monaroCountry

Chief engineer Kazutoshi Mizuno said the new GT-R "could get anywhere from 7:44 on up, with most laps coming in between 7:55 and 7:58." This fits perfectly with the recent times achieved by various professional drivers.



* Wolf could be Wolfgang Kaufmann *

Finally from the great man himself, Horst von Saurma

Guibo

Nothing strange about that. Nissan never said every lap would be the record lap.

This is the same von Saurma that lapped the GT-R on Bridgestones in only his preview test 4 seconds faster than the full-on supertest of the Turbo, and only 1 second off the pace of the supertested Z06.
You don't find the true potential of any high performance car within 5 laps at the 'Ring.

Notice how monaroCountry does not include the link to the discussion:
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/t...8&t=605408&i=0
Rumor-mongering at its finest.

So, if the rumor is true, Porsche lied about the capability of the GT-R. It's not a 7:54 car, but a 7:45. And that's before turning the thousands of laps with it that Nissan did.

TTRotary

There, fixed it for ya

The fact is that 11 pro or semi-pro drivers have now taken this thing around the ring, including no less than 5 non Nissan factory drivers and NOT ONE OF THEM can come anywhere close to Nissan's result. Those are the facts and no amount of excuses will change them.

The other red herring is that Nissan is also trying to manage down expectations about the car. It is ludicrous for the chief engineer to say a 7.21 car is really a 7.55 car.

Guibo

Fact? Links please. Show me where Nissan ever said every lap will be 7:29.

lt4dogman

You need to get nissan to man-up and bring their car to lemans or sebring and spank the porsches in an endurance race, that would settle everything

Guibo

That would actually settle absolutely nothing. Aston Martin has beaten Corvette at Le Mans before. Does that mean a stock DB9 stands a chance against a Corvette? We are talking about street cars here. And in test after test, GT-R's have been beating Turbos and GT3's and getting damn close to GT2's.
You need to get Porsche to man up that they almost never drive their competitors' cars to the absolute limit. After all, what's the incentive? Are they going to say, "Yeah, our legendary Turbo with decades of fine-tuning is slower than a Nissan"? Get real. This is like Pepsi saying that Coke doesn't taste as good as Pepsi. Big surprise!

Slowgoin

Please, enough. We know you hate Nissan. What is the point with you and this car? It's a car! Thats it! Give it up already.

Dave68

The legendary turbo has been getting spanked by Corvettes since 1990 when the ZR-1 was introduced. The sad thing is that Porsche makes so much profit to put back into R&D work and yet the new ZR1 still spanks the best they have to offer.

monaroCountry

Thats the problem, both GT3 and Turbo are 7:40-7:50 cars around the Nurburgring. Nissan advertised the car as capable of 7:20's which puts it smack bang in the middle of a group of proper supercars like the CGT, Enzo, Zonda, ACR and ZR1.


So Walter Rohrl could boast about his driving abilities .

About how he beat the main Ferrari test driver, about beating the 7 time F1 world champion about beating a fellow German around the Nurburgring.

Guibo

Nissan advertised the car as capable of a 7:29 in ideal conditions after thousands of laps.
That is not bang in the middle of the ACR (only 4 laps!) and the ZR1 (certainly NOT "thousands of laps" and with a strong headwind and plenty of imperfect driving). Get back to me when you know the word context means.

What's so boastful about being 12 seconds slower than the magazine test driver von Saurma in the 599?



CTS-V customers who take their car to the 'Ring thinking they can match the 599 are in for a rude awakening.

So all fellow Germans are equally as fast on the Nurburgring? Haha. That might actually mean something if F1 ran their races on the Nordschleife. Put the two together at Fiorano (or the NRing GP circuit) and see if the result is the same. I doubt it would be.

monaroCountry

The Ferrari 599 and the Nissan GTR scored a similar time around the Motortrend track, both are heavy boats, the Ferrari is a GT cruiser and can be forgiven for its time.

At least the CTS-V has a believable time. How about the previous Nissan GTR R33 with 280hp lining up to the Ferrari 599 or 550hp CTS-V thinking it could win...............since both the 599 an d GTR R33 scored a 7:59 around the ring. Nissan's exaggeration is just unbelievable.

Guibo

R33 =/= R35, got it?
Yes, both the 599 and GT-R were right on the *** of the GT2 around the Motor Trend track. You seriously think a CTS-V is going to be only 1.2s slower than a ZR1 on that track? Of course you do. The 599 is no normal "GT cruiser." It's a super GT far and above cruisers like a 645i or Jag XK, and a step above sportier GT's like the M6 or Aston Vantage.
Again, you are completely missing the point: Porsche claims the best the 599 could do at the hands of their drivers (including none other than Walter Rohrl) was a 7:59. Same time as a CTS-V, which according to your theory of hp/wt should be IMPOSSIBLE. The CTS-V is rated 286 hp/tonne, while the 599 is 349 hp/tonne. That's a difference of 22% in favor of the 599. And yet on the Nordschleife with their best man driving, Porsche is no faster than the 4-door, 4300 lb sedan. Using your logic, this should not make any sense whatsoever. GM has to be cheating! Oh, but since the Caddie's not a Nissan product, you automatically give the non-Nissan product the benefit of the doubt.

Instead of copying and pasting this totally unsubstantiated rumor across no fewer than 8 different forums (haha, the Subaru guys gave it to you real good!), you should stop and think critically for just a moment. Put your obvious bias/hate aside and you just might learn something.

Guibo

By the way, the 599 was faster on Evo's test track than the Z06, F430, 911 GT3 RS and Ascari KZ1. Similar results on TopGear's track:



And at Fiorano:
Ferrari Enzo 1'24.9
Ferrari F430 Scuderia 1'25.0
Maserati MC12 1'25.2
Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano 1'26.500
Ferrari F50 1'27.00
Ferrari F430 1'27.00
Ferrari 360 Challenge Stradale 1'28.00
Ferrari F40 1'29.60
Ferrari 360 Modena 1'31.00

Some "cruiser GT" huh?

monaroCountry

Again I will point out that the R33 Nissan GTR achieved a time of 7:59 with roughly 3400lbs and 280hp, now can you figure out the p/tonne figure for this? Like the R35, the best the European publications could do was ~30seconds slower than the Nissan factory figure. The sub 8 minute figure has now been marked by everyone as non stock, of course Nissan still claims that the time was set using a stock car. Nissan's R35 time is very very very suspect and far faster than what you would expect.

Porsche achieved a slow time with the 599 full stop. They were most likely testing in traffic (normal Porsche test) and were not going for the absolute fast time. Both Porsche and Ferrari knows that the 599 is more of a GT cruiser than a race car. Porsche obviously thinks that the 599 can go faster, they never questioned and called Ferrari a cheat like they did with Nissan.

Instead of copying and pasting this totally unsubstantiated rumor across no fewer than 8 different forums (haha, the Subaru guys gave it to you real good!), you should stop and think critically for just a moment. Put your obvious bias/hate aside and you just might learn something.[/QUOTE]

Guibo

Again, why are you talking about the R33? That has nothing to do with what anyone is talking about. 280hp...most people will tell you that is BS anyway just to conform to Japan's "gentlemen's agreement" about hp.
You accept that the R35 did a 7:45. Is that in line with what you expect of a car with its power and weight? Explain to me how the 7:54 previously quoted by Porsche is now mysteriously 9 seconds faster. How does that happen??

No, it's not obvious that Porsche thinks the 599 can go faster. Quit making that up just to fit your theory. If they ran the 599 in traffic, how do you know they didn't run the GTR in traffic also? That's right, you don't know. Do you even know for a fact which tires they were running?
And why would they call Ferrari a cheat? Ferrari doesn't even test there, nor do they make any claims about the lap times of their cars in Porsche's own backyard. Porsche's been caught napping, and they're crying foul, even though their GT3's, Turbos, and C2S's with PDK have been getting their asses reamed by the GT-R in independent test after test.

Errm.... Von Saurma in only his preview laps was already only 21 seconds within the factory claim (actually within 12 seconds of the claim at around the time he did the testing, which was 7:38, before further testing). He sure as hell did not have thousands of laps in the car, nor did he have anything close to perfect conditions.
I already know about the R33; in fact, I know that you've been quoting my exact statements about that car from previous discussions.

Give it a rest, guy. Your trolling here (and in at least 7 other forums) is tiresome.

monaroCountry

So why do I keep bring up the R33 sub 8 minute time? Well the gap between Nissan's quoted figure and what the rest of world achieved in their test is strikingly familiar....some 30 seconds slower.

Add Steve Sutcliffe to the list of doubters!!!!!

In 1997 Autocar sent two of its best drivers to test out a production Nissan GTR to try to match the sub 8 minute record. Two of their best drivers included two-times Le Mans winner Robert Nearn, and Steve Sutcliffe. Their best time was 8:28.1.

"Nissan GTR's, the Nurburgring and uspiciously rapid lap times go way back, the first eyebrows having been raised when the R33 GTR somehow broke eight minutes in standard trim in the mid 1990's.

We know now, of course, that the car in question was fitted with a set of tyres that could have stuck it to the side of the Eiffel Tower when it set its lap time, and im reasonably certain they've been at it again with the latest GTR's record breaking 7min 29sec lap."

monaroCountry

Well the previous 7:54 was the fastest lap done by Porsche engineer. The 7:46 was the fastest lap done by Porsches main Nurburgring driver who happens to own most of the record times around that place. The engineer also scored a slower GT2 and Turbo time than Walter R........but not the same margin as the GTR time.


How so? More nd more reviews are now starting to question the GTR time, not just Porsche. Porsche hasnt led the Nurburgring leaderboard for a long time (not including the 6:11 time set a Porsche in 1980's). They also have the GT2 and CGT that they could brag about.

This is the same Horst Von Saurma that along with Walter Rorhl are regarded as the ring masters. They hve driven many cars around the ring all their life. Yet they were beaten by a washed up ex F1 Japanese driver around their own back yard - by around 25-30 seconds? IMPOSSIBLE!!!!

7:29* -- 164.68 km/h - 2009 Nissan GT-R, *company test driver Tochio Suzuki according to mfr.


7:50 --- 157.79 km/h - Nissan GT-R, 480 PS/1750 kg, Horst von Saurma, (sport auto 12/07)

Guibo

And did Sutcliffe drive the R35 on the NRing? No? That's what I thought. MonaroCountry, none of my questions are rhetorical. Please do your best to answer them, lest you want to give the impression that you are some mindless internet troll with a peculiar vendetta against Nissan.

Also, if you rely on Sutcliffe for automotive "facts" you will end up being more confused than you already are (as difficult as that may be to believe). For example, in his blog, he claimed Nissan cheated because the tape they released showed the pit straight being excluded in the timing. Some of his readers pointed out his inept journalism, citing various sources that confirmed Nissan's timing marks are the same as others (Sport Auto, GM, etc.). This could be an honest mistake that anyone not familiar with 'Ring timing methods might make. However, when Autocar published their Murcielago vs Focus RS test which included a timed lap for both cars at the Nurburgring, the co-author of that article* was none other than...Steve Sutcliffe. You'd think having done a lap there (with lap chart almost identical to Sport Auto's methodology) he'd know what the hell he was talking about.

Now, here's a more recent test by Sutcliffe on the GT-R, not the 'Ring test car but a production import, done on a closed twisty section of the Isle of Man.
LP560-4 (352 hp/tonne): 1:55.99
GT-R (276 hp/tonne): 1:56.69
KTM: 1:58.90
R8: 2:00.00
Elise: 2:05.00

Sutcliffe says: "But, there's a caveat. This thing [GT-R] is limited to 112 mph because of laws they have in Japan. And it sat on 112 mph for about 10-11 seconds on the road route. If it had gone beyond that, it would have blitzed the Lamborghini. And bear in mind it costs 1/3rd of the Lambo...what a car!"



Look at that chart carefully. Aside from the obvious run-in with the limiter, the GT-R pulls about as strongly as the Lambo, despite the Lambo's 28% advantage in hp/wt. Coming into the first corner of the segment, the GT-R barely needs to breathe on its brakes compared to the other cars, it carries much more speed through that corner. And in the final corner, it carries more speed than all of them except the KTM. That's faster than the R8, the Lambo, and the Elise.

*The other co-author of that Autocar twin-test was Chris Harris. Here's what he's said about the GT-R and Porsche's claims:
"Now before we consider what this might tell us about the state of Nissan’s definition of ‘standard’ or for that matter Porsche’s paranoia, we should probably ask a more pertinent, general question. Namely, does anyone really give a ****? I mean once you learn a bit about the place, and what a very, very fast lap requires, you quickly begin to understand that these are among the most random markers of absolute performance to have been perpetuated since the advent of the 0-60mph time. Yes, they give you a very good indication of the car’s complete performance potential, but the scope for naughty ‘infringements’ and the variability of drivers means they must be taken with a pinch of salt.
The Nissan deserves some manner of defence though. It is not possible to make any kind of accurate estimation of its actual performance by looking at its bare numbers, as our Silverstone lap on DR TV proves. Numbers mean nothing**, it’s the net available and useable performance that counts and, plucking some completely arbitrary figures out of the ether by way of example, if a GT2 can deploy 75 percent of its potential over a given lap, the figure for the GT-R must be in the 90s.
They're virtually identical on the Brit circuit, so I can't see where the 25sec discrepancy comes from. If anything, the GT-R we used at Silverstone felt a bit tired, it certainly wasn't as quick in a straight line as the one we used for the road work."

His colleague, Jethro Bovingdon:
"What we can say is that the GT-R seems to deliver lap times and performance above and beyond what you would expect. Look how close it was to the GT2 around Silverstone - a fast circuit, remember. And that particular GT-R didn't feel as feisty in a straight line as some others we've driven."

Fellow Drivers Republic editor, Richard Meaden, who has driven his own Porsche 964 RS numerous times on the NRing, and has done two stints at the 24 Hours of Nurburgring with the Aston Martin team:
"The GT-R we drove at Silverstone was on Bridgestones and the GT2 on Pilot Cups and there was 1/10th of a second between them (in the GT2's favour). I remember the 911 being great fun but a real challenge, the GT-R an incredible experience but easier to extract the time from. I wouldn't have felt comfortable taking the same risks in the GT2 at the Ring, simply because you know it'll bite you if you really take the *%&%. Therefore if we can take anything from the whole Ring argument I'd say that whatever the GT-R and GT2's ultimate times are, a mere mortal would be able to get closer to the GT-R's best, which perhaps means more than a few seconds here and there.
As Chris has said in his column the Ring lap times are always open to conjecture, and while you could argue all day about whether the GT-R or GT2 is quicker it seems hard to believe the Nissan would be THAT much slower."

R&T's Shaun Bailey:
"Honestly I don't put much stock in manufacturer lap times. And I really don't put must stock in manufacturer's lap times of other makes. From our experience the GT-R on the Dunlop tires is more trackable than a Porsche 911T."

**And that is why you will never understand how a lowly VW Golf can outrun a top-fuel dragster on the NRing.

Guibo

So, you're saying that Porsche, in "trying" to evaluate the GT-R's performance, gave it to a less-than-qualified driver to extract the most from it? Well, no wonder the difference seems to be so great. They purposefully handicapped it by giving it to a less-than-qualified driver. Rohrl is more qualified, but until you can prove he lapped thousands of times in it, and had perfect conditions, there's no proof of cheating whatsoever. And the time you referenced in your opening post was 7:45, not 7:46. Nice try of moving the time up, guy.
This precisely demonstrates the differences between drivers in different vehicles, even when they know the track very well.
I'll ask you again: What tires were on this GT-R that Porsche bought from the States?



For regular street-going cars (not the stripped-out trackday specials), they were unquestionably the leaders.
No, more and more reviews are not questioning the GT-R time. Only unsubstantiated internet rumor-mongering (helped in no small part by your own work) is questioning the GT-R time. In fact, with the overwhelming wealth of data available (and Porsche's own inability to match von Saurma's time in the 599 by 12 seconds), the GT-R is confirming that it's far more than its hp/wt suggests. Test after test is bearing this out. Here's the latest one.



Are you going to cry "Ringer!" on this test too?




Nope, not impossible. Von Saurma's test was only a PREVIEW test, getting to know the car. Not a full-out supertest. Did you ever wonder why Sport Auto never published his lap chart?? Hmm???
And it was noted in the test that the track was less than perfect, being damp here and there; something they almost never mention in other tests unless it's important.
Are you seriously dense enough to think any of these guys can extract the best lap out of the car in only a handful of laps in imperfect conditions? Tochio Suzuki from an article published in May of this year:
"The conditions were perfect. I don't think the car could go faster. Its main strength is stability - on the brakes and in the corners. The lap was optimum but the car is predictable and easy to drive on the limit."

The site admin for bridgetogantry.com comments:
"The video inside should quell 90% of doubts. It shows some of the most comfortably aggressive driving I've ever seen. Seeing this level of attack is always impressive, but on the Nordschleife? Amazing."


And this is precisely the point you (and others) are missing: it's the GT-R's stability and predictability that makes it so fast through the hairiest sections of the 'Ring. This allows the driver to commit, given the right (ie, perfect) conditions. You can drive a dragster through the 'Ring, but even if you've got 3000 hp, what good is even 100 of it if you can't trust the car to do what you want it to do? That peak hp figure is next to meaningless. Which is why a mis-firing Maserati MC12 can outrun a 900-hp Koenigsegg at the 'Ring (and if you unplug your fingers from your ears long enough to read the driver's comments, you'll understand exactly why the CCX isn't as fast as its numbers suggest).

crwtrans

Well put.