Diesels @ Le Mans - A Sniffpetrol perspective

[oldtimer]

Point well noted about full grids making for a competitive race.  However I suspect we're going to see four ultra expensive Audi's and Peugeot's, and a bunch of grid filler.
Fax

Yep - suspect you are right about this year, but success will spawn imitators.  It may take a couple of seasons (or maybe more?) before full competitive grids are achieved but I reckon it is inevitable.

Did you get to carve up the hills above the Ohio river then..?

[mgmark]

 I may well co-drive a diesel powered beastie, but I do like hearing a good racing petrol engine on full noise as much as the next man or woman, but a lot of the change in direction is down to marketing and the environmental side of the house.  In our Off-Road Championship, aside from it being increasingly difficult to find good venues, the use of bio fuels is positively encouraged.  This year, the first 3-day BAJA GB was held succsessfully and the FIA have now sanctioned it as an international round from next year.  A quote from the organisers "Sustainability will be a priority for us in devising and arranging the event and, in particular, bio fuels, already being used by some UK competitors, will be encouraged.”   Much more difficult getting bio-petrol than bio-diesel, hence the popluarity of using diesel, although Nasamax did a fine job of using bio-ethanol from purely bio sources, rather than a 5% mix of something biological with 95% non-biological, which is what most of those running so called "bio-fuels" are doing.   Oh, and the UK government taxes bio-ethanol as alcohol, which makes it prety unviable economically on its own.   All a sign of the times methinks,

MG Mark   

[Boorish Grobian]

Oldtimer, yeah, got out for a few hours until the rains came.  Temperatures that are tolerable on a motorbike in the dry quickly become miserable when it gets damp.  However this time of year one has to grab every opportunity you can to get a ride in, because once winter really sets in, there no riding until almost April.
On the subject of the oil burners, I suppose if the new breed of sports-racers turn out to be something exciting to watch I'll probably change my tune pretty quickly.  I freely admit that much of my opinion is coloured by my dislike of the R10.  As I said before, despite all the bells, whistles, & technology involved, it left me cold as a stone when I saw it at Sebring.
Fax

[mgmark]

On the subject of the oil burners, I suppose if the new breed of sports-racers turn out to be something exciting to watch I'll probably change my tune pretty quickly.  I freely admit that much of my opinion is coloured by my dislike of the R10.  As I said before, despite all the bells, whistles, & technology involved, it left me cold as a stone when I saw it at Sebring.
Fax

Fax,

I know it's difficult to get excited by a quiet whisper when compared to a good rip-snorting exhaust blast from a good petrol V8, V10 or V12.  Like you can't.   But what I enjoyed with the R10 was watching them last year at Arnage during qualifying in the wet.   Virtually all of the other cars were pulling away from Arnage and heading to the Porsche curves kicking up the spray but stuttering, banging, and popping with constant wheelspin through all the gears, despite short shifting.  The R10s were just soooo much faster through and out of that corner compared to the others.   You didn't need a stopwatch to see the gulf of a difference, in pretty abysmal conditions.  Quite aside from the powerplant choice, seeing something that is so well sorted in terms of suspension, drivetrain etc rattling through the corners gets my respect, even if it does not make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up....and it sets a bar for the petrol cars to aim at.  The relative lack of noise may have something to do with the filtering that is needed post-combustion so that it runs with no visible smoke, although the latter probably has as much to do with using Gas-to-Liquid refined diesel.  Mind you the R8 wasn't exactly the noisiest thing on the block either.

MG Mark   

[termietermite]

Sad thing is Mark, I don't want to respect a car - it needs to make my heart thump - that's the problem.

[mgmark]

Sad thing is Mark, I don't want to respect a car - it needs to make my heart thump - that's the problem.

I know - I hesitated in using the "love" word....stiff upper lip and all that y'know.   I love the sound that the Judd V10 makes.  I love the sound of the Ascari, Corvettes and Ferraris.  I love the sound that the McLaren made.  I love the sound that the Mazda 787 made..... The only way a diesel stirs the soul is when it is emitting a guttural, visceral noise from a pretty much unsilenced main battle tank, with 1200+ bhp under its engine covers, when its dark and its coming towards you out of the woods.  And there's more than one of them.   That sends a shiver down my spine every time, because it must be what pre-historic man felt like when he heard a pack of carnivorous dinosaurs callling...... Poetic enough?

MG Mark

[termietermite]

Ah, Mark, I could almost have been there....

Still cannot imagine what that first practice session on Wednesday afternoon will be like when we pop open the bottle of fizz and wait for the pit lane lights to turn green and 55 cars rev the bejasus out of their engines - and they're all bl**dy deisels (even if the Termites do run 3 oil burners) - damp squib or what?

[Steve Pyro]

Yes, I have to say, the only diesel engines that ever got my heart pounding were the 2 stroke slow speed diesel engines I looked after when I was in the merchant navy.
They varied from 550mm to 900mm bore size, about 2000mm stroke and between 6 and 10 cylinders - giving from 15,000 to 35,000 shaft horsepower.

THATS a diesel engine 

[LangTall]

And also worth the name power plant.