Improve cooling of drivetrain

[brianman]

It was at Portland International Raceway (PIR) at the ProDrive driving school. They also host BMW, Corvette, etc. track days and always welcome other models. Plus they have a 14-50 outlet near the grandstand so I charged a bit during lunch. Great place!

Yah, PIR is fun. I was there last November.

 

[mnx]

Yeah it's a bummer as it's such a joy to go lapping in the Model S if you discount the power limits.

I bit the bullet and bought an ICE for racing in chumpcar.

For autocross for me, the Model S accel limiter isn't an issue for me.

For higher speed activities (lapping), it's a kill joy and is holding me back from fully experiencing the tracks. This, frankly, is starting to make me consider buying an ICE for such activities. This makes me unhappy.

 

[pilotSteve]

On the track with power limiting it is acceleration that is reduced, not necessarily top speed. Toward the end of my track day (about 20 laps IIC) I was still able to PASS two other cars because there was enough space between us on the back straightaway and my exit speed was pretty high. That was a kick for me!

 

[skills]

Here you can see my "fast" lap(from 2:38). Averaged about 1200w/mi. And as you can se, the 997 GT2 has no problem blasting past me out on the straight at the end of the lap

 

[brianman]

And as you can se, the 997 GT2 has no problem blasting past me

That doesn't seem something to be ashamed about:
Porsche 997 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

GT2
This is the most powerful and fastest road-going 911 GT2 ever to be sold to the public.
...
The GT2 accelerates in 3.6 seconds to 60 mph (97 km/h) and in 7.4 seconds to 100 mph (160 km/h) and has top speed of 329 km/h (204 mph). This makes it the first Porsche 911 GT2 to exceed the 200 mph (320 km/h) top speed after the 1998 Porsche 911 GT1 Race Version (which is not considered an actual Porsche 911 due to its mid-mounted engine and it only saw roads for homologation purposes). The Porsche 997 GT2 has a curb weight of 1,440 kg (3,170 lb). The only transmission choice is a 6-speed manual gearbox.

The GT2 is the first Porsche equipped with launch control.

If cars in this class are being compared with Tesla's first sedan at a track and it's not a laughable comparison, I'd say Tesla's doing pretty damn good.

 

[scaesare]

Well, in evidence against my earlier thoughts that they might be, the post by doug on THIS PAGE at 10-26-2011, 03:15 PM states that a conversation he had with JB says the same: they aren't cooling the rotor despite the patent.

(zombie thread alert)

Well, to potentially contradict this yet again, Michael Elias, ("Eldis" @ diyelectriccarforums.com) has a Tesla drivetrain he's dug in to in order to support the universal controller he's built to allow control of any inverter/motor setup. He's pretty familiar with this stuff.

He states in his video that the rotor is indeed liquid cooled:

Now, this drivetrain is out of a Mercedes Benz B-series, but as you can see it's basically the same as a Model S motor. They could opted to cool the rotor in the MB application, but not do so in the Model S... but that would seem odd given the Model S is the higher-performing car...

 

[jerjozwik]

posting to keep informed on this very interesting thread.