The 917 was even hairier!

not to be "that guy" but apparently the throttle pedal is actually very heavy, according to some guys whom have driven it and spoken with me about the experience, at least in modern perspective. But I feel wholeheartedly about what you are saying, its literally videos and history and cars like this that have led me to be so passionate about motorsports as a whole.

In my opinion its quite docile despite the speed

@@mitchellreece3711 The amount of torque he's getting through the steering wheel at times looks anything but docile.

600bhp & lighter than an elise, i can't imagine what it was really like to drive. I don't think the steering is heavy on slower corners, heavy clutch & accelerator & massive turbo lag. I think driving one of these at night in the wet would test your mettle.

The machine taking that sort of abuse lap after lap like nothing is more than noteworthy. 🏁

Too bad it isn't true. They really should have done their homework better: www.mulsannescorner.com/maxspeed.htm Anyone who thinks the real speed reached is somehow slow or not fast enough probably needs their head read.

917

@@mortenfrosthansen84 Long tail

No I mean, the 956 didn't go that fast.. but the 917 did

@@mortenfrosthansen84 i got it, the 917 long tail from 1969/70 img.favcars.com/porsche/917/porsche_917_1970_photos_2_b.jpg

It’s the Hunaudières straight, no matter how often someone gets it wrong. And: yes!

Le mans is over since the hunaudieres have been cut.

signorpippistrello No one cares. It’s been known at the Mulsanne for so long. And the 5.8 km version did nothing for the quality of the racing.

@@thethirdman225 What a Stupid Comment the 6km Straight is Le Mans 😈

@@SuperiorNo1 What did it contribute to the racing? The additional chicanes add two extra passing opportunities for starters.

What's a CDI box?

automotivedictionary.org/cdi_box CDI box definition Acronym for "capacitive discharge Ignition" device sometimes controlled by a computer . It is designed to help the spark plug fire at a rate consistent with the rpms of the engine.

The good old days when people got killed in crashes on the Mulsanne because of the speed differential. Yeah great…

@@thethirdman225 It's a race with danger. If you don't accept it, stay at home kid.

@@Stug9680 Oh, a tough guy, eh? Have you ever been to a race in your life or do you just look at bigly numbers from the Mulsanne and jizz off over that?

Bellof did magic, but Nordschleife track changed a lot since his record, so beat him is, simply, impossible. Best

It was beaten by the Porsche 919. The reason why this record lived such a long time is probably because the track is too dangerous for the fastest race car categories like F1, LMP1 or Indycar and so we don't see them compete on the Nordschleife anymore. If it was the case, the record would have been beaten a lot of times.

@@CKlasseDTM bmw tried their F1 car at nürburgring,which failed to break the record

@@vr5lover it was an exhibition. The car and the pilot were not prepared to smash the record and they did absolutely not attempt to smash it.

@@CKlasseDTM I mean it had too big difference,even if they did estimated time was slower than it

@tripasnipa i don't know why english people say "Mulsanne straight" or "the Mulsanne". Mulsanne is a curve, not a straight. The straight is called "les Hunaudières".

So what you’re saying is that only big numbers matter…?

@Kicker Which would do nothing for the quality of the racing.

220mph 😈

@@SuperiorNo1 Correct.

That is the 917.. this was different. But not that much improvement to safety on lower extremities

Nope . 956 had the drivers feet as part of the crush zone in front of the axle . The 962 that raced in the states at the time had the drivers feet behind the front axle

I think it was an engineer from Audi, some years ago he gave an interview for German magazine. He said it would be no problem to drive the circuit without chicanes, because the top speed wouldn't be different - new regulations, limitations etc. They should give it a try, at least remove the pathetic chicane at Dunlop. Horrible.

@@jigglediggle29 The second Dunlop Chicane is the only one I would get rid of. BTW, that claim of 246 is wrong for 1983. They should have done their homework better: www.mulsannescorner.com/maxspeed.htm

Welcome to 80's motorsport! :)

It maybe interesting to some ...but in 1934 ...Bernd Rosemeyer achieved 276 mph in an Auto Union....( later to become AUDI )...special brave drivers back then I reccon .

Indeed he did; there's nothing new under the sun!

@Bill Leavens Actually, I think the commentator had a bit of a woody under the table. The highest speed ever attained that year was 371 km/h (230 mph) by a flat bottom Porsche 936, as measure by the ACO speed trap: www.mulsannescorner.com/maxspeed.htm Anyone who thinks that isn't fast enough probably needs their head read. Motor racing is, unfortunately, riddled with tall stories where the real story is quite good enough.

@@thethirdman225 That's comforting. The number did seem a little nuts. But who am I to question the guy with the authoritative voice...

Ickx......

Dillon Denton Probably Geared down a bit more. Also aerodynamics.

It didn't. The original 962 was a single turbo to comply with IMSA regulations. The 956 had twin turbos. The other difference was that the 962 had the driver's feet being the front axle line, whereas the 956 was ahead of it. Rules mandated the use of the 962 chassis and they simply fitted the 956 engine to it. Besides, Group C was a fuel economy formula. So the sorts of outrageous claims made on the internet about how much power they produced and how fast they were in a straight line are frequently wrong and mostly there to impress the easily impressed... The 956 and 962 were both plenty fast in a straight line.

Apparently none of these people here read much on the 917. Which was estimated to hit 240+. I remember Sam Posey article in Road & Track years ago. In 1970 he was with Ferrari on that occasion, and recollected that Rodriguez, Siffort, et al were remarking they could push it only so far, because of aero lift on the front, slightly losing steering grip/maximum brake efficiency. Hence there was more to pull out that flat 12. Hell, even the GT40 back in its heyday was topping 210+ on the Mulsanne.

No, the 917 was only clocked at doing 224 and the GT40 was clocked at 192

my god, YOU are clearly the one who needs a thorough educating on the "917", as you clearly dont even realize from the get go how many variations there were of it. But since were discussing Le Mans, im going to assume you are mainly speaking of the initial 1969, first model car.... it never produced "aero lift" on the front, period. Thats simply incorrect, the car produced very poor results in 1969, it wasn't until the Kurzheck arrived in 1970 that the car attained its legendary reputation. The first version of the car was unstable at high speeds due to the lack of downforce at the rear of the car, the tail was far too long and lacking any sharp, traverse tail. It wasn't until they contracted other race teams that they realized (by virtue of someone noticing the entire car EXCEPT the rear tail was covered in dead bugs after a days driving, indicating no air traveling over the rear of the car, and thus the rear wheels not recieving proper levels of grip at high speed) the issue, and modified the bodywork accordingly. The 917K, sporting the shorter, more upswept tail, and the most well known version of the car easily, never was officially clocked at 240.... thats fact. And even if it did hit 240, the sacrifices they would have to make to lower the drag, would subsequently decrease downforce too, which would hurt there cornering speeds, effectively canceling out any benefit the higher top speed would have on the laps average speed. Moron

@@doric_historic That is also not accurate. www.mulsannescorner.com/maxspeed.htm

Great Clip Thank you for sharing

In 1983 it was 246 mph (396.3 km/h), but the fastest ever is still 255 mph (almost 410 km/h), which was done in the WM Peugeot P88 in 1988.

Peugeot did it to celebrate the release of their new 407 model...the went a bit faster at 410kph.

@@bruceg9892 *405. The 407 didn't exist back then.

@@MDDeGrande1994 All of that is inaccurate. The fastest speed in 1983 was 371 km/h (230 mph). Nobody ever did 255 mph. These speed readouts are taken from the ACO handbook which is published every year. The ACO owns and operates the race and the speed trap: www.mulsannescorner.com/maxspeed.htm Motorsport is full of tall stories where the real stories are quite good enough.

@TheThirdMan This is the problem when both you,@MDDeGrande1994 and the uploader of this video literally have no clue about what you are talking about.Derek Bell did a calculated top speed of 246mph way back in 1971 during an on track test(Which is why it wasn't recorded on the official ACO practice or race records) on the legendary 917 not the 956 in 1983.Peugeot did 252mph in 1988 officially.There are no fictional stories at Le Mans.Please don't insult it's rich history

But Peugeot reached 410km/h!

Peugeot did it to celebrate the release of their new 407 model...the went a bit faster at 410kph.

@@wolfliou3678 405. Is that not fast enough for you?

@@bruceg9892 Wrong again. The ACO speed trap recorded 405. Peugeot’s marketing department would have no say in the collection of speed trap data.

Tu sais que certaines voitures se sont envolées dans les Hunaudieres ! Notamment une Sauber Mercedes qui a décollé à 380kh/h.

@@TheTheolm Oui, ce sont des images qui marquent l'esprit....( Même quand on est pas dedans).

One of the greatest drivers of ALL time, period!

Ickx and Bell were on the same car, #2 was the Bellof/Mass Porsche.....

This is Derek Bell.

They hit 246mph in the early 80s. Idk what you're on abour.

@@nathanbailey8336 They never hit speeds like that until 1988. A 962C got to 391 in practice but it was eclipsed by the Peugeot doing 405 in the race.

Yeah, but no one can pronounce that so we just say Mulsanne :D