Howard Coleman

iTrader: (6)

drive your FD to Road America this weekend ... it's all mazda and there's NEWS

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o k maybe you know that this weekend at Elkhart Lake Wisconsin’s Road America is totally insane as far as Mazda Racing along w the Mazda Corral Midwest Rotary Rally....

but did you know that

Mazda's LMP2 American Lemans entry, currently running second in class just received an increase in the restrictor for the 3 rotor motor?

probably another 70 hp.. there are other rumors about a new engine this weekend but i would prefer to defer until i know for sure. Road America is Jamie Bach’s home track so if you want to see Mazda on top of the Podium at the end of a Major Race ‘best gas up the car and head to Wisconsin.

125 laps, 500 miles at Road America sunday.

of course there's also...

Star Mazda and extremely competitive series w Bobby Rahal's son kicking major ... Marco Andretti too but you can throw a blanket over the entire field.

along w the Le Mans cars the Speedworld GT cars do the same 500 miles. ferraris, maseratis, corvettes, vipers, BMWs.

the Speedworld Touring cars... Mazda 6 is near the front of this race

the Trans Am

and there's 2 days where you can put your rx7 on the track for some touring and anything else you can get away with. last year i passed a 427 cobra in the carousel w my FD. o k it was Frank Bennett's but i was driving. a mere $50 gets you on the track.

you might want to trade corners w Cam (Pettit) Worth's supercharged 6 piston braked RX8. Cam and Candy will be our guests all weekend and he is really looking forward to getting out on the track w his black and bad to the bone RX8.

and the mazda corral. and the mazda Party... ////MRR

link:


https://www.rx7club.com/midwest-rotary-rendezvous-archive-261/if-you-midwest-youd-better-plan-05-mrr-448371/

howard coleman

Kenku

*mutters* I would be there... except that it kinda happens to coincide with a Midwestern Council race, and I'll take racing over watching racing most days.

Ah well, maybe next year.

Snrub

iTrader: (1)

Howard, do you have any specific details on the engine that BK Motorsports runs? Other than the size of the intake restrictors and that it's a "race 20B" I haven't heard any details.

rotarygod

iTrader: (1)

The engine was originally installed by Speedsource Racing. It has since been turned over to another company who will optimize it for race use. The car was built in 10 days. They literally just placed a 3 rotor in the car and bolted up an intake and exhaust and sent it out to race. They were using a 49.1mm restrictor plate per the rules. They have since petitioned the governing body and are now allowed to run a 53.5 mm plate. Unlike Nascar, these aren't just plates in the air stream. They are very nicely shaped venturis. The new engine will have a properly designed exhaust system and a different intake system. The rules currently allow the variable length intakes on rotaries only so hopefully we will see a return of these.

The motor even with the 49.1 mm restrictor plate was still making right around 400 hp. Inpressive from an intake less than 2" across! The new plate at 18% larger is a big help in power. While the diameter different doesn't sound like much, it does flow noticably more air. While hp doesn't necessarily follow airflow in terms of percentage, it does stay fairly close. This means that if they have an 18% increase in airflow, they could theoretically have an 18% increase in power. This would be 72 hp! It probably will make a little less than that though but with the appropriate changes to the intake and exhaust, this will be an engine getting close to the 500 hp mark. With their current competition in the 480 hp mark, they would be competitive. The new Porsche LMP2 car is supposed to make around 525 hp. The R26b uses 10.0:1 compression. I don't know how much the rotors weight or what the intake/exhaust timing is. It is probably the same as previous race engines though.

The current car is also 100 lbs overweight. Remember they built the car from start to finish in only 10 days. They didn't have a suitable mounting system for the rotary in the C65 chassis so they used part of a C60 chassis that weighed more just so they could get it out to the track. While they don't at this moment have a solution for this, they will take care of it and the car will get lighter.

This os exciting news for the car as it is gaining more power and probably more over a wider rpm range, and hopefully will get the weight down over time as well. BK has hinted that they may try to enter the car in the 24 hours of LeMans next year. They are currently in 2nd place overall in their class and this is inspite of being down 80+ hp and being heavier. Admittedly there are only 3 other cars in their class but being the slowest of the group and still doing decent says quite abit for the durability of the car.

artowar

iTrader: (1)

I watched the race on TV. The car started spraying a lot of oil and died very early in the race. Speedvisions' coverage didn't try to find out what happened-- anyone know?

rotarygod

iTrader: (1)

During the race the car got bumped early by a Porsche from behind, that broke one of the oil lines to the gearbox. After a lap or so it overheated, and pop! The motor was fine, just a stupid gearbox problem. Here's a shot of the oil spray. I'll bet the guys behind him, especially any other open cockpit cars, must have loved him for that nice hot oil bath!

artowar

iTrader: (1)

I saw no coverage of what happened to the car, but plenty of coverage of a Porsche in the pits to clean the oil off of its windshield. There was a *lot* of oil on that car-- maybe it was the one that bumped our guy....