( V8 ) Supercars

[Aussie Trev]

This is worth a watch and has the best V8 motor ever used in the day.

I would love to see them go back to those days. He was talking about how the current engines produce more than that one and how given new piston designs etc his could have matched them. Thing is, I heard during Sunday's commentary that current "super cars" weight in at 2.25 ton. Can that be right? Because the old Commodores and Torana's, ah, to see an A9X L34 screaming down Conrod again, would have a major weight advantage by comparison.

 

[Reaper]

Ford should have used a Mondeo it certainly could not look any worse than the Mustang.

The mustang doesn't have to look that dopey. They front is deliberately dropped because they can (ie lower CD). DJR have done a brilliant job building a car taking every liberty available to it under the rules (of the day) and built a rocket and a half. Supercars is a parity formula however and it has been bought back to the field however the kick start it got in the first 1/2 of the season makes the title a fate-de-compli for this year. Now things are pretty close and will make for an interesting series next year.

 

[Reaper]

Yeah, going back a little earlier to 1981, there were 60 starters ( compared to only 25 ? yesterday ) and the sound of the race engines of Bartlett's Camaro / Brock's VC ? / Johnson's XD etc contributed greatly to the spectator experience, compared to the almost anaemic and homogenous sounds of todays racecar.

Not sure how many are here with rose coloured glasses or just to young to remember but the racing in the 70's and 80's was really terrible and more or less a political game to get the next go fast widget thru CAMS homolgation. Moffat was royally screwed with the RX-7 as was Bartlett in the Camaro meanwhile poster boy Brock, although having his own dramas ending up in the supreme court one year still did probably the best and the results showed (cubic megabucks from Marlboro didn't hurt either).

I love the historics and MCM head and shoulders over Supercars but in reality the competition is no different to any time in history with a handful of cars at the top likely to win and everybody else making up the numbers. What is different though is the whole field is far far more compressed (difference between mean lap time of p1 vs p24) than it ever has been.

 

[Derekthetree]

I would love to see them go back to those days. He was talking about how the current engines produce more than that one and how given new piston designs etc his could have matched them. Thing is, I heard during Sunday's commentary that current "super cars" weight in at 2.25 ton. Can that be right? Because the old Commodores and Torana's, ah, to see an A9X L34 screaming down Conrod again, would have a major weight advantage by comparison.

Wiki reckons minimum weight is 1395kg which seems more reasonable. 100kg minimum driver weight and some fuel still gets you nowhere near 2.25t