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[aaronjb]

Wouldn't fancy changing the cam cover gaskets.

That's probably a service part.. and by service part I mean they throw the engine away and put a new one in

[Viral_Jim]

Not sure I would want a Kers flywheel near me spinning at 52,000 rpm even if it is in a vacuum. These sort of inovations will make there way onto road cars one day

The company I work for makes these type of flywheel energy recovery systems, amongst many other cool bits of tech. Their application won't so much be for road cars due to the way they work. Road cars tend to either be on long motorway runs or stop start traffic. Neither of which generates the deceleration momentum required to power up the flywheel.

Where they will (and already are) coming into use is on buses, due to their increased mass over a car and frequent deceleration from c30mph they make great candidates for this sort of tech. As do certain delivery vehicles (think US mail trucks). The problem is one of miniaturising the technology, the smaller (and hence lower mass) the flywheel is, the faster it has to spin. Ours are larger and operate at around 45,000 rpm. But we're also making ones for the Audit R-18 which operate at similar speeds.

/Geek mode 

[Kevin Wood]

Wouldn't fancy changing the cam cover gaskets.

That's probably a service part.. and by service part I mean they throw the engine away and put a new one in

Yes, the way it's going to be driven, I'd be surprised if the engine lasts as long as the cam over gaskets.

[Kevin Wood]

Not sure I would want a Kers flywheel near me spinning at 52,000 rpm even if it is in a vacuum. These sort of inovations will make there way onto road cars one day

The company I work for makes these type of flywheel energy recovery systems, amongst many other cool bits of tech. Their application won't so much be for road cars due to the way they work. Road cars tend to either be on long motorway runs or stop start traffic. Neither of which generates the deceleration momentum required to power up the flywheel.

Where they will (and already are) coming into use is on buses, due to their increased mass over a car and frequent deceleration from c30mph they make great candidates for this sort of tech. As do certain delivery vehicles (think US mail trucks). The problem is one of miniaturising the technology, the smaller (and hence lower mass) the flywheel is, the faster it has to spin. Ours are larger and operate at around 45,000 rpm. But we're also making ones for the Audit R-18 which operate at similar speeds.

/Geek mode 

Interesting stuff. 

[chrisgixer]

Yes thanks for posting Jimmy.

One of the Nismo's dropped out, wheel came off after a pit stop, got it back but had to retire.

Audi and Porsche still swapping for the lead after each stop. So close, and so little in the way of dramas up at the sharp end.