Veyron - can Ferrari match it's engineering achievement? | FerrariChat

Veyron - can Ferrari match it's engineering achievement?

Discussion in 'Ferrari Discussion (not model specific)' started by ferandre, Jan 17, 2008.

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  1. ferandre

    ferandre Rookie

    Mar 20, 2005
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    What is, or should be, Ferrari's answer to Bugatti Veyron (not the "racing heritage," "legacy," etc)? Can Ferrari not match the engineering achievement of Veyron?
     
  2. Etcetera

    Etcetera Two Time F1 World Champ
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    IIRC, every Veyron is sold at a substantial loss. I do believe it was created in a money-no-object tour de force to show the engineering might of VW. I mean Bugatti. To see a similar effort from Ferrari, tune in to F1 races.

    The Veyron is the finest GT that mankind has put forth to date, and will likely remain so for a very long time, not for lack of ability of other manufacturers, but due to the lack of financial feasibility of such a massive undertaking.
     
  3. furious_ferrari

    furious_ferrari F1 Rookie

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    Why would they want to? Ferrari doesnt need to make a car to prove anything. The Veyron was an engineering masterpiece but also a financial loss of more then $3 million per car. It costs a lot of money to engineer something that just goes "really fast" in a straight line. Ferrari isnt too concerned about breaking any top speed records at this moment. Ferrari will probably come out with a hyper car that will do everything better then the Veyron except it will have a lower top speed...and I would be very happy with that.
     
  4. Andy348

    Andy348 Formula 3

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    Correct me if I'm wrong, but I have heard rumours that the famous Enzo is quicker than the Veyron around a track.
     
  5. Etcetera

    Etcetera Two Time F1 World Champ
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    The Veyron is the ultimate GT. The Enzo isn't a GT. The Veyron wasn't designed to be the ultimate sports car. It was designed to be the ultimate GT.

    If you want to wank out on track times, Richard Simmons with roller skates and on 25200 mg of caffeine is probably faster than the Star Ship Enterprise on a trip to Mars. But so what?
     
  6. rossocorsa13

    rossocorsa13 F1 Rookie

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    Wow. What an incredible mental image. :)

    The feat the Veyron accomplished, was, IMO, a little silly. They created a huge problem for themselves and resolved it in the most complicated way possible. It works, and it's incredible, but the way it works is a little superfluous.

    Steve Saleen reportedly needed on 8 cylinders and 2 turbos to achieve similar numbers to the Veyron. Different mission cars but similar performance. His S7 comes in several different forms of tune that, when maxed out, produces around 1000 horsepower, IIRC, and a speculated top speed of around 260 mph.

    The Veyron's performance can be achieved wihthout resorting to such extreme means. Great car, though. Wouldn't mind having one myself. :)
     
  7. texasmr2

    texasmr2 Two Time F1 World Champ
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    I think the Veyron has lived up to the Bugatti pedigree quite well, over the top in every category, Ettore would be proud.
     
  8. Etcetera

    Etcetera Two Time F1 World Champ
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    The Saleen car by any measure is a few steps above kit car. It's a horrible vehicle with no real build quality and no real QA. It's a race car with race car maintenance intervals. They Veyron isn't. They Veyron was designed in the same manner that a VW Polo was designed: to wit, long maintenance intervals despite huge stresses that long term high performance operation induces upon the machine. The Veyron is the single most outstanding engineering achievement of the 20th/21st Century. To place it in the company of kit cars like the Saleen and that other pile of garbage is an insult.

    By your standard of thinking, I could have a quad turbo 1400 HP Trabant and it would be the same as a Veyron. Kind of soft in the head, I think, but hey, whatever floats your boat.
     
  9. Moca

    Moca Formula 3

    Feb 3, 2007
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    That's the point. The question reminds me of the day nursery, where the kids are always bickering about who has the biggest sandcastle ...
     
  10. mat

    mat Formula Junior

    Mar 24, 2006
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    veyrons shouldn't be regarded as a financial loss. even though they spent massive amounts of money on it, they have a great base for next models (like a 2010 supercar developed under a name "project lydia", if it's true). and most important of all, they have put back bugatti in the front league of supercars creating a great image of the brand, so that now they can use less sophisticated cars using bugatti badge that'll make a good use out of it
     
  11. italiafan

    italiafan F1 World Champ
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  12. Bullfighter

    Bullfighter Two Time F1 World Champ
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    I'd rather see Ferrari continue to win F1 titles and lighten-up/slim-down its current sports car (F430).

    As much as I respect the Veyron for its top speed, it's kind of irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.
     
  13. skeletor123

    skeletor123 Karting

    Nov 24, 2007
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    +1
     
  14. SRT Mike

    SRT Mike Two Time F1 World Champ

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    I disagree with all of that!

    Basically what the Veyron did was take a 1000hp car and make it as tame, reliable, functional, and properly engineered as a Ferrari 430 (for example). I can show up at a racetrack with my Corvette with most of the interior taken out, hoosier slicks, a rock-hard suspension that will break your back if it hits a grain of salt on the road, and a huge bottle of nitrous and straight pipes and brag that my car is faster than yours for much less money - IMO that's the same as the Saleen/Veyron comparison. The Veyron is a very finely engineered car. I would feel safe driving it at 200mph. It's a car you can drive and know that all the problems you encounter trying to put the power needed for 250mph into a street car were solved, and were solved the right way.

    The Ultimate Aero, Saleen S7 et al are examples of other, lesser men and lesser companies trying to equal one aspect of the Veyron's achievement. The few folks I have talked to with any experience with the Aero say it's a real POS. I've heard the same about the Saleen. When you look at the recent test of the tuner cars and see that 2 out of the 4 cars blew up on ONE day of testing their 0-200-0 times. I have no doubt that if one was to actually test these cars, push them to their limits and really wring them out, the Veyron would perform far above a POS Saleen with the boost cranked up, and far far above Carrol Shelby's latest moneymaking POS attempt.

    My .02, at least
     
  15. SRT Mike

    SRT Mike Two Time F1 World Champ

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    Nope, he's right on the money
     
  16. Mr. V

    Mr. V Formula 3

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    Excuse me, but if you have 16 cylinders and 4 turbochargers to play with, a sandbox full of monkeys can get mega-power.

    You lads are too easily impressed.

    I am glad Audi built the Veyron, and agree it provides seamless, high levels of power, but the styling is not top drawer (it doesn't hold a candle to the original), and it certainly is not the fastest road car, either 0 - 60 or top speed.

    Close, but a bit wide off the mark.

    Still, a worthy effort, but it inspires no lust in my bones.
     
  17. RP

    RP F1 World Champ

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    Would agree 100%
     
  18. RP

    RP F1 World Champ

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    Disagree 100%. The body was designed and redesigned primarily for aerodynamic stability, which is does quite well. What other road cars are faster that are not just one or two offs?

    A Veyron would be my first choice of car in any category.
     
  19. Evan.Fiorentino

    Evan.Fiorentino F1 Rookie

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    You could get 1000 HP out of a 6 cylinder engine of course. But you would be pushing that engine to its limits almost all the time. The point is you can get a 1000 HP out of a W16 engine MUCH more reliably than a 6 cylinder engine. Just think about the stress levels of the engines, a 6 with 1000 hp or a 16 with a 1000 HP. The point of the Veyron was not to get ungodly amounts of power, it was to make a classy extremely fast reliable GT car, and they succeeded. I think it is one of the most high quality cars ever produced.
     
  20. texasmr2

    texasmr2 Two Time F1 World Champ
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    Not by a long shot but if you cannot see what the Veyron mean's in it's overall conception you never will. One will never completely understand Bugatti unless they read about and understand Bugatti's history.

    I can respect your opinion as the car does not appeal to alot of people. The only people the Veyron appeal's to are the, imho, true car enthusiast who truelly undertand what Bugatti stand's for. You get it or you dont, simple as that!
     
  21. italiafan

    italiafan F1 World Champ
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    ???
    (in no particualr order)
    Hoover Dam
    Panama Canal
    Suez Canal
    Apollo Missions/whole space program in the 60's with minimal "computing power"
    Space Shuttle program
    Satellites orbiting the outer solar system
    recent satellite that was designed to explode on impact with an asteroid billions of miles from earth, and did.
    Hubble Telescope
    Nuclear Subs
    ICBMs
    Nuclear Power Plants
    Nuclear Fusion and Fission


    I'm sure other shere could add dozens more......


    The Veyron is a car, albeit a powerful car.......
     
  22. DriveAfterDark

    DriveAfterDark F1 Veteran

    Jan 1, 2007
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    Two entirely different philisophies. End of discussion.
     
  23. tundraphile

    tundraphile F1 Veteran

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    The Veyron seems to me to be the automotive equivalent of the Concorde or SR-71. 50 years from now, when we fill up our cars with beer cans and banana peels for our Mr. Fusion, people will still marvel that any company made a car like the Veyron.

    It is not just the incredible performance, but the apparent civility of the beast that makes it so incredible. No car before (or probably after) can match it for the combination of the two. Many do not care for the looks, but it has a certain sophisticated purposeful look that has grown on me greatly.

    Ferrari, McLaren, Saleen, and others could certainly build a car that had better performance or looked better, but the Veyron seems to be currently in its own league.

    If you were to ask a question like "what cars would be required vehicles in a leading world-class car collection?" I would put a 250GTO on that list. Same with an Enzo, 300SL Gullwing, and McLaren F1. And the Veyron would also be there too.
     
  24. SRT Mike

    SRT Mike Two Time F1 World Champ

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    Well with all due respect, it shows me that you have no appreciation for the engineering involved. When you see the details of the car, how it was constructed and what lengths were gone to in order to ensure the car was "right", it's a feat of engineering. The car is as docile and reliable as a Toyota but it has 1000+hp. Nobody before has achieved what Bugatti has achieved, so I guess that means every other car manufacturer are not as smart as your sandbox full of monkeys. Right.
     
  25. SRT Mike

    SRT Mike Two Time F1 World Champ

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    Well I figured we were talking in terms of automotive engineering. I'd put the Veyron up there with just about anything else - including F1 cars, and anything Lambo, Ferrari, McLaren or any other has engineered.
     

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