Speed Source RX8 GT incar at Watkins Glen

[doogie]

Enjoy the mighty 20B driven by Sylvain Tremblay.

Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jqEyAIRR1c&mode=related&search

 

[njaremka]

sweet... seeing those cars at the glen was flippin' amazing - you could hear them coming, and know immediately what car was coming around the corner.

 

[altspace]

So close. I have a nice poster in my garage.

 

[Donas64]

Gorgeus! I wish I had a poster of that. I wish I had a garage!

 

[Hughes412]

The one thing that sucks about the RX8 is the power. At 1:58 secons into that you see him pull up on a car and then on the streight the car starts to pull away, the they cut the video. I would have liked to see what happend next. That car sounds really good and in the turns is very fast, but just lacks the passing power.

But I'd still take it.(drive)

 

[Raynman]

I'm glad to have met the whole SpeedSource team and damned lucky to have seen them in action not once, but twice.

I wonder when that footage was taken. The Glen wasn't a good race for SpeedSource this year. They were battling with rewards weight that they incurred and Sylvain had a helluva crash when the suspension failed, but fortunately Sylvain was OK. But from those ashes, SpeedSource rose like a phoenix to emerge second at Mid-Ohio where they found balance even with the rewards weight and where they put into bear suspension technologies that they were playing around with. They won first at Daytona after, and is still in the hunt for the championship.

By the way, while it might not be tops in the power category the real strength of the SpeedSource cars is weight. Lesser weight means less load on their tires which translates to less wear and more traction at the later stages of the race compared to their competition. It's this "reserve traction" that allowed Sylvain to pass Porsches late in the race at Homestead and Nick Ham's awesome performance at VIR. Power is not the end all for passing. Traction is also a factor and the SpeedSource RX-8 excel in that arena.

 

[altspace]

Yea, I missed out on Lime Rock this year. Hope to go next year.

 

[chuyler1]

What type of transmission do they run? I didn't see his left foot move at all...do they just shift w/o the clutch or is it an auto?

 

[altspace]

Six speed manual transmission with Mazda's renown precise shift linkage. Interesting read in the Jan. 05 Sports Car International on the Grand Am racing RX-8s. Did you know they use the stock transmission in the race car? SpeedSource claims the stock trans is very robust, lasting 3 races without a rebuild.

 

[chuyler1]

so do they use the clutch? I couldn't move my foot that fast.

 

[altspace]

No idea. Have to ask them, hehe.

 

[doogie]

Six speed manual transmission with Mazda's renown precise shift linkage. Interesting read in the Jan. 05 Sports Car International on the Grand Am racing RX-8s. Did you know they use the stock transmission in the race car? SpeedSource claims the stock trans is very robust, lasting 3 races without a rebuild.

You are half right. The ST (street tuner) car in Koni challenge uses the stock gearbox. The GT car that you see above (pics) and in the video uses what is called a Extrac 6 sequential gearbox with liftless shifting. This gearbox costs more than a new RX8 loaded. But it's worth every penny...why, if anything on that car is unbreakable it is the gearbox.

Koni ST RX8 by Speed Source.

 

[doogie]

so do they use the clutch? I couldn't move my foot that fast.

Yes it uses a clutch like a reg. manual gearbox. The difference is that this gearbox is a dog gear box which has gears with straight cut gears and syncro teeth rings. This allows the driver to engage each gear without using the clutch. So the clutch is used pretty much only for moving from a stop.

Now the ECU is the other part of the equation which matches the revs on the down shift to not only smooth en the lower gear engagement but also to make the engine compression to the lower gear more seamless. The ECU is set up with sensors to the sequential shifter that when the gear lever is pulled (up shift) the ECU cuts fuel and spark for a millisecond to make the dog teeth to mesh to the next gear.

For those of you that have seen both these RX8 in action you will notice that on every up shift there a loud pop (bang really) followed by a flame, this is unburnt fuel that is being burnt in the cherry red exhaust that explodes and releases a flame. On the down shift the lever is pushed forward as you can see from the video and the throttle bliped for synchronization.

 

[Raynman]

For those of you that have seen both these RX8 in action you will notice that on every up shift there a loud pop (bang really) followed by a flame, this is unburnt fuel that is being burnt in the cherry red exhaust that explodes and releases a flame. On the down shift the lever is pushed forward as you can see from the video and the throttle bliped for synchronization.

Yep, very impressive fireworks indeed. Here's my pathetic attempt to capture the 69 car's exhaust flame:

 

[doogie]

Yep, very impressive fireworks indeed. Here's my pathetic attempt to capture the 69 car's exhaust flame:

Sweet, ZOOM BOOM ZOOM..

 

[chuyler1]

ZEEEEEIIIIIBOOMZEEEEEIIIBOOM...or something like that.