New Panoz Champcar

Has anybody seen pictures of the new chassis to be used in CART next year? i just heard on last race commentary, lighter smaller, paddle gear shifts... plus still on slicks and no traction control. sounds like a fun car.

car is presented tomorrow(28th of July)
so have patience

The car may be presented tomorrow yeah, but the wind tunnel models have been public for a long time.

[www.champcarfanatics.com]

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Nice looking car, with aero designed to provide good overtaking when in close formation, it should be good for next year in Champ Cars.

Dave... im sure you will know, can you explain why a champcars underbody is shaped as it is?

I mean the why the strakes at the sidepod inlets bit? :S Thanks.

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

You'd have to ask the chassis builders. Lola make the old one, Panoz the new.

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Chet:

"We have to create the downforce in a sensible manner that is not as setup critical, and which is less affected by traffic turbulent wakes. (Chief Aerodynamicist) Nick (Alcock) has produced a superb underbody for this car, and an awesome looking topside which should keep the fans (and drivers) excited."

Ground effect basicly.







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Ah thanks for that. Champcar underbodys are pretty nice.

But ermmm this car looks ugly. Maybe in a proper livery it might look nicer, but atm eww.

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

Yeah I agree, the current Lola looks a lot better.

thirded. cheap yes....but its damn ugly

I think the most beautifull CART cars where around 1997 to 2000 (Reynard and Lola chassi, Swift chassi was damn ugly and slow :P), after 2000 the cars had minor changes but were still fine. But this shape dosen't look like a top series car, it look's like more a Jr. serie car.

In fact the car itself looks better than the drawn I saw last year, but it still not give me the feeling for a top serie Car.

Also I hope IRL and CART merge soon, so we have again more than 30 cars on the series...

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Rocker

it just dosnt look right to me lol I think its because theyve merged the raised nose cone with the old style engine cover.

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i liked the trusports car ( i think it was called) they made their own car and it just looked so nice this was 1997 i think.

1997 Chassis were Lola, Reynard, Swift and Penske...

Last Truesport entry i can find is 1992. It finished bottom of the chassis championship.

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1997 Reynard was the best look car :P

This one?

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Um dois três quatro cinco seis sete oito nove dez
Eins zwei drei vier fünf sechs sieben acht neun zehn
One two three four five six seven eight nine ten
Один два три четыре пять шесть семь восемь девять десять

All Reynards looked the same. From 1994 to 2002 the car never changed much.

I don't like the way that CART and the IRL have gone to single spec chassis and single engine? It was much better when you had lola, march penske etc. In the late 90's on the engine front you had honda, toyota, ford, mercedes.

Also with regards to a CART/IRL merger. If you look at your history in the late 70's early 80's we had the same situation with an oval series and a road course series. They merged in the end so here's hoping. Besiddes it's all Tony George's fault we have 2 series anyway.

I don't like the way that CART and the IRL have gone to single spec chassis and single engine? It was much better when you had lola, march penske etc. In the late 90's on the engine front you had honda, toyota, ford, mercedes.

You can only have more than 1 chassis if more than 1 company builds them. You cant just invent random engines for teams to run, just to make it look like the late 90s :S They havent gone to single spec...they are using what they can.

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and the engines werent far off f1 standard.. in 2000 were revving to 16,000rpm. now they are rev limited, and about 200 horsepower less, cos only one engine manufacturer left. but this saved costs, and the engines last like 2500 km or so.

Well it surely is a little boring to only have one chassis-type for them all, but that is the cheapest way, and one shall not forget that champcar was bankrupt a few years ago, and so it´s the only logical way to build up the series again. Maybe some day they series will have more Chassis again... maybe when they really manage to reunite Champcar and IRL one day. ....The only thing I hope for is that they won´t use those bloody ugly IRL Cars. Damn they look like crap.

And the point about only one engine suplier is the same story . It happened due to cost problems and some manufacturers wanting other engine regulations then the series...(first it was Honda and Toyota leaving Champcar cause they wanted another type of engine for CART..... Later it was Chevy and Toyota leaving IRL for similar reasons.)

PS: heard a story about Hyundai being willing to supply or give their brand name for IRL engines when it was unclear if even Honda would leave IRL (must have been late 2004 / early 2005). Does anyone know more about it and why it didn´t happen?