Peugeot 908 HDI-FAP

[sssssssss]

not sure this is the right place to post this new thread about an old issue, but i was wondering whether somebody figured out what the main secret ingredient was for the speed of the peugeot 908 hdi-fap back in 2008, 2009 and 2010 that audi just couldn't get at the time. they seem to have gotten it in 2011, when the new r18 tdi was finally a bit faster than the revised 908, but i suppose it's got to do with much more than just the aero advantage of a closed cockpit. furthermore, i reckon it wasn't even a ultra expensive technical spiel, since the 908 hdi-faps seem to sell at fairly reasonable prices for this category of a car:
https://rmsothebys.com/en/auctions/M...ototype/238814

[canaglia]

908 HDi and 908 were my favourite cars, rumored figures were 800hp and about 1300Nm in 2008 and 2010; about 700hp in 2009.
During years 908HDi has always been heavier than mandatory min. weight, because as some insider revealed the car had some kind of j-damper or rear suspensions that let the car to be extremely quick on kerbs and in twisty tracks like road atlanta.
During those years, aero development wasn't critical and extreme like nowadays but the car was one of the first to have two different bodywork (sprint and low drag).

[TF110]

Originally Posted by sssssssss

not sure this is the right place to post this new thread about an old issue, but i was wondering whether somebody figured out what the main secret ingredient was for the speed of the peugeot 908 hdi-fap back in 2008, 2009 and 2010 that audi just couldn't get at the time. they seem to have gotten it in 2011, when the new r18 tdi was finally a bit faster than the revised 908, but i suppose it's got to do with much more than just the aero advantage of a closed cockpit. furthermore, i reckon it wasn't even a ultra expensive technical spiel, since the 908 hdi-faps seem to sell at fairly reasonable prices for this category of a car:
https://rmsothebys.com/en/auctions/M...ototype/238814

To be fair, the R18 wasn't faster than the 908. If you're talking about Le Mans it was a little quicker at times, but it burned more fuel (shorter stints). Overall they both were setting about equal lap times. Every other race it was advantage Peugeot. I think they had a power advantage over Audi. I recall that was the difference maker, or at least that's what was believed.

[templer]

According to Paolo Catone the 908 HDI-FAP didn't have something special on their suspension compared to Audi, but they did a lot of development there.
The main secret was a J-damper and a pretty soft rate for spring/dampers which was the reason the car was better running over the curbs like the Audi.
For this you have to design a car which is not pitch sensitive and you need a aero which is stable even if the car changes it ride heights.

A soft/spring damper ajustment was also the main secret of the 905 Group C as the rear diffusor was designed to stall at a certain point reducing downforce and drad on the straights and running also better over curbs than the pretty stiff rivals.

[chernaudi]

Basically Peugeot did what Audi did with the R8, but in a different/more modern way. The R8 had a clear advantage over its rivals with handling bumps and curbs back then. Even then, the 908 it has to be remembered had a clear power advantage over the R10/R15 and even at first the R18, which if anything was bigger than any handling advantage (the 908s for a couple of years it has to be remembered were actually so stiffly sprung that they handled horribly in the rain).

It was allowed at the time a larger air restrictor due to being closed cockpit, and above a certain speed, the closed cockpit was more aero efficient.

[canaglia]

I guess that the ultimate weapon was 2010 season 908HDi, that car had a better aero than audi R15+ and much more power. A real beast.
Season worst enemy was inside the engine.... titanium rods.

About 2011 season, according some rumors 908 had something like 50hp more than audi R18 (650hp vs. 600hp). For the whole season peugeot revealed to be the best car.
About 2011 LM, I think it was like this:
peugeot used an extreme low drag set-up for the race; even with a considerable power reduction (in 2011 max displacement for turbodiesel was 3.7L from previous season 5.5L) peugeot however hit over 340km/h as overall best top speed. On the other side, audi used a more high downforce set-up, a bit less top speed but better cornering speed; the price to pay for them was a worse fuel milliage that forced their stint to be 1lap shorter than peugeot.
If wurz didn't hit at indianapolis during sunday morning, very likely #7 would have won the race because in the late hours had to refuel once less than audi #2.

Peugeot engine specialists were later hired by audi after peugeot withdrawn from WEC. Indeed during next season, 2013 R18 e-tron engine had much more power than previous season.

[sssssssss]

well, the hp advantage was stated by peugeot from the start (initial claims of 700 hp vs. 650 hp for the r10) but audi didn't seem too concerned with that. if i remember correctly, they were later intrigued about how the 908 hdi could handle so well with so much power (about 800 hp in 2008), which sounded like peugeot had some kind of trick to make all of that possible - probably the j-damper and suspension development, but then again - would that be so hard for audi engineers to figure out?

in 2010, audi were finally matching peugeot's top speeds at le mans with the r15+ (and they actually had even higher top speed at paul ricard than the 908 hdi) , but that seemed to be more of a low-drag aero setup rather than anything else, since their lap times at LM were still over 2 seconds down.

as for 2011, i think audi were more focused on le mans than anything else and they ultimately were faster that year, since the sole remaining r18, with all the pressure and the shorter stints, still couldn't be topped by any of the 3 908s in either absolute lap time or, especially, in covering the 24 hours faster. pretty much like audi in 2010, peugeot indeed seemed to get top speed (343 km/h vs. 336 km/h for the r18) through LD aero setup rather than engine power. if i remember correctly, their official hp claims about the 2011 car were the same as audi's.

also, concerning r18 2012 vs. 2013, the 2013 car was obviously faster, but, surprisingly, not in terms of top speed (as one would've expected from higher hp), at least as much as we can trust the official audi onboard telemetry: the audis were hitting 318-320 km/h on the first part of the mulsanne both years, when no slipstreaming happened.

was someone also mentioning using a bit of a different type of diesel than audi back in the 908 hdi days?

[canaglia]

In 2010 peugeot 908HDi were using some kind of high downforce-low drag bodywork at le mans, that's the reason why they still had the best top speed and were about 3 seconds faster than audi R15+ that were running in low drag setting (that explains why audi was however able to hit over 340km/h despite less hp).

About 2011, if you check on alkamel site, you'll find out that in other ILMC races peugeot and audi had basically the same stint lenght; even if according to some rumors, peugeot had about 50hp more; the two cars basically had same fuel milliage. Difference is that at le mans, R18 was more aero loaded, this created much more drag, so the car had to refuel more often than low drag 908. In qualifying all 6 cars were close in a range of five tenths, but during the race audi had a better pace from the very beginning, expecially the lone survivor #2 that was fast and furious during the night.
Anyway, at the end shorter stints were costing them the win, #9 finished second at about 13 seconds recovering a lot of time during the last pit stop when peugeot crew decided to don't change tyres, #8 was out of game for the win, while #7 was several seconds ahead of other peugeots on sunday morning and was using the same fuel strategy. Very likely they would have won passing audi #2 in the last 2 hours because of one less refuel required. But wurz crashed the car at indianapolis..... the remaining is history. That day some peugeot drivers were on the edge like pagenaud, bourdais and davidson, some other like lamy and wurz were shamefull and have been basically kicked out.

About 2013, you forget a little detail.... true is that 2013 R18 was barely able to hit over 320km/h as was in 2012; but 2013 car had the 1900mm full width rear wing and an overall more drag because of improved aero. So to hit the same top speed they needed more power from ICE.
At that time, I used to browse this forum and according to some users, figures were likely like that:
2013 R18 e-tron quattro: about 650hp
2013 TS030: more than 550hp but less than 600hp.

[Flo aus N]

Originally Posted by canaglia

In 2010 peugeot 908HDi were using some kind of high downforce-low drag bodywork at le mans, that's the reason why they still had the best top speed and were about 3 seconds faster than audi R15+ that were running in low drag setting (that explains why audi was however able to hit over 340km/h despite less hp).

About 2011, if you check on alkamel site, you'll find out that in other ILMC races peugeot and audi had basically the same stint lenght; even if according to some rumors, peugeot had about 50hp more; the two cars basically had same fuel milliage. Difference is that at le mans, R18 was more aero loaded, this created much more drag, so the car had to refuel more often than low drag 908. In qualifying all 6 cars were close in a range of five tenths, but during the race audi had a better pace from the very beginning, expecially the lone survivor #2 that was fast and furious during the night.
Anyway, at the end shorter stints were costing them the win, #9 finished second at about 13 seconds recovering a lot of time during the last pit stop when peugeot crew decided to don't change tyres, #8 was out of game for the win, while #7 was several seconds ahead of other peugeots on sunday morning and was using the same fuel strategy. Very likely they would have won passing audi #2 in the last 2 hours because of one less refuel required. But wurz crashed the car at indianapolis..... the remaining is history. That day some peugeot drivers were on the edge like pagenaud, bourdais and davidson, some other like lamy and wurz were shamefull and have been basically kicked out.

About 2013, you forget a little detail.... true is that 2013 R18 was barely able to hit over 320km/h as was in 2012; but 2013 car had the 1900mm full width rear wing and an overall more drag because of improved aero. So to hit the same top speed they needed more power from ICE.
At that time, I used to browse this forum and according to some users, figures were likely like that:
2013 R18 e-tron quattro: about 650hp
2013 TS030: more than 550hp but less than 600hp.

Well there are somer further point about the R18 from 2011-2013. From what i know, their engine was not much down on power compared to the Peugeot. I highly doubt it that they were more than 20 bhp down, compared to the Peugeots. In 2013 several major factors came into play: they burned between 15-20% more diesel as they did in 2012 to maximise power and ontrack speed. This Had resulted maybe in a 10% gain in bhp. In addition to that, thei blown diffusor came into play. One of the big benefits was, that a major part of the exhaust gases exitet at the rear fenders, which is usually an area which produces drag. So they reduced to low pressure withit and saved overall drag there. The last major point was:



they knew that their car was faster than the Toyotas and the 2014 regulations were underway, with BIG discussions behind closed doors about potential efficiencies.....

[Lagunaseca_4life]

Nvm