Sports Racer vs Sedan

[davedarrow]

Anyone racing in GT that's getting frustrated with either cost of racing and or maintance to keep a sedan running -I have a solution.

Sports racer or a Formula car.

With the exception of Porcshe, production cars were never built with racing in mind. Put a cage in a sedan and go racing and you find all the weaknesses of a sedan.
Brakes,wheel bearings, clutches, transmissions,rubber bushed suspension, getting the weight out of the car and so on. And of course fuel and tires.

A purpose-built race car like a sports racer or formula car has the best of the best race proven parts.

I bought a Star Mazda formula car which i converted to a sports racer-Star makes a body kit to do this. This is a wankel powered race car which produces 175HP on 87 octane gas.

This winter I had Dave at Mazdees freshen up the motor (it had 6 seasons on it) and do a street port hop-up with lighter rotors(225hp) for less than i paid for a Cosworth crank for a vintage 4 cylinder ford motor.

I expect to get my car down to a 1:22 or faster at Mosport this season.

I burn 15 gallons of the cheapest gas on the planet per race weekend. I spend more money at the restaurant than i do on gas.

I used 1 1/2 sets of tires the whole race season at a cost of $820.00 per set.

After each race session I add 5 gallons of gas, torque the wheel nuts and check the tire pressure then go help my friend with his sedan while i wait for the next Libre grid. The only extra thing the guys with bike powered sports racers have to do is check the chain tension.

A couple of my friends have Ztec Ford powered sports racers. These are pump gas motors that get 75 hours or more between rebuilds.

Monday at work after a race weekend i sneak out to the warehouse and have a look at the car to see what it needs for the next race weekend-nothing- back to my desk and work.

I will never ever get bored driving a sports racer or formula car-it can always goes thru a corner faster than your common sense wants you to.

Why pick a sports racer over a formula car?

Personal reasons for me. If 2 formula cars touch tires in a corner usually one car goes into low earth orbit.

My Star Mazda has a 5 speed gearbox. As a formula car in 5th gear the shift light would just start to glow as i turn into 8 at Mosport.With sports racer body kit and 75 pounds more weight the shift light comes on at the last marshall station on the back straight and the motor is bouncing off the rev limiter for 3 seconds before I turn into 8.

Aerodynamics are good!!!

This makes me wonder how much faster F1 cars would be as sports racers-4 tires in the airstream are 4 brick walls.

Mr Majors-I probably don't want to know what is costs to keep a Viper race ready.

dave darrow

[vinnie mack]

definitely make some good points there dave. unless you properly prep a production car for racing you are going to find every single flaw in every single design. like you said, most production cars are never built for racing in mind.

when it comes to touring and GT i think the key thing is to have a drivetrain that can last. A lot of guys find out pretty quickly that the engine or gearbox is never made for abuse and it costs them as much as the car itself to come up with new solutions to solve these problems.

those cars look like a lot of fun to drive!

[davedarrow]

I did forget to mention if you want to get the last tenth out of a sports racer you can bring the scales and play with chassis set up between race sessions..

[Director]

Dave,
Who ever said we were complaining?

The cost of racing is high anyways, just ask my wife.

I don't doubt for a minute that running a CSR or equivalent is probably cheaper, but the chicks like the sedans better!

[sparky]

Originally Posted by Director

but the chicks like the sedans better!

im not too sure about that perry, and real racecars dont have doors!!!

[timewarp9]

Of course the other alternative is purpose built cars, tube frame, such as Stock Cars, Trans-Am cars etc.

These cars like the SR or Formula cars are also built with the best components designed for severe racing duty. If you hit the wall, you undo the body work, cut-out the bad and weld in the good. They are virtually indestructible and consequently very safe.

I like the idea of a roof over my head, I tried an F4 at Dunnvile and I felt very exposed and cannot imagine what it must be like at hyper speeds. Watching Surtees get hit in the head last year was also a source of concern to me, as an open cockpit does add another dimension of danger from flying objects, or going into the back of another car or wedging under a tire-wall.

Admittedly the fuel consumption is higher, I use about 100 litres a weekend, but it is up to the individual as to which grade of fuel they want to use according to the specs of the engine design.

I will go through about 2 sets of tires at a cost of $2,400.00, and will have to replace valve springs every 20 hours, and freshen the engine every third season, or about 40 hours.

So, yes a SR is more economical to run, but the initial purchase price is higher especially if you want a more modern design and if you hit the wall hard, I suspect the monocoque tub is not repairable.

Regardless, I would love to have a SR in the stable and hope to acquire one someday. I think the Daytona Prototypes are amazing and would love to have something like that... just dreaming though.

Jon

[davedarrow]

There is 4 flavors of tubs depending on the era and builder.

aluminum skinned steel tube frame

aluminum tub

aluminum honeycomb tub

carbon fibre tub

cheapest to not so cheapest to repair

Ask Nick what it cost to repair his Viper after it was bent.

If i smashed my Star Mazda beyond repairable I hit the buy it now botton for a new frame for $5500.00.

[CAllen]

And Dirt is for sandboxes?

Originally Posted by sparky

im not too sure about that perry, and real racecars dont have doors!!!

[lotiguy]

Dave, you Sir are "spot on"


Always remember, words to live by

"Only toilets need doors"



Gord
www.blurredvisionracing.com

[pmyers]

Originally Posted by Director

Dave,
Who ever said we were complaining?

The cost of racing is high anyways, just ask my wife.

I don't doubt for a minute that running a CSR or equivalent is probably cheaper, but the chicks like the sedans better!

No complaining

Sports racers/formula (not F1) cars are definitely cheaper to run.

Chicks? Perry what chicks and does "the wife" know ?

I'd have both but my wife already says I have too many cars. What does she know

A sports racer is definitely a true race car built for one purpose but then a sedan takes mechanical aptitude to make it go fast.

I say own one of each.

[Steven Scala]

Brazed spaceframes, like the ones on Van Diemens, are the most easily repairable chassis' on the planet - if you know someone who does brazing right.

Carbon tubs can be repaired by Multimatic in Markham. Yeah, they cost more to fix. We're kinda lucky having Multimatic up here, as the alternatives are in Indianapolis or in North Carolina. It takes a bigger hit to damage one, or the relentless type of curb-bottoming that only a pro-hopeful teenager can provide (and which is really, really tough to do at Mosport). Mario won all those titles on a carbon tub without requiring any tub service. He was on a Tatuus, tho, which are laid up in Italy by folks who do F1 stuff for Ferrari. Watch out for French-made tubs, tho...

You can run with a slightly cracked carbon tub, and drill the crack edges to stop it growing. With delaminated areas, you can 'drill-and-fill' with epoxy, adding a bit of weight but holding off a repair (which can be done inside two weeks) until the offseason.

That's what I can tell ya. Brian Graham's one of the many who know more about running these things, particularly on latter Van Diemen-made Star Mazda tubs like Greg Beresford's. (Dave's got an early-generation spaceframe Star Mazda, made I think by Mondial?)

[MARC W]

I find it surprising that a sedan is more expensive to run. You can buy 95% of your parts locally from a junk yard/wrecked car (body panels, suspension engine/transmission bits, etc. etc. Bearings and other various race parts can be found at the Canadian tire or a local race shop.
A open wheel car you have to order suspension bits and the million shims and spacers that go with them, chassis specific fuel cells, engine frames, wings, bearings, gears, cables, uprights, wiring looms etc. etc. and with that comes heafty shipping and duty fees plus the usual mark up they feel they can get away with and exchange rates.
If you stuff your touring car in the wall hard you're looking at stretching it back, welding and replacing body panels. With parts availability from Keystone and "auto recyclers" this can be done cost effectively.
With a carbon tub your looking at replacing any number of corners, gearbox, etc. and having to replace($15000 +) or repair the tub same with a space frame or ally tub.

[Sasha]

Either way you decide to go about it, buying used race equipment is great value. Especially from big budget teams.

Sedans are fun because you can smash them into each other, get into huge drifts and drive the things on the street if you're crazy enough (I don't!!!). Then when their time has come you can cut the lights out and enter them as ice racers.

But the real reason is (or originally was) to attract the general consumer into believing one car, tire, part, brake pad etc. is better than another, since the race cars are basically a direct image of what the everyday consumer drives.

Seems like it only works in Nascar, where the cars aren't even close to the real thing. Carburated V8s bolted to tube frame bodies pretending to be front wheel v6s. Fantastic. The world just doesn't make sense.

I think Dave's right and that used open wheel or sports racers are the best value, I'm always amazed at how small the libre fields are considering this!

[davedarrow]

One used Star Mazda $16000.00

One sports racer body kit $8000.00 (optional)

One Wankel rebuild and upgrade to street port and light weight rotors=225Hp

$2800.00

1:22 or maybe sub 1:20 at Mosport.

That lap time in a GT1 car= $200,000.00 to $250,000.00 or more?

dave darrow

[Bubblecar]

Originally Posted by MARC W

I find it surprising that a sedan is more expensive to run.

But it is true!

Indeed you can run a low cost, budget conscious season in an older sedan - but even at that level - I think that you would still save money by buying a used F1200 or Formula Four. Then it's a matter of how fast you want to go and how competitive you want to be. The savings can escalate dramatically.

As many of you know, I am fortunate enough that I can pretty much afford to run any car - anywhere - but my talent and ambitions keep me at the fun / regional level. My racing goal is to compete locally with the the fastest possible lap times that I can achieve - before my money and age run out.

While few of the front runners really like to admit how much they actually spend in a season, here goes . . .

After I sold my business, I bought the Viper Comp Coupe for about $175,000 and claimed three consecutive championships and several track records - but - it was at a cost "in excess" of $200,000 per season - excluding wrecks! That was to run it at the highest level of maintenance and support - virtually an arrive and drive (no volunteer crew).

I've now bought the IMSA Lites Elan DP02 for about $100,000 and should not only be 5 seconds a lap quicker at Mosport, but will spend "a fraction" of the running costs required by the sedan. This year I hope to join the under 1 minute 20 second club at Mosport and to compete in maybe a couple of ALMS IMSA Lites events.

Look at a top Canadian touring car team - many (perhaps most) of the front runners are spending ~100K per year - not including car cost and not including crash damage. As they say, how fast do you want to go - how much do you have to spend? And a season of GrandAM or World Challenge is easily $250,00 plus.

So regardless of your budget or level of experience, I think the Sports Racer / Formula Car route makes great sense. You can buy a used sports racer for $25 - $50 grand and put down 1:25's or better all year. That's why several of us are working real hard to build the Formula Libre grid in general and promote Sports Racers in specific. As for talented, young drivers there are few steps up the ladder that are more economical and developmental than running a Formula 1200 or even a 1600.

My own decision was made after watching the 2008 IMSA Lites L1 - L2 and L3 cars putting down laptimes at Mosport, ranging from 1:16's to 1:25's. John Cosgrove and I looked at each other and asked - "Are we crazy?". Both of us have since bought sports racers.

Finally, for Mr. Iannuzzi's comment ;

Originally Posted by Director

. . . but the chicks like the sedans better!

Oh come one - is this not raw sex appeal ? (excluding the driver of course )