RE: Isle of Man TT with Mark Higgins

[rhinochopig]

Life Saab Itch said:

caine100 said:

Suggesting a car that has a lot less horsepower than the bikes have will go round faster is not really a "sensible point".

It's got a 1000cc bike engine in it.

Swap it for the motor that was in McPint's bike and it'll have the same power.

It'll accelerate slower, have a lower top speed due to the higher frontal area, but have more corner speed.

I don't see how it's not a sensible point. It was sensible last year.

I'm putting my suggestion at a disadvantage, yet you're saying it's not sensible?

It is sensible. The side-cars which are a similar size and weight with 600cc and two up post a 113mph lap. Whether the better PTW with McG's engine is worth another 17mph is debatable though.

Sell his race engine for 20k and add a forced induction busa though - holeshot will build you a 500bhp turbo-busa for 5-6 not-inc engine - and the power is there to get close to the top speeds of the bike and you still have the massive braking and cornering advantage.

[dingocooke]

I was at TT2012 for race week, and the most boring/dull/lacklustre thing of the whole event was the procession of Subaru's...half the visiting spectators on road bikes on open roads were travelling quicker on the sections where we watched, and the groan from the crowd when the subaru's came round was obvious!! They also took up track time that would have been better used for practice and racing.
The Mark Higgins car incident last year at the bottom of Bray Hill could on its own have spelt the end of the TT if he hadnt been lucky enough to have caught it...it would have been a truly devastating accident; with potential for multiple deaths.
My opinion the TT doesnt need cars, in the same way the British F1 Grand Prix doesn't need motorcycles!
I think the discussion about bikes or cars on the TT course is a little pointless as it will never happen; but to get the same power to weight ratio as a superbike, you would need an F1 car, and an F1 car would fall to bits in half a lap never mind a six lap equivalent to the superbike race trying beat the 130+ average speed the road bike based bikes manage!
If you dont believe me try riding from Ginger Hall to Ramsey; it's a public road and rough as can be!!
Long live the TT and super cars, but they dont mix!!

[hairykrishna]

I'm really not convinced that the course would knacker an F1 car, or at least an F1 style hill climber. If the suspension on the sidecars stands up to it why wouldn't a single seater?

[Speedy11]

dingocooke said:

My opinion the TT doesnt need cars, in the same way the British F1 Grand Prix doesn't need motorcycles!
I think the discussion about bikes or cars on the TT course is a little pointless as it will never happen; but to get the same power to weight ratio as a superbike, you would need an F1 car, and an F1 car would fall to bits in half a lap never mind a six lap equivalent to the superbike race trying beat the 130+ average speed the road bike based bikes manage!
If you dont believe me try riding from Ginger Hall to Ramsey; it's a public road and rough as can be!!
Long live the TT and super cars, but they dont mix!!

Exactly the TT doesn't want or need cars. However if a Rover can do 100mph and a WRX STI 120mph which are both very slow cars compared to racing cars an F3 car for example I would say would easily beat the bikes time while an F1 would be able to cruse around and not worry about damage etc and easily beat that time.

[Life Saab Itch]

Don't go clouding the issue with facts now!!!

[Life Saab Itch]

caine100 said:

Braking yes, but I'm not so sure there would be quite the massive cornering advantage you allude to. Regardless, 1mph equates to about 15 seconds around the TT course, that's a lot of time to make up with a lower top speed. Maybe it could, maybe it couldn't.

well the cornering advantage would shock you then.

Downforce added to a much much larger contact patch, added to not having to shift weight around the vehicle for a direction change would see cornering speeds increase massively over a 'bike.



Put it this way, if (as all the bikers keep banging on about) a 'bike's acceleration is so much faster than a car, why are there no outright circuit records that are held by 'bikes, rather than cars?


TT course is excluded, as is any other 'bikes only course.


I'll give you a clue, the cornering speed of 'bikes is lower than cars. Substantially lower.


Compare Thruxton. All about top speed. Look at the bike record there, then look at the various car classes.

Touring cars
Formula Ford (no downforce)
Formula 3 etc

[GC8]

Life Saab Itch said:

...as all the bikers keep banging on about...

There you go again. You keep making foolish references to 'bikers', but expect to be taken seriously.

Im not a 'biker', but I feel that beating a motorbike around the mountain course would be far more difficult than some people think.

I suspect that being anti-bike, Jeremy Clarkson-style is what motivates you, which explains the completely unneccessary hostility.

[jackh707]

What's the best equivalent to the TT, where both bikes and cars run? Long bumpy and high speed? The nurburgring?

Can we not just extrapolate lap times from a similar track to form a rough estimate of which is quicker, because until it actually happens is the best your going to get.



Or here another option, an evofq330whatever does a lap of Silverstone in 2:17 a vaguely similar car to the impreza.
A formula 1 car does it in 1:18 (with Schuuy at the helm in 2004)

About 80% faster by my rough calculations,

Ok... lets be generous, the TT and Silverstone are not comparable circuits, let's knock off 20% because the speed differential will be narrower between the cars on the TT (possibly)... and let's knock off another 10% because 2004 Schuuy was very fast.

So that leaves us with lets say 50%.
So a Formula 1 type car is likely to be 50%ish quicker than the scoob.

hmm... 19:37 reduced by 50%ish = 13:05 ish


It might be just possible Jim, it just might.




If there is anything wrong with my calculations besides being rough feel free to abuse me as they were done with a beer in hand.

(We could apply this method to all circuit to find an average speed differential between F1 and scoob for more accuracy.)

[Life Saab Itch]

GC8 said:

There you go again. You keep making foolish references to 'bikers', but expect to be taken seriously.

Im not a 'biker', but I feel that beating a motorbike around the mountain course would be far more difficult than some people think.

I suspect that being anti-bike, Jeremy Clarkson-style is what motivates you, which explains the completely unneccessary hostility.

I've got a couple of motorbikes myself and I like riding motorbikes, but my background is mechanics and engineering so this discussion every year is laughable to me.

I do, however, seem to be referring to some of the other threads on this where endless red herrings and strange excuses seemed to emerge when facts started to be added to the discussion.

[Life Saab Itch]

jackh707 said:

(We could apply this method to all circuit to find an average speed differential between F1 and scoob for more accuracy.)

It's called the Pomeroy Index and is fairly easily extrapolated for any car/bike.

[Life Saab Itch]

caine100 said:

Try and stay focused, we're talking about the TT Mountain Course.

I'm well aware of the limitations of bikes.

Ok, as I said, a 1000cc Formula Jedi using McPint's engine and appropriate gearing (antiquated as the car is in design) should easily beat the sidecar lap and I'd bet that it would be far closer to the bike record than many here reckon.


Add in up to date chassis/suspension/aero etc and the record would be easily within reach.

Now all you've got to do is convince Mark Higgins that he doesn't want a roof over his head.



Otherwise, for a bit more budget, a Norma M20.

[hairykrishna]

jackh707 said:

Can we not just extrapolate lap times from a similar track to form a rough estimate of which is quicker, because until it actually happens is the best your going to get.

That's over complication. As far as I know there are no tracks, where bikes and cars are both allowed to run, where the outright lap record is held by a bike. On most of them the bikes are beaten by relatively mundane race cars with no F1 spec machinery required.

I can see the argument coming that circuits are wide and relatively bump free so favour the cars. This may be the case, but I doubt it. Look at hill climbing. Somewhere like Prescott is extremely narrow, has a not so great surface and emphasises low speed acceleration - presumably favouring bikes. Despite this I believe all of the outright records are held by cars and normally by a considerable margin.

[Lighty]

Having visited the Isle a week or so ago, we had a few goes at the mountain course in our cars.
I can tell you that any quick car is too low to negotiate a lot of the course at speed, my car bottoms out at over 50mph quite regularly, i guess this is why they use a Subaru, with decent ground clearance.
The mountain course section is quite smooth, and we could go as fast as possible without bottoming out.Max speed for me was about 160 mph, a few more practice goes would have seen another 6 or 7 mph I guess. The bikes (at least the racers) will probably touch 190 to near on 200 on the mountain, and a few other places on the roads.There is no way a car can beat a bike at this place imo , I have both, so think I am correct. The racers are "other worldly " as far as I am concerned, most of the bike owners that go, just do the track for fun and pretty slow as far as I could see.
I put a couple of vids for you to see, just for fun
this one is our first ever run across the mountain
http://youtu.be/i6GSe2yibOc

This one is a bit quicker
http://youtu.be/GMFppR3adKk

[Martin_Hx]

Lighty said:

Having visited the Isle a week or so ago, we had a few goes at the mountain course in our cars.
I can tell you that any quick car is too low to negotiate a lot of the course at speed, my car bottoms out at over 50mph quite regularly, i guess this is why they use a Subaru, with decent ground clearance.
The mountain course section is quite smooth, and we could go as fast as possible without bottoming out.Max speed for me was about 160 mph, a few more practice goes would have seen another 6 or 7 mph I guess. The bikes (at least the racers) will probably touch 190 to near on 200 on the mountain, and a few other places on the roads.There is no way a car can beat a bike at this place imo , I have both, so think I am correct. The racers are "other worldly " as far as I am concerned, most of the bike owners that go, just do the track for fun and pretty slow as far as I could see.
I put a couple of vids for you to see, just for fun
this one is our first ever run across the mountain
http://youtu.be/i6GSe2yibOc

This one is a bit quicker
http://youtu.be/GMFppR3adKk

Enjoyed that, looks like good fun

[Speedy11]

Lighty said:

There is no way a car can beat a bike at this place imo , I have both, so think I am correct.

You cannot use a fast road car such as a 911 as a reference compared to a single seater. A 911 is lightyears behind a proper slicks and wings racing car. For example using the Nordschleife as a reference the difference between an F1 car and a 911 RS is bigger than the difference between a 911 RS and a Transit van ie approx average 145mph vs 100mph vs 70mph

[Lighty]

Speedy11 said:

You cannot use a fast road car such as a 911 as a reference compared to a single seater. A 911 is lightyears behind a proper slicks and wings racing car. For example using the Nordschleife as a reference the difference between an F1 car and a 911 RS is bigger than the difference between a 911 RS and a Transit van ie approx average 145mph vs 100mph vs 70mph

You are correct, but I didn't think we were including single seaters

[Life Saab Itch]

How much is a TT bike though.

I think we could do a reasonable comparison on price.

[Mr2Mike]

Life Saab Itch said:

well the cornering advantage would shock you then.

Downforce added to a much much larger contact patch, added to not having to shift weight around the vehicle for a direction change would see cornering speeds increase massively over a 'bike.

Massively? Care to explain how an British biker just managed a 7:10 at the Nurburgring on a 7 year old Yamaha R1? Very few cars are significantly quicker, with the exception of some LMPs.

[Speedy11]

Mr2Mike said:

Massively? Care to explain how an British biker just managed a 7:10 at the Nurburgring on a 7 year old Yamaha R1? Very few cars are significantly quicker, with the exception of some LMPs.

Wasn't that time for the shorter lap? And if it was it, would be about 7:45 ish for the full length?

[Life Saab Itch]

Mr2Mike said:

Massively? Care to explain how an British biker just managed a 7:10 at the Nurburgring on a 7 year old Yamaha R1? Very few cars are significantly quicker, with the exception of some LMPs.

Yes, massively.

What year was it that the 7 minute barrier was broken in F1 on the track? On the full circuit, not a B to G time.

Was it Lauda in 1975?

Look at the pomeroy index to see where the 1975 Ferrari 312T stands compared to today's cars.

That's an impressive lap for a bike, but it's not that great in outright speed terms.