V8 Supercars fuel parity situation still unresolved

The V8 Supercars world has been polarized by the largely unresolved fuel parity situation regarding Nissan and Mercedes. With only eight days until the Pirtek Enduro Cup kicks off at Sandown Raceway, V8 Supercars management has yet to make a decision regarding whether or not the new manufacturers will be permitted to run E70 ethanol fuel in the three upcoming endurance events.

The issue surfaced at the most recent round at Winton Motor Raceway, where the Nissan and Mercedes entries were permitted to trial an altered fuel mixture consisting of 70 percent ethanol and 30 percent unleaded fuel, as opposed to the regular E85 mixture which contains a higher percentage of ethanol. Using the E70 blend, Nissan’s James Moffat and Michael Caruso stormed to a dominant one-two victory at the opening race of the weekend. However, when reverted to the regular E85 control fuel for the final two races, Caruso and Moffat were unable to repeat their stellar Saturday performance and finished mid-pack.

The state of affairs sparked a wide spectrum of opinions from drivers and fans alike. After initially suggesting that the Nissan’s pace could be partially credited to what he described as “jungle juice”, Jamie Whincup later divulged that he expected a Nissan to have won the race regardless of the fuel blend. Saturday race-winner, James Moffat, was quick to dismiss any performance advantage gained by the E70 mixture used by his Altima, declaring that “it [had] no performance implications on the car at all”.

The intention of V8 Supercars management was to improve fuel consumption for the new manufacturers without altering performance, as the factory Nissan squad and Erebus Motorsport would be at a disadvantage in the enduro cup with their thirstier quad-cam production V8’s as opposed to the push-rod engines powering the Holden and Ford entries. However, following the inferred correlation between Nissan’s results at Winton and the fuel mixture used, many teams are now questioning whether the revised blend dealt the new manufacturers an unfair advantage over their rivals.

No word on the continued use of the revised fuel blend has been given by V8 Supercars management, and it is unclear when they will announce their stance in the lead up to the Wilson Security Sandown 500 next weekend. Intriguingly, despite extensive testing by the V8 Supercars in the lead up to the Winton round, a rival team reportedly achieved a small horsepower boost when trialling the E70 mixture as opposed to the control E85 fuel.

With regard the inequitable fuel consumption situation faced by his team, Erebus team manager, David Stewart, told Speedcafe.com that the lower percentage of ethanol is the answer to concerns about long distance parity.

“E70 is what we are looking for to be on parity with the Ford and Holden engines or the two-valve push-rod engines,” said Stuart. “For us the only solution going into the endurance races to have parity is to run E70 on all three cars. It’s the only solution that allows us to take advantage of the fuel windows that the two-valve engines can do and also the refuelling time.”

“All we can do is to supply them (V8 Supercars) with as much information as we can and work with them in the process to try to achieve an outcome that is suitable to us and the category,” conceded Stewart after revealing that the engines of his three AMG Mercedes entries consume as much as seven percent more fuel per lap as compared to their Holden and Ford rivals.

The opening race of the inaugural Pirtek Enduro Cup takes place at Sandown Raceway next weekend, before the running of the Bathurst 1000 and Gold Coast 600 events during October. A decision will be handed down some time before next Friday when the cars hit the track for opening practice at the Melbourne-based Sandown circuit.