Well that's the speculation anyway.
http://blackflag.jalopnik.com/first-photos-of-the-nissan-gt-r-lm-nismo-le-mans-car-on-1680213405 (http://blackflag.jalopnik.com/first-photos-of-the-nissan-gt-r-lm-nismo-le-mans-car-on-1680213405)
http://www.mulsannescorner.com/newsjan15.html (http://www.mulsannescorner.com/newsjan15.html)
Supposedly the front tires are wider than the rear, and the gas engine powers the front wheels, with the electric powering the rear. Also at Lemans the car may run without a rear wing to reduce drag.
This seems like a crazy car, but if a crazy technology can win anywhere, it's Le Mans, where diesel engines ruled the top tier for about a decade.
(http://www.gtspirit.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/zfgyylqtukm6ojsksm1w1-640x360.jpg)
(http://johndagys.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/q5vlij98bigbkxt60ezd.jpg)
Very strange looking indeed.
Weird!
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--ahSEztwJ--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/p5mtqwdfyrkpkyegcqg3.jpg)
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--5vlY3viW--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/ypp2nemjkrba7vm8sho9.jpg)
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--NWWOj3Uf--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/oqugadhhm4eveoq8wt3i.jpg)
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--en0m3zMz--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/rrf2r3ni1xwogbzjo4ir.jpg)
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--sLilFgjY--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/uahz5kuuftj8wy6gnbfv.jpg)
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--jTkrvycW--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/vwdesdfvjohhydc2ibps.jpg)
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--X1h4Ikkd--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/pc0zxabogydkpda8x5nq.jpg)
I hope it does well. I enjoy when crazy technology rocks the racing world.
Batmobile!
Deltawing is still crazier
Is therre a rule in Lemans that this is exploiting, or do they think its faster on its own merits?
And people doubted me when I got the Civic.
Nissan should call this El DoRado
Now fully revealed.
http://www.autoblog.com/2015/02/02/nissan-gtr-lm-nismo-le-mans-wec-official/#image-15 (http://www.autoblog.com/2015/02/02/nissan-gtr-lm-nismo-le-mans-wec-official/#image-15)
Also featured on the Superbowl commercial.
Words cannot describe how excited I am about this car, it looks insane.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8Kzazvcc98 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8Kzazvcc98)
Needs more high pitched wailing exhaust. But otherwise, very cool.
Quote from: Soup DeVille on January 20, 2015, 11:04:08 PM
Is therre a rule in Lemans that this is exploiting, or do they think its faster on its own merits?
General consensus is its done for marketing and because they didn't have a big enough budget to go head to head with Audi - so they engineered themselves an excuse.
That thing has some very interesting Aero.
(http://www.turnology.com/image/2015/02/gt-r-lm-1.jpeg)
Quote from: r0tor on March 04, 2015, 06:23:56 AM
General consensus is its done for marketing and because they didn't have a big enough budget to go head to head with Audi - so they engineered themselves an excuse.
Huh?
I can't picture this being cheaper to make than a traditional LM Car.
Quote from: 2o6 on April 14, 2015, 12:27:59 PM
Huh?
I can't picture this being cheaper to make than a traditional LM Car.
Even if it cost the same amount of money, they probably got a ton more media exposure than they would've even if they won with a "normal" LM racecar
The rear axles (if they're even used) are portal axles, and the whole design is very radical as a whole
I like to think that Nissan is racing a big Maxima, even if that's not really accurate
Quote from: 2o6 on April 14, 2015, 12:27:59 PM
Huh?
I can't picture this being cheaper to make than a traditional LM Car.
To beat Audi, you need to invest megabucks in engineering and development - they didnt
Quote from: r0tor on April 14, 2015, 03:04:52 PM
To beat Audi, you need to invest megabucks in engineering and development - they didnt
Huh?
How is creating a FWD LeMans car NOT engineering and development?
Quote from: Soup DeVille on January 20, 2015, 11:04:08 PM
Is therre a rule in Lemans that this is exploiting, or do they think its faster on its own merits?
I guess the idea is that it's easier to get downforce out of the front of the car rather than dealing with the rear.
Apparently because the car's main drive wheels are up front, cornering speed is higher than a traditional LM car.
I'm excited to see how it does.
Quote from: 2o6 on April 14, 2015, 03:07:58 PM
Huh?
How is creating a FWD LeMans car NOT engineering and development?
The car is an undeveloped train wreck
Quote from: r0tor on April 14, 2015, 05:15:49 PM
The car is an undeveloped train wreck
You're the only person I've heard say that
Quote from: 2o6 on April 14, 2015, 03:01:48 PM
The rear axles (if they're even used) are portal axles, and the whole design is very radical as a whole
I like to think that Nissan is racing a big Maxima, even if that's not really accurate
Lots of offset drive arrangements that wouldn't be called portal axles that it could be running: But I doubt they are driven at all actually; electric rear wheel drive system could very well be a motor-in-wheel arrangement.
Quote from: 2o6 on April 14, 2015, 03:13:03 PM
I guess the idea is that it's easier to get downforce out of the front of the car rather than dealing with the rear.
Apparently because the car's main drive wheels are up front, cornering speed is higher than a traditional LM car.
I'm excited to see how it does.
I'll be interested to see that as well: but I don't buy the explanation about cornering speeds for one second: it will clearly drive a different line than the rest of the field though, and that could be problematic.
Quote from: 2o6 on April 14, 2015, 10:13:33 PM
You're the only person I've heard say that
Its missed many test sections and reportedly failed crash testing which means it can't race until it gets certified.
Quote from: r0tor on April 14, 2015, 03:04:52 PM
To beat Audi, you need to invest megabucks in engineering and development - they didnt
Generally yes, however Toyota had the largest budget in F1 back in the day and they never won a flower pot.
Quote from: r0tor on April 15, 2015, 05:56:52 AM
Its missed many test sections and reportedly failed crash testing which means it can't race until it gets certified.
It has since passed the test.
Quote from: Galaxy on April 17, 2015, 12:02:45 PM
Generally yes, however Toyota had the largest budget in F1 back in the day and they never won a flower pot.
A large enough budget is a necessary, but not sufficient factor to winning :huh:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTGaUMC1gZ8 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTGaUMC1gZ8)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njTkyZfcPGs (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njTkyZfcPGs)
Nissan is being remarkably transparent with the whole project. Everyone else is very secretive. People are saying that it's just one big PR move, but in some way racing in general is just one big PR move.
I think the thinking behind this car makes some sense, as Nissan pretty much said this car is just engineered for Lemans and not for the rest of the WEC series.
The simple part is that lower drag = more straight speed at a track that's mostly straights and you spend 70-80% of your time on full throttle. The places that aren't straights in the first 2 sectors mostly consist of 2 slow chicanes and a few very slow 50mph corners where downforce doesn't help much anyway.
The problem with running an extremely low drag setup in the past was that the cars wouldn't have enough front end bite to not understeer severely at the porsche curves at the final sector of the track. The porsche curves are long sweeping steady state corners. To deal with these you either need enough front tire (why all the LMP1s run square setups after the Acura did it), enough front end downforce, or in the case of the Nissan, enough front end weight bias.
Also moving the engine to the front of the car frees up the entire rear of the vehicle to make room for large tunnels that run the length of the car, allowing them to make downforce more efficiently than with a wing.
I think someone mentioned the original plan for this car was front engine powering the front wheels, and a twin flywheel mech system at the 8Mj class pumping some 700hp to the front and rears using that portal drive shaft system that is currently in the car but not used this season. Also apparently the plan was to run without a rear wing as well (all LMP1 at Lemans are required to have tail lights on the rear end plates of the wing to meet regulations, the Nissan does not, probably because the original concept did not have a rear wing at all). The entire system output was supposed to be around 1500-2000hp. The extra HP over the competitors hinged on the all mechanical flybrid system made by Torotrak. Audi uses a flywheel too, but it that flywheel turns kinetic energy back into electricity to power motors with the expected losses in the conversion. The Torotrak was supposed to harvest kinetic energy, store it as such in the flywheel, and release it back as kinetic energy to the front, and also the rears through a drive shaft and a set of portal gears to clear the big tunnels at the back. As the energy was not being converted to electrical energy anywhere in the process, the only losses would be due to friction in the system. Unfortunately that entire system basically doesn't work.
In their simulations this original front engined AWD concept ran something like 3:15's according to some reports (course record was a 3:18 in the Peugeot 908 FAP HDI, and last year it was like a 3:23). It's not hard to imagine if all the systems were indeed working, that this car would be immensely fast. To start, it would be ridiculously fast down the mulsanne straights with less drag than the competition. Then with the slow chicanes, the Nissan will engage the AWD portal gears to help put the additional 700hp of the flywheel to all 4 wheels, and then again at the launch out of the slow mulsanne corner. As it approaches the porsche corners, indeed the lower downforce setup would be slower here than the competition, but as the Nissan carries the majority of the weight over the front wheels, turn in would be better than expected. As the Nissan exits the porsche curves, again the AWD system helps maximize corner exit. Another benefit is that the Nissan if it does encounter GT traffic would be affected less, as it's not very fast in the corners anyway, where the majority of LMP cars get held up by GT cars.
That I think was the concept. Unfortunately the hybrid system has been full of problems, so they are basically running 1 flybrid wheel instead of two, and even that one wheel isn't working well. With barely any hybrid power to release, they aren't running the rear portal gears at all.
Overall I think this year will be just a testing year for Nissan for the chassis, and mostly importantly that brand new 3.0TT V6. I hope that next year Nissan can bring the full 8mj 1500hp AWD beast to Lemans.
https://twitter.com/nismo (https://twitter.com/nismo)
Nissan has been using twitter and the Periscope app to basically broadcast live images and commentary from their test runs. It was a fascinating day today with the live broadcasts, and you basically felt like a member of the testing team watching them. For me it brought back memories of when I worked on my college solar racing team. They'll broadcast again tomorrow.
Also they brought out car 22, which is new. And a new car 23 in all black, which looks amazingly badass. I'm not sure what happened to the original car number 23, I think it's in Europe now. Anyway they made 3 cars as promised.
Great photos from the testing day
https://www.flickr.com/photos/nissan-racing/sets/72157651928353276/ (https://www.flickr.com/photos/nissan-racing/sets/72157651928353276/)
Two brand new GTR LMs
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CEKA5MqXIAEZwRe.jpg)
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CEKAbA7XIAEsUB2.jpg)
The carbon black version is proving to be so popular Nissan is likely to run it at Le Mans
EDIT:: Crap flickr won't let me link photos. Boo.
(https://flic.kr/p/rx2MX7)
The new red one is numbered 22
(https://www.flickr.com/photos/nissan-racing/17167816987/in/set-72157651928353276)
Now it has the rule mandated brake lights on the rear end plates as well (which the previous number 23 car was missing)
(https://www.flickr.com/photos/nissan-racing/16754985013/in/set-72157651928353276)
And it also has the indicator vertical light strips on the side to say what place the car is in.
(https://www.flickr.com/photos/nissan-racing/16754989493/in/set-72157651928353276)
By comparison this was the older number 23 car, the original, without the place indicator lights or rear end plate brake lights
(https://www.flickr.com/photos/nissan-racing/16545734893/in/set-72157651928353276)
I want that trailer, would be great for moving the track cars around.
Despite running at the back of the pack, Nissan says it isn't disappointed by the results of its first test day with its radical new GT-R LM Nismo race car.
In preparation for the 24 Hours of Le Mans set to run later this month, Nissan began a series of test runs of its front-wheel drive GT-R LM Nismo over the weekend. The results were less than stellar, with the GT-R LM Nismo posting lap times that were more than 20 seconds off the pace of the fastest LMP1 car. In fact, the GT-R LM Nismo was more than two seconds slower than the fastest car a rung down in the LMP2 category. Most of Nissan's laps were, however, run under rainy conditions.
Darren Cox, head of Nissan's motorsports operations, wasn't discouraged by the slower lap times.
"There are a lot of positives to take from the test," Cox told Autosport. "We have three cars sitting in the garage right now with nothing wrong with them. We only had one problem that stopped us out on track and we covered a total of 1500km across the three cars."
He added: "We were fastest in the speed trap and at the end Jann [Mardenborough] was one of the fastest cars on intermediates."
Nissan's GT-R LM Nismo is a departure from the norm at Le Mans, with the car utilizing a unique front-wheel drive setup. Nissan says the FWD layout allows for better aerodynamics, but, at least, so far the design doesn't appear to be bearing fruit. Nissan has a few weeks to make adjustment before the 24 Hours of Le Mans kicks off on June 13.
Quote from: r0tor on March 04, 2015, 06:23:56 AM
General consensus is its done for marketing and because they didn't have a big enough budget to go head to head with Audi - so they engineered themselves an excuse.
Quote from: r0tor on April 14, 2015, 05:15:49 PM
The car is an undeveloped train wreck
Qualified 20 sec off the time of the new Porsche... Couldn't even beat a privateer team running customer cars.
Apparently there AWD does not work, so they are running FWD only.
Quote from: Galaxy on June 12, 2015, 12:07:25 PM
Apparently there AWD does not work, so they are running FWD only.
That was the revelation a many months ago... Bailed on AWD after tbey couldnt get it working and then went on a propaganda campaign bragging about the benefits of FWD.
Quote from: Galaxy on June 12, 2015, 12:07:25 PM
Apparently there AWD does not work, so they are running FWD only.
What? How can the makers of the GT-R not get AWD to work?
They were trying to do some electric drive to the rear wheels working off of batteries charged by regen breaking and other sorts... Didn't work
They then gave up and started campaigning that FWD would allow them to exploit aero advantages and other crap to avoid saying "we wasted our money"
Quote from: r0tor on June 12, 2015, 02:25:23 PM
They were trying to do some electric drive to the rear wheels working off of batteries charged by regen breaking and other sorts... Didn't work
They then gave up and started campaigning that FWD would allow them to exploit aero advantages and other crap to avoid saying "we wasted our money"
Yeah, I couldn't figure out how FWD was better for aero.
The Porsches are fast, and only 1 manufacturer Corvette is left.
Today/tomorrow will be interesting
Can't even watch it... WTF
I downloaded the app.. Watching it for 9$. I wish more racing series did the same
Quote from: SVT666 on June 12, 2015, 02:53:40 PM
Yeah, I couldn't figure out how FWD was better for aero.
It's easier to put more downforce on the front end, since they put the engine up front. Since the weight is up front, remove the wing and optimize the shape since there's no MR layout.
I wonder what this thing would have been like if KERS was working, failure or not, it was a pretty rad concept.
Still 4 cars within one lap.
Quote from: 2o6 on June 13, 2015, 09:58:51 AM
It's easier to put more downforce on the front end, since they put the engine up front. Since the weight is up front, remove the wing and optimize the shape since there's no MR layout.
I wonder what this thing would have been like if KERS was working, failure or not, it was a pretty rad concept.
Downforce does more than provide traction for the drive wheels. It provides increased lateral grip for better corner speeds. You still want downforce on the rear of the car even if it's FWD.
Quote from: MX793 on June 13, 2015, 06:57:20 PM
Downforce does more than provide traction for the drive wheels. It provides increased lateral grip for better corner speeds. You still want downforce on the rear of the car even if it's FWD.
Yeah, but nissan's reasoning was since a lot of the weight was up front, they could optimize that? Idk it seems really novel.
Quote from: 2o6 on June 13, 2015, 07:25:42 PM
Yeah, but nissan's reasoning was since a lot of the weight was up front, they could optimize that? Idk it seems really novel.
So novel it doesn't work.
Quote from: SVT666 on June 13, 2015, 07:36:57 PM
So novel it doesn't work.
It's a new concept and they've had a lot of problems with it? They seem to be very optimistic and really excited even if it is very slow. I think that dedication to innovation is really nifty
I don't know, I'm not an engineer.
They're excitement is obviously fake. Nobody is excited about getting absolutely destroyed in the biggest race in the world.
Quote from: 2o6 on June 13, 2015, 07:25:42 PM
Yeah, but nissan's reasoning was since a lot of the weight was up front, they could optimize that? Idk it seems really novel.
These cars generate enough downforce to be able to drive upside down at 100+ mph. The extra ~200 lbs associated with moving the drivetrain forward is in the noise.
Congrats to Porsche!
Although it's pretty mind boggling how much money VAG left Porsche spend to defeat an already spendy and dominate Audi program. However, this might be the current race series that transfers tech down to the street the best.
Quote from: 2o6 on June 13, 2015, 07:41:57 PM
It's a new concept and they've had a lot of problems with it? They seem to be very optimistic and really excited even if it is very slow. I think that dedication to innovation is really nifty
I don't know, I'm not an engineer.
Those that think that Nissan did this experiment to "win" Le Mans, or who are otherwise poking fun at it, don't understand what is going on.
Quote from: GoCougs on June 14, 2015, 10:04:58 AM
Those that think that Nissan did this experiment to "win" Le Mans, or who are otherwise poking fun at it, don't understand what is going on.
Yeah, this clearly was a proof-of-concept, super high-tech, engineering mule.
It was an lowly funded program that never had a chance which was designed for publicity.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=fw_2N3tGMEg (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fw_2N3tGMEg)