this is just posturing.
it's crazy to try to have rules that don't provide an advantage to either side when you allow open and closed cockpits in the same class. it's pretty darn impossible.
that said, this just comes off as the closed cockpit teams whining that they don't get their power advantage anymore. personally, i don't see why they should. they have a little bit more weight, and a little less drag. seems pretty fair to me. i don't understand why they say they need to run air conditioning. why? the open cockpit drivers don't have little a/c units in their helmets, just vents. put a couple little vents in the car.
(10-15-2009 03:17 PM)frankdouglason Wrote: [ -> ]this is just posturing.
it's crazy to try to have rules that don't provide an advantage to either side when you allow open and closed cockpits in the same class. it's pretty darn impossible.
that said, this just comes off as the closed cockpit teams whining that they don't get their power advantage anymore. personally, i don't see why they should. they have a little bit more weight, and a little less drag. seems pretty fair to me. i don't understand why they say they need to run air conditioning. why? the open cockpit drivers don't have little a/c units in their helmets, just vents. put a couple little vents in the car.
They are required to run air conditioning because it is a driver saftey issue. If drivers are exposed to high temperatures for prolonged periods of time they are more likely to get heat stroke which may cause an accident on the race track. Current ACO regulations state if the ambient temperature reaches 35*C for more then 15min or if it peaks at 43*C the car must pit and will not be released until the car has cooled off. This is a major problem in the middle east where the LMS runs a few rounds of it's championship.
i get that temperature is a safety issue. i just don't understand why open cockpit drivers can get by with just some wind blowing through their helmets and the closed cockpit drivers can't. why are vents not good enough?
(10-15-2009 03:44 PM)frankdouglason Wrote: [ -> ]i get that temperature is a safety issue. i just don't understand why open cockpit drivers can get by with just some wind blowing through their helmets and the closed cockpit drivers can't. why are vents not good enough?
Because the vents needed to make a closed cockpit car cool enough would have to be massive - creating a ton of drag. Then you'd need fans or tubes to direct copious amounts of fresh air into the vents in the drivers' helmets.
At that point, you'd just go back to building an open cockpit racer.
but they could make use of that by controlling where the exhaust vents send the air that is pulled in. they could funnel it into the diffuser, allowing them to run lower wing profiles.
i just think they're being whiners instead of designing around the problem.
(10-15-2009 06:37 PM)frankdouglason Wrote: [ -> ]but they could make use of that by controlling where the exhaust vents send the air that is pulled in. they could funnel it into the diffuser, allowing them to run lower wing profiles.
i just think they're being whiners instead of designing around the problem.
It takes money to design around the problem. The ACO is very much "privatier" driven; besides Audi and the french team there are no real major manufactures involved in the sport. The ACO also doesn't want to turn the LMS into F1 where billions are spent to improve the cars by 10ths and 100ths.
are any teams running coupes other than peugeot and aston martin-prodrive? because i don't feel too bad for them having to spend a little money developing their car. when i think of privateers i think of dyson or lola chassis.
(10-15-2009 09:15 PM)frankdouglason Wrote: [ -> ]are any teams running coupes other than peugeot and aston martin-prodrive? because i don't feel too bad for them having to spend a little money developing their car. when i think of privateers i think of dyson or lola chassis.
There are a lot of Lola LMP1 and LMP2 coupes on the gird (RML for example), and even the Aston Martin is a Lola LMP1 customer car with some minor Aston Martin areo modifications on the front of the car. The only 2 real manufactures are Puegot and Audi. Everyone else is a privateer with a customer car.
Oreca, Ginetta, Lola, Courage are all the real independent constructors and even at that Puegeot doesn't even build their own cars because they don't have composite capabilaties Dalarra actually constructs the cars for them.