RE: NZ rally report (no audi content)

["Dave Eaton" <Dave.Eaton@clear.net.nz>]

the economics of 'wrc' cars vs group 'a' cars is way out of our league
scott, your experience so noted :-)

however, i would wager that the cost of a 'wrc' car would be very, very
considerably *less* than a group 'a' car when you consider the cost of
finding and tooling a factory, and producing,  selling and supporting 2,500
cars/year.  do they make a profit on the cars?  apparently not even close.
you need to remember also that the whole intent of the 'wrc' regs in the 1st
place was to enable manufacturers to compete in the wrc *without* undergoing
the expense of homologating a turbo awd car.  quite logical when you think
about it :-)

also, if you continue to think that there is no difference between 'wrc' and
'a' in terms of suspension regulations (pickup points and so on), perhaps
you should just read the regulations, they make it pretty clear.  or perhaps
even check out the front strut towers of the ford focus, versus the road
car?  the fact is that with a wrc car, the designers have considerably more
freedom for e.g. rear tunnel design, suspension design, and suspension
pickup points, heck even wheelbase and track.  so the ford engineer told me.

as i said, it is highly likely that there will be no more group 'a' cars in
the wrc next year.  so, with regard to the relative merits of group 'a'
versus 'wrc', the case rests...

also, i did not say that "active suspension can't be competitive".  re-read
my post.  in my post i talked about ford's experience with active *dampers*,
not suspension.  the ford engineer told me that ford did not have active
suspension on the car, that they were playing with it (along with dampers),
and hadn't as yet found an advantage.  do you think they were lying?

while f1 was successful with active suspension before it was banned, the
issues with rallying are much, much more complex.  one thing that you can be
absolutely certain of though is that if/when a competitive advantage is
found, it will appear on the cars.  subaru *have* been playing around with
electronic damping on their wrc cars, if you understand the difference.

you claim that the *only* advantage of struts is packaging.  fine.  that's
your call.  foolish, but that's your prerogative.  i would note however,
with all due respect, that a great many top-line designers seem to disagree
:-)

actually, the whole idea that you seem to consider that an experienced
motorsport-orientated manufacturer would invest 10's of millions in an
attempt to get the glory in the wrc and then would deliberately design
something that was not the absolute best (in his opinion) for the dollars he
has to spend, is just plain laughable.  i sure you don't do this in your
business when someone approaches you with their hard-earned money - if you
do, then thanks for warning us.

if you sit back and look at it, what are the differences that make the
500hp+ group 'b' machines (audi, lancia, peugeot, with their double
wishbones) so much slower over a special stage than today's top cars which
make do with only 300hp?  with all due respect to the current crop of
drivers, i do not consider any of them a match for alen, rohrl or toivonen,
so you cannot say that drivers are where it's at.  there are 3 things that
have made the major difference: tyres, suspensions and transmissions.
simple really.

and can we please drop the "rallye" and "groupe" affectation?  it's "rally"
and "group", as we're using english.  thanks.

dave
'95 rs2
'90 ur-q
'88 mb 2.3-16


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-audi-s-cars@lists.emailsol.com
[mailto:owner-audi-s-cars@lists.emailsol.com]On Behalf Of QSHIPQ@aol.com
Sent: Wednesday, 4 August 1999 01:28
To: AUDI S Cars Discussion List
Cc: audi-s-cars@lists.emailsol.com; audi-20v@emailsol.com
Subject: RE: Re: NZ rallye report (no real content)

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