The new FIA WRC-car concept 2017

[Barreis]

From NASCAR: An impressive 130 of all Fortune 500 companies are NASCAR sponsors.

From NASCAR/Margolis: At Hendrick Motorsports, which employs 500 people, sponsors are estimated to cover 65 to 70 percent of all infrastructure costs. The rest is paid for by race winnings and other endorsement deals.

Some NASCAR 2015 stats.
There are 18 official teams.
70 drivers have entered one or more of the 21 races so far.
11 racers have netted a victory.
23 drivers has been Top 5.
45 different drivers have been Top 10.


Lets make a dream WRC scenario:

10 "official" teams.
4 cars pr team. (Total of 40 "official" WRC cars)
2 "main drivers" pr team.
The 2 other cars available for specialist drivers (Tarmac/Gravel/Snow)
10 "private" teams with 1-4 cars pr team. (total of 10-40 "private" WRC cars)

Cost of WRC car: Cost capped to 200.000 Eur.

Safety:
- Strong spaceframe.
- Limited aerodynamics.
- Limited damper travel.
- Sentral seating.
- If needed for safety: RWD.

Engine/performance:
Cost capped engine: 30.000 Eur.
Min 5 rallies pr engine.
500 hp
600 Nm
1000 kg


(Or just use World Rallycross Cars)

This will never pass (that cheap) 'cos guys like Wilson (and Richards in the past) must make some money...

[lewalcindor]

Hehe, 1:0 for You

Haha, well, I don't think the boxy rear end of Chaparral reduced much drag to be honest.

[Lundefaret]

Haha, well, I don't think the boxy rear end of Chaparral reduced much drag to be honest.

A boxy rear end (clean cuts) is actually a quite good way to not get more drag than necessary. The worst is having a "tail" that is has more than about 12 degrees slant, that will cause stalling and generate lift.
The Charparall is also pushing air in to the wake of the car, from the underside, wich also has a positive effect on the drag.
The "worst" thing with the Chaparral is its big frontal area.

[Lundefaret]

The space frame rallycross lites made in Turkey at still expensive.
https://youtu.be/mjU__B6Oaes (Nascar robot welding tube car).
Maybe the Australian 'answer' of UTVs in rallies for less expensive 'current' vehicles. Certainly engine capacity is similar e.g Brendan Reeves R2 Fiesta ecoboost vs a Polaris RZR turbo

The Lites are a very god point, tough I dont agree that they are expensive.
The Lites are made quite cheap in Turkey, and sold with a very good profit.
A similar solution could have worked very well in rallying.

The last price for a Lite I heard was 185.000 Dollar, which is about 170.000 Eur (remember, a very good profit).
Thats the same price as a NASCAR, and an R5 rallycar.
And the Lites are comparably very easy and cheap to run. And it could be made even easier and cheaper.
And it would be easy to scale them up, making a WRC-car.

- The good thing with a Lite is very cheap/easy to change broken body parts.
- Internal chock absorbers, so if You take of a corner You only brake cheap metal stuff, not expensive suspension parts.
- Standardized production, making the cars cheaper to produce.
- A space frame construction making it easier to change out bruken parts, and cheaper and easier to change a whole chassis if needed.

----

UTVs are perfect for rallying (I have a Polaris RZR 800 XP4 my self), and the new RZR Turbo with 144 hp is much faster than an R2 rallycar.
They can also run on much poorer roads, making it much easier to find roads to rally on.
And they could make rallying quite watchable. I have been a driving instructor for Polaris at the Norwegian launch of the RZR1000 (not turbo), and ran on a big motocross track, jumping extremely high and far, with no problems regarding the suspension - and we were running a standard set up.
I have had my RZR for two years, and it has been extremely cheap to run (fuel, oil, oil filter). Nothing has broken (it has even rolled a couple of times), until I tore off one of the rear wheels last time I was out (I live on a forestry farm with A LOT of good rally roads for the RZR), and even that is costing pennies to repair compared to a "normal" rally car.
So a UTV based rally series would be very good

[skarderud]

The main problem is the manufacturers. They dont want any other to build cars, so they can do whatever they want and suits them.
Maybe to ban manufacturers, and easier/cheaper buildt cars is the only way to get a decent championship again?

[danon]

[OldF]

The car concept for 2017 is ok for me except the increase in aero downforce. More power and aggressiveness is what I welcome. The sound is quite OK but what I like to see is the aggressiveness of cars out of a corner like in the days of group B cars.

How about some global regulations with drawings, material definitions and measurements of parts that can be fabricated locally with any need of any homologation, only a passport from the local ASN.

The engine could be an engine big enough without any need of any high tuning. What I’ve read for example the BMW M3 used in Finnish F-Cup aren’t much tuned because about 300 hp is enough in the cup. My personal favourite would be a 2,5 – 3,0 litre V6 engine.

The transmission could be same or similar to what is used with the Maxi Rally cars. Well, the only options probably are Subaru or Mitsubishi or is there any other options?

This kind of formula would of course never get an approval from the manufacturers and never have a global championship but same kind of cars with their drivers could compete with each other and the performance of drivers could be evaluated in different parts of the world compared to the WRC or WRC2 drivers to find some new talents.

[giu canbera]

Some really good intetrsting talk here and just like in other series, manufacturers ego are "damaging" racing. But theres some people saying that we r close to the day manufacturers will turn to electric engines only and leave racing to garage companies that will be only interested in "build this engine/car under that specification, sell it and have a good day. Next week we see you to buy something to replace broken parts if needed".

[danon]

WRC 2017...

[N.O.T]

useless photoshops for kids...