The unofficial auto thread

[Vindekarr]

By popular request I'm opening this thread. There's been two kinds of requests, firstly there's the lovers, who want a place to talk about this sort of thing, and the uhm, normal people, who find our constantly blathering about things they don't understand irritating and wish we would just go away. So here it is! a thread where you can wax-lyrical about the virtues or a flat-planed crank shaft or discuss the intricacies of variable valve timing, without a single normal person telling you you're kookoo. Enjoy.

 

The only worthwhile news I can contribute this weekend is this:

 

Bikes: Jorge Lorenzo, who had been a major contender for this year's world championship has had his hopes and bones mashed into a fine powder, after the grumpy Spaniard went head-over-handlebars while practicing for tommorow's Assen TT. Lorenzo was not seriously injured, but did sustain a broken collarbone. He is probably in hospital counting his lucky stars right now, given in most of his previous races at Assen, someone else has smashed into him and turned both him, and his hopes of victory, into red paste.

 

Endurance: Le Mans has been and gone, and we've all lost a great driver in Allan Simonsen. This leaves Australia's Tekno racing deprived of a driver for this year's Bathurst 1000, the country's most prestigious race. Meanwhile, Australian Formula One ace Mark Webber, has announced his retirement from the sport will coincide with a new Porsche factory team, sponsored by megacorp Red Bull, to race in the 2014 LM24.

 

F-1: Not much to report yet, save that Mark Webber has announced his retirement at the end of this year's season. Webber waved-off claims that a fued had developed between he and his Red Bull team, citing that this had been planned as his last season since late last year and that he would continue racing with the brand, albeit in the World Sports Car Championship(WSCC) for 2014-on, driving for Porsche's factory team.

 

Semi-related idiocy: An old stereotype claims Australians are stupid, or if not stupid, then totally mad. This stereotype was only further cemented when a crazed engineer from Australia's Holden car company stormed around the Nurburgring in a pickup truck, trying to claim the all-time pickup truck lap record. Me, I've never heard of that record, but his time, 8:19:47, is pretty impressive for a deranged engineer in a hideously outdated, poorly made two-ton farmer's car. A pity it's still a whole 12 seconds slower than the current record for a stock hatchback.

Edited June 28, 2013 by Vindekarr

[Lisnpuppy]

Thank you Vindekarr....I would like to continue our conversation here about the Le Mans race issue we were discussing. Feel free to cut and paste your other response and we can go from there if you don't mind.

:thumbsup:

[Vindekarr]

So, here's a video of what happens when you take a mad-dog Aussie, a two-ton pickup truck, the world's most dangerous race track, and then tell him to go break the lap record.

 

http://news.drive.com.au/drive/motor-news/holden-sets-nurburgring-lap-record-20130628-2p0nq.html

 

Simple really, you get two-tons of tomato-red Aussie farmer's car, flying through the air at nearly 160 MPH. Great stuff, seriously crazy and seriously dangerous, but still absolutely awesome

 

But yeah, I don't really know what they can do about GT, it's a bad catch-22. GT3 cars are fundamentally, modified road cars, and therin lies the appeal. These are not too different from cars you can(if you're Clive Palmer) go out and buy. Their engines particularly, are closely based on the road version, and for the most part this gives great racing-watching a McLaren MP4 racing a Porsche 911 RSR and a Dodge Viper is not only a battle between three of my all time favourite cars, it's also good racing since they're all fairly similar to their stock versions, and carry over their unique strengths-the Viper's insane torque and forgiving handling, the 911's natural agility, and the McLaren's supreme tech.

 

Sadly this comes at a cost to safety. While the McLaren has a similar ultra-safe and nearly indestructible carbon/aluminium shell to protect it's driver(because all McLaren cars are made entirely from carbon) it's a very safe car indeed-you'd need an insanely hard hit to bust into the cockpit, and the modern harnesses and HANS(a small carbon plate you attach to your neck, one of the best safety innovations of the 21st century, saved hundreds of driver's lives, AND dirt cheap to boot) mean the G-forces are atleast survivable. Sadly of all the GT cars, only the McLaren and to a lesser degree the Viper have that sort of ultra-strength crash structure, and that's a big problem. That structure not only saves lives, it VASTLY enhances your handling aswell(the stiffer the chassis the better the suspension works)

 

Unfortunately if you apply that to all GT cars, then they'll lose any ressemblance to their production cousins. Of the assorted GT cars, ONLY the McLaren has a full crash-box; adding it into other cars would modify them so far beyond stock they'd literally have nothing to do with their road-counterparts-they wouldn't even look remotely like them, in essence, they'd be prototypes under the skin and you'd lose everything GT currently has going for it; affordability and a close relationship with road cars.

 

So what can we do? well right now I don't see a way, within the rules and budgets of GT, to improve safety. There's a new Corvette next year, a new Audi is coming, and a new Mercedes, all of these will have immensely improved chassis, and the Viper that debuted at Le Mans this year has similar advances. it WILL get safer, but until metal is dispensed with entirely like in the McLaren, there's still going to be a risk.

 

Barriers? I think that's the easiest way to make things better, though if I were the ACO-and this might just be sacrilege-I'd remove Tertre Rouge corner entirely. Maybe stick in a tyrewall chicane or make the corners before it a little slower. It's mainly a track issue and while Tertre Rouge is probably one of Le Man's most noteworthy corners, we've had a slew of bad accidents there in the recent past and we may just have to trade tradition for safety.

[Lisnpuppy]

My question at the Le Mans was the barrier as soon as we saw it. It seems with that corner being such a high speed one that barrier was ridiculously out of date with current tech. Wouldn't hurt to put a little chicane (sp?) right before that corner

 

On an off-note...I hope Mark Webber doesn't flip the Porsche like he did the Mercedes! lol

[Phalanx108]

Taking this conversation down to the personal level:

 

Sad days are upon CC and myself. His old workhorse Commodore (1996 VS Series II Wagon), has died.

Travelling a total of 428,540KM before the engine developed a horrible knock, she was truly an example of how reliable the old Commodores were. Only major mechanical fault was one of the "coil packs" that control cylinders 3-6 failed, causing a heavy misfire issue. Easy to fix.

Often driven hard and fast, while being very much looked after mechanically, the old V6 started developing a severe knock on startup and at about 3,500RPM. When getting inspected by professionals, it turned out that at least one big end bearing was completely shot, and such was the source of the knocking.

A shame, but we decided to retire the car after noticing some quite obvious dings and scrapes on the bodywork, the paint cancer starting to appear on the bonnet, and the fact that all up repairs would be the equivalent of a newer car. The Ecotec Engine isn't really easy to come by at a good cost due to all the idiots thrashing them, and so wreckers start charging more for them etc.

 

Anyway, time for a new workhorse to replace the old. Sad days indeed, as many good times and long road trips were had in the old girl.

http://i.imgur.com/buApeFk.jpg <- Odometer reading

Edited June 28, 2013 by Phalanx108

[Vindekarr]

*sigh* know that feel Phalanx, my granddad has a '94 Berlina that still runs fine. Crazy, sure, he doesn't drive it much-but that the thing is still alive at all is incredible, he lives up in central coast QLD, so I expect it it suffurs a lot from both coal dust and rust. Dunno milieage, I know it's been a daily drive since I was a crawler.

 

I myself have an '06 Land-Rover Discovery 5-door as my main car, it's grey, and as bad as Rover's reputation is for reliability, I've never seen a car that has seemed better bolted together. Driving it feels like driving around in a big Humvee-not because of the size, but because of how tough and utilitarian it is. It's a tough, no-frills offroader, and that's why I like it, as a work car it's perfect since I live in country vic and often visit farms/go down fire trails. Replace it? it's done about 150,000 KMs but I'm just going to wait until something is actually wrong with it-country it's literally in near-new condition. I'd go back to Land Rover, gladly, I don't know how representative it is, but this thing's been an absolute fortress.

[JimboUK]

My question at the Le Mans was the barrier as soon as we saw it. It seems with that corner being such a high speed one that barrier was ridiculously out of date with current tech. Wouldn't hurt to put a little chicane (sp?) right before that corner

 

On an off-note...I hope Mark Webber doesn't flip the Porsche like he did the Mercedes! lol

 

There should have at least been a tyre wall there, the one at that corner was far too short, a tyre wall would have reduced the impact greatly, just look at the frame, that must have been one hell of an impact...

 

http://i.imgur.com/pKQzQNZ.jpg

[Thor.]

This is a great thing you are doing, you should get in depth with that awesome win at Nurburgring, that must have some interesting crashes and close calls ehh, and stories to tell. :cool:

Edited June 28, 2013 by Thor.

[Lisnpuppy]

My question at the Le Mans was the barrier as soon as we saw it. It seems with that corner being such a high speed one that barrier was ridiculously out of date with current tech. Wouldn't hurt to put a little chicane (sp?) right before that corner

 

On an off-note...I hope Mark Webber doesn't flip the Porsche like he did the Mercedes! lol

 

There should have at least been a tyre wall there, the one at that corner was far too short, a tyre wall would have reduced the impact greatly, just look at the frame, that must have been one hell of an impact...

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

Yeah it was a bad impact as that place is so very fast. The car actually went up onto its front also and I just don't think that guy had a chance with head injury.

I mean the idea of those barriers is 1) to protect people 2) to protect drivers

 

Having a barrier that would dissipate more energy when hit would be much safe I would think. I realize that Le Mans is not just a track but actual public use road but I don't think that it would interfere with anything to have a removable section/tire wall there that they could replace for the race. Even changing the road or adding the chicane would not impede that area of road.

 

I am sure many people would have issue with that, saying that this is an inherent risk of racing. However I disagree when time after time there are accidents here...serious ones at that.

 

(sure can tell who is American and who is European by the "tire" vs "tyre" lol)

[Vindekarr]

In some breaking F-1 news, the FIA has announced the FULL 2014-2020 rule set, and I'll post the major changes below, aswell as sending you the link the official change notes.

 

1: You now only get FIVE engines per car per year and engines must last a certain distance before being changed. Changing an engine before it hits the required mileage results in instant demotion to last place on the grid and a start from pit lane. Furthermore new rules also cover the vastly more complicated internals-changing the KERS, turbo, KERS battery, or ECU will now result in a ten-place grid penalty.

 

2: A bunch of rule changes governing testing. Teams can now test as early as January, on track, with extra track-days. During the year there will be four more days of testing at tracks of the team's choosing, allowing a return of the mid-season testing of the '70s and '80s. Teams can now share wind-tunnels and testing resources. Crash-safety parts are now standardised across all cars, VASTLY resducing costs and developement times while increasing safdety due to some frankly inspired and ingenius new concepts.

 

3: Step-noses were designed to circumvent an FIA rule change and have been totally banned in every way. Good riddance to ugly noses. The new cars will have much lower noses more along the lines of a car from the early '90s

 

4: The cars are 5 KGs heavier, have horsepower, and radically less downforce. They will be far twitchier and harder to drive, but a LOT more powerful. Because of the new turbo engines disliking low speeds, the pit lane speed limit is now 80 KPH.

 

5: Drivers who break the rules now get "points" on their licence that last 12 months. Get 12 points, and you are banned from the next race. Harsh, but it should keep total morons like Romain Grosjean who can't even drive in a straight line without hitting someone and then blaming them, HOPEFULLY, on the sidelines.

 

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/6/14718.html

Edited June 29, 2013 by Vindekarr