New Forum: Rob's Garage

[VoodooBoss]

I'm pleased to announce that Rob Edwards, AKA blacksheep-1, has agreed to have his own forum where he can answer questions related to car setup, tires, fabrication and racing. Rob has a wealth of knowledge working with race teams including Phoenix Performance, an IMSA Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge team, and as a fire fighter where he also moonlighted as a fire crew at race tracks. You can see some of his work at his website:

http://www.blacksheep-1.com/

Ok, who's going to ask the first question?

The blacksheep-1 CTSCC fan club


Rob's favorite toys

 

[13Boss#3328]

Great idea! Thanks Rob

 

[ArizonaBOSS]

What kind of rwhp/tq do those Mustangs put down with the IMSA restrictors?

 

[blacksheep-1]

What kind of rwhp/tq do those Mustangs put down with the IMSA restrictors?

approximately 475 rwhp. A lot of that depends on the time on the engine, they have a "race life" of 50 hours but they drop off near the end of that.

 

[VoodooBoss]

Is 50 hours enough to cover a whole season? How often do most CTSCC teams rebuild their engines?

 

[ArizonaBOSS]

That is impressive.

 

[blacksheep-1]

That is impressive.

It;s impressive when you consider the Subaru we were running got an entire drive line every race. What they do is after each race they take the car back and dyno it if it's under a certain percentage they keep it, if it fall outside of the parameters, it goes back to Roush. The only thing different between those motors and a stock boss is valve springs, rod bolts and an overbore. Phoenix has a complete engine shop but the GSc ars go back to Roush simply because it's easier and faster (and the roush engines are sealed per imsa specs) while the engine shop is busy doing customer and special stuff. I don't know if the WC cars will be Roush or in house built, but they are fully capable of doing about any engine you want.
Although that 50 hours would cover most of the season Phoenix does a crap ton of testing which high times the engines earlier.

 

[cobrakidz]

Very nice. Next time you come to Laguna Seca let us know--would love to come and check it out. Maybe a close up tour of the car too?

 

[VoodooBoss]

Very nice. Next time you come to Laguna Seca let us know--would love to come and check it out. Maybe a close up tour of the car too?

I've done this a few times and the teams are always open and friendly but none so like Phoenix Performance.

 

[YellowJacketBoss302]

I've done this a few times and the teams are always open and friendly but none so like Phoenix Performance.

+1

 

[ArizonaBOSS]

OK NEXT QUESTION(s):

How often do you guys dump your tires each race? Is each set a single-session type deal or do you try and get everything you can out of a set before tossing them?

Are you mandated to buy a minimum amount of tires for each race like with PWC?

 

[blacksheep-1]

No we don't have a mandatory amount, at least if we do, we've never ran into that. We do have to pre order our tires so that Conti knows how many to bring and we have bumped into that once awhile back, we went over, but Conti brings extra sets so they'll let you slide..a little..once.
We go by heat cycle and time rather than laps because that's different for every track, generally we heat cycle the sets we're going to use for the race during practice, that way they last longer. We do use stickers for qualifying because that's the fastest those tires will ever be, the first 5 laps, then we have to start the race on those tires. Generally when we get rid of tires they have 2-3 heat cycles on them.

 

[13Boss#3328]

one more question:

Can you please provide us with a list of lap times you guys run at different tracks? preferably specifying the car, Boss, STI, Corvette...etc.

thanks
Rabee

 

[blacksheep-1]

one more question:

Can you please provide us with a list of lap times you guys run at different tracks? preferably specifying the car, Boss, STI, Corvette...etc.

thanks
Rabee

that might take some doing..I don't know id IMSA keeps the qualifying time son line or not

 

[Grant 302]

Rob-
Glad you took Rick up on having your own forum! 8)

Gotta thank you again for all the insight and guidance regarding tire pressure. Having my own charts and pressure curves has been priceless!! Last weekend, the biggest adjustment I made was dropping .5 psi hot on one tire.

 

[blacksheep-1]

Great! I'm glad you took advantage of that.