New customer Ferrari 550 engines

[AU N EGL]

Originally Posted by SALEEN S7R

Yes that is true, but then the ALMS may not even have that next year if Corvette are seriously considering pulling the plug on their ALMS campaign. A couple of weeks ago Doug Fehan was quoted in Autosport magazine as saying that Corvette was looking at running their C6R's over in the LMS for 2007 along with the Spa 24hrs and of course Le Mans. There is a strong possibilty of there being no factory C6R's in the ALMS for much of the 2007 season.

That is why it is called "silly season" just like F1. Evey one, teams, manufactures, and series promotors are just doing a little postureing and politicing.

[HORNDAWG]

Yes the 550 ran well in practice and qualifying,but that was because it ran with zero restrictions including no ballast.

The Stewards, having received a decision from the FIA GT Bureau, have decided that following the results of the nr 3 Ferrari, without restrictors, it has been decided to move this car to be before the first of the GT2 cars in the starting grid.

So in essence it is not a good comparison for cars running in class trim(rules & weight)!! And the only adjustment I can find published is ballast. With the car finishing in seventh,basically between GT-1 and GT-2 we do not truly know what this tells us as to competitiveness.

L.P.

[AU N EGL]

Originally Posted by HORNDAWG

Yes the 550 ran well in practice and qualifying,but that was because it ran with zero restrictions including no ballast.


So in essence it is not a good comparison for cars running in class trim(rules & weight)!! And the only adjustment I can find published is ballast. With the car finishing in seventh,basically between GT-1 and GT-2 we do not truly know what this tells us as to competitiveness.

L.P.

Or like a very smart teams do, is not push the car, not test it too the limit in public. Do lots of private testing in the off season to find out what the car can really do.

What the stuarts and scrutineers dont know and dont find can only help

[Francesco]

the car wasn't "air-restricted" but it was electronically restricted... and it had ballast even in qualifying... in race it didn't prove reliable with many stops but the fastest lap is really near to best of the class... and if you look at the top speeds... they are not so amazing

[tux]

am i right in thinking the fia are not to happy that it was faaster than all gt1 cars in qualifying?

[HORNDAWG]

Originally Posted by Francesco

the car wasn't "air-restricted" but it was electronically restricted... and it had ballast even in qualifying... in race it didn't prove reliable with many stops but the fastest lap is really near to best of the class... and if you look at the top speeds... they are not so amazing

Jack Leconte – Team Manager, Larbre Competition
However, it should be noted that our car has no ballast, which gave it some advantage.

The Larbre Ferrari 550 Maranello, running in G2 and which set the best time in qualifying, was awarded 10 kg penalty weight by the GT Bureau, and also placed behind the GT1 cars on the grid.

The Stewards, having received a decision from the FIA GT Bureau, have decided that following the results of the nr 3 Ferrari, without restrictors, it has been decided to move this car to be before the first of the GT2 cars in the starting grid.
This means that the nr 23 will start from pole position.

All quotes from the FIA site as to ballast and restrictions.It would seem that the Q time was unrestricted and unballasted(in thier words).
L.P.

[ChironWSC]

I see in Autosport this week (Nov30th page 21) that the Prodrive Ferrari 550 electronically restricted engine will be used as a template for the 2008 FIA GT engine regs. This is great news for GT racing; hopefully the same system will be used for GT1 and GT2. I do think it is 2 years to late though and should have been in place this season.

[AU N EGL]

I guess I would like to see what those 'electronic restrictions' are?

The PCM in my car is flashed with a program when we dyno tuned the car. I can not make any changes unless I retune and reflash the PCM. It is not stock nor maxed out. Nor can I change the A/F ratio. So my car in essence is also 'electronicly restricted.'

The ACO & FIA do not allow two way electronic data telemetry either. So are cars that run under ACO & FIA rules also electronicly restriced?

Electronic restriction is a very catch all phase.

[ChironWSC]

I have been doing some digging and found out a little info about the system.
They are electronically controlling the throttles which I would think means that they are using fly by wire. They are also using a data recorder to record the throttle data which the ecu could do any way.
I have been doing some research into the best way to electronically control a GT2 engine and fly by wire throttle control was the way we came up with as well.

[AU N EGL]

Very few cars are drive by cable any more. All most all cars and modern races cars are drive by wire.

I have an electronic TB and TB data recorder as well. That is nothing new.

Originally Posted by ChironWSC

They are electronically controlling the throttles which I would think means that they are using fly by wire. They are also using a data recorder to record the throttle data which the ecu could do any way.
I have been doing some research into the best way to electronically control a GT2 engine and fly by wire throttle control was the way we came up with as well.

I would agree.

What Prodrive is doing may not be anything really new. Just a new packaging. More Info would be welcome.

Cable TB are old news and do not react or as accuate as the drive by wire / electronic computer controled TBs.

[ChironWSC]

I think you will find very few race cars have fly by wire throttle systems. FIA GT1 regs do not allow such systems so it is some thing new to FIA GT1 and ACO cars. F1 cars have fly by wire but out side that very few. We have never used it on any of our race cars.

[HORNDAWG]

Originally Posted by ChironWSC

I think you will find very few race cars have fly by wire throttle systems. FIA GT1 regs do not allow such systems so it is some thing new to FIA GT1 and ACO cars. F1 cars have fly by wire but out side that very few. We have never used it on any of our race cars.

The FIA & ACO rules do not sate that.

ACO 2.8.2,2.8.3 but specifically 5.3 last sentence (pg 11 of LMGT1).

FIA 5.2.7 once again last sentence (pg 8 of Appendix J-Article 258)

It all depends on original equipment.

L.P.