24 hours of Le Mans 2014

Jonny69

Jonny69

Jonny69

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I don't think we have a thread for this year's Le Mans yet. It's 15/16 June and the countdown has begun with cars being unveiled, rumours about 2015 and technology being showcased.

The usual links:

Main site:

http://www.24h-lemans.com/en/

Wikipedia links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/24_Hours_of_Le_Mans

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_24_Hours_of_Le_Mans

Radio Le Mans for live commentary during the race from John Hindhaugh et al. and regular podcasts leading up to the event:

http://www.radiolemans.com/

It doesn't look like there is a full entry list yet, but off the top of my head LMP1 will be Audi diesel hybrid vs. Toyota petrol hybrid and new petrol hybrid entry from Porsche. GT class sees a completely new Corvette car. Garage 56 entry is a wild hybrid loosely based on the Deltawing with a 400hp 1.5 litre 3 cylinder and, uh, that's about all I know for now :D
 
Audi revealed their new LMP1 car a month or so ago: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/111780

audi_1.jpg


Porsche called their LMP car the 919. Not a lot of information out there yet other than it'll be packing a 2 litre hybrid direct injected petrol and will be driven by Mark Webber. Some links to keep an eye on:

http://www.24h-lemans.com/en/news/l...mp1-driver-squad-complete_2_2_1746_13504.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porsche_919_hybrid

Having said that, there's quite a lot about it on this link and some cool pics: http://www.racecar-engineering.com/cars/porsche-919/

porsche_1.jpg


porsche_2.jpg


The Garage 56 car is the Nissan Zeod RC. I'm pretty sure it was originally rumoured to be all-electric, but it is in fact a hybrid with enough battery power to get it round a whole lap on its electric motors. The engine side is a 400hp 1.5 litre turbocharged inline 3 cylinder allegedly weighing only 40kg. There's a cool 360 degree animation of the engine here: https://www.facebook.com/NissanZEODRC

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_ZEOD_RC

zeod_1.jpg


zeod_2.jpg
 
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Skeeter said:
From what I can tell they will use regenerative braking and other recovery tech to collect enough electricity per stint to do 1 lap on electric power.
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Yeah I'm starting to like it less and less if that's the case.

P1. If porsche are going to run a whole season then they might actually be competitive by Le Mans. Could be good.
 
Listening to Radio Le Mans through last year, the GTE Porsche (and previously the GT2) was not designed or built by Porsche and doesn't much resemble the GT3 which is based on the road car built by Porsche. Porsche hasn't had a lot to do with actual endurance racing other than building the GT3. They didn't have a factory entry either, but kind of endorsed the GTE car to be built by this third party. When they canned support to the GTE project to concentrate on the LMP1 car they irritated a lot of racers who were depending on having the car to carry on racing in GT. Flying Lizard for example. Audisport were interviewed on RLM and maintained that they wouldn't be sharing secrets and that the car and team would be completely different and that they were a competitor in their eyes. There probably have been a few words of wisdom, but this is basically a brand new team.
 
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lunarwolf said:
any idea of what each team has for a budget?
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Back in about 2006/2007 the event became very dominated by Audi branding and it was clear that they were pouring money into the event. Rumours went round that they were spending ~€100million per year. Pescarolo, the privateers who came second that year (whichever year it was :D), had a budget of ~€12million for comparison.
 
Le Mans budgets are traditionally quite small. I blagged a pit pass one year and ended up in the Corvette pit talking to the guys. Even them as a factory team with a big budget were made up of a large number of unpaid volunteers. The guy who was driving the little quad/trailer thing to collect their tyres wasn't even a car guy, he was a journalist writing about Le Mans. That 100m figure from Audi was way higher than anyone had ever been spending at Le Mans. For everyone else it's a lot of hard graft from a lot of people who are really into it.

In-car shot from the Corvette C7R night testing at Daytona 24:


**** me that acceleration out the pits is brutal :eek:
 
^ So some of the teams have driven their alternators off a 'turbocharger' so as not to draw mechanical power off the engine. I think you might also be able to do this if you run in a non-turbocharged class. Obviously running an alternator off a turbocharger you're relying on as a compressor would slow the turbo down, so running an auxiliary turbine makes sense to me.

But yes, it is quite different to what Audi have hinted they will be using. Have they actually announced what it will be yet?
 
Porsche 919 livery "leaked". It's going top be at Geneva motor show according to this article: http://www.autoevolution.com/news/porsche-919-lmp1-leaked-in-le-mans-livery-77893.html

Speaking of Porsches, I was quite surprised to see on Top Gear last night that the 918 supercar didn't sound like it shared much with the 919 despite the 918 being a petrol hybrid. Same goes for Audi, I guess, because they've never released a big hyperdiesel.

Was looking for any news on the Toyota TS040 and stumbled across this Ferrari prototype, presumably for next year's return: http://www.motorauthority.com/news/1089568_mystery-ferrari-race-car-prototype-spy-shots

If it is, they are getting started VERY early!

Toyota seem to be ramping up the publicity this year with teaser shots, a soundclip of the new engine running and now it looks like a teaser video: http://blog.toyota.co.uk/toyota-ts040-hybrid-teaser-video

There's some good stuff on the Audi on this site too: http://www.autoblog.com/2013/12/12/audi-r18-e-tron-quattro-racer-secondary-hybrid-diesel/

Mainly interested in that hybrid system. It's got it's normal flywheel hybrid system but the heat energy recovery is designed to power an electric turbocharger! Awesome!
 
SRT Vipers have pulled out: http://sportscar365.com/lemans/lemans24/srt-vipers-set-for-withdrawl-from-le-mans/

Not sorry to see them go as they're homologated and don't really fit in the regs, but it's sort of sad to see them replaced by two more Ferraris. GTE is already quite heavily subscribed with Ferraris imo and it would have been nice to see some more variation. I guess it's no different to the Porsche's of Le Mans past though.
 
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