Project Blueprint

[lukey73]

I have found an article which explains how and why things were done 2 yrs ago when the BA and VY were introduced to V8supercars. Maybe some people on this forum should read what is here before making outlandish comments.

here is the article (http://www.v8x.com.au/cms/A_30409/article.html)

But here a few excerpts from it.

Ford continues to mount the wing with giant end plates, with its exact location also up for debate. Ford Racing Australia is happy to lose some downforce here, acknowledging that the Falcon has a faster rear end than the Commodore and has always generated more pressure here.

Ford picks up the trailing arm location off the Commodore, which Marsden says will help get the power to the ground. The shockers have also been repositioned in-line with the Commodore's; this, combined with more downforce on the nose, will provide some pretty significant changes to the balance and setup of the Falcon.

And the last is pretty interesting
All Ford drivers will be looking forward to having better balance on the aerodynamics, more at the front and less at the rear.

[Malik]

very interesting article mate... thanks for posting it :)

[SL/ENUT]

Sorry but Blueprint is crap.It should be left alone.

[singer]

Originally posted by SL/ENUT
Sorry but Blueprint is crap.It should be left alone.

Its better than having CAMS decide whats in & whats out:D

[SL/ENUT]

Originally posted by singer
Its better than having CAMS decide whats in & whats out:D

True very true.But i rather see the Commodores have the Macpherson strut up front rather the Ford double A wishbones.

[lukey73]

sl/enut i dont get it ? that article is 2 yrs old. What would you like left alone ? The reason i posted this thread is that there are others on this forum who are stating that the FORD's have been hard done by, all im trying to show is that they had ample opportunity to sort it out before they put the BA on the track.

[SL/ENUT]

What i liked left alone is Ford have there suspesion and Holden has theres.Thats all.
Sorry if sounded like i'm a bit mean.

[lukey73]

Nah thats ok just wondering what is was you wanted left alone. I agree with you in that, but i can see why they have done what they have. I think eventually they will go the same as NASCAR and all be the same except for the look. That would be a shame but with all the carryone i dont think they will have much choice.

[Malik]

SL/ENUT your not gonna be happy next year when they bring in even more controlled parts which I believe is planned...

[Leigh]

Originally posted by SL/ENUT
What i liked left alone is Ford have there suspesion and Holden has theres.Thats all.
Sorry if sounded like i'm a bit mean.
But that IS the point...Ford never had theirs...

All Falcons since the inception of V8's back in 93 have had hand-built front A arms, mounted in a different position to the equivalent road-going car...

This occured because Ford recognised that they'd have consistant front-end failures if they didn't...

(and this is one of the major reasons the V8 category was developed over a production car category).

So why did the Commodores have to have road-going suspension for all those years...

Also
Ford continues to mount the wing with giant end plates, with its exact location also up for debate. Ford Racing Australia is happy to lose some downforce here, acknowledging that the Falcon has a faster rear end than the Commodore and has always generated more pressure here.

This statement is slightly out of context. The endplates don't reduce the downforce. The downforce from the Blueprint rear spoiler is less than that of the AU spoiler...

All Ford drivers will be looking forward to having better balance on the aerodynamics, more at the front and less at the rear.

Again this statement could be interpreted the wrong way...The AU had approximately 4 times more downforce at the raer than at the front, whereas the VT/VX had roughly the same overall downforce but had it more-or-less evenly distributed between front and rear.

The BA on the other hand has more downforce at the front and less at the back compared to the AU, giving it rougly 2 times more downforce at the rear than front. Incidently, the VY was also adjusted to have a similar 2:1 ratio and similar front and rear downforce figures.

[lukey73]

Icfp2297 i posted this thread for GAN88. He was making comments about how the FALCON has been hard done by in project blueprint. When you read the attached article with the thread it shows that FORD new what there were doing and why they were doing it.

The pace car helped. The car understeered really badly and the rear wing deficiency really showed at the top of the mountain. But Lowndes is a class act and carried the car, especially when he caught the equally fidgetty car of Bowe down the mountain.

What exactly don't you get?
The Fords lack rear end grip. That is a well known, commonly acknowledged fact. Keep in mind that the VY has been far superior in the last two years. Why they didn't cop a penalty during the last review after Winton, I will never know.

What im trying to show is that FORD not Holden, didnt pull the wool over TEGA's eye's FORD willingly had the BA setup this way and now he is complaining that its someone's fault. Well he should write a letter to the FORD competition department and ask them why they did it.

[69Mach1]

Funny thing is I don't hear the Stone brothers complaining. Maybe some of the other Ford teams should take note of who won the championship last year.

I also agree that a car should run its factory body kit since nothing else is the same as the road car.

[lukey73]

If we went back to running standard body kits there 2 major effects on the cars and the series as i see it. First up the car makers would start to produce cars like they had to in the old GRP A days, i for one cant see them wanting to do that as they had enough headaches last time.

Second is after watching a piece that crompton did on saturday or sunday the wings really dont add much downforce, there their mainly to stop lift. From memory it was something like 200 kg's downforce at 200 kph which isnt really much when they compared an f1 car which has 1600 kg's of downforce at 200kph.

The only real way to make it totally fair is to make them a silhoutte formular as NASCAR is and then there would be no arguement.

Its never going to be a perfect world, one of the cars will always better in one area at one track than the other, but overall there are so close why change what has been a great 2 yrs so far.

[wayno]

I must admit that I am really not too upset with the way things stand at the moment. The makes are all pretty even and there have been a number of winners this year.
It's all very easy to whinge when your make isn't winning but it is a TWO make series and the opposition must win sometime or we won't have a sport to watch at all.
SBR are doing what HRT used to do and good luck to them I think. Remember things could be worse. We could always go to things like 'success ballast' like they do in other series. I don't think anyone would like to see that.
I think some people need to go buy some chewy and get the sour taste out of their mouths.