What's the story with the Nissan Delta Wing at Le Mans?, Strange looking machine Options

[DNHunt]

What could be the advantages and disadvantages? Maybe weight and aero advantages. What would be the front suspension issues?

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Dave

[DBCooper]

There aren't any particularly "tight areas" at Lemans, but why would one wheel make turn-in any quicker?

[Cap'n Krusty]

There aren't any particularly "tight areas" at Lemans, but why would one wheel make turn-in any quicker?

"One wheel"? Looked at the picture yet? 2 front fenders. BTW, it's been all over the car media for well over a year, and Dan Gurney's heavily involved. AFIK, he's not generally involved with loser ideas.

The Cap'n

[Elliot Cannon]

There aren't any particularly "tight areas" at Lemans, but why would one wheel make turn-in any quicker?

"One wheel"? Looked at the picture yet? 2 front fenders. BTW, it's been all over the car media for well over a year, and Dan Gurney's heavily involved. AFIK, he's not generally involved with loser ideas.

The Cap'n

What happened to that "alligator" motorcycle he was developing?

[Cap'n Krusty]

There aren't any particularly "tight areas" at Lemans, but why would one wheel make turn-in any quicker?

"One wheel"? Looked at the picture yet? 2 front fenders. BTW, it's been all over the car media for well over a year, and Dan Gurney's heavily involved. AFIK, he's not generally involved with loser ideas.

The Cap'n

What happened to that "alligator" motorcycle he was developing?

Google it. I've seen one, and they were/are in limited production (limited at 36 machines) and sell for $35K.

The Cap'n

[struckn]

The low frontal area reduces drag, true...........but it also reduces visability and what concerns me is that when running against the other cars, in a pack in the turns, a slight bumb to the side of the frontal area of the Delta appears to easily cause it to be taken out. The Delta is a very small car, very light, which has it's pros and cons.

Again I thought the original idea was to make all the Indi cars Deltas. The Delta design is actually some what similar to Indi, or F1 Cars if you could move their front wheels in tight to their narrow nose.
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[Richard Casto]

The low frontal area reduces drag, true...........but it also reduces visability and what concerns me is that when running against the other cars, in a pack in the turns, a slight bumb to the side of the frontal area of the Delta appears to easily cause it to be taken out. The Delta is a very small car, very light, which has it's pros and cons.

Again I thought the original idea was to make all the Indi cars Deltas. The Delta design is actually some what similar to Indi, or F1 Cars if you could move their front wheels in tight to their narrow nose.
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I do agree that it didn't hold up well when hit by a heavier car. It was boom! and right off the track.

I do think actually the frontal visibility on the Deltawing was the best of any prototype at LM. What has been a real problem recently has been that it has become fashionable for the P1/P2 prototypes to have larger front wheels (wide and tall). Couple that with the migration toward coupes (closed cockpit with small windows) and drivers who are nearly laying down open wheel style, they have very limited views and there has been a number of prototype collisions in which the speculation is that the driver just couldn't see the other car. The viewing angle out the windows is small and the height of the drivers head is below that of the front fenders. I hate to keep going on about the 2014 FIA/ACO prototype rules, but they are going to require that the drivers sight-line to be higher than the fenders and for them to sit a bit more forward. The idea being that they can actually see over the front fenders and that by moving forward, the angle of view out the window is larger.

If anyone cares to look here is the press release for the 2014 P1 rules. Its not the official rules, but it hits the high points...

http://www.lemans.org/wpphpFichiers/1/1/re...lation_2014.pdf

Last few pages goes into fixing sight-line issues.

(I just re-read you post after I posted my reply above and realized you probably were talking about how hard it was to see the DW and not that the DW driver has poor visibility. I think it all comes together to make it hard to see other cars with current prototype designs).

Richard