DJR Team Penske Cheating?

[Sandman]

Fines are applied by Cams, and they keep the money. Doesn't stay within supercars. The engine thing is a weird setup all round including the timing of the announcement, but if its outside the rules, that's the rules. The issue with the slow down fiasco is they basically penalised Car 12 and the team but got of scott free with Car 17 who was the beneficiary of the setup allowing them to maintain track position and eventually go on to win. All whilst it ruined the race for many others further in the pack on different strategies. I gather there is not enough in the rules or the evidence to penalise car 17 for what went down so Penske played it very well. But penalising Car 12 which was already the scapegoat basically isn't a penalty as he was already sacrificed, and although $250k is the biggest fine that they could hand down, it is a drop in the ocean for the Penske empire. I just hope they revise the rules so this can't happen again in the future.

 

[Deuce]

Still, 3.5 thousandth of an inch is nothing. You would get that from different valve lash.
More intake or exhaust flow could be achieved by seat profile.
Would they have more power from this? 1hp more maybe, which isn't even a qtr of a % more power. You would be better to thin your paint a bit more and save weight.

All seems strange to me.

 

[Skylarking]

@Deuce, maybe the engine fiasco was the only way cams could penalise car 17 considering what @Sandman said.

It could be as simple as CAMs couldn’t penalise the winner for receiving an unfair advantage from his team mate’s slow dow tactic so they found another way

 

[Immortality]

Still, 3.5 thousandth of an inch is nothing. You would get that from different valve lash.
More intake or exhaust flow could be achieved by seat profile.
Would they have more power from this? 1hp more maybe, which isn't even a qtr of a % more power. You would be better to thin your paint a bit more and save weight.

All seems strange to me.

Gotta remember this was a used engine, what were the numbers when it was new?

 

[Skylarking]

^ hahahaha, special DJRTP valve tips designed to wear down to legal limits after the required use just “missed it by that much”

 

[Aussie Trev]

Still, 3.5 thousandth of an inch is nothing. You would get that from different valve lash.
More intake or exhaust flow could be achieved by seat profile.
Would they have more power from this? 1hp more maybe, which isn't even a qtr of a % more power. You would be better to thin your paint a bit more and save weight.

All seems strange to me.

If the valve lift was such a non issues why did they use a different engine in the race? They obviously knew they were non compliant with the rules otherwise they would not have bothered to change a pole position winning engine.

 

[Deuce]

If the valve lift was such a non issues why did they use a different engine in the race? They obviously knew they were non compliant with the rules otherwise they would not have bothered to change a pole position winning engine.

Fit a lighter valve springs that allow cam to 'throw' the valve for higher lift, drive hard for short time frame, spring goes soft, fit alternate motor with stiffer springs that can go the 1000km race.
Perfectly simple reason to swap motors.

Of course it could be anything and it's unlikely any press release will highlight the truth. So I guess we will never know.

 

[Deuce]

Gotta remember this was a used engine, what were the numbers when it was new?

Probably the same.
I wouldn't expect any measurable wear on a race motor of such few kms.
Unless they forgot to put oil in it.

 

[Deuce]

@Deuce, maybe the engine fiasco was the only way cams could penalise car 17 considering what @Sandman said.

It could be as simple as CAMs couldn’t penalise the winner for receiving an unfair advantage from his team mate’s slow dow tactic so they found another way

This sounds like the most logical train of thought.

 

[Immortality]

Probably the same.
I wouldn't expect any measurable wear on a race motor of such few kms.
Unless they forgot to put oil in it.

...and yet there was a fair bit of difference between the 8 valves. I doubt an engine builder that puts out work with such variation would be doing race engines for any team let alone a top tier V8 supertaxi team. I also though these engines were sealed to keep everyone honest once they leave the engine builders?

Fit a lighter valve springs that allow cam to 'throw' the valve for higher lift, drive hard for short time frame, spring goes soft, fit alternate motor with stiffer springs that can go the 1000km race.
Perfectly simple reason to swap motors.

Of course it could be anything and it's unlikely any press release will highlight the truth. So I guess we will never know.

It's called lofting and is an old Nascar trick (I'm sure it's no co-incidence that that is where Penske came from) but I doubt it as I think things like valves have minimum weights to stop teams using exotic materials. All done to make an even playing field.

Something I wonder about though, are they allowed to change valve springs between races?