WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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Callum
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Joined: 18 Jan 2009, 15:03
Location: Edinburgh, Scotland

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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zonk wrote:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdI93V8ZAtk

Free practice 1Fri 2nd May - 09h00
Free practice 2Fri 2nd May - 14h15
Qualifying Fri 2nd May - 19h20
RaceSat Sat 3rd May - 14h30

Just a quick note, I believe the race starts 1430 Belgian time. Which is 1330 BST.

zonk
zonk
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Joined: 17 Jun 2010, 00:56

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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Yup 14:30 CET

zonk
zonk
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Joined: 17 Jun 2010, 00:56

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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WhiteBlue wrote:
zonk wrote:
WhiteBlue wrote:WEC 2014 is shaping up nicely. I may be inclined to shell out 20 € for the races.
No need for that.

Go to http://members.fiawec.com/

Click on signup, fill the details. Then it opens the payment site.

Close it, go to http://members.fiawec.com/ and see the live coverage.

Quali Live stream starts 19:20 Gmt + 02:00
Are you saying it works without payment. Th last time I tried for Silverstone it did not work for me until I paid. So I have now decided to pay for the season. It should be cheaper if I want to see all the races.
Still works.

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Nebhotep
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Joined: 11 Jan 2009, 10:46
Location: Bacau, Romania

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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zonk wrote:
WhiteBlue wrote:WEC 2014 is shaping up nicely. I may be inclined to shell out 20 € for the races.
No need for that.

Go to http://members.fiawec.com/

Click on signup, fill the details. Then it opens the payment site.

Close it, go to http://members.fiawec.com/ and see the live coverage.

Quali Live stream starts 19:20 Gmt + 02:00
Thanks! It works for me so far.

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Bomber_Pilot
20
Joined: 28 Jan 2011, 14:19

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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Very good race so far. Too bad for the damper problems on the #20 Porsche.

zonk
zonk
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Joined: 17 Jun 2010, 00:56

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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WhiteBlue
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Joined: 14 Apr 2008, 20:58
Location: WhiteBlue Country

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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Another win for Toyota. Porsche fast but too fragile. They are still leaning. But it is easier to make a fast car reliable than a slower car faster. So WEC is still very fascinating and Le Mans will be a huge event. I just can't believe the Audi people got it so wrong with the technology balancing.
Formula One's fundamental ethos is about success coming to those with the most ingenious engineering and best .............................. organization, not to those with the biggest budget. (Dave Richards)

Sombrero
Sombrero
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Joined: 22 Feb 2012, 20:18

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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Very good coverage. The WEC is the best championship for hybrid racecars. I hope Spa stays in the WEC calendar. Could you imagine a 12h of Spa-Francorchamps before the 24h of Le Mans ? That would be something ! Well done Toyota !

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machin
162
Joined: 25 Nov 2008, 14:45

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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WhiteBlue wrote: I just can't believe the Audi people got it so wrong with the technology balancing.
It does seem a bit weird... However, in the latest version of RCE, Thomas Laudenbach (head of Audi Sport's Hybrid division) claims that they could have gone for 4MJ without going over the minimum weight limit, but they wouldn't be able to achieve the optimum weight distribution, and they're still claiming to hold the reliability card.

There might be something in that last comment... the #1 Audi was able to hold off the #7 Toyota at the end... which may be down to a diminishing hybrid system performance from the Toyota at the end of the race.... but I do wonder if it was actually simply down to a difference in drivers...? The #8 Toyota was able to continually put in really fast laps, whereas the #7 seemed to drop off the pace at the end....

Shame about the #14 Porsche's stuttery couple of laps mid-race.... could have been right in there....
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tomazy
tomazy
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Joined: 10 Jan 2006, 13:01

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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WhiteBlue wrote: I just can't believe the Audi people got it so wrong with the technology balancing.
I think that the late change in that balancing is really hurting Audi. The rules changed after Audi allready homologised there car, if I remmember correctly. They got less fuel for stint and less fuel for the lap then they tought when they decided on a 2MJ option (petrol 6MJ cars got more of both). This change could throw the power to fuel efficiancy ratio of there diesel engine out of the window.

Huntresa
Huntresa
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Joined: 03 Dec 2011, 11:33

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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Some nice 25-30km/h advantage on the straights for Toyota vs Audi.

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machin
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Joined: 25 Nov 2008, 14:45

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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tomazy wrote:I think that the late change in that balancing is really hurting Audi. The rules changed after Audi allready homologised there car, if I remmember correctly. They got less fuel for stint and less fuel for the lap then they tought when they decided on a 2MJ option (petrol 6MJ cars got more of both). This change could throw the power to fuel efficiancy ratio of there diesel engine out of the window.
I don't think it is a question of petrol vs. diesel balancing that is the problem... since it was always known that the best Diesel would be balanced against the best petrol... I think the final EoT may have given more advantage to the bigger Hybrid classes than the earlier versions of appendix B.. but it is difficult for us to say because (to my knowledge) the FIA have never declared the BSFC's of the manufacturers and neither have they declared the characteristics of the fuel... we know how many litres of fuel each car gets per refill of the fuel tank, but we don't know the exact density or the engine's BSFC (grams of fuel per kW.Hour), so we can't figure out how much energy they're getting from each refill which is a bit annoying.
Some nice 25-30km/h advantage on the straights for Toyota vs Audi.
You can't take that at face value though because the #1 and #2 Audis were in high downforce trim and were faster in the twistier middle section of the lap...
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Huntresa
Huntresa
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Joined: 03 Dec 2011, 11:33

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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machin wrote:
tomazy wrote:I think that the late change in that balancing is really hurting Audi. The rules changed after Audi allready homologised there car, if I remmember correctly. They got less fuel for stint and less fuel for the lap then they tought when they decided on a 2MJ option (petrol 6MJ cars got more of both). This change could throw the power to fuel efficiancy ratio of there diesel engine out of the window.
I don't think it is a question of petrol vs. diesel balancing that is the problem... since it was always known that the best Diesel would be balanced against the best petrol... I think the final EoT may have given more advantage to the bigger Hybrid classes than the earlier versions of appendix B.. but it is difficult for us to say because (to my knowledge) the FIA have never declared the BSFC's of the manufacturers and neither have they declared the characteristics of the fuel... we know how many litres of fuel each car gets per refill of the fuel tank, but we don't know the exact density or the engine's BSFC (grams of fuel per kW.Hour), so we can't figure out how much energy they're getting from each refill which is a bit annoying.
Some nice 25-30km/h advantage on the straights for Toyota vs Audi.
You can't take that at face value though because the #1 and #2 Audis were in high downforce trim and were faster in the twistier middle section of the lap...
Yeah higher df then toyota but Audi said it was their Le Mans trim so ?

tomazy
tomazy
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Joined: 10 Jan 2006, 13:01

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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Audi had 3 cars in the race, 2 with sprint high downforce settinghs and one with Le Mans settings. The sprint package had a max speed of 291.9km/h for both cars, and LM package of 304.2 (308.6 Toyota, 311.2 Porshe). For downforce of the cars, we can look at the fastest second sectors of those cars. Audi High DF=54.974s, Audi low DF= 56.570s, Toyota=56.223s, Porshe=56.959s.

So Toyota in Le Mans trim, has more DF and has highet top speed than Audi in Le Mans trim.

All info from here: http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com/

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machin
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Joined: 25 Nov 2008, 14:45

Re: WEC (World Endurance Championship) 2014

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The thing is, those Toyota sector times may be slightly skewed by the Hybrid usage strategy (in full Hybrid boost mode their car has nearly 1000bhp...). It would be interesting to compare the sector 2 speed on the same lap as they achieved the best top speed to see if they simply used all their Hybrid boost in one go to achieve a high speed down the Kemmel Straight (to overtake, for instance), at the detriment of the sector 2 time....?

WEC really is very interesting. Well done FIA for some interesting regs. Just please publish the BSFC's and fuel specs!
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