For the second year running the Porsche 919 Hybrid set the fastest lap at the first day of practice at Spa. Both cars debuted the new low-drag aero package intended for Le Mans this year, along with a new lighting package designed to both reduce weight and increase cooling efficiency.
The reigning champions in the number 1 car, driven by Timo Bernhard, Brendon Hartley and Mark Webber posted the fastest time of the day, a 1:58.012, in the day’s first practice session. The number 2 car, driven by Romain Dumas, Neel Jani and Marc Lieb set the third fastest time of the day, a 1:58.577, despite suffering several issues with both FIA telemetry and the hybrid system requiring a change of the high voltage battery pack. Team Principal Andreas Seidl notes that despite the issues “apparently we’ve got the speed to be competitive here and also had an encouraging long run.”
New Headlights For Porsche 919 Hybrid
Per Jens Maurer, Head of Systems at the Porsche Team, the new lighting system reduces weight by thirty percent, made fitting easier and optimized cooling for the lighting units. The new lights retain the four-spot configuration, and are equipped with twelve pairs of Osram LEDs and reflectors in each headlight unit. The lighting units have three modes:
- Pencil Beam(for ultra long distance)
- Main beam
- Side beam
Cornering light functions are also included, and have controllers on the lights.
To ease identification twenty of the LEDs in each light are colored, allowing the number 1 car to throw Magenta light and the number 2 car to throw blue light.