First Stefanv@aol.com wrote:
>Flames shooting out of the back of a car (especially running
>in endurance racing) is not a good thing!
[snipped]
The Audi is turbo-charged. My understanding is that there is no way to
cut the rich mixture that is flowing to the motor under boost just BEFORE
the driver comes off the gas, which would be the only way to stop the
flames out the pipe. No engine management programming can anticipate
when the driver is going to lift. When he comes off the throttle, there is
excess fuel charge in the induction system that has to go somewhere, and it
goes out the exhaust pipe, where it is ignited by high temps there.
If they were set up with a leaner mixture, the turbo engines would not
make the power they do and probably burn up the pistons in no time.
>Poorer fuel mileage means more pit stops.
>More pit stops means you lose the race.
They didn't seem to have any problem with fuel consumption hurting their
results.
Then WheelerDealerUSA@netscape.net (Jonathan Kniskern) wrote in the same
thread:
>See what a *whole lot* of manufacturer support can do for a team?
>Supposedly the rear-end swap took them 7 minutes last year!
As I remember, the swap took only 4-1/2 minutes last year,
but they say the memory is the first to go....
>Kudos to Bentley for sure! A friend told me that there chassis came
>from Audi - is that true?
No, only the engine block. The rest of the car was a "clean sheet" design,
according to the Bentley project manager who was interviewed on the show.
--------------------
Tom Tweed mailto:tweedt@ucsd.edu
La Jolla, CA or ttweed@san.rr.com
"I started out with nothing and I've still got most of it left."
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