Couldnt an Enzo beat a NASCAR?

How on Earth do you think that a Veyron could keep up with an F1 car around a road course?! The Veyron may have VERY good acceleration, but THESE ARE FRIGGIN' F1 CARS!!!

 

Ya, it was Mark Twain.

YYAAAWWWWNNNNNNN!!!!!!!

How a troll? I didn't name call until someone else started it.

When did I say they did not know about balance and making a motor breath? I didn't. Perhaps you didn't see my sarcasm in the post you responded too.

The last car of mine that I helped build, I dropped a ZL2 into it. You can look at the history by doing a simple search. With the 'modern' redesign, it could do 725-750 with reliabilty unheard of when it was a ZL1, or NASCAR engines (sarcasm). It went longer than a NASCAR engine can go for with reliabilty that put my modern sports car to shame. Ohh yeah, I put Direct Fuel Injection on it. Lot better than carbs.

 

What a funny thread!
I love you Ferrari fan boyz....Clueless ....

 

Here's some data:

Talladaga:

In 1987, Bill Elliott established a world stock-car record when he posted a speed of 212.809 mph. in qualifying for the Aaron's 499. Mark Martin established a 500-mile stock-car record in 1997 when he won the caution-free spring Aaron's 499 with an average speed of 188.354 mph.

Talladega 2005, Jay Leno and David Donohue pilot a stock Carrera GT around Talladega. Donohue, son of the late Mark, set three flying speed records in the production category with the Carrera GT, including a closed-course speed record for the 2.66-mile track of 196.301 mph.

We can assume a clean race with, let's say, a Nascar, an Enzo, a Veyron and a McLaren F1. These cars are all faster than a Carrera GT.

Same crew, fresh tires, same amount of fuel, etc.

I predict that the McLaren F1 wins, mostly because of fuel economy, superior grip, light weight and a top speed of over 240 mph. As far as reliability, the McLaren should be fine at 8/10 of it's redline. The Enzo should be pretty close too.

 

That was what I said in my first post.

Yes, I know that, and you know that.

When reliabilty is no longer a requirement, you have more leeway. I put more miles on the ZL2 (in 1 year) than a NASCAR engine would do in three/four seasons. BTW, aren't NASCAR engines only designed to run a single race?

Anyways, we are comparing apples to oranges.

And while I hate NASCAR, I do believe in giving credit where credit is due. With experience in only left turns, NASCAR drivers are competitive against road racers in equal cars (IROC, etc.).

The problem I see with NASCAR is this: When The King went back to Plymouth in 1970 and was whooping everyone, NASCAR changed the rules. The cars today only have a semblance to what you get off the showroom floor.

Under that semblance, you still have that 35 year old technology that has been developed to a great extent by the wonderful engineers. Imagine if Formula 1 did this, McLaren would have never introduced the CF monocoque.

 

I had the privilage of speaking to Jay Leno about the Talladega adventure. He mentioned they also spun the car at 188mph and was lucky enough not to end up in the wall. I DID NOT, however find out whether that was due to driver error or any kind of mechanical failure.

 

What does this have to do with the discussion? Sorry if people have different tastes than yours, and they are stupid for it.

 

Some years back, A.J.Foyt, you know, the INDY car legend guy? Anyway, he drove a basically stock Audi Quattro around the Indianpolis speedway for several hours. The car had some extra boost, a roll cage, and that was about it. Magazines called it the first production car to lap INDY at over 200 MPH.

Again, quite a few years back, SAAB had three showroom stock 900's pulled off a parking lot at random, and with only the parts they could carry inside them, shipped them to Daytona. The cars were run day and night, with one car accumulating something like almost 80,000 miles without stopping for nothing but tires and fuel, and the occasional driver. With over 70,000 miles on one of the cars, one journalist who drove it at that time around Daytona, commented how tight and solid the car still was. That is a stock production car being driven flat out around a basic oval for over 70,000 straight miles.

Many Ferrari have been driven at tracks around the world, some to great success. The lowly 308, by Micheletto and others, have challenged at Le Mans many many times, and many have finished there, as well as at Daytona. I would only assume the Enzo has equally heavy suspension and wheel bearings as a 30 year old 308. Or as heavy as a 20 year old SAAB for that matter. My point is simply that to write off the Enzo would be as big of a mistake as trying to make a comparison.

 

I highly doubt on any course that a road car such as the Enzo could lap as fast as a Cup car, I have the feeling it would get worked. The FXX on the other hand would probaly be a different story

 

The Carrera GT used by Donohue and Leno was actually equipped with slicks (or at least racing tires of some kind, but they were NOT the regular CGT street tires), which I would consider a large factor in performance in these comparisons.

The Nextel Cup Car should crush any street car with regard to carrying speed through the corners. Even if the McLaren F1 may be able to pose a threat in the category of straight-away top speed, I would imagine that this advantage would not be enough to overcome the Nextel Cup Car's "corner-carving" ability.

As an aside, I see many people showing disrespect towards "American style" engines (pushrod, single cam, 2 valve, etc). The bottom line is that in the racing series where this type of engine is required, those who participate are doing downright amazing things with this type of engine and working within the parameters set by the governing bodies. Drag racers achieving nearly 1400 hp from naturally aspirated, 8.2 L, pushrod, carbureted, 2-valve engines that are touching 11,000 rpm. Nextel Cup cars running 8k-9k rpm for 4 hours. Corvette Cx-R winning 12h/24h endurance races. Honda/Cosworth/BMW/Mercedes F1 engines that blow up after 75 mins at race pace.....wait, nevermind. What's the world coming to when the F430 owner resorts to bragging about the fact that his engine has twice as many valves and 4 times as many camshafts as a Z06? (That's not to say that the F430 isn't a nice car; it is a wonderful automobile) In the end, what matters is that the Chevy/Ford/Dodge V8 motors are successful at doing what they are supposed to do: make power, be easy to work on, be reliable. They were created in an era where simplicity and power ruled. And is that really such a bad thing?

 

I think I gotta agree...I don't think I've been able to sit through an entire Nascar race since Fireball Roberts died.

 

No it not a bad thing. It all boils down to getting an automobile to perform to extroadinary levels of performance whether it be 1/4 mile, oval or road
course. Whatever your choice of power is( multi-camshafts and valves or pushrod american power) as long as you remain competitive who cares. You will probably never see a Ferrari powered car run a 4 second 1/4 mile. But since that's based on a Chrysler hemi motor I guess there must be no real engineering involved since it not a complex 4 cam 4 valve motor. It all boils down to snobbery and the way people look down on the whole unsophisticated NASCAR bunch. I have never been to a NASCAR event and am pretty sure I never will. But I'm pretty sure the guys who build the NASCAR's could build a car that is very sophisticated. The Enzo is state of the art and not restricted by laws to keep speeds down. Owning A Ferrari doesn't make you an elite member of society. Loads of prople have boats that cost far more to buy and maintain than a Ferrari or second houses. If you have your Ferrari because it makes you cool, then you are definitely not cool. Most of you are not in this catergory but some of you are. Answer the question without derogatory comments.

 

Also, for those calling Nascar bodies platic, and just slapped on, they are anything but. Nascar bodies are hand made and shaped for each races specific needs, to produce the most downforce and fastest car possible.

Also, Nascar shops are just as clean as F1 shops, with the same care taken when building the motors, bodies, and everything else.

 

Being I grew up driving American V8 engines, building some, and blowing some up, as well as working and helping others do the same thing, I dont feel some of you really are considering a lot when you make comparisons.

My very first car, before I could even get my drivers license, was a 1966 Pontiac GTO, with a hotted up 421 HO 4 speed and a 6.13:1 rear axle. The car was set up for 1/8 mile drag strip runs. No top end but acceleration was out of this world. Cars in my home town had names like the Street Cleaner, Dark Horse, White Cloud, and the Gangster. The Gangster was a 1970 383 Dodge Challenger, making over 800 HP on the street without a blower, a turbo, or a bottle of Nos. I went to school with a guy who ran a 265 small block in a Chevy II Nova. That little engine would scream well over 10K and nothing in town could touch him on the street, he could pull down into the 9's in the 1/4 with that lil car and he still drove it on the street. We all did.

I was never afraid to rev up those old big motors, and neither was anyone I knew. When your young, and dont care what breaks because its cheap, you go for it. We would rev those big motors up to over 8K rpm all the time, and seldom did one break. My last Pontiac was a 65 Le Mans. I swapped some parts around off GTO's and a Tempest, and threw a bored 400 in it with a big cam and the rest. I wont say how fast I could get that stupid car up to, but I cranked it to almost 8K rpm once with a 2.78:1 rear axle behind a 4 speed. I did that just before my 17th birthday over 30 years ago, so 200 MPH today dont impress me a whole lot.

1400 HP out of 8.2 liters you say? Well, that works out to 170 HP per liter. A 3 liter engine would need to make 510 HP to match it. They were doing that in F1 over 30 years ago too, and those engines ran a lot farther down the road than a 1/4 mile. Many speculate a F1 engine today makes over 800 HP. Thats well over 250 HP per liter. Your 8.2 motor would be making 2050 HP! So many people think this stuff is new, and its so far from new its almost scarey. The 308, with its twin cam heads, that kind of engine existed in World war 1. In fact, there were 4 valves per cylinder race car engines around by 1900. Ferrari isnt and has never done anything new, they just took good advantage of available technology. Ford, Chevy, and Chrysler did just the opposite, took the cheapest and crudest designs available, and made them work on an assembly line. In fact, to see Chrysler build a 8 liter V-10 pushrod motor in the 21st century seems almost a joke. The fact they cant get even 500 HP out of one off the showroom floor is even more of a joke. yeah, I know they can make more, but not stock. Thats an awful waste if you ask me, when they could have built a real OHC engine of smaller displacement and made MORE power.

 

Blah blah blah...

If it were so easy for you and your friends back in the day then why are there multi million dollar NASCAR teams now? I googled NASCAR engine building and there are pages and pages upon facts vs your recollective nonsense at which you make zero money and have won nothing in any professional motorsport event whether F1, WRC, NASCAR or even soapbox derby. Why do they put research into their old motors if it's as simple as buying parts off the shelf and slapping it together like they did back in the 60's? Don't bother to answer that. You have the bad habit of moving your arguement around as common sense chases you around the room. Please. Just stop.

 

While everyone here so far has focused on HP, no one has mentioned torque. As the saying goes, "HP sells car, torque wins races". I haven't seen torque numbers on either NASCAR motors or F1 motors, but I am guessing that old fashioned stock car motor puts out tons of it. Maybe someone else here has the numbers.

Perhaps someone has the qualifying times of cup cars at Watkins Glen and the times of various class ALMS cars. These would be very revealing.

Dave

 

You could debate till the cows come home, but I think it would boil down to the skill of the drivers.

 

NASCAR is a business. Would they sell one more ticket or get one more $ in TV revenue if they switched to "higher tech" 4 cam 32 valve injected V8's? I don't think so. They would just add cost with zero revenue increase. Dumb move. With their existing rules they have been making more money every year.

F1 vs NASCAR? Different cups of tea but at least you see passing in NASCAR

 

Those guys have a car for Daytona (big restrictor plate track) a car for Martinsville (tiny flat oval) a car for Watkins Glenn (road course) a car for Bristol (fender banging high banked tiny oval)...these are all DIFFERENT CUP CARS. Jeff Gordan runs (at least) 5 different cars.

So, which will the Enzo race against? On the road course, which makes the most sense for the Enzo, I'm sure it could do some close lap times as a time trial but in a real race, the Cup car will win every time IMHO. A purpose built race car will pull more HP and torque where you need it. Any street car is a compromise, so if HP/weight is close, the Cup car will smoke the other car.

On an oval I doubt the Enzo could keep up on any track in street trim. Maybe Bristol...but I doubt it.

Ken

 

Ken is absolutely correct. So for arguements sake you would have to allow for "Team Ferrari" to modify it's Enzo road car appropriately for the track and race as best it could.

 

I am so glad you learned everything you ever knew about a subject in 10 minutes searching Google. Maybe before you take all the BS the NASCRAP boys are blowing up your wazoo you should learn a new word. Hype. It sells a lot of junk to people who dont know any better. If you had any real background you wouldnt need to read pages and pages of nonsense off Google, you could speak with your own knowledge. But you have none of your own.

 

It took a two second search to see that there was more to it than your narrow mind could comprehend. Fact is, for all of your "knowledge" were it so, you'd be the most valuable man in any form of engine building and you are not. As for me, I do not work in nor do I have a background the automotive industry. Regardless of industry however I know a fool when I see one. They think whatever they did in the 60's is relevant now.

 

Reminds me of a friend and his '57 Chevy back about 1976. It had a 350 engine with a 3/4 cam and '58 Corvette cylinder heads. He was clocked on a cop buddy's radar gun doing 147 MPH. At the time, he had about $1500 in the car. Add another $50,000, and he could have gone maybe,....150 or 160MPH in a 308 Ferrari?

 

Nonetheless, this car, which I calculate to have run 233MPH according to the data provided, would have impressed the Bonneville crowd. "Classic Unblown Gas Coupe A" & "Classic Production" AA & A records are both at 237MPH, all set in this decade. Them good ol' boys in Wisconsin sure were ahead of their time, why aren't they as famous as the moonshiners for their outlaw car building prowess?

 

It didnt go that fast, it had slightly smaller tires on it.