicane. Perhaps we might need a G suit for the driver as well.....

Heres the full spec

Lotus 88 double chassis full ground effect aerodynamics
Most effective design for maximising downforce and keep the JPS colour scheme, may need a new moulded monocoque over the Cut and shut original, we'll ask John Barnard to knock it up as well as some carbon uprights.

Honda V6 Turbo engine
Most powerful turbo engine.

Recent full soft slick tyres
Only just hard enough to last one warm up lap and one hot lap.

Early nineties super fuel
Well you can't call it petrol.

Ferrari 2001 driver aids and 7 speed gearbox
To put the power to the road most effectively.

Williams Active Suspension (on both Lotus chassis)
To help the aerodynamics work.

Pre 80Gpa ruling Carbon brakes from AP and Carbone Industrie
The best yet.

Ayrton Senna driving
One of the fastest recent driver, perhaps the best ever 1 hot lap driver.

[Ben]

I'd definitely go with the Lotus T88 without active, if you haven't got the edition of Racecar with Wright's article on it you're missing out on the best explaination of the car ever published.

However if you are going to run active you wouldn't need the twin chassis because they were designed to do the same job, active does it better.

You'd need power assisted brakes (as run by McLaren and Williams(also had 4-channel ABS)), otherwise the driver wouldn't be able to put enough energy into the brake system without a huge travel to use the front half of the g-g diagram at high speed.

Let's throw in a CVT while we're at it.

Ben

[mhferrari]

Imagine if you could pull a Mercedes and make a streamliner version?

I would agree that power brakes would be in order.

I would put Senna in the cockpit, by far the master of qualifying, especially with qualifying tires.

[jetsetjim]

I think you will find that this year's cars have broken several outright lap records this year, most notably at Suzuka, which hasn't changed since 1993...

I think that pretty much answers the questions.

[imaginesix]

'A':
I don't get it. Clearly the 2001 Ferrari, as it posted the fastest race lap and overall race time over any of the past 20 or so years on a similar configuration. It only missed out on pole due to rain. Simple, no?

'B':
Ingredients:
-The front clip of the Tyrell P34 6-wheeler;
-The rear clip of the Williams 6-wheeler;
-Full ground effects with blower from the Brabham BT46 in the middle;
-Full active suspension from the Williams FW14B tying it all together;
-All-wheel steering (Williams and Benetton experimented with it.)
-The BMW Turbo 4-cylinder 1500hp qualifying engine driving the 3rd axle (should be impossible to break traction anyways).
-Radiant cooling system also from the Brabham BT46 (only has to last one lap);
The only problem is finding someone able to withstand the forces for one lap, who also doesn't value his life at all.

[Schummy]

I have heard Japan F3000 equivalent used super soft slick tyres and could corner faster than F1 in (I assume in medium-slow corners). Could they be the best racing tyres available today in "legal" racing?

I'm going to ask some complementary question about this Spa "challenge":

What kind of car would be faster in Spa, open cars or closed cars? Let's say, if you are going to freely design (without reglament) a car to lap Spa, would be it open or close?

There would be any limit in HP for a freely designed car to lap Spa, in the sense that above that HP amount it would not go any faster. I know in 500cc FIM bikes they are stucks in lap times for years as tyres seems to be unable to channel all the HPs those bikes produce.

My humble participation:

Section A: I assume current F1 car are the faster cars today around a regular road track (and by a healthy margin). Then I support 2001 Ferrari is the faster legal racing car thru Spa today.

[desmo]

Full envelope bodywork would definitely be the way to go, the open wheel concept is, to me, a simple nod to tradition (of course ignoring past GP/F1 envelope bodied cars) and no engineer in his right mind would ever consider an open wheel design given a clean sheet to design on.