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J Ames Barclay, a 40-year-old South African, raced at the national level in the UK with Vauxhall and Lotus, but also spent many years in the press and marketing world, including as director of communication. LeMans and GT3 programs. In 2015, he was appointed to lead the Jaguar Racing Team.
The automaker's racing effort was seen queuing between his legs after the 2004 F1 season, which, like the previous four, did not go well. his abandonment. But now, Jaguar is back, fully engaged, she said, in the all-electric format, Formula E. The team is entering its second year and Jaguar recently announced the new I-Pace eTrophy as a series of support.
We caught up with Barclay while he was in New York before the next Formula E race.
Car Magazine: So you're back.
James Barclay: Jaguar announced his return to the race in 2015, but officially started in 2016 with our Panasonic Jaguar Racing team. Formula E has been our main activity in motorsport.
The moment could not be better chosen while we turned to electrification with our first electric car on the market, the I-Pace Jaguar. Now, we are also very pleased to announce with the revelation of the I-Pace in its production form, that we will actually take the I-Pace race and be the first manufacturer to have a race car factory electric. We have our Formula E racing car, which is a prototype of single-seater. But we are actually the first manufacturer to produce our own electric race car series with the I-Pace, so I think of two real firsts and something we are very excited about.
AM: What changes were made to the I-Pace for the race?
JB: As a basic car, the I-Pace is in fact very well suited for to be a racing app. We transported the production motor 90 kilowatt hours. It is very well packaged in the floor, a skateboard design that is very good because it has a very low center of gravity, which is also the case of the race car. We use the same electric motors as the standard car on the front and rear axles. The race car is also four-wheel-drive, produces 395 hp, so performance, the powertrain is actually more than up to the task.
Then you can imagine the specific race things we are changing. We have dedicated race brakes. We are changing the suspension system for a reel and shock absorber system – very upscale racing equipment for the kind of rigors of a racing environment and racing situation such as sidewalk strokes and all that kind of thing. We also have specific safety devices, protection cage and FIA safety systems. And we are working closely with the FIA to create the car because, again, they had no rule for a race car electric production plant. So we helped the FIA refine and set new rules for the production of electric racing cars from the factory.
And we also used our control system from our Panasonic Jaguar Formula E team and the work we did on this car. . We are currently using a report on some of these control systems and racing car software [à l'I-Pace,] which is still technology transfer. We like to think of it as a running race in the race
AM: Are there any particular safety issues associated with a race car that has a battery in case of a problem? ;accident?
JB: Like most combustion cars that handle fuel, [les batteries sont] inherently dangerous, and you take the right safety protocols and, obviously, with regard to the I -Pace, very rigorous and extensive collision test procedure that gives us a fantastic base to develop the race car off. But we've added a number of different things, like reinforcing the car's protective floor, which helps protect batteries and cells from impact. The I-Pace battery has some specific security features that, again, are very good in terms of control and problem management; we have been able to offer a very extensive safety regime for our production cars and this helps
AM: What is the battery technology in terms of safety for the race?
JB: With respect to battery design, and the management of specific cells and how individual cells act in the event of a runaway. It simply allows you to control and manage and limit the effect of a cell triggering the next cell, so that a large part of the battery design is meant to isolate specific cellular problems without having a trigger effect on others. Smart design helps minimize problems.
One of the specific requirements we had to work with the FIA was to move the driver away from the side of the car, so we moved the driver's seat to the center of the car, further away Door. The steering column is moved;
One of the great things we have about the car is the new Michelin tires we use. We now have a tire that works in wet and dry conditions so we do not trace around the world [carrying tires.] It is based on a Michelin Coupe tire, an excellent high performance tire that works very well in all these conditions.
AM: As the electric race develops and there are different brands of electric cars rolling against each other, go you increase the engine power of the origin? Will not it be imperative to increase the power to make them even faster? What will you change to give more power to your race car? To what extent is I-Pace likely to be changed at a later date?
JB: This is only our second season in this sport. We arrived in the third season of [E-championship racing,] and we are now in season four. Last year was purely a learning experience for our new team and uncompetitive. To put things in context, it's not like we have a motor sports team ready where we could just say, "We're running, we're going to do Formula E now." Jaguar did not have from the motorsport team and we had not had it I did not have it forever. You could even argue over the years of Formula One, [2000-2004] did not count because it was not a factory, an internal project. It was with an outside team that ran it. Realistically, we had not had a motorsport team since the 1960s.
So we literally had to revive it and it was a fantastic experience for all of us to bring motor sport back to the brand.
The first year has really been learning the approach, learning and establishing the tradition of racing in the company that is doing the race, build a team capable of delivering a dignified run against a world class opposition. We learned a lot last year, which was extremely valuable to us and we started riding this year with the new I-TYPE 2, so we built a brand new powertrain for the first season. .
We lowered the gravity centering, we reduced the weight and we lowered the weight limit last year. So we were able to focus on the weight limit and put the balance in the car. center of gravity that ultimately makes this powertrain more efficient too.
AM: Do you foresee a time when electric race cars can run against petrol racing cars?
JB: Absolutely. We would never say never. The reality is that racing is the race, and we are only in the fourth season of electric racing cars. You think how much the formula has come in four seasons. In season five, next year we will introduce the next generation to the Formula E car. It increases the 200 kilowatt power in qualifying mode now to 250. The battery goes from 28 kilowatt hours to 48 to 52 kilowatt hours. So now, the driver does not change car in the race, and we will have a car for the driver where as at this moment we change cars after 25 minutes. We will have a car that can last the whole distance of the race and it goes faster. So, it evolves very quickly.
By the time you put the world's engineering minds together and you have Jaguar Racing, BMW, Audi, Mercedes, Porsche, together, to name a few, you know shown that we will evolve very quickly. And I have no doubt that Formula E will be another example.
The performance of electric cars on the road right now? It is comparable if not faster than combustion cars. We are in a transitional phase and early technology [electric] but as it evolves, I see no reason why it will not continue to evolve and will really push the combustion cars on the track race.
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