Dance Officer posted:

Definitely switch to the new engine.

Danny Glands posted:

Did #74 overheat?

GQ, September 1990 issue posted:

With this year's racing season now well underway, we had the chance to speak briefly with one of the most interesting personas in today's performance racing scene. From his teen years of exuberance and joie de vivre on the French riviera, up through adulthood marked by multiple forays into experimental pharmaceuticals, Frank D. Rockfort has only kept one true love.

– Motor sports. Nothing gets the blood flowing like the pulsating rhythms of an overpowered American, how do you say, muscle car. The chromium, the steel, the octane; there is no feeling quite like sitting down in such a machine, and have it cater to your every whim.

Meeting at his seaside manor in the Hamptons, the flamboyant playboy did not seem at all perturbed by the lackluster performance demonstrated so far by the contenders put forward by his latest venture, Muira Puama. Slowly swirling a glass of $200 scotch, staring out towards the Atlantic, his only comment on the matter was that of a true entrepreneur.

– The racetrack, of course, is only half the battle. The other half, the important half, is fought in the quarterly earnings reports.

Meanwhile, the marketing apparatus of Muira Puama is currently running advertising in men's magazines of every repute. Will this be enough to win the war for Rockfort? We suppose only next quarter will tell.

Pursesnatcher posted:

Autosport Weekly posted:

Gérard Duchesne of Equipe Mardre Sports seemed in much better spirits after the final test at the SASC test track before the circus moves to Daytona.

"We liked very much the Cyclone's engine - a thoroughbred Formula One flat crank V8 with some concessions to fuel economy for race pace... but we could not tolerate failures. Increasing the stroke from the Formula One specification meant that piston speeds were too high and reliability was... borderline at best. That is why we do these tests, no? In the end, as much as we liked the MFB engine, we had to do something. As a test we took an MFR from the Sprint, put spare pistons from the Superbe's MFT in and a pair of development turbochargers, and voila. Almost immediately we had recaptured all of the MFB's race pace, but with far more reliability, and some tuning produced even better results. Personal feelings aside... the data is the data."

Asked about overall results, Duchesne smiled. "We are very pleased with the results of our testing program - to achieve what we are with the older Prototype chassis I believe shows some of the strength of our abilities, and aside from reliability issues, the Salope was very quickly turning the lap times we thought it should be. After the last test day at Daytona, I look forwards to seeing everyone's true pace over race distance, and showing what ours is."

mekilljoydammit posted:

Chiwie posted:

drat, you got reliability and kept the lap times? Impressive work mate.

P.S Your transport is sorted.

Autosport Weekly posted:

An interesting note that I came across in the test at Daytona was the Equipe Mardre Sport cars being unloaded alongside the Scuderia La Moore entries from common shipping containers. Jean-Luc Ledgédale, CEO of the French team, onsite to watch the testing and take in the sunny weather, was more than willing to explain.

"We are not completely new to automobile racing, of course... we were associated with Mr. Tyrol's efforts in Formula One in the past as you may recall, so we had exposure to engineers from Scuderia La Moore previously. In testing, some of our engineers were of course talking with some of their old colleagues and competitors and sharing notes, while at the same time we were trying to plan the logistics of tending to a worldwide championship. While Equipe Mardre Sport is associated with the larger Mardre Aerospace family, we do not have access to many of their resources. It turns out that an arrangement beneficial to us both could be struck - in our testing we had found issues from translation to simulation to the track that the La Moore Academy team had not exploited that unlocked more potential for them, while their logistics were easily capable of coping with our entries as well. After all, they are already capable of handling the Formula One circus; our modest requirements hardly taxed them at all."

Asked whether this will herald any long term joint ventures, Ledgédale shrugged. "For now we are keeping our designs entirely separate - while the starting point for both of us shares some similarity, we both went in different directions. In the future, who can say? For now though we are focusing on the championship, both for ourselves and for what aid we can provide to our partners."

Motorsport International posted:

I had the chance to sit down with the racing director of de tuf-tuf club, the Dutch motorist club with a team participating in the SASC, and ask him about the work up to the start of the season. This took place after the results of the test race at Daytona came in.

"The work up has been... interesting, I would say. Before the official test race there was a series of smaller scale test races on a private track, and when we first entered the competition, I was surprised by just how dominant we were. However, that didn't last. Several other competitors caught up with us, and eventually our group C entry was surpassed. That was a bit vexing." "We only had to do one revision for our group A and B cars. We'd held back on suspension tuning at first because we thought we would burn through the tires too fast, but it turned out we had some 40% tyre profile left when the cars had to go in for refueling. This allowed us to tune much more aggressively. We haven't touched the engines yet, but I reckon there isn't much to be gained there."

"Our group C entry was a different matter entirely. It was dominant at first and also received a suspension tune but group C turned out very competitive and also very closely packed. In the mock races during private testing we ended up two laps behind the class lead, and today we were 44 seconds behind in 2 hours of driving. I suspect that the car as it is now will stay in the middle of the pack, or even end up the slowest of the "serious" entries. It's a good thing then that this car also had a lot of room for improvement." "The Group C has a bit of a funny story behind it, you see. The only reason we can run it is because of a club member's financial support. In one of the meetings running up to our entry into the SASC he said that he would sponsor a group C entry if we could meet some damands. They were to use the chassis he would bring in, and fit the biggest V12 it could hold. The body he brought in was rather... odd. It was made out of carbon fiber with fiberglass panels, that's good. It was also a cabriolet, with folding roof and everything. Really, the chassis is what's holding the current car back."

"So, we went back to talk to the sponsor and told him that if we had to run with the chassis he gave us, we weren't going to be very competitive. He insisted on using it anyway. When I asked him why, he said that he intended to use one of the cars for cruising around after SASC and boast about how he had a street legal racing car. (Obviously a lot of work would have to be done before that could ever happen) We really wanted to be competitive though, so we resolved to find a new sponsor who would provide us with a proper racing body. After a while of searching and calling around, we found an other member, a retired racing director, who was willing to foot the bill for new bodies. We received them less than a week ago and have been hard at work prepping, tuning and testing." He gets a big smile on his face. "I got a report an hour ago that we hit 1:59 dead on the private test track. A second and change faster than our previous body and currently the fastest time in Group C. It's as economic as the previous car, and it's just as reliable. It will debut on the first race. I suspect that we may be a competitor for the title in this group, after all."

excerpt from Vauhdin Maailma, magazine number 3/1990 posted:

Q: So, what is the story with the Group C spec version of the RM2000? You traditionally have been the biggest proponent for natural aspiration in engines.

A: We started to run out of money to develop the Group B version so we decided that all those are going into national championships and one of the very first ones went to a tuning shop in Jyväskylä. About a week later, they called us and gave a very interesting proposal to adapt our rather successful AWD system that's been turning heads in the Rally world and turbo tech for the car. We said "Sure, but are you absolutely certain this system will work?". The man behind the phone responded with a very confident yes and asked us to start adapting the joint project with a Swedish turbine manufacturer to develop a race-ready version of the one they already use in our turbo-diesel vans.

Quite frankly, I was skeptical of the project until I got the chance to drive it and so far, it feels quite promising for a proper endurance racer.

Q: Any predictions on how this will affect on-track performance?

A: Well, AWD does allow us to have that precious acceleration out of corners and to give them an edge in rain so we do hope the extra complexity is worth the time and effort.

mekilljoydammit posted:

All right, since I've not done one of these before... so with cars running in 4 classes, I'm going to be earning at minimum something like 40 revision points per week? Just trying to figure out what to submit for first revisions based on track schedule.

Chiwie posted:

I'm having a dumb. Where do I get my numbers for the pit strat tool?

Dance Officer posted:

Can I get a test report on my latest group C revision?

Autosport Weekly posted:

"An interesting result," Gérard Duchesne putting things mildly. "The Superbe... we reused many components between the different cars, no? Once we moved up to our true pace instead of handicapping ourselves during testing, the greater loads plus fatigue life from testing, and then the banking at Daytona, well. The steering rack on the 65 car failed after the warmup lap and..." he trailed off, gesturing helplessly. "We owe our drivers better and will do better - the organizing body graciously allowed us to submit a revised part as long as there were no performance changes."

"The rest is much better... the Gran Vitesse turned excellent lap times when they were on track, and if we had not had an accident may have been contending for the top step. Certainly I think we were the only team below the 1:54 mark. The Cyclone performed exactly to expectations. While I vastly prefer the earlier versions of the engine on a personal basis, I think finishing 7th and 8th overall speaks for the results. The Sprint, we need to examine our data to figure out the relative need for stops, but also this track does not play to its strengths."

"Going forwards, well. We need to see what the Superbe and Sprint have for pace on shorter tracks before we decide a path forwards, and certainly there is room to find more reliability on the Gran Vitesse. We are also moving to the low drag specification next due to the unique requirements of la Sarthe."