Valkyrie [Official] Aston Martin - From AM-RB 001 to Valkyrie

[Matski]

Geez. I had no idea that it's so loud that occupants wear hearing protection.

If I had to sit next to DC, I'd probably be wearing ear defenders too.

 

[bmwz4coupe]

Geez. I had no idea that it's so loud that occupants wear hearing protection.

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The most discree Valkyrie I have seen until now, colourwise. Looks really good, no need to put strong look-at-me colours on a car like this.

 

[StartYourEngines]

Hmm, 9s 200-300km/h... that's actually pretty terrible. I doubt that they are using the full power setting. 720S is about 11s and a proper race car like the 919 Evo is 4s.

In fact, they were running with the 800 hp engine map, confirmed in the full video below:

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Also, according to what is reported in the official blog of race driver Hiroki Katoh, at the Bahrain circuit earlier this year the AMR Pro at full speed proved to be just 4 seconds off the lap times of (presumably 2022) F1 cars.
Here below's the link:

ASTON MARTIN Valkyrie AMR Pro - Hiroki Katoh blog

世界限定４０台のValkyrieAMRProが日本に初上陸。光栄にもシェイクダウンを担当。車重１０００kgに１０００馬力。バーレーンサーキットでF1の４秒落ちくらいのパフォーマンスは、富士のストレートの真ん中過ぎた地点で３１０kmオーバー。レギュレーションに囚われることのない速さ。圧倒的なダウンフォースと低重心は富士スピードウェイの知らなかった世界を僕に魅せてくれた。オーナーのMさん、本当にこんなチャンスありがとうございました。為替の影響で約６億円というのは走り終わった後に聞きました?無事終わって良かった｜дﾟ)ﾁﾗｯ...

blog.goo.ne.jp

 

[StartYourEngines]

So, I found some interesting data on the aerodynamics of the Valkyrie AMR Pro.
Before going into detail, I'll do a little recap on all the info available until now regarding both Valkyrie and Valkyrie AMR Pro chassis/aerodynamics.

- The road legal Valkyrie has electronically adjustable suspensions and active aerodynamics
- The AMR Pro has mechanical race suspensions and fixed aerodynamics
- When put into "Race mode", the suspensions of the road legal Valkyrie lower the car to a ground clearance of just 1 cm (from the 8.5 cm of the "Urban mode"). This is basically done with the aim to seal the floor for the ground effect aero to produce its maximum downforce.
From all the pictures I saw of both cars, it appears that the side skirts and diffuser of the road legal Valkyrie in "Race mode" are actually even closer to the ground compared to what happens for the AMR Pro (see picture below of the Valkyrie in "Race mode")

- In "Race mode", the road legal Valkyrie is stated to produce more than 1400 kg of downforce at 240 km/h
- However, beyond certain speeds the active aero of the road legal Valkyrie intentionally bleeds downforce off in order to conserve its road tyres (from basically exploding...)
- Instead, being on LMP-grade slick tyres the AMR Pro doesn't need to bleed downforce off (also, it shouldn't actually be possible with fixed aero...)

All of this means that, for the AMR Pro, we can safely assume that downforce increases with the square of velocity (since all aero coefficients are fixed), while this is not true for the road car after a certain threshold because of the intentional bleed off.
In fact, peak downforce for the road legal Valkyrie was also stated to be around 1816 kg at top speed, but it would be far more (considering that it is already +1400 kg at 240 km/h) without the intentional bleeding.

Now, when the AMR Pro was revealed, no specific downforce numbers were provided.
It was only stated that the car makes "twice the amount of downforce" of its road-legal counterpart.
As a consequence, until now I personally applied this sentence to the only relevant downforce figure that we were provided for the road car, i.e. the 1400 kg at 240 km/h in "race mode", thus doubling it for the AMR Pro.
I am/was very well aware that, as a result, this would mean an insane amount of downforce for the AMR Pro and I quite never trusted this supposed figure...
In fact, by not quoting the specific speed at which the downforce of the AMR Pro doubles that of the road legal car, Aston Martin basically purposefully provided nebulous info. Indeed, considering that the road legal Valkyrie bleeds downforce off after certain speeds, the "double the downforce" quote could very well be applied to a velocity threshold after which the downforce of the road legal car is already subjected to artificial reduction. As a consequence, this would result in a much lower value of downforce for the AMR Pro as well.

So, given this context, I never stopped searching around for more accurate sources for the downforce figure of the AMR Pro.
And, apparently, I now found quite a good answer.

At the following link, it is stated that the AMR Pro generates a total of 26800 Newtons of downforce at 220 mph (354 km/h):

AMR PRO - The Ultimate Expression of Power and Performance

Aston Martin’s ultimate expression of power and performance, the track-only Valkyrie AMR Pro hypercar represents the next level in the marque’s evolution

magazine.astonmartin.com

The figure translates into around 2732 kg at 354 km/h.

Finally, it appears we may have a reliable number for the AMR Pro as well, which furthermore confirms the serious hint that I already got from the following video (which I posted here last week) at the 1:34 mark:

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In fact, in the video it was said that the car generates 2000 kg of downforce at speeds exceeding 300 km/h.
If we go and do a simple calculation with the square of velocity (remember, no active aero so it should be a fixed L/D ratio for the AMR Pro) the numbers match perfectly:

- 2732 kg of downforce at 354 km/h = 1962 kg of downforce at 300 km/h (which confirms the "2000 kg of downforce at speeds exceeding 300 km/h" quote from the video).

While this is for sure a high figure, the evaluation at 240 km/h provides an estimated value of 1256 kg of downforce.
The funny thing is that this would be a value actually lower than what was quoted for the road legal Valkyrie in "Race mode" (+1400 kg at 240 km/h), before the intentional bleed off at high speeds.

While this may appear unbelievable at a first glance, it could actually make sense considering that, at the end of the day, the Valkyrie AMR Pro should be based on a "standard" LMP chassis and it was initially designed to compete in the new Hypercar class, while the road legal Valkyrie was the one that was fully aerodinamically conceived, designed and developed by Red Bull and Newey.

Still, this should not mean that we would have to consider the AMR Pro 'slower' on track than the road car of course, because:

- The AMR Pro has LMP-grade slick tyres, is likely 200+ kg lighter and has full race suspensions
- The AMR Pro is not subjected to downforce bleed off at high speeds (so, beyond a certain threshold its downforce becomes higher than that of the road car)

In any case, these remain all assumptions based on the few data that we can gather around.


PS:

On the other hand, these numbers would potentially change the outcome of the comparison between the AMR Pro and the new McLaren Solus GT.
In fact, the Solus GT is claimed to generate 1400 kg of downforce at 240 km/h, but unlike the road legal Valkyrie (and like the AMR Pro) is of course not subjected to intentional downforce bleed off at high speeds since it is fitted with LMP-grade slick tyres and has fixed aero.
Moreover, the Solus GT should be actually lighter than the AMR Pro so there's the possibility that, under these conditions, it could have a better downforce-to-weight ratio than the AMR Pro.

All in all, an interesting comparison and for sure I will wait/search for other relevant info on both cars.

 

[duesy]

So, I found some interesting data on the aerodynamics of the Valkyrie AMR Pro.
Before going into detail, I'll do a little recap on all the info available until now regarding both Valkyrie and Valkyrie AMR Pro chassis/aerodynamics.

- The road legal Valkyrie has electronically adjustable suspensions and active aerodynamics
- The AMR Pro has mechanical race suspensions and fixed aerodynamics
- When put into "Race mode", the suspensions of the road legal Valkyrie lower the car to a ground clearance of just 1 cm (from the 8.5 cm of the "Urban mode"). This is basically done with the aim to seal the floor for the ground effect aero to produce its maximum downforce.
From all the pictures I saw of both cars, it appears that the side skirts and diffuser of the road legal Valkyrie in "Race mode" are actually even closer to the ground compared to what happens for the AMR Pro (see picture below of the Valkyrie in "Race mode")

- In "Race mode", the road legal Valkyrie is stated to produce more than 1400 kg of downforce at 240 km/h
- However, beyond certain speeds the active aero of the road legal Valkyrie intentionally bleeds downforce off in order to conserve its road tyres (from basically exploding...)
- Instead, being on LMP-grade slick tyres the AMR Pro doesn't need to bleed downforce off (also, it shouldn't actually be possible with fixed aero...)

All of this means that, for the AMR Pro, we can safely assume that downforce increases with the square of velocity (since all aero coefficients are fixed), while this is not true for the road car after a certain threshold because of the intentional bleed off.
In fact, peak downforce for the road legal Valkyrie was also stated to be around 1816 kg at top speed, but it would be far more (considering that it is already +1400 kg at 240 km/h) without the intentional bleeding.

Now, when the AMR Pro was revealed, no specific downforce numbers were provided.
It was only stated that the car makes "twice the amount of downforce" of its road-legal counterpart.
As a consequence, until now I personally applied this sentence to the only relevant downforce figure that we were provided for the road car, i.e. the 1400 kg at 240 km/h in "race mode", thus doubling it for the AMR Pro.
I am/was very well aware that, as a result, this would mean an insane amount of downforce for the AMR Pro and I quite never trusted this supposed figure...
In fact, by not quoting the specific speed at which the downforce of the AMR Pro doubles that of the road legal car, Aston Martin basically purposefully provided nebulous info. Indeed, considering that the road legal Valkyrie bleeds downforce off after certain speeds, the "double the downforce" quote could very well be applied to a velocity threshold after which the downforce of the road legal car is already subjected to artificial reduction. As a consequence, this would result in a much lower value of downforce for the AMR Pro as well.

So, given this context, I never stopped searching around for more accurate sources for the downforce figure of the AMR Pro.
And, apparently, I now found quite a good answer.

At the following link, it is stated that the AMR Pro generates a total of 26800 Newtons of downforce at 220 mph (354 km/h):

AMR PRO - The Ultimate Expression of Power and Performance

Aston Martin’s ultimate expression of power and performance, the track-only Valkyrie AMR Pro hypercar represents the next level in the marque’s evolution

magazine.astonmartin.com

The figure translates into around 2732 kg at 354 km/h.

Finally, it appears we may have a reliable number for the AMR Pro as well, which furthermore confirms the serious hint that I already got from the following video (which I posted here last week) at the 1:34 mark:

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In fact, in the video it was said that the car generates 2000 kg of downforce at speeds exceeding 300 km/h.
If we go and do a simple calculation with the square of velocity (remember, no active aero so it should be a fixed L/D ratio for the AMR Pro) the numbers match perfectly:

- 2732 kg of downforce at 354 km/h = 1962 kg of downforce at 300 km/h (which confirms the "2000 kg of downforce at speeds exceeding 300 km/h" quote from the video).

While this is for sure a high figure, the evaluation at 240 km/h provides an estimated value of 1256 kg of downforce.
The funny thing is that this would be a value actually lower than what was quoted for the road legal Valkyrie in "Race mode" (+1400 kg at 240 km/h), before the intentional bleed off at high speeds.

While this may appear unbelievable at a first glance, it could actually make sense considering that, at the end of the day, the Valkyrie AMR Pro should be based on a "standard" LMP chassis and it was initially designed to compete in the new Hypercar class, while the road legal Valkyrie was the one that was fully aerodinamically conceived, designed and developed by Red Bull and Newey.

Still, this should not mean that we would have to consider the AMR Pro 'slower' on track than the road car of course, because:

- The AMR Pro has LMP-grade slick tyres, is likely 200+ kg lighter and has full race suspensions
- The AMR Pro is not subjected to downforce bleed off at high speeds (so, beyond a certain threshold its downforce becomes higher than that of the road car)

In any case, these remain all assumptions based on the few data that we can gather around.


PS:

On the other hand, these numbers would potentially change the outcome of the comparison between the AMR Pro and the new McLaren Solus GT.
In fact, the Solus GT is claimed to generate 1400 kg of downforce at 240 km/h, but unlike the road legal Valkyrie (and like the AMR Pro) is of course not subjected to intentional downforce bleed off at high speeds since it is fitted with LMP-grade slick tyres and has fixed aero.
Moreover, the Solus GT should be actually lighter than the AMR Pro so there's the possibility that, under these conditions, it could have a better downforce-to-weight ratio than the AMR Pro.

All in all, an interesting comparison and for sure I will wait/search for other relevant info on both cars.

This is valuable investigative and technical journalism. Keep it up, mate. Much appreciated.

 

[Bridster]

The AMR Pro having less downforce than the road car seems exceedingly unlikely to me. The car being based on "standard LMP chassis" doesn't somehow make it aerodynamically deficient. Quite the opposite, LMP cars generate more downforce than F1 cars. At their peak, the LMP1 cars were at something like 2800kg at 250km/h and LMP2 were at about 2400kg (meanwhile, F1 cars, in 2020, were at about 2300kg - although this of course changes a lot with setup).

The problem with AM is that they lie all the time. So was the claim that the AMR Pro generates twice the downforce of the road going Valkyrie a lie? Or was that true, but was the claim that the road going Valkyrie generates 1400kg at 240km/h a lie? Maybe it's both.

I've grown tired trying to speculate what the track performance of the Valkyrie will be. It's too many dishonest claims piled up on each other and meanwhile the car still doesn't work properly. The track mode where the car lowers itself to 10mm ride height - that reportedly doesn't work currently. And the car is not using bespoke tires as AM claimed - but it's using Michelins designed for Porsche and their 991.2 GT3RS/GT2RS models. So even if the car does start working at some point, how much of that supposed downforce they will be able to transfer to the road remains in question, as well as how long the tires might last. In any case, for the Valkyrie it's time to put up or shut up. Either show us laps, or hang your heads in shame. I don't wanna hear any more BS claims.

 

[StartYourEngines]

The AMR Pro having less downforce than the road car seems exceedingly unlikely to me. The car being based on "standard LMP chassis" doesn't somehow make it aerodynamically deficient. Quite the opposite, LMP cars generate more downforce than F1 cars. At their peak, the LMP1 cars were at something like 2800kg at 250km/h and LMP2 were at about 2400kg (meanwhile, F1 cars, in 2020, were at about 2300kg - although this of course changes a lot with setup).

The problem with AM is that they lie all the time. So was the claim that the AMR Pro generates twice the downforce of the road going Valkyrie a lie? Or was that true, but was the claim that the road going Valkyrie generates 1400kg at 240km/h a lie? Maybe it's both.

I've grown tired trying to speculate what the track performance of the Valkyrie will be. It's too many dishonest claims piled up on each other and meanwhile the car still doesn't work properly. The track mode where the car lowers itself to 10mm ride height - that reportedly doesn't work currently. And the car is not using bespoke tires as AM claimed - but it's using Michelins designed for Porsche and their 991.2 GT3RS/GT2RS models. So even if the car does start working at some point, how much of that supposed downforce they will be able to transfer to the road remains in question, as well as how long the tires might last. In any case, for the Valkyrie it's time to put up or shut up. Either show us laps, or hang your heads in shame. I don't wanna hear any more BS claims.

I agree with you that this downforce difference seems quite unlikely.
As you said, there's sadly the chance that those claims that you reported are not actually true.
In any case, I too believe that it is time to put an end to the whole Valkyrie story: relevant lap times or factual, verified data must be provided.

I am also quite particularly interested in the downforce data that you provided in your post.
First of all, a disclaimer is mandatory: these are simplified analysis, actual performance data of race cars depend on specific aero setup, L/D ratio, BoP from year to year and so on.

Being said that, it seems to me that the values that you quoted for LMP1 and LMP2 cars are far too high.
I agree that at some point top end LMP cars generated - on average - more downforce than F1 cars but this was mainly valid for the pre-2017 era F1 machines.
Over the years, I gathered specific downforce values for different race cars from many direct quotes, all of them more or less fit with the difference in speed between the different racing categories and, in general, the numbers are quite lower than what you quoted here.
Since this is an interesting discussion, I'll post few of these downforce data to give some context (however, we must remember that these values would change with setup and must be also related to efficiency to have a more complete analysis).

- 2011 LMP2 machines generated on average 1610 kg of downforce at 322 km/h
- The 2011 Dome LMP1 race car was quoted at 1300 kg of downforce at 240 km/h
- The 2020 Acura DPi generated 1360 kg at 241 km/h
- The 2017 Mercedes C63 AMG DTM was quoted at +1150 kg at 200 km/h (i.e. +1650 kg at 240 km/h). 2017 DTM machines were at their performance peak in terms of aero and, on some circuits, they were as fast if not faster than few top-end LMP prototypes
- The 2020 Mercedes W11 (which is the fastest F1 car ever and probably the F1 with the highest ever generated downforce) provided over 3000 kg of downforce at 276 km/h
- The 2012 Nemo Evo WTAC race car was quoted at 2450 kg at 241 km/h (and top-end WTAC are totally unrestricted in terms of aero, unlike LMP prototypes)
- The 2021 Wolf GB08 TSC-LT (hill-climb racing monster devoid of any aero rule, twice in a row Pikes-Peak winner and with a giant rear wing and aero setup thought to generate downforce at high altitudes) is quoted at 1474 kg of downforce at 200 km/h (which would become around 2300 kg at 250 km/h)

I know that, compared to their 2011 counterparts, LMP1 and LMP2 protypes became much faster and their downforce increased, but modern (i.e. 2020, for example) LMP2 race cars were still regulated to be a little bit slower (if not - at max - quite as fast as) 2020 DPi protytpes. So, I don't think that there's a chance for a recent/modern LMP2 car to generate 2400 kg of downforce at 250 km/h when a top-end DPi race car like the Acura is capped (on average) at 1360 kg at 241 km/h.
Moreover, 2400 kg of downforce at 250 km/h for a LMP2 car would basically mean 4000 kg of downforce at 322 km/h, which is a value just shy of what was generated by the fastest late ground-effect, high-downforce monsters IMSA GTP and Group C race cars.
For example, in its high downforce setting, the monstrous AAR Toyota Eagle MKIII (with its giant tri-plane wing far exceeding the aero limits imposed to current LMP cars) generated around 4200 kg at 322 km/h. And this car, to this day, is still known to be the closed-cockpit prototype race car with the highest downforce numbers in history (probably beaten only by the 919 Evo, I guess, but that thing was devoided of any LMP racing rule in terms of aero).
To me, there's no way that any LMP2 car of any racing era could match the Eagle MKIII in total amount of downforce.
The same would go for the (regulated) LMP1 prototypes and the quoted 2800 kg of downforce at 250 km/h.
I believe that's just too much: only the 919 Evo (with its boosted downforce way higher than the regulated 919), the W11, top-end WTAC cars, the Eagle (along with few other top-end GTP/Group C monsters) and limitless hill-climb monsters could probably boast those numbers.

PS: and the FZero of course, but that's going to be another story...

 

[Bridster]

I agree with you that this downforce difference seems quite unlikely.
As you said, there's sadly the chance that those claims that you reported are not actually true.
In any case, I too believe that it is time to put an end to the whole Valkyrie story: relevant lap times or factual, verified data must be provided.

I am also quite particularly interested in the downforce data that you provided in your post.
First of all, a disclaimer is mandatory: these are simplified analysis, actual performance data of race cars depend on specific aero setup, L/D ratio, BoP from year to year and so on.

Being said that, it seems to me that the values that you quoted for LMP1 and LMP2 cars are far too high.
I agree that at some point top end LMP cars generated - on average - more downforce than F1 cars but this was mainly valid for the pre-2017 era F1 machines.
Over the years, I gathered specific downforce values for different race cars from many direct quotes, all of them more or less fit with the difference in speed between the different racing categories and, in general, the numbers are quite lower than what you quoted here.
Since this is an interesting discussion, I'll post few of these downforce data to give some context (however, we must remember that these values would change with setup and must be also related to efficiency to have a more complete analysis).

- 2011 LMP2 machines generated on average 1610 kg of downforce at 322 km/h
- The 2011 Dome LMP1 race car was quoted at 1300 kg of downforce at 240 km/h
- The 2020 Acura DPi generated 1360 kg at 241 km/h
- The 2017 Mercedes C63 AMG DTM was quoted at +1150 kg at 200 km/h (i.e. +1650 kg at 240 km/h). 2017 DTM machines were at their performance peak in terms of aero and, on some circuits, they were as fast if not faster than few top-end LMP prototypes
- The 2020 Mercedes W11 (which is the fastest F1 car ever and probably the F1 with the highest ever generated downforce) provided over 3000 kg of downforce at 276 km/h
- The 2012 Nemo Evo WTAC race car was quoted at 2450 kg at 241 km/h (and top-end WTAC are totally unrestricted in terms of aero, unlike LMP prototypes)
- The 2021 Wolf GB08 TSC-LT (hill-climb racing monster devoid of any aero rule, twice in a row Pikes-Peak winner and with a giant rear wing and aero setup thought to generate downforce at high altitudes) is quoted at 1474 kg of downforce at 200 km/h (which would become around 2300 kg at 250 km/h)

I know that, compared to their 2011 counterparts, LMP1 and LMP2 protypes became much faster and their downforce increased, but modern (i.e. 2020, for example) LMP2 race cars were still regulated to be a little bit slower (if not - at max - quite as fast as) 2020 DPi protytpes. So, I don't think that there's a chance for a recent/modern LMP2 car to generate 2400 kg of downforce at 250 km/h when a top-end DPi race car like the Acura is capped (on average) at 1360 kg at 241 km/h.
Moreover, 2400 kg of downforce at 250 km/h for a LMP2 car would basically mean 4000 kg of downforce at 322 km/h, which is a value just shy of what was generated by the fastest late ground-effect, high-downforce monsters IMSA GTP and Group C race cars.
For example, in its high downforce setting, the monstrous AAR Toyota Eagle MKIII (with its giant tri-plane wing far exceeding the aero limits imposed to current LMP cars) generated around 4200 kg at 322 km/h. And this car, to this day, is still known to be the closed-cockpit prototype race car with the highest downforce numbers in history (probably beaten only by the 919 Evo, I guess, but that thing was devoided of any LMP racing rule in terms of aero).
To me, there's no way that any LMP2 car of any racing era could match the Eagle MKIII in total amount of downforce.
The same would go for the (regulated) LMP1 prototypes and the quoted 2800 kg of downforce at 250 km/h.
I believe that's just too much: only the 919 Evo (with its boosted downforce way higher than the regulated 919), the W11, top-end WTAC cars, the Eagle (along with few other top-end GTP/Group C monsters) and limitless hill-climb monsters could probably boast those numbers.

PS: and the FZero of course, but that's going to be another story...

The way I got the downforce figures is pretty simple. I looked at some onboards with telemetry, looked at what cornering Gs the cars were able to achieve at certain speeds, and then, knowing how much these cars weigh and assuming 1.3 friction coefficient for the tires I converted that into downforce. So, for example, if I would see a 1000kg car cornering at 3.9G at 250km/h, I would know the car would have to be making 2000kg of downforce.

Obviously, this is a pretty rough estimation as we don't really know what the friction coefficient of the tires is and we don't know how exactly it changes with load, we don't know exactly what the weight of the car is (some variance with fuel load), it's not always clear what the highest cornering G through a corner is - because we need to look at sustained Gs and not a momentary spike (and also some corners might have slight banking) - and also when a car is cornering and is driving at an angle not all the aerodynamic surfaces will be working perfectly and this would change slightly from corner to corner. So my numbers are far from authoritative, but, seeing as there are no authoritative numbers in general, this is still probably the best info you can get. The one advantage it has that it comes from actual cars driving and it's not some made up theoretical figure.

You are saying the numbers I came up are too high and that may very well be the case. If, for example, the tires have a much higher friction coefficient, let's say 1.6 instead of 1.3, then, looking at my previously given example, the 1000kg car would only need 1440kg of downforce to corner at 3.9G. That said, I could just as easily argue that some numbers that are accepted are too high. As you said, we have Group C cars claiming even higher downforce, but how does that square up with their pace which is quite a bit slower than that of LMP1 cars at their peak while having comparable weight and power? So this again goes back to the question of how the downforce numbers were derived in the first place. There really doesn't seem to be any standard that anyone adheres to.

 

[StartYourEngines]

The way I got the downforce figures is pretty simple. I looked at some onboards with telemetry, looked at what cornering Gs the cars were able to achieve at certain speeds, and then, knowing how much these cars weigh and assuming 1.3 friction coefficient for the tires I converted that into downforce. So, for example, if I would see a 1000kg car cornering at 3.9G at 250km/h, I would know the car would have to be making 2000kg of downforce.

Obviously, this is a pretty rough estimation as we don't really know what the friction coefficient of the tires is and we don't know how exactly it changes with load, we don't know exactly what the weight of the car is (some variance with fuel load), it's not always clear what the highest cornering G through a corner is - because we need to look at sustained Gs and not a momentary spike (and also some corners might have slight banking) - and also when a car is cornering and is driving at an angle not all the aerodynamic surfaces will be working perfectly and this would change slightly from corner to corner. So my numbers are far from authoritative, but, seeing as there are no authoritative numbers in general, this is still probably the best info you can get. The one advantage it has that it comes from actual cars driving and it's not some made up theoretical figure.

You are saying the numbers I came up are too high and that may very well be the case. If, for example, the tires have a much higher friction coefficient, let's say 1.6 instead of 1.3, then, looking at my previously given example, the 1000kg car would only need 1440kg of downforce to corner at 3.9G. That said, I could just as easily argue that some numbers that are accepted are too high. As you said, we have Group C cars claiming even higher downforce, but how does that square up with their pace which is quite a bit slower than that of LMP1 cars at their peak while having comparable weight and power? So this again goes back to the question of how the downforce numbers were derived in the first place. There really doesn't seem to be any standard that anyone adheres to.

Yeah, I get where your numbers come from and I guessed that it could be from reverse calculations starting from measured cornering Gs.
That is perfectly fine, however as you said there are quite a bit of assumptions that can be made here and that can considerably change the output of the calculations (like, as you mentioned, the tyres friction coefficient, but also ride height and suspensions setup of the cars at that specific moment, plus ambient and asphalt temperature).
While the numbers that I provided in my previous post are direct quotes from manufacturers and race teams that I collected over the years.

Regarding your question about Group C and IMSA GTP cars highlighted in bold, I believe the answer would be due to these factors:

- tyres (most important element of all here, we are talking about tyres made with construction tech of 30-40 years ago). For sure, if you put some custom-made, modern slick tyres on an Eagle MKIII, the car would literally and easily shave off multiple seconds from its original lap times
- suspensions: these cars were downforce monsters, but modern LMP1 cars are honestly fitted with mechanically more advanced suspensions
- tracks and tarmacs: most of current tracks are now characterized by considerably grippier and thus "faster" tarmac compared to 30-40 years ago

If we hypothetically put all of these elements together, an Eagle MKIII could likely run much faster today than before.

 

[tristatez28lt1]

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[StartYourEngines]

Well, it seems from the video above that this time they used the full 1000 bhp power output.
Just to give some context: the laps were done on the Silverstone National Circuit.
The current lap record of the Silverstone National Circuit is 47.404 seconds, registered by the Benetton B197 F1 car during the 2004 Silverstone EuroBOSS round.
Here, in the second lap Hulkenberg did basically the same time (47.41 seconds), but with a passenger on board.

PS:
Still regarding Silverstone (but this time the GP circuit), the road legal Valkyrie apparently registered a lap time 22 seconds faster than the McLaren Senna.
Source here:

Aston Martin Valkyrie og Valkyrie AMR Pro til Oslo Motor Show! - Oslo Motor Show

1 160 hestekrefter, 11 100 omdreininger i minuttet og en toppfart på 400 km/t er bare motoren i en av bilene som Arne Fredly tar med seg til Oslo Motor Show. Det er mange som har ventet lenge på å få se og oppleve superbilen Aston Martin Valkyrie etter at den i 2017 ble vist på […]

oslomotorshow.no

Personally, I've already heard about this info almost one year ago, but now it is being stated publicly in the link above.
I hope there will be public data to verify it at some point.

 

[bmwz4coupe]

Well, it seems from the video above that this time they used the full 1000 bhp power output.
Just to give some context: the laps were done on the Silverstone National Circuit.
The current lap record of the Silverstone National Circuit is 47.404 seconds, registered by the Benetton B197 F1 car during the 2004 Silverstone EuroBOSS round.
Here, in the second lap Hulkenberg did basically the same time (47.41 seconds), but with a passenger on board.

PS:
Still regarding Silverstone (but this time the GP circuit), the road legal Valkyrie apparently registered a lap time 22 seconds faster than the McLaren Senna.
Source here:

Aston Martin Valkyrie og Valkyrie AMR Pro til Oslo Motor Show! - Oslo Motor Show

1 160 hestekrefter, 11 100 omdreininger i minuttet og en toppfart på 400 km/t er bare motoren i en av bilene som Arne Fredly tar med seg til Oslo Motor Show. Det er mange som har ventet lenge på å få se og oppleve superbilen Aston Martin Valkyrie etter at den i 2017 ble vist på […]

oslomotorshow.no

Personally, I've already heard about this info almost one year ago, but now it is being stated publicly in the link above.
I hope there will be public data to verify it at some point.

I dont think the normal road legal Valkyrie is 22 sec faster than Senna around Silverstone, it must be the Pro version. The text in the article is not clear on which version they are talking about.

 

[StartYourEngines]

I dont think the normal road legal Valkyrie is 22 sec faster than Senna around Silverstone, it must be the Pro version. The text in the article is not clear on which version they are talking about.

No, this info is related to the road legal Valkyrie.
As I wrote, this is actually not something fresh and I personally had the occasion to come across this claim almost one year ago. And even then, it was referred to the road legal Valkyrie.

Being said that, I too would like to see this claim verified on practice.

 

[bmwz4coupe]

No, this info is related to the road legal Valkyrie.
As I wrote, this is actually not something fresh and I personally had the occasion to come across this claim almost one year ago. And even then, it was referred to the road legal Valkyrie.

Being said that, I too would like to see this claim verified on practice.

Ok then. I would also like to see this verification because I can not see how this is possible; 22 sec faster than the Senna on a circuit which is a little over 5 km long….

 

[A.P.]

Crazy numbers for both regardless. If true of course.

 

[Bridster]

With 90%+ of AM's claims about the Valkyrie having been proven false, discussing any is a complete waste of time.

Speaking of the Silverstone lap, the Benetton time is not the best comparison. During these historical racing events they often don't run the cars at full power to preserve engines and they don't get the full technical support either. So that time is not even representative of the times 1997 F1 cars would do in period. Better comparison is the Praga R1T, which did 52.88 and which is almost exactly as fast as GT3 cars. From that point of view, being 5s faster, even on a short circuit like this, is nothing special. What's again standing out more is AM's total refusal to do a representative lap with either version of the car.

 

[StartYourEngines]

Speaking of the Silverstone lap, the Benetton time is not the best comparison. During these historical racing events they often don't run the cars at full power to preserve engines and they don't get the full technical support either. So that time is not even representative of the times 1997 F1 cars would do in period. Better comparison is the Praga R1T, which did 52.88 and which is almost exactly as fast as GT3 cars. From that point of view, being 5s faster, even on a short circuit like this, is nothing special. What's again standing out more is AM's total refusal to do a representative lap with either version of the car.

While I agree with you about the gap between BOSS GP and original 1997 F1 times, we can derive a hypothetical full potetial lap time of the Benetton B197 at the Silverstone National Circuit by looking at the times set at the Red Bull Ring circuit.
The Red Bull Ring is useful for this kind of comparisons because its layout basically never changed since 1996.

During the Austrian 1997 F1 GP, Alesi did a qualifying lap of around 1'11 with the Benetton B197, while during the 2018 BOSS GP round at the Red Bull Ring the B197 did a 1'16 lap time.
This % gap would lead to a projected lap time in the high 43 seconds-low 44 seconds range at the Silverstone National Circuit for the B197 F1 car at full power.
In the video, Hulkenberg stated that with a more aggressive (i.e. oversteering) suspension setup and without the passenger, he could remove a couple of seconds from the 47.4 seconds lap time of the AMR Pro.
This would lead to a potential lap time of high 44 seconds-low 45 seconds for the AMR Pro.

In the end, there actually wouldn't be that much of a difference in performance between the AMR Pro and a late 1990s top-end F1 car.

So, while I agree with you about the comments on the BOSS GP lap times and, especially, on the poor management of the cars from AM, the AMR Pro still is a very fast track car in absolute terms.
In fact, it is much faster than any other 2-seater, track-only cars currently available to buy for gentleman drivers.
One could argue to buy an old F1/Indycar instead (or a modern LMP machine) and probably pay less: while I agree with that, those cars are fully fledged race machines which literally don't work if driven slow (and that's what gentleman drivers would do 99% of the times, as they would lack the required driving skills). On the other hand, the AMR Pro would provide a similar level of performance but it is designed to be also driven 'slow' and be manageable by an amateur.

Point is: if much, much slower track cars such as the FXXK, the Huayra R, the Senna GTR (and so on) cost 3-4+ millions, the existence of the AMR Pro is more than justified because, for the same amount of money, it offers performances which are on a whole different level entirely.

 

[KiwiRob]

Ok then. I would also like to see this verification because I can not see how this is possible; 22 sec faster than the Senna on a circuit which is a little over 5 km long….

more power, better aero, more grip.

 

[KiwiRob]

With 90%+ of AM's claims about the Valkyrie having been proven false, discussing any is a complete waste of time.

Speaking of the Silverstone lap, the Benetton time is not the best comparison. During these historical racing events they often don't run the cars at full power to preserve engines and they don't get the full technical support either. So that time is not even representative of the times 1997 F1 cars would do in period. Better comparison is the Praga R1T, which did 52.88 and which is almost exactly as fast as GT3 cars. From that point of view, being 5s faster, even on a short circuit like this, is nothing special. What's again standing out more is AM's total refusal to do a representative lap with either version of the car.

Hulkenberg said with tc switched off and changes to the suspension set up a few more second could be found. The current set up appears to be a safe setup for the old guys who will own them not professional racing drivers.

What’s sad is this car will not do what it was built for and that’s race at LeMans.

 

[Tourbillon]

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