Active Diffs - Where's the loss of performance?

[Finni]

2006 Sordo drove active Xsara in Catalunya and Corcica. Then he stepped in passive diff Xsara for Germany and did his most convincing drive in the year. There was hardly any difference.

[ST205GT4]

I expected someone to pipe up with Dinga's ideas. However I refuse to believe that within 3-4 months of Loeb stepping out of his active Xsara and into the passive one they had made sufficient advances in tyres or magical engine technology to mask the loss of "performance" from active diffs.

In fact I believe that Citroen actually had some of their suspension components banned by the FIA (http://www.kinetic.au.com/oldernews.html). So in fact they were going backwards at least in that area.

Did Michelin suddenly develop much better tyres in that timeframe? Or Citroen a much more powerful engine? Active diffs look a lot the Emperor's New Clothes to me...

[Zico]

I expected someone to pipe up with Dinga's ideas. However I refuse to believe that within 3-4 months of Loeb stepping out of his active Xsara and into the passive one they had made sufficient advances in tyres or magical engine technology to mask the loss of "performance" from active diffs.

In fact I believe that Citroen actually had some of their suspension components banned by the FIA (http://www.kinetic.au.com/oldernews.html). So in fact they were going backwards at least in that area.

Did Michelin suddenly develop much better tyres in that timeframe? Or Citroen a much more powerful engine? Active diffs look a lot the Emperor's New Clothes to me...

The advantage was so minimal, ie, 0.1 sec per km... you should not expect to see a difference on the time-sheets.

[Daniel]

I expected someone to pipe up with Dinga's ideas. However I refuse to believe that within 3-4 months of Loeb stepping out of his active Xsara and into the passive one they had made sufficient advances in tyres or magical engine technology to mask the loss of "performance" from active diffs.

In fact I believe that Citroen actually had some of their suspension components banned by the FIA (http://www.kinetic.au.com/oldernews.html). So in fact they were going backwards at least in that area.

Did Michelin suddenly develop much better tyres in that timeframe? Or Citroen a much more powerful engine? Active diffs look a lot the Emperor's New Clothes to me...

You're only the second person on this forum to ever mention Kinetic The second being me. Perhaps I'm looking too much into it but I do think Kinetic were one of the factors that made the Xsara totally unbeatable before the system was banned. Not the sole factor but a factor nonetheless.

[pentti]

Members here should remember my utmost hate for active diffs. Two reasons. Delay and too abrutvive for traction. Good sensitive drivers like Colin and Tommi were destroyed with these systems.They reacted before active diffs started to confuse. It's long story why active diffs came but basically it is just because mechanics forgot how to use the file!!