ITS Ford Mustang(s) Build - Stripper Stang Part II

[Ron Earp]

It is "done". Well, at least it is able to be driven on the street and doesn't leak oil, water, or have other bad habits.



Obviously now the real project actually starts, but at least Mustang One is running and running pretty well. I drove it and put about 0.8 hours on the clock to start breaking in the motor. Jeff Young took it for a few laps around the neighborhood as well. All systems are functioning well and doing what they were designed to do. Next step is getting it to a dyno to make sure the motor is safe to turn up to peak power RPM, then the track.

A bit anticlimactic in that there were no emergencies and so on, but that is a good thing. Actually, it has been a good weekend - Mustang One finished and I sold my F250, so things are on the up and up. I'm looking forward to spending some quality time with the family over the next few weeks and less time in the garage.

[Robbie]

That's a sharp looking Improved Jalopy!

[Mike Mackaman]

excellent work! I am ashamed to say that I haven't touched my car since last year. Seeing what you have done is very motivating, I will get that thing put back together and run at CMS if not sooner.

[manny]

Ron, you have put together a fantastic car. I have been watching and reading every post since the beginning. I am going to my next race this weekend at Daytona doing the Enduro and the SARRC, when done i think i will take mine apart and put it back together using yours as an example, thank you. Yes im a Ford nut too but only in the ITB ranks. I like showing that if you can drive good you can finish good too . Keep us informed as to how they run.

[Ron Earp]

Thanks for the encouragement fellows. Again, this is a group effort and the Jeffs and I have many, many months into these two Mustangs. Frankly, we're tired of working on them but at least the end is in sight.

Stang One got graphics and dyno time, yahoo!





We had about two hours of dyno time today and it was very productive. I'm pleased that we performed all the tuning and modifications ourselves and sort of know what the hell we're doing. What we've got is a safe initial tune, but in no way have we exploited the full features of the tuning nor have we run through the complete multivariate optimization of parameters. I suspect there is another two to five percent in getting that all sorted but we'll work on that in the future. For right now I'm very pleased with what we've got and we're going to try and hit the test day at VIR on Friday.

[Butch Kummer]

"complete multivariate optimization of parameters"

Wow - THAT's a mouthful!

Good luck this weekend...

[lateapex911]

Good luck at VIR! How many going? You Jeff and Jeff? Both stangs?
Out of respect I won't ask about the power numbers But good luck keeping it from the ITAC!!! LOL>

[Ron Earp]

Thanks for the wishes guys. We've got just the green one going as the red one isn't going to be quite ready. We could get the red one done with a couple of late nights but we think it'd be a bad idea and we'd trade off some preparation in trying to get it ready. We'll have our hands full dealing with the green one, I'm sure.

Of course we're not posting up our first effort dyno sheets, but we will do so eventually. Suffice to say, it isn't an ITA car by any stretch of the imagination as some posed a few months ago, and as long as it'll handle it has power to be somewhat competitive in ITS now. And it'll get better with development.

Just like any car in IT you've got to make your selections on attributes you favor. I wanted a car with a broad power band and I think we got that covered, but I'm sure we'll give up some handling to the lighter weight ITS cars with more sophisticated suspensions. All in all I think the car will work out just fine and be fun to race. And, with the low-revving engine and typically heavily built driveline and suspension pieces, I hope it'll be durable and long lived. It might not ever be "the car to have" in ITS, but I think we'll show it to be a reasonable choice in ITS and with work and luck, maybe a good one in ITS. Hopefully, if ITS continues to be well-balanced there won't ever be a "car to have" in ITS, but if that were to happen my money would be on the new Miatas or a Pontiac Solstice.

But, with the Mustang I'm happy. I sure as hell like the "turn key and watch car start and idle" thing it has going. Doing the Carb Shuffle and Ether Spray dance with the old Z was getting tiresome, plus, I'll not miss the drum brakes. And, I don't feel the need to carry every spare part with me that I could possible use as every Advance/AutoZone/Pep Boys is a Mustang parts warehouse; new parts cheap.

All in all I'm very pleased and looking forward to doing some ITS racing.

[JeffYoung]

Car is a good looking car in person. Meaner than stock by a lot. Drives nice, HUGE on the inside.

A great addition to ITS -- can't wait to see them on track.

[Knestis]

This just flat rocks.

That is all.

K

[Ron Earp]

And coming from a German aficionado that is high praise and much appreciated. We'll get some pictures up from the VIR test day. I'm hoping things go well, but I'm a realist and know test days are just that.

Thinking of a new racing logo for it, like:



Area under the curve, we got it.

[Ron Earp]

Test of thread search function

[Ron Earp]

Well the time has come. #38 ITS was rolled out for some logbook photos and loaded up on the trailer. As expected the Mustang is a bit longer, and wider, than the Z so it looks a bit like 10 lbs of pooh in a 5 lb bag when on the trailer.

VIR test day here we come.

[Ron]

Go and set the world on fire mustang. Your smaller brother in Atlanta is pulling for you.

[Racerlinn]

You're gonna take a lot of shit from people that ask you "what kind of V8 does it have?"

[Ron Earp]

;I’m pleased to write that the VIR test day came off without a hitch. The car ran beautifully all day. Water temps pegged on 180F, oil pressure 75psi, and oil temps right at 210F. In short, we're pleased.

We arrived at VIR Friday around 7am to get unloaded. After a quick driver’s meeting we learned we were in group four for a 10am start. Since we had spent so much time preparing to run the car we didn’t have anything to do but wait, which of course built up a fair amount of anticipation and nervousness. I hadn’t driven an ITS car in about a year so I was apprehensive of climbing in and hitting the track.

However, I was very pleasantly surprised that within half a lap I felt right at home in the car. I ran the entire thirty minute session and gradually pushed the car a little bit more each lap, eventually finishing up the session with some 2:24s or thereabouts. My first impressions were that the car was very stable, much more stable than my Z and the Lola. It turned, went where you pointed it, and braking was flat out awesome. It did pull a bit on braking but otherwise it was all good and a solid car. Steering effort was damn high due to the huge amount of caster in the suspension, something we should have picked up on earlier, but there wasn’t anything we could do the alleviate that problem. Balance was so-so with respect to oversteer/understeer, but as I wasn’t pushing it a huge amount I wasn’t getting very much data for those handling characteristics.

Once I was back in the pits I conveyed as much info as I could to Jeff G and we made a few adjustments for session two, a change in camber and a bit of a change in toe. We bled the brakes, checked fluids, and we were ready for session two.

During session two I was able to push the car harder and get more of a feel for how it would drive under race conditions. Braking deeper into corners, holding down the throttle more in T1 through T5 and pushing more in the uphill esses. I tried to hang with a couple of the fast ITS Integras out in the test session but no dice there. They had more top end power and were handling and driving better, but it was entertaining to try and chase them. The front end did have a tendency to wash out when pushed, but I attributed part of the problem to the tires that were getting too hot unevenly across the surface and ending up with pressures around 41 psi – clearly we need to start with lower tire pressures and make some suspension adjustments. I ended the session with a 2:20.4 and a 2:21.0 as my best laps. Being as how this was Test Day #1 with Mustang v1.0 I was pretty pleased with it. Back to the pits and a change to ride height, toe adjustment, bar, and camber and we were ready for more action.

For session three I decided to only drive three laps and then convinced Jeff G to get in and take the wheel for the remainder of the session. The session went well and back in the pits we compared notes. Jeff G had a very different impression of the car – he felt the steering effort was too high to be drivable, the front end understeered too much, and the car felt too heavy to drive well. Basically, two sides of the same coin and I think he was pretty disappointed in the way it felt. Now, there is a difference in perspective – I’m comparing everything to a Z car whereas he’s comparing it to a perfectly setup Miata that he owned and raced for years. He wants the car to feel light, precise, and razor sharp, whereas I’m just happy if it brakes without shaking the car to pieces, runs well, and makes it around track without a failure. Clearly, he has the right vision and is where we want to be, but that might be an unobtainable goal.

So, by session four it was late afternoon and Jeff Young had finally arrived at the track. We decided to give him a session in the car to see what he thought about it. He got no forewarning about our experiences as we wanted him to be unbiased about the experience. Mr. Young belted in and off he went for the session. He stayed out the entire time and from what we could tell he was pushing the car hard straight out of the gate in typical Mr. Young fashion. We clocked him at a string of 22s and 21s, then a few 2:20s back to back. Once back in the pits his verdict was “Great, very racable, needs more power but it’s ready to go!” I’ll let him chime in on the thread about the car but his impression was favorable, maybe not as favorable as my rose tinted analysis but not as pessimistic as Jeff G’s. Also, Jeff Y is going to like it better than Jeff G since the Mustang is far more TR8-like than it is Miata-like.

So there you have it. The day was very successful in my opinion and we learned a lot about where we are, and, more importantly we’ve learned a lot about where we want to be. We know what aspects of the suspension we want to change and develop, and we’re planning to apply those changes to Jeff G’s Mustang that will debut at CMP on Memorial Day. Therefore, we didn’t stick around to race the car today and tomorrow. We had our data, we knew we had a somewhat competitive and racable car, but we also knew we had a lot of work to do to both cars if we wanted to have a chance of making the CMP Monster Memorial. So we packed up Sleestack Lightning and rolled back to the lair.

Over the next couple of weeks we’ll be working hard on all fronts – suspension, setup, engine tuning, and exhaust. We feel the car has very strong S potential and had we had another 20 hp this weekend we would have undoubtedly turned some competitive ITS times. And I don’t estimate that the 20hp will be hard to obtain given the extremely conservative ECU tuning we’re running now and the unexploited power we have in the ECU. We also feel we know pretty well what we need to do with the suspension to improve turn in, reduce steering effort, and improve the balance of the car.

I have Traqmate data for sessions but the damn video portion only worked on Jeff’s session, and, it is out of synch for some reason. If I can get the video/Tmate to line up I’ll upload the data later today or tomorrow. If I can’t get the Tmate data to synch I’ll just upload a few laps of Mr Young’s drive in the car.

PS-Ron, thanks for the call and the tips with the panhard.

[Ron Earp]

Allrighty, I got the video up, but I think the sound/data/video is a bit out of synch but I'm tired of trying to fix it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dByf3...ature=youtu.be



Mr. Young's lap as the video for my recorded session is SOL, but we were both within 0.4s of each other. Not too shabby of a sound from a six pot! Outside the car thought it is unbelievably quiet, by far the quietest car in the session. We suspect that our system is costing us some horsepower (not just due to how quiet it is) and have some plans in store.

[Knestis]

It sounds tough!

K

[billf]

Sounds tough, and looks like it corners flat. Great job. I have envy!!!!!

Good racing,

Bill

[JeffYoung]

It's a great race car, I loved it. I only got 6-7 laps since we had a black flag all and just had enough time to get comfortable in the car. By the time I did, and could turn 20s, I had killed the front tires. More on that in a minute.

In short, in looking at the vid, I gave up a lot of time in 3, 4/5/6, 10 and Oak Tree. And ran a 2:20.1 I think the car does 2:18s as it sits now, maybe more with newer tires.

The really good: Sucker has great basic handling characteristics. Corners flat. Good balance. When tires are fresh, slight bias towards oversteer (perfect), when the fronts get worked it goes to under though (need to work on that).

The brakes are freaking awesome. Whoever seemed to think these cars wouldn't stop be WRONG. Car ran four sessions and when I got in it, the pedals was high and hard and stayed that way.

The good: Tranny shifts nice. I like the steering feel, it's heavy but not terribly so with good feedback. Power is I'd say average to above average for ITS right now, but here's the kicker. It's awesome in 2/34th gear. Or at least really good. More on that in a second.

The needs to be worked on: The car clearly works the front end too hard and kills the front tires too fast. I had nice 35 PSI pressures all around on it the first few laps but working the car hard in 3/4/5/6 quickly pushed the left front to 41. Not good.

You can see it in the vid. What kills this car right now is the shift to fifth, which is like a .62 overdrive or something. The car enters the esses at good speed --109/110 and then can't accelerate up them like mine does. 122 or so on the back straight is about 5 mph too slow and I am positive it is the gearing.

This car will be a winner in ITS. Needs six months to a year of development and might need a rear end that allows it to run 2-3-4 rather than 3-4-5.

And yes, the motor sounds awesome on the inside.

These guys did a great job with these cars. I think they will be fantastic S cars and I hope we see more of them out there.