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Vorshlag 2018 Mustang GT + S550 Development Thread

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The front bumper cover has to come off, as do the coolant lines and main radiator hose shown above. Then an oil filter sandwich plate goes in place of the little cooling brick shown before.

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This oil filter sandwich plate is a very well made part and has a thermostatic bypass, so cold oil doesn't pass through the Mishimoto heat exchanger. It also has two 1/8" NPT plugs - one of which we installed with an oil temp sensor (more on that later). The "Active grill shutter" system is in the way of where the heat exchanger goes, so it was removed.

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The sandwich plate plate is installed at the oil filter location (after removing the Ford brick) and the included -10 AN braided lines go from there to the external cooler. The oil filter then goes back below the plate, in the same spot as the OEM.

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The heat exchanger is nicely sized and fits right behind the factory upper grill opening, with a well made bracket that attaches to the carbon composite radiator support structure above. The lines connect to the single pass cooler at opposite ends, as shown.

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The install is pretty straight forward, other than clocking the sandwich plate and routing the lines. It gets a little tight around the giant Whiteline swaybar, but there's a 1/2" of room to the hose ends. We only added a little bracket with a Vibrant dual hose separator attached to keep the braided lines from sawing into any nearby plastics, but that might be overkill.

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Brad and Evan wrapped up the oil cooler install and we moved on to the new temp gauges...

OIL TEMP / TRANS TEMP / DIFF TEMP GAUGES

Rumor has it that the factory "oil temp" gauge readings are fake - they are inferred numbers based on other inputs and readings. I also wanted "real gauges" that I could see without having to scroll through menus while on track. Ideally these could be data logged, but with a rear mounted camera (and me calling out temps while driving to the mic) I could capture this data with discrete, analog type gauges.

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I purchased these three 2-1/6" "GlowShift" gauges above, which are ranged and marked for engine Oil temp (100-300F), Trans fluid temp (80-260F) and Diff fluid temp (100-250F) uses. Electric steeper gauges, work pretty well. These are all three trouble spots on the S550 chassis, especially trans and diff (and for 2018-19, oil temp). It would have been better to install real gauges for engine oil temp sooner, but our testing and work schedule doesn't always allow for this. Instead we planned to install oil temp, diff temp, and trans temp gauges during the Mishimoto oil cooler install (since the sandwich plate had the oil temp sensor port).

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We popped the front dash cover off then the center top panel of the dash was removed. We plan to mount a 2012-13 Boss 302 Ford Racing triple gauge pod to this panel, which can be replaced if we ever want to un-do all of these mods.

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There were many aftermarket gauge pods to choose from out there but none of them looks half as good as this Ford Racing unit, made for mounting three 2-1/16" gauges.

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Once the gauge pod was mounted to the upper dash panel the GlowShift electric stepper motor 270 sweep gauges were installed and wired in. I'm not going to bore you with the steps for wiring but it takes a number of hours to do this correctly - where it is tired into the light circuit, with fuses, and soldering and heat shrinking everything. Brad also added weatherpack connectors near each sensor, so that things like the trans and diff could be removed by just unplugging the sensor circuit.

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The MT82-D4 six speed manual trans was easy tap get a sensor into. We researched, ordered, then replaced the M16 threaded lower drain plug on the bottom with this special adapter we found, which has a 1/8" NPT female opening in the middle. This meant we needed to do a trans fluid change, the 2nd in 1800 miles of use, but its never a bad idea.

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The diff sensor install was a bit last minute, and I did this one myself. I had ordered what I thought was the right adapter, in stainless steel, with overnight shipping. But what showed up five days later (!?) was wrong. Some evening searching in the Home Depot plumbing aisle got me what I needed: a 1/2" MIP to 1/8" FIP adapter. This replaced the stock 1/6" NPT lower drain plug.

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One thing I noted when adding this sensor: when I drained out the diff (which we had changed early on to MOTUL synthetics) it was about 1/3rd of the fluid missing... gone. It has been boiling off due to high temps, we suspect. And there was a LOT of material on the magnetic drain plug. This was likely material from the clutch packs on this base model car's clutch style differential (its worn smooth out). The Performance Pack and Shelby cars all get a Torsen.

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These gauges really do work great, especially considering they are under $70 each. The install was a total pain but in the long run it should be worth it. I am making sure I take a picture of the gauges right after I come in (it takes several minutes for them to cool down from their peak numbers) from each session, hopefully getting the AiM Solo readout to know which session (lap times) they correspond to. Again, once I get the rear mounted vidcam in place this shouldn't be necessary. Already seen some great data from these 3 gauges.

MSR-C TRACK TEST, NOVEMBER 24th, 2018

This was a member day at MSR Cresson where they were running the 1.7 CCW and a bunch of buddies were going. I had finished the gauge install the night before and was going to load up onto a trailer in the morning. Due to some things out of control, my enclosed trailer and the open trailer I normally use as back-up were both out of commission.

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I borrowed a trailer the night before, picking it up late and in the dark. In the light of morning we noticed it was about 4" too narrow to clear the track width of this car - it would be inside the trailer fenders. So we went to a nearby trailer rental place and rented their so-called "car hauler", which took a lot of ramps and wood to get the car up onto the deck (of this tractor/utility trailer). The fenders were so tall I had to crawl out the open window. Good thing we didn't buy a Camaro - that would be impossible!

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We made it to MSR rather later than we had planned, but the weather was overcast and cool so the "early session" wasn't the only fast session. The weather was so nice in fact that the track was rather crowded with members, and that turned into a challenge for getting clan laps.

Picture and video gallery: https://vorshlag.smugmug.com/Racing-Events/MSR-Test-112418/

My testing goals for this day were 3 fold: 1) Test out the new Ohlins R&T coilovers at MSR-C on their 1.7 mile CCW course. 2) Test both the Hoosier A7 and RE-71R street tires, back-to-back. 3) Get some data with oil/trans/diff temps with the newly added Mishimoto oil cooler.

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Both sets of tires were pretty "tired" but the data was still valuable, and it would be back-to-back on the same day. I haven't done a street tire vs R-compound tire test like this in a LONG time. The first session would be on the RE-71R 200TW tires, which had 8 weekends of abuse on them now.

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Remember, one of the Hoosier A7 tires was already showing a stripe of cord on the outside edge, so this is far from a perfect test. I moved that wheel to the left front, which is the less stressed front tire on this track. Hoping I get a clear lap in the first or second hot lap, so that the tires don't overheat and "fall off".

That's not how it worked out, of course. There were some rolling trains of cars, plus I got stuck behind a few slow pokes, but that's what happens on a nice member Saturday in late November.

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I had several buddies out there, including Brian in his GT350, Jerry's last drive in his C6 Z06 (he just got a C7 Z06), and Kevin had his new C7 ZR1 on Michelin slicks.

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As you will see in the video below, some knucklehead pulled right out of the pit lane onto the track, right in front of me on my first flying hot lap. That was the best shot at a good lap time on these tires. Gone. I also got blocked again on laps 2, 3, 5 and 6 (two of those shown above), and had a hair raising 3 wide pass on Lap 3 (the 86 driver talked to me after - he knew I was passing but the NSX pulled over on him!) I had to stick with hot lap 4, my only lap clear of traffic. Lap 4 on an A7 is usually not at all what you look for...

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Lap times on Hoosier A7s (not showing the out lap or cool down laps)
Lap 1: 1:24.921 (traffic)
Lap 2: 1:29.021 (traffic)
Lap 3: 1:22.441 (traffic)
Lap 4: 1:21.138
Lap 5: 1:21.507 (traffic)
Lap 6: 1:22.308 (traffic)

The AiM Solo was showing predictive times as quick as a 1:20.5, but all I ended up with only a 1:21.138. That's still a solid 8 tenths faster than this car has ever run here on RE-71R tires, and fully 3 laps past when these tires have their best performance (lap 1).

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After 8 total laps in this session, both front tires were now showing cords. The worst one was showing cords on the inside and outside shoulders. This tire had been flipped inside out between the COTA and NOLA weekends - the majority of the wear is from the outside shoulder, even with -4° of front camber. The tread layer was actually peeling smooth off on the outer two inches, so these tires were officially D-U-N!

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The temps on the fluids looks within spec (pic above shot right as I came into paddock), but only just in spec for the trans and diff. We have some ideas on how to combat high diff temps that we will address very soon. Engine oil looks perfect, and I rattle off all of the temps at the end of the Hoosier test video.

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Not having our enclosed trailer meant I had to throw a bunch of tools and such in the back of the pickup. Brought a new battery jump box / air compressor to set pressures (#500psi) and a crappy jack that will never go to the track with us again. Pulled the four wheels and tires off and took them to Doghouse Performance for a tire swap to the RE-71R streets. That took about an hour while we sat out a session and let everything cool down.

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Made it back out in the last session of the day, 4:30 pm, but luckily the temps were still cool and the partial clouds were keeping the track from cooking on this 70°F day. It was less crowded out there, but this set of tires had been sitting in the shop for a couple of months and took a couple of laps to scrub them back in and get the tires up to temp.

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I edited the video down a good bit, but in this session I got stuck behind some slow Miatas, a new NSX, and two Porsches. Somehow I managed 3 laps in a row without traffic.

Lap times on RE-71Rs (not showing the out lap or cool down laps)
Lap 1: 1:28.748 (cold tires + caught a slow Miata)
Lap 2: 1:23.065 (still cold tires)
Lap 3: 1:22.126 (nearly matched the best lap these tires have ever done - when new)
Lap 4: 1:22.440 (made a big mistake in big bend - almost had a 1:21.1)
Lap 5: 1:26.188 (passed a new NSX + caught slow Porsche)
Lap 6: 1:24.050 (lapped slow Miata + caught slow Porsche)

On lap 3 everything mostly worked, and got that 1:22.126. That is less than 2 tenths off my best lap ever on these tires, 8 months earlier. So the stories of RE-71Rs wearing out or falling off might be greatly exaggerated. We used these RE-71Rs at yet another event after this!

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The difference in grip from A7s to RE-71Rs was painfully apparent, and there is one full second difference in lap times (see log of best laps for each tire, above) but I fear that the lap time differences don't show a fair representation of that.

With the laps on the A7s I was considerably restricted by traffic. There was some "potential improvement" I didn't reach on the street tires, too. On my best RE-71R lap the AiM showed a 1:21.5 predicted time, and on Lap 4 it showed a 1:21.1 pred, but I screwed up something on both laps. Either time would have a marked improvement over the 1:21.9 previous best lap on these same tires. Oh well, I'm a bit of a hack driver and can't always match what the computer says is possible (that 1:21.9 lap was matching predicative, so it was a better driven lap).

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The small changes made since that March NASA TT event - mostly brakes - are what makes the difference. The Whiteline and Ohlins coilovers are using about the same spring rates (which both produce more roll than I like on Hoosiers - see the 3 phases of Big Bend, above), but some of that potential lap time improvement from March to December would be firmer spring rates & damping of the Ohlins setup. I still need to get a lap on the RE-71Rs here on the MCS RR2s...

PRODUCTION TOW HOOKS RELEASED

We didn't do much to the Mustang over the next week, other than getting the prototype front and rear S550 tow hooks ready for production. These were made back in the summer but the templates were lost in the move. Off comes the front and rear bumper covers.

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Once the prototype pieces we made were removed they were reverse-engineered and a few updates were made. These changes make the cut parts 1-piece, to remove some welding, but we did add a cut line for the bend.

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Getting these into CAD then cutting them on our CNC plasma table a few minutes later was nice. I love this machine and we keep coming up with new products to make on it. Getting the settings right for each material isn't easy, but we're working our way through steel, aluminum, and stainless in various thicknesses and finding out what works.

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We now have a production batch of red powder coated steel tow hooks that bolt on without cutting any painted parts or removing critical crash structures of your S550 chassis.

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The S550 rear tow hook kit is a 100% no cut/bolt-on part. The front (2018-19 GT) kit requires a notch be cut into the lower black grill plastics. We include a cutting template for the front 2018-19 GT tow hook kit and will be making these for the 2015-17 cars and Shelby GT350 models soon. We include a cutting template to cut a 4" oval hole and 3 mounting holes, then the inlet ducts bolt in and mount on the back side of this plastic grill. Some 4" hose connects the inlet to the backing plates, and now you have brake cooling. We are already working on some other S550 Mustang model variants and will show that next time.

PRODUCTION S550 BRAKE BACKING PLATES

While we had the car apart we went ahead and made a major revision and production batch of S550 front brake cooling backing plates and 2018-19 GT brake cooling inlet ducts.

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On the backing plate we changed from the prototype's round 4" opening to this 4" oval, as this shape puts all of the airflow "inside" the rotor ring. Pumping cool air in this region first cools the front wheel hub, then the air is pumped through the vented rotor ring.

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This "ghosted" picture shows the backing plate's 4" oval opening being under the rotor ring of the 2015-19 Performance Pack 15" rotors. This backing plate works on the 6 piston Brembo PP brakes as well as the 380mm 6 piston Powerbrake front kit (PB caliper shown).

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This backing plate also serves as a heat shield, protecting three different ball joints (see above right) on the front suspension from the heat radiated by the brake rotors. This is why we use 304 Stainless Steel vs Aluminum or Carbon steel - SS has better thermal resistance, and is often used for heat shields.

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To get air to the rotor backing plates it needs to come from somewhere. On the 2018-19 GT there isn't a great place to steal air from, so we took some dead flat space in the corners of these lower grill pockets, that were likely added for styling.

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SCCA CLUB TRIALS, MSR 1.3, DECEMBER 1, 2018

This was our last opportunity to compete on track for 2018. The Hoosiers were TOAST but the RE-71Rs had a little tread left. Send it! The weather for the Saturday event was forecast to be excellent, so right after wrapping up the new brake backing plates and production tow hooks on the Mustang I washed then we loaded up the Mustang the night before. Of course it rained overnight, and being on an open trailer, the freshly washed Mustang had spots on it all damn day at the track (see below).

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I'd rather have a dirty car running on a dry day, of course. You can see the shape of the Mishimoto oil cooler almost perfectly fits inside the reduced opening of the upper grill in that close up pic. The back-up open trailer was back so we loaded up after I washed the car Friday for the event on Saturday.

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We were back at MSR but running on the smaller, more technical 1.3 mile course, which has a lot of elevation change. This course is located next to the MSR 1.7 course, which an HPDE group was running that same day. The SCCA used the newly built MSR "Museum" clubhouse for the driver's meeting, and that's where most of us spent time between sessions. After seeing the insulating foam in here, I sure was glad we painted the foam insulation in our shop (otherwise it turns this yellow color in a short time).

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At this point the 9 month old RE-71Rs weren't going to shine, but I wanted to get more temp data on the oil/trans/diff fluids as well as the Mishimoto oil cooler. Also wanted to see how the Ohlins R&T coilovers stacked up against the tough "CAM-C" class Mustangs and Camaros that run a lot of TT events in this region. I'd be learning a new track so it would be dependent on "that driving stuff" more than normal.

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For the past 5 years the Texas Region SCCA has been holding TT events (9 events in 2018) using modified autocross classes, unlike the SCCA National TT classes. While it is far from perfect, it is a lot more sensible than 2018 National TT classing, which I'm not a huge fan of. It also makes it easy for local autocrossers to "class" their cars.

The cars we would be running against in the combined "CAM" classes are all on 200 TW tires and include 5th and 6th gen Camaros (including many 1LEs and even a new ZL1 1LE), S197 and S550 Mustangs, and a healthy chunk of C6 and C7 Corvette Grand Sports and Z06s, including some heavily modded ones. They have a "handicap" system that merges the Pony Car Mustangs/Camaros in the same class as Corvettes. This doesn't work that well, but "it is what it is" and most of the competitors ignore the "handicap" times and just look at the raw times. This Region has some TT classing changes for 2019 that might work better. We would be looking more closely at the CAM-C pony cars.

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Event Photo Gallery: https://vorshlag.smugmug.com/Racing-Events/SCCA-CT-MSR-120118/

The Texas region runs their events with at least 4 different run groups on their stand-alone TT events. The group splits are based on class, experience and speed. They stuck me in the faster "Red" group, which had all of the CAM cars, instructors, and advanced folks. Passing is only with a point-by, which can only happen in two spots on this short course. With these smaller run groups, though, it worked fairly well.

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I most recently ran this MSR 1.3 course back in August in Amy's FR-S (that car on 315 Rival-S tires could only muster a 1:10 lap). Before that event it was fully ten years since I ran the 1.3, and it was in an EVO X. So it took me a few sessions to re-learn this track and to make this big pony car dance around this tight circuit. I started off in the hunt (see session 2 results above) sitting in second only to a heavily modified CAM-S Corvette (which HPR built the 660 whp 468" LS engine for) and ahead of the CAM-C cars.

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This was a somewhat blustery day, with ambient temps in the low 70s but high winds all day. Amy was there shooting pics and the Mustang ran great all day - running all five sessions without a hitch. The car could run the whole 15 minute session but I usually found my best laps in the first 5 to 7 laps. I kept getting quicker in each of the 5 sessions, even as the track warmed up - an obvious sign that I was still learning this course.

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At one point I had fallen to 3rd in class, fighting with some light traffic in each of the earlier 4 sessions. By the 5th session they put me at the front of the grid so I could set the pace on the out lap. In the video above you can see that I had 4 traffic-free laps and found my quickest time on lap 3. Predictive timing kept flashing up 1:04.9 laps but I only managed a 1:05.448, which was a little disappointing.

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Final results sorted by time for the 46 entrants in Time Trials

It was good enough for 2nd place in the 11 car "combined" CAM class, and quickest of all of the CAM-C Camaros and Mustangs. Barely. Scott's similarly modded, white 2016 GT on 315 Rival-S tires was only 2 hundredths back. Overall I scored 3rd quickest out of 46 total T cars - behind two C6 Z06 Corvettes. There aren't many folks running in this TT in this region on R-compounds.

200TW TIRES AFTER 9 WEEKENDS

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These pics above are a good reference - this is what the RE-71R tires look like after 9 weekends and 9 months of track use (zero street use). The rears are pretty hammered, but they actually spent much of their life up front. The tires have been flipped and rotated more than once. The "fronts" still have plenty of life left in them, and if you look at the data logged in the video, they still sustain 1.25g lateral and touch 1.4g loads in spikes. Have they really fallen off that much? It would be nice to test an old set vs a new set back-to-back - only takes money!

NASA TEXAS AND VORSHLAG ANNOUNCE STREET TIRE TIME TRIAL CHAMPIONSHIP

This press release was sent out on Dec 21st about an experimental series of sub-classes for NASA Texas Time Trial built around a 200TW tire. For 2019 this is a Texas Region only championship that they agreed to let us try, where Vorshlag is going to provide trophies for the Street Tire competitors.

Press Release: https://nasatx.com/nasa-texas-and-vorshlag-announce-street-tire-time-trial-championship/

A little back story: NASA has the largest Time Trial series running in the United States, and they regularly bring in the largest, most competitive fields at dozens of events every year. NASA's "science based" ST/TT classing - where power, weight, tire widths, and aero devices have hard limits and are routinely measured - are attractive to the top level TT racers. Easy to understand, easy to build around, and easy to verify. We have written a post analyzing the 2019 ST/TT rules in detail, linked below.

More on NASA ST/TT classing: http://www.vorshlag.com/forums/showthread.php?p=58774#post58774

Back at the beginning of NASA TT, some competitors could win classes and even set class track records on street tires (we did a few times), but that quickly changed. It wasn't long before more top level NASA TT entries moved to a dedicated R-compound and non-DOT slicks.

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This EVO X and this BMW both took wins and/or set TT records on street tires back in 2006-2008

These "tire wars" have escalated, and unless you can afford to buy or win new contingency tires every time out, you have to budget $300-1000+ per weekend to stay on sticky R-compound tires. Tire costs have quickly become largest part of most Time Trial competitors' budgets. Some people have seen this tire battle play out and have opted to switch to longer wearing street tires - often with other series.

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By 2013 we were bringing new "sticker" sets of Hoosier A6 tires, to help knock down track records

Since those days, the number of tire options in the 200 treadwear segment of tires has grown tremendously - tires which last a lot longer than sticky R-compounds. This growth has been fueled by endurance racing groups, autocross classes, drifters, and other Time Attack groups building classes and entire series around these longer wearing street compound tires. We have been hearing from a lot of folks about tire costs, and were working on a way to bring 200TW to NASA TT. We worked with Will Faules of NASA Texas to create this experimental series of regional classes built around a 200TW limit.

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Optima / USCA was one of the groups that built their whole series around 200TW tires - and it works

In the new NASA Texas 200TW Championship, cars will compete in the existing TT1 to TT6 classes, but will also be scored during the event as a ‘race within a race’ for cars entered on and declaring the use of 200 UTQG rated tire. For example; a driver will still compete in TT1-6 but will declare in the morning meeting to be running on a 200TW tire. Tires will be verified by the NASA Texas Time Trial Director. It will then be noted on each results page during the day which cars are running in the 200TW sub-class. Regional season points will be awarded for these Street Tire sub-classes. Vorshlag will be presenting trophies for the podiums of these classes for every event as well as the 2019 Street Tire Season Championship.

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This set of experimental 200TW classes should bring in new competitors and give existing TT folks a new option to compete on tires that could save them thousands of dollars per year. We are excited to see the outcome in 2019! If you are in or near Texas we welcome you to reach out and try to be a part of this. You will still need to earn a NASA Time Trial license, of course.

WHAT'S NEXT?

There are even more updates to show but this update is running very long. I am gong to wrap it up now with a few teaser shots if what is in store for 2019 on our car, as well as associated S550 product development.

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The lone prototype "Auburn Pro" limited slip differential unit built for the Super 8.8" is in our hands. We are building up an all new aluminum Super 8.8" housing to use with this diff as well as 4.30:1 gears. I will show more of this next time, weights of the housings, and reasoning behind 4.30 gearing.

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This set of ARH 1-7/8" long tubes with a catted 3" X-pipe is here and already installed on our car, but we are waiting on a CAI kit that was on backorder to arrive. When we get the car dyno tuned we are seeing how much this Gen III Coyote can make on 93 octane. Should do a bit more once it has both a free flowing inlet and exhaust.

Until next time,
 
Great progress on your project Mustang GT. I like your simple tow hooks and Ockham said it best:

“All things being equal, the simplest solution tends to be the best one.”
 
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Are the 4:30 gears a new offering from Auburn? Currently the are no 4:30 gears available for the Super 8.8. If some are coming available, that would be great news for track rats.
 
Just read the whole thread, thank you very much for putting the time and effort into these posts! Excellent information for learning about setting up a GT for the track.
 
Great stuff, Looking forward to getting your brake cooling kit for my 2018 PP1 as I keep chewing up rotors on the track, I have the Centric Cryo rotors on it now and they hold up much better than the stock rotors but they are starting to look worse for wear after 5 track day events on 2.4 mile course. They should be good for couple to 3 more trips. Looking at 2 piece rotors, PS Track Day pads and Your cooling kit. I can see that stock brake cooling is fine for the street but just cook the rotors on the track.
 
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Are the 4:30 gears a new offering from Auburn? Currently the are no 4:30 gears available for the Super 8.8. If some are coming available, that would be great news for track rats.

Well I "mis-remembered" - we purchased 4.09 gears, not 4.30... which you are right, do not exist.
 

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Project Update for February 28th, 2018: I started writing this post over 4 weeks ago, showing the work we have done since the last update. More and more parts kept showing up and it blew up into a mega-sized post, and I couldn't wrap it up. So I have shortened it to the prep we did right before the 2019 season opener NASA TT competition weekend, over the last weekend in January, which I will instead show next time. Plus ALL of the mountain of parts we have added since then.

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In this update we will show some horsepower that was added, by way of ARH 1-7/8" long tubes + JLT CAI kit + SCT X4 tuner. After a dyno tuning session and average power dyno calculations, this forced a last minute NASA classing change, which I will go into further below. Running TT2 was never in the game plan, and we will switch back to TT3 after this January event.

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Then we removed the Ohlins R&T coilovers after three successful track tests and some street miles to reinstall the MCS RR2 coilovers. These went on with a new revision of our spherical rear shock mounts, with which we tested 3 different shock lengths. We also installed a strut tower brace and made proper remote reservoir brackets this time.

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Two new sets of MOMO wheels with both street and race tires were procured, so we could test out their new flow formed wheel offerings in 18x11 and 19x11" sizes. I bought a new helmet, which was long overdue. Made production seat brackets for the S550 and installed the passenger Sparco seat and Schroth belts. Then we go into a brake pad wear analysis on the Powerbrake X6EL fronts compared to the wear on the base 14" 4 piston as well as the PP 15" 6 piston front brakes. We also put together two new S550 front brake cooling tricks, one of which did not work at all and another we will be testing soon.

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Let's get started!

BRAKE PAD WEAR, BRAKE COOLING, + OVAL TUBING DUCT TEST

In the last year we have done a lot of events and upgraded from the the base GT 14" 4 piston "inverted hat" rotors and OEM pads -> to G-LOC pads on the 14" bits -> to the 15" PP 6 piston brakes with G-LOC pads and brake cooling -> to the Powerbrake 380x34 6 piston brakes with cooling + Powerbrake pads. We note that not only stopping power/longevity improve, so did the pad wear after each braking system improvement.

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STEP ONE - BASE 14" 4 PISTON BRAKES

The single biggest disappointment with our "base model" GT were the front brakes that came on these 480 hp cars. They aren't just "not great" on track, they are downright UNSAFE. I've even had HPDE1 students in base S550 GTs cook these pads/rotors on easy 70% effort laps at some tracks. We spent our first few track days doing "one lap stints", even with GOOD track pads on the car. If I pushed hard I could overheat the fronts AFTER ONE STOP, so it was a study in restraint to make them last a lap and still get a "decent" time.

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The inverted hat front rotor design - which allows no airflow through the back of the rotor and through the vanes - is the single dumbest idea I've seen in the automotive world in the last 15 years. And remember: I've worked on SUBARUS! (these car combine many of the worst ideas into one single platform)

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We tried to keep track of the brake pad wear rates since the beginning, but the 14" brakes were so horrendous that we had trouble. If you followed along in this development thread, you might remember that we saw very high wear rates on the stock 14" front brake pads (only 8 laps took new OEM pads to the backing plates!) and even the rears (3 track days). We put on some R8 G-LOC front track pads, then shortly after new R16s, and while the wear rates got a little better, the fronts were continuing to wear rapidly - and would still overheat the fronts within about 1-2 laps.

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The rears pads, even though those are inverted hat rotors, still have the same set of G-LOC R16 pads with plenty of meat left, a full year later. Rear brakes never wear as quickly as the fronts.

STEP TWO: 15" PP 6 PISTON FRONT BRAKE UPGRADE

After the upgrade to the larger 15" PP front rotors and 6-piston calipers, we could finally add some brake cooling - since the rotor wasn't made "backwards". This helped in two ways - the larger pad/rotor as well as basic forced cooling.

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We went with another new set of G-LOC R16 front pads for this caliper, and initially we had WORSE brakes, due to the large hydraulic ratio difference in the master cylinders between the base and PP cars. We fixed that and had working brakes, yay. These front pads were still wearing a bit faster than we liked - closer to what we saw on our S197 with the same pads on the 14" Brembos with cooling.

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After seeing the pad wear rates I had started planning for front pad replacements every 4-5 weekends, similar to the S197 saw on the ducted 14" Brembos. Still, these 15" PP brakes were a DRAMATIC improvement over the 4 piston S550 brakes, and probably what most casual to semi-serious track days S550 folks should run. If you do go this route, brake cooling is still a very wise investment - saving brake pad and rotor wear, as well as extending wheel bearing life significantly.

STEP THREE: POWERBRAKE 380X34MM X6EL 6 PISTON BRAKES

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We probably could have run these 15" PP brakes for a few years and just cycled through rotors and pads regularly. But I wanted MOAR! Powerbrake made the prototype set of Powerbrake 380x34mm 6 piston "X6EL" S550 big brake kit for our car and we put that on before NASA Nationals at COTA.

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With the upgrade to the Powerbrakes, we not only lost 21 pounds from the 15" 6-piston Brembo PP brakes, we gained even more rotor cooling, a more rigid caliper, thicker pads, and after a number of events since then, we are seeing even better pad & rotor wear.

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We try to take pictures of new brake system consumables like this, to help track wear after events. This is after two high speed NASA event weekends, at COTA than NOLA. We see our highest speeds all season at these two tracks (145 mph+).

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The two pics above are after 5 full weekends of testing and TT events in the car, shown above. The Powerbrake PB13 front pad thickness is still thicker than the backing plate, which means we still have some life left in these. One side is worn more than the other, which is explained by an issue we had at MSR-H with the brake ducts (see below), but still well within usable limits. Happy with that wear, might get 1-2 more weekends out of these pads, and the rotors look like they should last another 6-12 months as well.

BRAKE DUCT TESTING

So the brake ducting we have on this car consists of 3 parts: the brake inlet ducts (2018-19 GT specific parts), the brake backing plates (which fit all S550 Mustangs with either the 15" PP brakes or the 380mm Powerbrake kit), and a length of 4" diameter brake duct hose on each side.

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Ideally these brake cooling parts parts should last forever, and our metal parts will do just that. But there is one part that becomes a consumable on the S550 when you run wide wheels and tires - the brake duct hoses.

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With 11" wide front wheels and the massive 315mm Hoosiers, the tires "get into" the brake duct hoses at full steering lock. You shouldn't ever turn the wheels to full lock on track, but you will do it surprisingly often in the paddock, or parking lots when driving around on the street. Over time it wears a hole into the hoses - about once a season we replace the hoses. This is a hassle, so we tried a new solution.

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Above is a test we did to try to alleviate the brake hose wear issue - a stainless steel oval 4" tube section, which was "squashed down" a bit, and bolted to the chassis. The hope was to make a thinner cross section piece of tubing that can allow for more steering lock yet not wear down if the tire touches it.

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Great idea, in theory, and I sketched out what I wanted fabricated while I was going to be gone on a week long vacation which I was taking 2 weeks before the 2019 season opener at MSR-H. They did a good job, but if I was there it might never have made it onto the car.

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Evan made it bolt to the chassis with two riv-nuts added to the inner fender section shown above right. The hope was that it could be "crushed" right where the tire would hit at full lock and yet still flow enough area. Well the 4" oval-ized tube starts to pancake and buckle pretty quickly when put into a press, and it ended up still being more than 2 inches wide at the tire intersection.

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The problem is, the 11" wide wheel and 305-315mm tire BARELY fits this car under the stock fenders, and even then it takes some camber to fit. At full lock the tire just starts to rub the inner liner. Well with a 2" thick tube in there, this massively limits steering lock.

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At MSR-H this became a real nuisance in the paddock and grid. I kept running over cones and doing 3 point turns and felt the tire rubbing the tubing HARD in paddock.

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Never on track, but the grid tire rubbing eventually ripped one of the stainless steel tubes off, which blocked the LF brake duct hose. This led to some brake temperature issues that made uneven pad wear, which I will describe in the event write-up next time. Long story short - this did NOT work, and we will be going back to hoses for the next event.

ALTERNATIVE TO BRAKE HOSES

When the S550 first arrived in 2014 we tore one apart and looked at things to improve. We got to explore Aaron's 2015 PP1 car, then this red PP1 I ordered but decided not to buy (the dealership was happy to sell it for more).

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We noticed the "scoop and flap" brake cooling that came on the PP GT cars, and while we felt the flaps were a bit on the small side, we had plans for a more traditional "forced" air inlet-hose-backing plate cooling.

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Of course the hoses can become a challenge with wide wheels and tires, and of course adding the inlet scoops can force you to cut on the front of your car. We also had some advice from a Ford engineer that a bigger flap than the PP cars came with would help. And strangely, the Shelby GT350 is missing the flaps altogether - but has the undertray duct.

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So we took the PP1 brake deflector scoop that mounts to the front control arm and made it significantly bigger. The prototype above is ready for testing, which we will do soon on our car - comparing it to no cooling (like the base GT) and then to our forced brake cooling package on the car now. We will share the results, and if it is as helpful as we think it will be, these will go for sale on our website shortly thereafter.

MCS RR2 + NEW SHOCK MOUNTS + STRUT TOWER BRACE

After 3 events/weekends testing with the Ohlins R&T coilovers, it was time to go back to the MCS Remote Double adjustable coilovers, which we call the "RR2" (shown below). This setup is valved for a higher spring rate, and has separate Rebound and Compression adjustments. This will help us dial i the setup for running both 200 Treadwear street tires and the Hoosiers in the same weekend, which we have planned for 2019.

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We ran these dampers before at COTA during the 2018 NASA Nationals, but the lengths of the rear dampers changed from the 2014 design we helped come up with (which was not inverted then), and the rear was running out of shock travel, until I raised the ride height. There were two ways to fix this - make an extended height shock mount and/or shorten the rear dampers. In this case, we did both.

NEW S550 SPHERICAL REAR SHOCK MOUNT

The factory rear shock on the S550 uses a "divorced" spring, located inboard on the rear control arm. The shock mounts to an aluminum upper shock mount, which has a rubber bushing to allow for shock articulation during suspension travel. Rubber in a damper path is never wanted, as this delays the shock's reaction to suspension movement.

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The real problem comes when we convert to a "coilover" spring location on the rear. This moves ALL of the suspension loads (not just damper loads) to the rear shock mount. What can happen - and often does - is shown above. The steel washer that is crimped into the aluminum housing holds the bushing in place, but when you hit a big enough bump with coilover springs it can act like a fuse - and pops. The solution is an all metal spherical shock mount, made for these higher suspension loads.

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We used to make a spherical rear shock mount out of the OEM cast aluminum pieces, which we machined and added a CNC machined aluminum spherical cup to. But these were too expensive to make, pretty ugly, and didn't give us any additional shock travel - so we moved to this steel plate design with a CNC machined steel bearing cup welded into the structure.

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Jason and I have been stumped on how to make a dual height shock mount on our CNC machines, but ever since we purchased a CNC plasma table last year I have wanted to move to a welded design with a machined cup. Myles expounded on a sketch I gave him to create this mount and it has worked great.

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We have tested this new design on multiple cars, including our own, with two lengths of MCS rear dampers. The lower holes from the dual mounting positions adds 1.5" of additional "bump" travel, which helps accommodate OEM length shocks with lower-than-stock ride heights. Remote Reservoir style shocks can go even lower, and with the new shorter length we have, we get a LOT of bump travel. That's the setup we have on our car - the lower mounting holes and a shorter shock length (I like to run the car pretty damned low).

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We tested the bump and droop travel of these dampers on the lift with with the rear swaybar disconnected and the rear spring removed. Now we get extreme bump travel without running out of rear shock stroke.

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I tested these dampers + mounts at the very bumpy MSR-Houston and never had a single "shock travel" issue all weekend, so we can check that issue off the list. As you can see above, the rear "squats" pretty good on acceleration (even with 750#/in coilover springs), but its nowhere near the limit of shock travel now. Very happy with the new shock mount design, which is now available on our website for any "pin" style upper S550 rear shock.

STRUT TOWER BRACE

Our "base model" 2018 GT came with no strut tower brace. Not a huge deal, and I don't think most modern S197 or S550 Mustangs even need these items - not as badly as the floppy pony car chassis of the 1980s-90s.

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But I wanted to add one, mostly just for a place to mount the front strut reservoirs, like on the BMW above. That car didn't really need strut tower brace, either. Mostly these braces and doo-dads are another somewhat useless holdover from the 1980s...

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We looked at the Performance Pack and Shelby GT350 strut tower designs. There were OEM options (painted black) and a Ford Racing version (the silver one we bought). There's a big U-shaped stamped steel plate piece that attaches at the towers and back to a flange on the firewall, which triangulates the towers to the firewall. All of the mounting studs there there... and our car had "half" of this triangulating piece from the factory.

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Of course we weighed these bits. The strut tower brace was only 5.1 pounds, but the triangulating stamped plate piece was twice that at 10.6 pounds. Again, we took about 5 pounds off with the stock "half brace" at the back, so we gained about 10 pounds. In the grand scheme of things, not a big deal, and I don't expect any real "chassis stiffness" gain from this, either. Mostly wanted it for a shock reservoir mount. :)

MCS INSTALL + MOUNTING REMOTE RESERVOIRS

So we have installed this set of MCS RR2 double adjustables with remotes before, and ran them at NASA Nationals. Now we have had the rear shortened and of course the new rear shock mounts gain us another 1.5" in bump travel. Excited to get these installed.

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This time we had enough time to make some brackets to hold the reservoirs correctly, instead of just zip-tying them to the swaybar or underhood. We do want to place these in a place that is easy to access, allows for heat dissipation, and protect the hoses from any kind of chafing. The Teflon lined reservoir hoses are braided stainless steel and can saw through just about anything, but worse - if they get cut you lose both Nitrogen pressure and hydraulic fluid. This will turn a high end damper into a useless slug of metal.

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We mounted the MCS rear remotes in the spare tire well inside the trunk, which requires some 2-piece grommets from Seals-It to allow them to pass through the trunk sheet metal. No, we don't use "quick connects" on our remote shocks because those are damned pricey and you still have to discharge ALL of the Nitrogen pressure before connecting/disconnecting those. It is much easier in the end to just use a larger 2-piece grommet to seal the opening into the trunk. Those can be unbolted to allow the whole remote reservoir to pass through the opening.

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Pro Tip: One thing about the S550 rear is there is a lot going on back there. With an inverted shock and coilover spring mounting, the spring sits at the bottom of the shock. This puts it very close to the CV boot at the rear axle. Most mounting designs we have seen (AST, Ohlins, MCS) have either an offset lower fork mount (one side is longer than the other) or slotted holes in the lower mounting fork. Offset the bottom of the damper AWAY from the axle/CV boot and use the smallest diameter spring for that damper (2.25" ID is what we use on the MCS). This way the spring cannot rub the CV boot, which can expand at speed, tear, and then let all of the grease out. This will cause the CV internals to fail rapidly.

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The hose length on the MCS front struts wasn't quite long enough to allow those remotes to be attached to the strut tower brace like I had hoped. Evan still made some nice "saddles" to hold them, which are bolted in the front of the engine bay, away from heat sources and with adequate airflow over them. Also with excellent access to the compression knobs.

AMERICAN RACING LONG TUBE HEADERS + CAI FOR MORE POWER

I teased this upgrade last time, as I was tired of running TT3 class being down on power and/or heavy for the class. In 2018 we ran TT3 at ___ pounds, which was 240 pounds heavy or 21 whp down on power. With no great way to lose weight, we wanted to instead jump up by that ~21 whp amount in average power. There is no easier way to gain power on a modern V8 pony car than long tube headers and a cold air.

ARH LONG TUBES + X-PIPE + CATS

Over the past 34 years of wrenching on pony cars I have installed dozens of sets of long tube headers, and backed with lots of dyno testing, I can see obvious trends. Having worked with ARH in the past we know that these fit and function the best of the available options for the Coyote 5.0L, and know that the 1-7/8" primaries work better even on otherwise stock engines than the optional 1-3/4" versions.

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I ordered the setup above, complete with catalytic convertors and an X-pipe merge. All 100% stainless steel, and American Made. No Chinalloy up in here! :D

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Again, this is the best bang-per-buck power mod on the planet for the Coyote. "BuT tHe StOcK hEaDeR iS tUnEd!" That's JUST a big load of nonsense. The factory tubular stock manifolds are constructed by the lowest bidder, made to "light off" the catalytic convertor quickly, designed to go onto the engine with the least amount of work, and have the drivetrain all pop into the chassis from underneath on an assembly line. That's it. LOOK at the visual tubing differences above. Then look at the dyno results below.

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The actual header install is the biggest challenge, involving partial removal of the front crossmember. This is done to gain access to remove the stock manifolds as well as slide in the new ones. Big fun! We bill this header install as an 8 hour job, but you hopefully only ever do this once. And once you see the gains...

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There was a little challenge merging the Magnaflow exhaust with the mid-pipe sections ARH included, with a cut and splice needed, but nothing we couldn't handle in our shop.

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The finished job looks mighty nice, and when I heard it fire up for the first time I knew we were in for a treat at the dyno.

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COLD AIR INLET TUBE + FILTER

The stock air filter, filter box, and inlet tube are made to meet strict government "sound" rules (which apply to new factory vehicles), as well as keep any trace of dust out of the filter element box. This is done by restricting the size of the "inlet" into the filter box very small. There are often sound resonators and quarter wave tubes leading off of OEM air inlet tubes as well. The Mustang has a "sound tube" that pumps sound into the cabin, so it "sounds cool". We took that bit off long ago, but now it was time for a real "cold air" inlet tube, bigger filter, and integral MAF sensor housing.

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We waited six weeks for a particular brand of cold air to become available off backorder - a major brand that we can buy wholesale and hopefully resell. With only a few days before our first event I punted and got a brand that was available. Oh well.

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This JLT kit is unique for the 2018-19 GT, as it is based on their Shelby GT350 unit. The diameter of the tube / MAF housing is larger than the stock throttle body, so it has to converge slightly at the TB. But air is much more inclined to converge than diverge, and doesn't seem to hurt airflow as much at the latter factor.

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The picture above shows the two front MCS remote reservoir mounts and saddles we made

This JLT unit did not have some of the features of the brand I wanted to buy, having to do with materials and a more sealed "box" for the filter element, but it was available and I had a deadline. This is still a popular unit, and the dyno results also speak volumes (we might have made 20 whp with the CAI alone).

DYNO TUNE + SUDDEN CLASS CHANGE!

Our local tuner is True Street Motorsports, who we have worked with for many years. They stepped up again, moved some things around, and got our car slotted in and dyno tuned at the last minute. They are the ones that also dyno'd the car for us in stock form (well, it had a Magnaflow "race" exhaust), shown below with SAE correction.

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Previous dyno of our Stock 2018 GT with Magnaflow axle-back exhaust

Above is the initial 435 peak / 417 whp average dyno number we have been using for the last year in TT3. Remember, with the stock tune the engine wouldn't pull past 145mph (speed limiter on the base GT, due to OEM tires) in 4th, but did make peak power at 6800 rpm, right before the speed cut. If you look below this is the same RPM the new tune made peak power, but could still pull to 7400 rpm. We have to test for NASA in the 1:1 transmission gear (4th gear on this year model) and that was the legal way to do that TT dyno test initially. Doesn't look like we left anything on the table with the 145mph speed cut before, good to know. All the gains in the dynos below are real, then.

This time True Street reflashed the stock tune with this SCT "X4" handheld unit, an updated version of the SCT handheld that they used to tune our S197 Coyote Mustang. This re-flash allowed them to turn off the 145mph speed limiter as well as dial-in the fuel and spark tables to work with the additional airflow provided by the hard parts, the long tube headers and CAI.

We also had them keep a smooth, linear throttle response curve, unlike the mail-order tunes that make it a logarithmic or regressive curve. Logarithmic throttle action is where a small amount of initial gas pedal movement makes for a LOT of throttle blade opening - making the car REALLY hard to drive, but it "feels faster". Just like those plug-in electronic throttle "tuner box" kits that uninformed dummies like to buy. ;)

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True Street also supplied the JLT cold air, which got us out of a bind. While they are primarily a drag race tuner shop, we have worked with them over the years to have them tune 50+ road course cars, and they know what we are after: a linear throttle response (not digressive), a safe spark table (for long periods of WOT use), and an average power dyno readout + data plot with SAE corrections. I dropped the car off the day before the NASA event and picked it up that after noon, hoping for a +20-25 whp bump, but I didn't tell them to hold back.

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After the tuning it made an uncorrected pull of 485 whp peak whp... wait, what?! That's too much. What's the SAE corrected number???

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Peak with SAE correction (corrected down on this cool day) is still 474 whp peak, 426 wtq. Oh crap. I frantically started doing the average power dyno calculations the night I was loading the car up for a Friday morning NASA event departure.

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Yes, the car went from 435 peak/417 whp avg to 474 peak/460 whp avg. Notice how the peak gained 39 whp but the average went up 43 whp. This number was going to make staying in TT3 difficult. Time to weigh the car and do a quick corner balance (after the pic below). Last time we weighed it at 3825 lbs with driver, but that was less fuel (1/3rd of a tank) and no passenger seat at all, before 2018 NASA Nationals. With the ~62 pound roll bar in the car, though. Again, we were 240+ pounds heavy for TT3 then at 417 whp avg.

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Well "luckily" the car gained about 100 lbs from last time. I just came back from a week long Caribbean cruise, and we ate GOOD! Well, the second seat was installed (will show that next time) and added some mass, as did the higher fuel load and a few other updates - the strut brace, the long tube headers, oil cooler, brand new RE-71s (this weight) vs Hoosier (the 2018 weight), and some other doo-dads.

So running the NASA ST/TT online car classification form, using a minimum weight of 3925 pounds (slightly less than it weighed that night, and close to what we claimed last year with full fuel load) and the 460 whp avg, with all of the bonuses (stock aero for TT3) only got us to 9.63:1 pounds per hp. Need to be at 10.0:1. Oops...

With the "over 100 UTQG" bonus we would have been fine at 10.13:1 ratio, and we did plan on running our 200 TW on Saturdays and R7s on Sunday. But switching classes and sheets from Saturday to Sunday was asking a lot, and we were out of time to add ballast to make the Hoosier R7 setup TT3 legal. There was no time to de-tune the car, so there's no way to run TT3 on Hoosiers with this power level. We overshot TT3 by 25 whp -OR- I needed to add 204 more pounds and run the car at 4140 lbs minimum (wow!) Adding 50 pounds of fuel wasn't going to be nearly enough.

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It's 8:30 pm the night before I leave for this NASA event, the crew is long gone home, and I still need to load the car into the trailer. So I re-did my classing paperwork for TT2, a class which had grown to 10 cars for this event.

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TT2 ended up being brutally fast, and I will show "how well" this class jump turned out next time. Then how we will find a way to get back to TT3 (200 TW tires + a power de-tune after we add aero). ;)

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HELMET UPGRADE FOR 2019

I've had the same composite helmet since early 2010, which was a Pyrotect full face unit with a Snell SA2005 rating (the new 2010 rating hadn't come out yet when I bought it). I have used this lid in Autocross, Time Trial, HPDE, Track Testing, Karting, Drift Events, and Wheel to Wheel road races hundreds of times since I purchased it. Even around the office. ;)

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I have used this lid with a "horse collar" neck device as well as 4 different HANS devices, and have had to change out the anchors each time (we had to drill the holes the first time - the helmets rarely included anchors for HANS units back then). In the 2018 season the fabric inner liner was starting to come unglued (and would fall down in my eyes), and some of the hardware on the visor hinge was worn so badly that if I hit a bump the visor would SLAM down.

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Why do so many of my Mustang events look like drift events??

Racng groups are starting to refuse SA2005 helmets this year, so I had to step up to a SA2015 rated helmet. After some neck strain at a few events, I wanted to move to lighter unit, maybe even carbon? The costs can get into the $3000 range for a Stilo carbon helmet, and I had no intentions of using one of the fake China-Carbon helmets.

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Again, since I try to use brands that I can actually resell, I looked at Sparco. We do move a decent amount of Sparco seats, so this brand helmet could "match" the seats in my car. This Sparco Sky RF-7W model retails for $950 and includes the latest FIA 8859-2015 and Snell SA2015 ratings. This composite design "has a carbon fiber outer shell reinforced with layers of carbon-Kevlar", like any Carbon helmet under $2000 usually does. The visor closure is pretty slick and can be opened easily with gloves on, and the venting works very well.

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The fit for me turned out to be perfect on their XL sized helmet. I like the chin strap, it came pre-drilled and with HANS anchors installed (which we switched out for the NecksGen anchors), and the visor is really nice. Using it on track I am only mad that I didn't get this sooner. And the "MADE IN ITALY" tag on this helmet makes me a lot more confident than "MADE IN CHINA" of my old helmet.

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It always frustrates me how little weight data there is out there on just about anything. How hard is it to snap a pic on a digital scale? So the weight of this helmet was a bit of a mystery until we snapped this pic above. Luckily it is indeed 0.52 pounds (or 14%) lighter than my old Pyrotect helmet. Not an insane weight drop, probably due to some of the upgrades required to meet the one decade newer SA2015 standard. But when you are pulling 1.5g in a corner or under braking, every little bit helps. :)

TWO NEW SETS OF MOMO WHEELS + TIRES

It is no secret that we have been a dealer for Forgestar wheels ever since we first found this company and dragged them into the motorsports field back in 2012. Some ownership changes have been brewing for a while, with Weld Wheels buying Forgestar, then MOMO bought Weld and their subsidiaries. Which eventually led to MOMO developing, then introducing several Flow Formed wheel designs in late 2018, which we ordered for testing on our car for the 2019 season.

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I showed some of these in my PRI 2018 posts, including this video above.

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The first two sets we ordered include the "Heritage 6", shown at left, and the RF-20, shown at right. The Heritage 6 is based on their popular 6 spoke Formula 1 wheel from the past. It comes in 17" and 18" diameters from 8" to to 11" wide. The RF series has 3 styles, and we chose the 20 spoke RF-20 for our first set. This wheel comes in 18" and 19" diameters from 8.5" to 12" wide.

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These two models both come in 3 depths or "concave profiles", which are somewhat visible in the images above. The width and offset range of the initial "blank" determines which depth of spoke or outer lip is provided. We picked the sizes that fit our car, ordered the bolt circle and offset we needed, and MOMO finish machined and powder coated these in the color we wanted.

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We ordered the Heritage 6 wheels in 18x11" for use with 315/30/18 Hoosier race tires, and the RF-20 in 19x11" for use with 305/30/19 street tires. We switched to Hoosier R7 compound for this set, to track wear/life and lap times. We will use these on the same days back-to-back to get good data against a new set of RE-71R street tires, for 200 treadwear events.

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With the sets mounted and balanced, we installed the RF-20 set, and loaded up the car for the first track event of 2019. And while you might be asking about weights, know that I will show all of that and much more - next time (this post is running long!)

WHAT'S NEXT?

This post got really long and I had to pick a place to stop and post.

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Next time we will cover the 2019 season opener NASA TT event (TT2), talk about the RE-71R vs Hoosier R7 lap time comparisons, and then all of the parts and work that followed. This included a gearing/speed analysis, the Auburn Pro diff + 4.09 gears + aluminum diff housing build up and install, and an S550 pinion flange "running change" issue we learned. We will show the new Anderson Composites GT5 carbon fiber hood install (with weights), PP2 splitter install, show some wheel/tire weights, a new rear muffler upgrade (bigger, quieter mufflers), Mishimoto radiator install (and weights), then cover an SCCA autocross and another NASA TT weekend we should have completed before the next post drops (weather permitting). We might have the carbon rear trunk install and GT350R wing on by then, too.

Thanks for reading!
 
Great write up. For those thinking of adding the PP1 brake cooling deflectors to their GT350's don't bother. The stock ducting works fairly well. When you add the deflectors the air flow from the stock ducting is not aimed at the deflectors and they won't do anything except lighten your wallet. Porsche uses brake ducting pretty effectively as well on 991 911 cars.
 
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Excellent update as always! With regard to the Momo Heritage 6 wheels, how much do they weigh, specifically in comparison to similar sized CF5s? I think those things would look GREAT on my Focus RS.
 

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