CN based cars

[Ken_T]

Gentlemen,

First post, sorry for the length…..

I just sold my single seater that I ran here in the States in SCCA. The transporter took the mistress away yesterday on her way to her new home in Florida. So now it’s time to talk about the next one. I have always been a fan of sports racers, so that will be my next effort and looking at the rules, I am thinking of running a 2 seater CSR. The 2 seater will allow me to bring my son/daughter along for the occasional track day and also the CSR rules have given some allowances to the 2 seaters to make them more competitive.
CSR now is populated with single seaters with 1.6l engines at 1300 lbs and some restricted larger displacement engines that vary weights with restrictor. For 2 seaters, they allow the car to run at 1350 lbs (with driver) and an unrestricted 2.0l engine. There is an engine builder nearby that claims a 300 hp 2.0l Honda with a 100 hour engine life. The advantage of the 1.6 liter cars is they generally have full tunnel floors (single seater conversion cars) but the engines are strung pretty tight. I was thinking using a CN based car as a start because they have quite a bit of development into them, are pretty robust, and can be used for some enduro type racing as well as the sprints. I can do the allowable updates over time. The choices available in the States are the Norma, ADR, and Ligier. I have seen some results showing success with the Norma and the Ligier, but have not seen whether many ADR CN cars are being run and their success. Any input on the ADR cars? From what I saw, they appear to be lighter. Perhaps some of you have seen them in the Speed series or VdeV? There is an ADR dealer nearby that I know and I have talked to our Norma dealer here in the States.

Thanks in advance for any input. I take a little time to make a decision, so I am in the information gathering phase.

[chris bailey]

Ken!

Slightly off-topic, but have you looked at Sports 2000 in the States. They are in the process of adopting a new Mazda Duratec engine to run alongside the existing Ford Pinto cars, many of which date back to the 1970's. Although they run without a rear wing, they do allow diffusers, so there's some aero to consider. Interestingly, we have a Duratec Sports 2000 class in the UK, which has more power and a wing, but no underbody aero. The boys in the States seem reluctant to adopt the full-house Duratec solution for many reasons, mostly based on not leaving the Pinto crowd disadvantaged. I suspect they'll convert fully over time, ending up with a much better value package than CN2, both in terms of capital outlay and running costs.

The UK cars have @ 200 horsepower and 6 inch/8 inch rims (front/rear). We also do not allow limited-slip differentials, and limit the cars to 5 forward gears. Sequential shift is allowed, but not paddle-shift and its associated electronics. The cars virtually match CN2 times in the UK, but are much more affordable in every respect. We now have grids approaching 30 cars on a regular basis and the series is going from strength to strength for obvious reasons.

A new turn-key car has a price limit of £42000 (@$65000) and ready-to-go pre-owned cars start around $30000.

What's not to like?

See www.sports2000-srcc.com for more information and a link to the USA discussion forum.

[Ken_T]

Thanks. I think, however, the US series is very different to what you have over there. The numbers are kind of low here and are at a stage where its going to either grow back with the new engine or decrease. I think many of the S2s here have gone vintage racing. There are a few cars that are trying out the Mazda, but it has adoption by SCCA is pending. Also, the horsepower is capped below the Pinto so I would be giving up 20 or so horsepower(ow estimate) with several hundred more pounds than my previous car. I think the series over there is probably a fair bit more interesting, though.

With a little research, I keep finding more of more of these CN cars. The PRC WPR60 looks very cool. It will be great to see how it goes this year. The car from WFR looks very nice in the one picture I have seen. Like I said, right now in the States there are a few Normas, one ADR, and I think a Ligier.

I hope I can find results and video from the series over there as the year progresses.

[chris bailey]

Can't disagree with you Ken. Sports 2000 in the USA is quite a complex situation, so we're told. However, should someone feel inclined to import a ready-to-go UK spec car and run it in CSR, I'm sure they'd get a very good deal on the car and blaze a trail for others to follow. It's a kind of "Fields of Dreams" scenario.

Regards,

Chris/Rollo the Insufferable (Swift DB2)

Originally Posted by Ken_T

Thanks. I think, however, the US series is very different to what you have over there. The numbers are kind of low here and are at a stage where its going to either grow back with the new engine or decrease. I think many of the S2s here have gone vintage racing. There are a few cars that are trying out the Mazda, but it has adoption by SCCA is pending. Also, the horsepower is capped below the Pinto so I would be giving up 20 or so horsepower(ow estimate) with several hundred more pounds than my previous car. I think the series over there is probably a fair bit more interesting, though.

With a little research, I keep finding more of more of these CN cars. The PRC WPR60 looks very cool. It will be great to see how it goes this year. The car from WFR looks very nice in the one picture I have seen. Like I said, right now in the States there are a few Normas, one ADR, and I think a Ligier.

I hope I can find results and video from the series over there as the year progresses.

[Ken_T]

So it looks like in the first race of the SpeedUK Series, the WFRs were dominant. Last weekend at Spa, the new Norma M20FCs came to the party and were very quick. Anyone make it out to Spa to see the races? What happened to the WFRs at Spa?

[Tony_Simpson]

WFR were withdrawn due to the serious accident suffered by Joey Foster in free practice on Friday.

Search for speed euroseries spa accident testing (or similar) for the incident. There should be more discussion somewhere on this forum.

I would not be surprised with the increasing speeds of these cars some more of the 'shark' fins over the engine covers to remove the risks of cars flipping.