and decided to look up the rules for competitors. it was a fairly interesting read to say the least.
sometimes, i know i should leave things alone....but i can't. i'm a persistant bastage. back to the ford vs chevy thing.
i've finally found something on the camaros. they are not delivered race ready from chevy, as the fords are. the chevys are built into "GS" camaros outside of chevy. they weigh 3275 pounds, the mustangs 3300 pounds. they have the LS3 engines, which i believe are 6.2 liters, with no restrictions, the mustang only a 5.0 liter, and they must run a grand am supplied air intake restrictor. they both use tremec 6060 race prepped 6 speeds.
the camaro carries 20 gallons of fuel onboard, where as the mustang only carries 18 gallons(this is notable, as the mustangs always go farther between fuel stops than the camaros).
both cars can have engines built by an engine builder, but they have to be inspected, and sealed, with results given to grand am. the camaros are allowed to run a bosch ECU, whereas the mustangs have to run OEM computers. also notable, the chevys run a two stage dry sump oil system, whereas the mustangs run the factory type wet sump oil system.
of the 15 permitted replacement components allowed on the camaro, the only one supplied by gm, is the rear spoiler(of which there was a big deal made mid season, since that made them somewhat competitive). nearly everything else is riley technologies.
on the other hand, of the 12 permitted replacement parts allowed for the mustang, nearly all of them are ford motorsports, with a couple of things from steeda(hood being one of those).
of allowed modifications, there are 4 allowed on the camaro, including that bosch ecu, relocating the battery to the trunk, the dry sump oil system, and a brake caliper upgrade.
of the allowed modifications on the mustangs, there is exactly 1. that is the installation of a fuel cell behind the rear axle.
so, what we have, is a heavier car, with old technology(solid rear axle) using less fuel, and forced to run an intake restrictor to pretty much running up front. fairly impressive i'd say. i guess they had to buy their way into this series too.........
they out accelerate, out turn, out stop, out run, and in general, they outclass their gm counterpart.....and they do it as the race was intended, which is as a production car, not a production car sent to a race shop, and modified for the series as is the camaro.
i watched the final race of the season today, and it was a great race. the bmw's were kicking serious butt. while there was 1 camaro running up near the front(i think he finished 7 or 8th), there were a few mustangs in the hunt, including roush(lead nearly the entire second half) and the multimatic teams were keeping pressure on. there was a LOT of tight racing, and it was fun to watch.
had roush won this race, they'd have taken the drivers, team, and manufacturers championships, as it was, bily johnson(driving the roush car) made a mistake(according to the driver of the rumbum bmw, he thinks he missed a shift), allowing him to make the pass with only 3 minutes left in the race, allowing him to hold the lead long enough to win.
this race was a bmw vs ford thing.
i've been finding this type of racing much more enjoyable than the more mainstream races such as nascar, or nhra drag racing, because it keeps its cars based on those which we really can buy.
