Dominant Dirty Diesel: The Story of the Audi Le Mans Diesels (2006-2016)

thanks, the other day I talked a little about the LMPs and how they were more advanced than the Formula One spaceships, which were the Ferns endurance racing favorites and it was interesting to see how little competition there was in that category, the reason Let's say this is because lmp1 was designed to appeal to manufacturers, but since only Audi came along at first, I mean Lister safe panels and lightweight chassis, but unless you had four rings at the front of your car you weren't going to win, like it was Audi one in the R8 in 2000 and then again in 2001 and 2002 before Bentley won it in 2003, but let's face it, that thing was just a D-hour with a roof, a monster car Absolute, though I mean, look at it.

Basically it was the Audi r8c that ran in lmgtp. It will only be one time because I already knew they were onto something with the R8 and I decided to focus on that and the Bentley was the only car in that category, yeah, the Oco hadn't really made it. This had not yet been achieved, if the RH had taken two more victories in a row in the famous 24-hour race before appearing in

2006

with something that made people think what Audi had found with a

diesel

engine, the fuel of Satan , like Top. Gear used to describe it: They were not the first team to attempt this, although in 1949, the first year Le Mans resumed after World War II, brothers named Jack and Jean Deleterz were driving a straight-4 six-cylinder engine. .4 liter that ran on

diesel

and the car was later withdrawn.

They ran out of fuel and then burned out the starter motor. 2004 entered privately. Lola entered using the V10 diesel of a Volkswagen Touareg like the De la Tres brothers. He removed his gearbox and gave up the ghost after 35 laps, so that has to be the big question. So why use a diesel? Why try something that has been done twice before and failed? That question is the main one I had, so I went online to find out that it starts with a Mana Audi named Ulrich Baretsky who had been to some meetings. with the ACO in the early 2000s to try to understand where the ACO and the manufacturers thought endurance racing was going to go in the future, while also discovering that in the European Union there was a direct division between vehicles gasoline and diesel. 50 50.

At the same time, Audi was competing in the American Le Mans series and was considering bringing its diesel range to the United States and having a diesel-powered prototype would help change public perception of diesel cars, as the Saints recall in that moment. People said that if you did a lot of highway miles, diesel was better. Unfortunately, people only heard the second part and they all bought diesel and then started crying because all the filters were clogged and it was a three and a half Grand fix. and that children in cities were suffocating and it really made sense for Audi to bring diesel to Le Mans in 2004, a 1.6 liter petrol Ford Focus would have 25 liters in the city and 42 on the highway.

The same capacity. The diesel would get 60. By metrics, that's 5.6 liters per 100,000 for gasoline on the highway and 3.9 per 100 kilometers for diesel, something like that, so building an engine that would consume fuel for a race resistance seemed like a no-brainer and an Audi didn't. They don't do things by halves either, they built a five and a half liter V12 turbodiesel engine for the car that would participate in the

2006

24 Hours of Le Mans. Five and a half liters is the largest displacement engine allowed according to the regulations Aluminum construction Injection direct twin turbo and 650 horsepower out of the box and that wasn't the end either because it produced 811 pound-feet of torque at 3000 RPM, so a short gear like no tomorrow made the R10 longer than the R8 due to the great Hawking. engine in the rear, but as Top Gear magazine described it, it was the open-cockpit prototype of the early 2000s, when you're asked to draw an F1 car to remember, you'd probably draw the Jordan 191. you'd get to draw ultra a prototype from the early 2000s. probably bringing out the r10 Audi had taken everything to the maximum Marla had to make pistons that could handle the power Delara had to make sure the whole package fit and that everything was competitive from the start Winners of Sebring on the first attempt from Pit Lane then at Lamont Christensen Magnesio Cappello won there as well setting a distance record in the process and one thing everyone noticed about this engine is how quiet it was, even inside the car it was quiet and was sitting in the car with the engine directly behind.

Driver Alan Niche said that at over 100 miles per hour the wind was stronger than the engine, which meant it was difficult to downshift by ear. The only problem Audi had when building the car was deciding where to put the particular filters that worked that way. Well, there was hardly any dirt in the exhaust after 24 hours, but it was not without its problems, although one of the cars at Lemont in 2006 was affected by a problem with its injectors and Audi worked constantly with Bosch to solve the problem. Christensen McNish Cappello's car that did not have this problem led every lap setting a record for longest time between pit stops in 16 laps of the 8.4 mile Lassarte circuit, which is equivalent to a total stint of 134.4 miles with a fuel economy of 5.73 miles per gallon on a 24-gallon tank, that's 41 liters per 100 kilometers on a 90-liter tank.

You see, this is crazy. In Britain, petrol is sold at a bird's eye rate at miles per gallon because we still use miles. and miles per hour, I'm not sure if this is a vulnerability because after a while, fuel tanks were reduced for diesel engines to balance things out, a rule that probably didn't exist at this time in 2007, cars with Diesel engine. I had the tank reduced to 81 liters or 21 gallons because I can only imagine that the makers of ACO Raw were sitting in his office and thinking yeah, this Christensen guy is taking Le pis. Audi would win three in a row with this car before losing in 2009. to Peugeot with its diesel-powered 908 HDI Audi had brought a new R15 car with a new, smaller engine to Le Man, so the Peugeots were able to maintain higher speeds than the Audis.

They would also be involved in accidents and off-tracks that would dodge their chances of four in a row and Peugeot with David Brub and Mark Janae and Alex Verts would be the winners, but in 2010 Audi reigned supreme, setting the distance record for Le Mans with 397 laps, therefore, Studio 397, the R15 only lasted two years before Audi achieved its biggest P1 recent designed for Le Mans the r18 the r18 was a response to the new rules for 2011. The cars now had a closed cockpit and had to have a stabilizer fin at the rear and aerodynamic efficiency was improved with a closed cockpit design that was even smaller in size.

The engine was a 3.7-liter V6 diesel that had 532 horsepower, a little less than what it had before and only one turbocharger, so the power-to-weight ratio would have been improved. I think I'm not an engineer, in 2011 the Audis would also be eliminated. the race due to collisions, one of which involved the Niche element and a Ferrari in what is one of the scariest crashes you will ever see and I'm sure people are now nodding their heads and saying yes, I know exactly about What are you talking. I can see it right now, the third car would still win the race even though it was in 2013, although when things got extreme Ico mandated that any manufacturer entering had to run a hybrid system which was there to improve fuel efficiency instead of performance, but you can bet.

His bottom dollar is that teams use him to increase performance because he can see that the rules change every year. The restrictors get bigger. Tanks get smaller. and when Audi adds the word Quattro to things that you know are about to scare Group B, it was either the same V6 Diesel with a hybrid engine mated to the front wheels, so you can debate in the comments whether it is classified as a Quattro suitable. or not, the hybrid system was built by Williams, since in the Williams formula one team it was only active above 75 miles per hour or 120 kilometers, chassis from the Italians, hybrid from the British gearbox from the British, some of these cars were German, the engine became larger.

By 2014, it was now a four-liter diesel, now had a combined output of 770 horsepower, 540 of which came from the diesel alone, and it was the first time since the late 2000s that it already had some competition. Toyota and Porsche also had brought their lmp1 competitors, Toyota, the ts040 and Porsche, the 919, but despite the competition, Audi would win again, but it would be the last time they would win at Le Mans in 2015 and

2016

, Porsche would assume the lead at Le Mans and in At the end of

2016

Audi would disappear and Porsche would quickly follow the official reason: business Audi was in cost-cutting mode.

It is rumored that Audi was investing 500 million euros a year in the lmp1 program. The dieselgate scandal didn't help either. The involvement of parent company Volkswagen also meant that Audi needed to save face, ditching lmp1 with its

dirty

diesel and heading into Formula E, where research and development of electric cars would have been a better publicity move. Marshall Pruitt eroded and was told by track insiders that everything in the Volkswagen group racing programs that were not making a profit or winning had to go as Porsche was winning at Le Mans. Audi disappeared and Porsche was saved, but with all that said, in the years that Audi was in the lnp1 category it won 13 times with 15 different drivers.

Its dominance put it second on the all-time winners list behind Porsche which has 19 wins and leading Ferrari which took its 10th victory on Sunday, but diesel Audis will always be a racing fixture. The ingenuity of Audi May made it work, they built an engine that performed exactly as designed to prove that a diesel could be sporty, be fast and ultimately proved to be

dominant

. Well, the lack of competition, other than Audi leaving lmp1, probably spelled the end of the category. Development costs of 500 million euros, then three years to catch up with established brands, no one came to replace them.

Porsche went and then became the Toyota show, so the lmp1 ended pretty much as it started in a single manufacturer cup, so then let's take a look at Audi's

dirty

diesel tractor engines, if this has been new . and/or interesting, then like the video to know that I have done a good job even though my voice is completely recorded and for more things like this, subscribe with the bell on so you never miss it. Many thanks to the people. from Patreon, you know who you are and if you want to help contribute, all the relevant links are in the Discord social media description, etc., other super thanks if you just want to say thanks but with a little extra pizzazz, so even the next.

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