458 Italias Exhausts - And Sebring and Windows!

As mentioned in the first practice session report, the 458s were not sounding identical.  Hankook Farnbacher’s example was by far the noisiest, in a very good way, JMW’s was more subdued and AF Corse’s pair whisper (or diesel) quiet by racecar standards.  Noise seemed to reflect the difference in pace too, although that is too straightforward a comparison bearing in mind, as a simple and significant example, all run different rubber.

Dominik Farnbacher had a logical and straightforward answer to their car being the noisiest.  “Michelotto are developing two different exhaust systems and we are running the straight pipe like they used in Sebring.  The ALMS is less restrictive on noise.  JMW and AF Corse are running the LMS-spec one.”  A look at the back of the cars shows the difference clearly, a pair of big square boxes obvious by their omission on the Hankook Farnbacher example.  “We need to see what the decibels were and whether we then switch to the other one, but I would be surprised if there was anything more than one or two horsepower in it.  Michelotto wanted us to try it.  It does sound a lot better though and the fans love that!”

The situation remained the same in the second practice session, so they haven’t received a ‘non’ from the ACO yet.  What chances then of the other cars having some new gas plumbing fitted tonight?

JMW’s Doc Bunkall on being asked that question: “we don’t have the parts and I didn’t see them last week when we got the car, but if they are legal and give an improvement then I hope we see them.  We only have what we were given and are learning our call all the time anyway, so we will see.”

Stefano Galante, engineer/data analyst for AF Corse showed us the Tubi silencers fitted to their pair of cars and confirmed “I don’t think we have the straight-through parts here.  In Italy there are a lot of complaints about noise and many circuits only have designated days where you can make noise, so it might be that we are over-cautious.  It is very hard to say what sort of power gain you might have for a straight system, for sure it will be more free, but it is hard to say how much horsepower. 

“We have been working on finding a more precise car and we have been finding problems as we try new things, then solving them.  Toni Vilander tried a quicker lap but lost control slightly, so exceeded the track limits on his fastest lap.  We are continuing to work for the race and will try to get a car that is quick in qualifying but ready for the race. 

“The Michelotto guys are looking to get the Ferrari fast as quick as possible so some information will be spread between the teams, but it is very difficult to do that during a race weekend.” 

Asked about the incident at Sebring where the window popped out on the F430, he explained “the window came loose and just after Kaffer’s pitstop it came right out and was only being held on by the pipe from the cool suit.  The big problem was that because it was sticking out it was blocking the airflow to the gearbox cooling (ducted through the rear right haunch vent) and it got dangerously hot so we had to bring it in.  Other than that I think we did a fantastic job against the works teams, the pitwork was fantastic and it was only when it began to cool that it became obvious that we didn’t have the pace we needed to beat them.  AF Corse is an important team to Ferrari, but it is not a factory team like BMW or Corvette.”

PS