This could easily be another of those issues that is a cost thing. Give me a bigger budget and more will spent on the engine. In 11 years of competing my GTD my total engine budget has been about £10,000. Two engines and one rebuild. If I lived in the USA I am sure I could have saved money on those bills too!
In our little competitions here in the UK, the general rule of thumb that is emerging, is that you want lots of torque low down in the rev range as we need the grunt exiting low speed corners. When guys have have high revving big BHP monster engines, unless it is matched with low rev band torque (is that possible?) they don't blitz the field. I hope you are reading this JP! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
But a cheaper route to winning is actually tyres. Slap on a set of sticky tyres and your times just tumble.
Cost wise if you want to get better times for less money, put your money into a second set of rims and sticky tyres. Then go back and do your engine later.
If you get the next GTD club mag, I beleive there is an article in there about Jackie Ickx knocking 4 secs off his Goodwood lap times by running a 2 inch wider rear tyre, all else remaining the same.
Interesting comments above about Cobra owners whacking in monster engine power and then crashing at the next corner. Doesn't help the US stereotype of not being able to get cars around corners, just kidding guys. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif But it is true. When I got my 40 it was a jump from never having driven anything regularly over 150 bhp to 350 bhp. I went off at Goodwood as a result so took lessons at Peter Gethins Driving School. If I took the lessons first I would have saved a lot of money! I would recommend any new owner taking lessons and building the cost into the build budget. It could well be cheaper in the long run.
Get used to your car's "lower" power before you go nuts with big power.
Malcolm
In our little competitions here in the UK, the general rule of thumb that is emerging, is that you want lots of torque low down in the rev range as we need the grunt exiting low speed corners. When guys have have high revving big BHP monster engines, unless it is matched with low rev band torque (is that possible?) they don't blitz the field. I hope you are reading this JP! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
But a cheaper route to winning is actually tyres. Slap on a set of sticky tyres and your times just tumble.
Cost wise if you want to get better times for less money, put your money into a second set of rims and sticky tyres. Then go back and do your engine later.
If you get the next GTD club mag, I beleive there is an article in there about Jackie Ickx knocking 4 secs off his Goodwood lap times by running a 2 inch wider rear tyre, all else remaining the same.
Interesting comments above about Cobra owners whacking in monster engine power and then crashing at the next corner. Doesn't help the US stereotype of not being able to get cars around corners, just kidding guys. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif But it is true. When I got my 40 it was a jump from never having driven anything regularly over 150 bhp to 350 bhp. I went off at Goodwood as a result so took lessons at Peter Gethins Driving School. If I took the lessons first I would have saved a lot of money! I would recommend any new owner taking lessons and building the cost into the build budget. It could well be cheaper in the long run.
Get used to your car's "lower" power before you go nuts with big power.
Malcolm