Discuss your idea's for a new series here

No, I dislike it because they can't race together easily. As I said a fair bit earlier in the thread, if we're to run any of the LM spec cars then it would be better as a single make series such as the Mazda's like Toni proposes.
There is (upto) a 15 minute range disparity between the 3 cars, a 10 lap tire life gap, and laptimes that always differ by over a second.
If it's picked then fine, but I at least owe an explanation as to why I voted no and give some data as to why I think they're a bad idea.

I'm really not making up how long these are taking to balance properly - I'm actually running a spreadsheet to do it as I need so much data from them.
The ballast/restrictor route gives cars similar to when we tried balancing the Kunos GT40, 330 P4 and 908 against each other - apart from the Porsche which wasn't touched the other 2 cars were just horrible to drive by the time they were nearly as slow as the Porsche, the driving factor is something that needs to be considered in this too.

 

I didn't know that, I thought they could race together more easily. Thanks for sharing this.

That being said as I stated before in this thread I am not in favor of a BOP if the real series was not BOP-ed. So yes, I would prefer running just the Mazda like Toni suggested than running a heavily BOP-ed version of those cars any day.

I will replace my suggestion by another one.

I also just tried the NFS tournament class B cars and they seem to be 1-2 seconds apart also. I will probably replace that suggestion as well.

 

Question for @Tim Muttram since he has been doing extensive research into the Group C cars.

Suppose we don't BOP the cars and run them as is. Would it be possible to come up with a track selection that favors each car equally? Supposing we run a 6 track championship that each car is best at two of those tracks. Which would mean everyone has as much chance for winning the championship in any of the cars. I know that would also suppose that no car is best at 2 of them and worst at 4 of them.

If that would be the case then my vote would be the Group C cars with a calculated track selection.

 

Id say Barcelona Spa Suzuka for the first 3 since they are a good mix. Food for thought even though i know i wasnt addressed.

 

If the server is available during the off season, it might be good to have some practice sessions with different cars and drivers to post lap times to see how it all goes. Last March-April, SRS ran those three group C cars (Porsche 962, Mercedes C9 and Mazda 787b) in sprint 20 minutes format without any BOP. You could choose any car for any race during the whole season. Porsche got selected by the majority and won most of the races because of great handling and good top speed. On tracks like Monza, there are better chances for the C9. And especially at Le Grand Circuit 1967, where the C9 won purely because of its huge top speed and acceleration. Handling is tough in C9 but for a good driver it will probably pay off if control and use of that extra power is solved. The Mazda is just always too weak with top speeds. It's all a matter of racing eras and rules of those particular times or even particular years.

 

I mean each car was meant for something. Porsche for the balance Sauber Mercedes C9 for the power and Mazda as the wildcard. So with that being said you should be able to figure out a track format for each. If you want to run LeMans for that authentic facture then run it. The tracks i described are the medium for all three.

 

The discussion about BOP, etc, is fascinating but I believe excessively complex and I'm unclear of the final objective. We might be agonising about the difference in performances between cars whilst blatantly ignoring that a typical grid in the SRO races (I've done) is populated with drivers of very different levels. I've seen Tim fighting Matteo and I doubt I will be challenging them directly with the same car (or even category) any time soon.
Someone was rightly pointing out the other day that fixed setups are by no means conducive to fairness as the 'fixed' setup might be more suitable to some drivers... Wouldn't the same apply to some extent to the best efforts for BOP? Tim might spend countless hours doing a great BOP for his driving style and achieving very similar times across a range of tracks with different cars... A different driver might struggle though with that arrangement to keep similar performance levels with each of the cars in the same tracks...
By this, I don't want to undermine any efforts to balance some things but, maybe, the differences in performance of cars could be more of a blessing if it was possible (I know it would be very challenging) that we embraced those differences and 'match' it inversely to our driving levels... (I know this is almost impossible... but with goodwill, everything can happen).

At the end of the day, we need to ask ourselves what is it that we enjoy from these races... And I'm sure each of us will have a slightly different answer. I might venture the following:

• We all want to win (otherwise we wouldn't be racing)
• I suppose (but I'm not sure) we all want to be challenged and race closely with other drivers to make the races interesting. I personally don't enjoy much races where I'm on my own for the most part of the race. I like fighting, struggling against a few other drivers, overtaking, defending, ... Yes, a dominant win feels good from time to time but sometimes I feel for the aliens amongst us and their lonely races...

If we were 200 drivers, it would be easier to split us into grids with similar and more competitive levels but that's challenging with 20 drivers.

So I wonder what is it that I'm trying to say with the above... Just an appeal to our better selves to choose wisely combinations of drivers/cars that help to make races more interesting and competitive...
The reality though is that, in the real world, typically the best drivers get access to the best equipment... And it's boring. It is much better and what has made motorsport legendary when the most skilled driver is the underdog with the most challenged machine but still can win races. It feels much better also when you win against the elements.

I'm not that bothered at the end of the day with the final car we race... Most of the suggestions so far look good and I'm sure they have the potential to be enjoyed. My own experience with the Escort in the DRM has been very interesting: I picked it up because, from previous races against Maxime, I knew we have a very similar level and I knew that, at least, I would be fighting against him. Brands Hatch was an awful race. We were last and the tyres killed the rest of our races. I developed the impression that the Escort was a weak car without a chance ever to win against the Lancias, etc. But I kept working on the car. Filip showed us all at Sebring that there is more in the Escort than you might think at first glance. There has been a strong element of luck in my successes with the Escort this season but I'd also say I have hugely improved myself in the car throughout the series. And those fights against Kiril and Toni at Lausitzring, or against Mac, Toni and Henri at Nords, feeling as well as the 'weaker' underdog with a bit of luck (even if this is just a figment of my imagination ) were really enjoyable.
Anyway, I hope this message is not a massive waste of time... Sorry for the brick guys.

 

Doing this will result in a choice of tracks that favour either the Merc or the 962, never the Mazda - it simply doesn't have the raw pace.

Remember all 3 cars are from different years and had very different design ethos and rule sets to abide by.
The Porsche dates back to the start of Grp C and has ground effects, loads of power and a low drag shape (I'm ignoring the short tail here - it's FAR to fast to ever race the other 3 unless in a true long distance endurance event or a track like old LeMans where it's top speed will bite it), it has slightly better grip than the C9 because of this so favours slightly twisty fast circuits.
The Mazda was designed around efficiency - it was so light they never bothered making 2 variants, so the low drag LM chassis was used all season, it gets it's advantage in the pits, as it goes there less often than it's competition as per real life (this still amazes me, how the hell a quad rotor is efficient I'll never know! Can't remember if they were limited in fuel grade or not back then, the weight also heavily reduced the tire wear).
The Merc dates to the end of Group C - No ground effects but far more engine development than that in the Porsche, so the low drag variant in AC has a higher top speed thanks to more power and less drag. Unsurprisingly the 5l TT V8 is a bastard to control on 'normal' tracks because we have the wrong chassis for those locations and it hates slow corners.

@Jos:
To me BOP is solely about the choice to drive what ever you want while retaining the chance to race your friends and still have a chance of winning - when Matteo joined DRM I upgraded to the M1 because I knew it had equal pace. The K2 I had originally chosen did not, which was my original reason for picking it.
While we've shown that my assumption was correct through most of the series, the only issue is that our cars are each strong at totally different things. So our races are therefore less close than we would like (In Sebring you could watch the gap between us change by about a second throughout every lap, even while we banged in near identical times).
Looking back I should have taken the same car as him really, but I like keeping variety on the grids so picked something no-one else had instead.

Driving unbalanced Grp C will give the same result due to the way those cars behave Vs each other, so the only way to race one of your 'common enemies' is to pick the same car as them as you did with the Escort.

In GPL as we had a more static racer list we had some series that were handicapped with drivers restricted to cars based on their skill.
All this tended to do in reality was generate the problem experienced by the lead Div2 cars in DRM when having to fight with much slower drivers who have better cars. This resulted in a heavy workload for the mods in several instances.
Race speed is a combination of constancy and car control, someone lacking in either is often scary to have to race against when you are in the disadvantaged car (Or even an equal one if you've ended up behind) because regardless of intent, they are more likely to hit you while you're trying to pass. This isn't always the case of course and sometimes you can have cracking battles, but when your 3rd race of a season is ended in DNF due to someone driving into you then you tend to loose the will to go on.
Better to start equal and then add success ballast each race if you want to narrow gaps in the field.

With enough testing put in balancing can work, I know you aren't a fan as they're fairly new, but my prep for the DTM series has all the cars lapping within tenths of each other on differing tracks for both myself, and the other drivers who have tried them all - But this only works as they're very similar in driving terms to begin with. I've mostly done the maths to balance power/Weight with some adjustments to give the 4wd and turbo cars the appropriate advantages and disadvantages.
In this instance I honestly believe that it is possible to win in any of the 4 cars - providing luck and skill are with you of course!
Without BoP anyone winning in an Alfa will have won 'because they have the Alfa', now it's fair game for all.

This is just my argument FOR keeping the BoP in mind, we can race without it - but you often end up with people picking fast cars that they shouldn't really be in if playing fair.

 

Thanks Tim, I was a bit afraid of that. Too bad really because these cars are great.

 

Happy with this Tim. As I said, my message wasn't an attempt to undermine BOP and it's much appreciated the efforts you put into it. Just I was philosophical this morning .
I agree with your message and considerations about the ingredients to proper close racing.

I'll love to join the DTM races. When are they planned? Or have I missed them already?

 

Beginning Of Jan - I'll be putting up stuff over the weekend. Although not here as I'm not allowed

 

Great, great, great post Jos.

I would just add that some people tend to compare the drivers' skills on much occasions, and it's fair enough as it is spirit of racing after all, still it is mostly biaised in the real world yet, and probably even more biaised in simracing. So that actually it's quite pointless and only self-satisfying at the best. Let's face it : none of us would drive in the real world like we do in sim and to get back to performances/skills topic, we have different hardware with their pros/cons here and there, everyone knows that a simracing "station" can cost us from 200 to 5000 euros, and this without even counting the PC running it.
Take a look at this : a high end quality pedals set gives you a wonderful brake precision thanks to the load cell, but additionally a simple 15 years old G25 allows you to do unbeatable brakings by making the heel and toe so much easier. A high end DD wheel gives you great reactivity and precision, yet I guess it demands quite some efforts to tame it with its potential peak torque. Same goes for the shifter, then we can get to the screens or VR, etc, even the seat makes a differnce... All those aspects should make us putting things into perspective.
Not to mention that most of the modelled cars we drive aren't realistic enough unfortunately : we quite don't manage/care keeping the beast healthy, the gearbox/transmission/rev matching handling is very often wayyyy too much forgiving or even completely unrealistic. It's a shame, but we have to do with it until a new high end classic cars simulation is released (I pray all the gods of racing everyday )

So to me the main point isn't the competition itself, but to compete. I mean : close, clean, fair racing. The rest is secondary.
All that to say that I personally am ok with different cars characteristics racing each other, but at least those should really race each other. Otherwise, and if we are tempted to half-open the skills comparison door, I'm more for a cup-style racing (I mean single car type ofc), and this car being as top modelled as possible. This is one of the reasons why Jos and I propose a 250 GTO cup series. But plenty of other suggestions can be good too of course.

 

Ive heard that Mazda did there homework very well for the 787B model due to their 757 model (i believe thats what the model before was) being effecient in sipping gas but not enough raw pace and reliability. Rotary engines have shown to be able to sip fuel well if done correctly (hence the reason why Herberts team was told to go flat out since MAZDASPEED knew that the car was good enough to push) so in that regard i understand it can be baffling to think that such a motor that makes all that noise would be able to go that much of the distance.

 

lol, I was referring to the normal economy of Rotarys Kenny, Mazda pulled a fast one on the competition the year they won - can't remember where now but I saw a great documentary about it a few years back where they discussed their planning and logic behind the design of the car
I've been hooning around in Japanese sports cars for 20 years so know plenty of people with Rotarys, tuning one to be efficient and fast on the road is near impossible.
To do it in a race car Mazda had to be completely on top of their game - which, of course, they were (and bloody certain of the quality of their fuel!).
My old 540i made any RX series Mazda look like it had a big hole in the tank, and that thing had most of a living room in it and still did 155 in near silence with out trying too hard..

In road cars it's not unheard of for RX8 owners to bin the Renisis unit and replace it with an LS so they can double both the power and the economy in one go
Sure it kills the handing, but in a road car that matters less

 

I was wondering why they had individual downloads - I'll give them a go when I get a chance, also good work finding Stardust - I loved that track in the CanAm mods in GPL!

 

We ran similar at SROUK last year using great old tracks like Riverside, Bridgehampton, Mosport etc. it was quite a hoot and the cars sounded amazing. We just used the Lola Mk2 Spyder though.
https://i.postimg.cc/xjGPszxN/Key-Cars-002.jpg

 

That's a good point Maxime. One thing that it is quite critical for me is the rim I use depending on the car. Not sure if anyone else has experienced anything like this but, for me, there are some cars that are impossible to be driven fast without the right rim... This might be because of my hand racing style and how I unorthodoxly tend to free the wheel and catch it up back when the car oversteer to control the slide... This is impossible with certain rims. Perhaps a pseudo-technic that I should dispose of anyway but as always there are habits difficult to get rid of...

 

Actually that's quite usual way to deal massive slides when driving in icy roads in Finland..

 

The fact is that if you master this style, it is quite good and fast, but any misjudgment and you are out